From comments made by Russian chess officials in July, following an incident at the Moscow Open in which a chess-playing robot broke the finger of its seven-year-old competitor. Translated from… ...

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From reports of people living at airports. A German former pilot spent thirteen days in Viracopos–Campinas International Airport after he was dumped by a woman he met online. An Indian… ...

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Paul is Lily’s gay best friend and closest romantic confidant. Grating portmanteaus are a crucial part of their relationship. “Dickmatized?” I pronounce the word wrong so she knows I hate it. “That’s ...

I can’t name the seven major types of plastic, but I’m pretty sure I’ve thrown them all away. Crumpled them up, peeled them off the bottom of my shoe, chucked them like basketballs after saying, “For ...

From I’m Always Looking Up and You’re Jumping, which will be published next year by Random House.

A version of this column originally ran in Le Devoir on December 2, 2024. Translated from the French by Elettra Pauletto. The darkest moment of the Democratic defeat on November 5 must have been the ...

From the Archive Timeless stories from our 175-year archive handpicked to speak to the news of the day.

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The Pornographer, by John McGahern. New York Review Books. 272 pages. $17.95. If you were asked to name the finest Irish writer of the second half of the twentieth century, a strong case could be made ...

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