Issue 28 / 2006
28 / Essays from the Edge
This issue features new voices exploring the darker side of life. These riveting and thought-provoking essays honestly grapple with a difficult time in each author’s life.
Craig Bernier takes us to a racetrack in West Virginia in “Mountaineer,” Megan Foss reflects on a history of addiction, prostitution and rape in “Fourteen Years in the Making,” and Thomas Wanebo recounts an experience in Osaka’s red-light district in his essay, “Three Minute.” Other essays are slightly less racy, but also explore life from the edge: in “Then You’ll Be Straight,” Margaret Price writes about her experiences as a queer white professor at a historically black women’s college, and Gwen Gray meditates on “The Rules of the Room.” Meredith Hall chronicles the eleven months she spent traveling across Europe on foot and her attempt to deal with not only the loss of a child but of the life she expected for herself. Finally, this issue features an excerpt from celebrated writer Gay Talese’s memoir, A Writer’s Life.
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What’s the Story #28
The James Frey-Oprah Winfrey affair erupted at about the same time we were finalizing this issue. Frey is the author of the blockbuster “recovery” memoir, A Million Little Pieces, in which he describes his life as an alcoholic and crack cocaine addict and his miraculous rehabilitation.Soonfrom “A Writer’s Life”
Prior to my homecoming visit to Alabama, I had frequently been in contact with the newly appointed editor of The New Yorker, Tina Brown, a 40-year-old British-born, Oxford-educated blonde who reminded me of my high school English teacher—a comely, decorous and demanding taskmistress, who was often at the center of my teenage erotic fantasies and who was the first woman to personify for me the awesome combination of sex appeal and professional power.InFourteen Years in the Making
I guess if you look at it through the twisted lens through which men tend to view the world, you could make the argument that I started the conversation.Standing outside the recovery center during the smoke break we always took at the one-hour mark, I noticed that Mike, who ran the group, had stepped away to speak with Karen in private.The Rules of the Room
The fourth rule of the waiting room is “Thou shalt not talk about the waiting room,” and the first rule of the waiting room is “Thou shalt not make the other patients feel crazy"...Ghost Children
The car gleamed under the Alabama sunlight. While the sun was still in its early-morning warming mode, I had risen from my bed, moved the hosepipe from the front yard to the driveway in the rear of the house and driven my car, a 1979 Datsun 200SX, to the middle of the driveway.Without a Map
“Don’t be mad,” I telegram Steve, care of the American Express office in Amsterdam. Heading off alone. See you in India.” The telegram takes a startling $4.50 out of the $70 I have left after paying for my hotel.Then You’ll Be Straight
A gay, white professor takes a job at a historically all-black women’s universityThree Minute
I took the train into downtown Osaka on a Tuesday afternoon to get my alien registration card. I was going to school at a university in one of Osaka’s suburbs and living with a family in one of the suburb’s suburbs—in a neighborhood where the houses were packed so tightly you could go for blocks across the rooftops without ever having to jump.Christmas on the Palisades
I should begin by clarifying my plea: I am pleading guilty to exceeding the 50 mph limit, but I am pleading not guilty to exceeding the limit by 20 mph.Mountaineer
About 500 of us are huddled along the homestretch rail at Mountaineer Park in Chester, W.Va.—a lower rung of Thoroughbred racing. It’s late into a chilly September evening; we’re waiting for the horses of the ninth race to be loaded into the gates.Kathryn Harrison: Cutting Beneath
“It’s brutal out there,” I greet Kathryn Harrison, after emerging from a sweltering New York City subway ride to Park Slope.“It’s brutal in here, too,” the author replies. Her solid, high-ceilinged 1882 building has no air conditioning.KathrynInterview with Thomas Wanebo
An interview with author Thomas Wanebo, author of "Three Minute"Interview with Margaret Price
An interview with Margaret Price, writer of "Then You'll be Straight"Interview with Adam Gussow
An interview with Adam Gussow, writer of "Christmas on the Palisades"Interview with D. Winston Brown
An interview with D. Winston Brown, writer of "Ghost Children"Interview with Craig Bernier
An interview with Craig Bernier, writer of "Mountaineer"