What Bobby McIlvaine Left Behind
Grief, conspiracy theories, and one family’s search for meaning in the two decades since 9/11
September 2021
In This Issue
One family 20 years after 9/11, how the creative class broke America, and remembering Emmett Till. Plus a 17th-century priest’s radical feminism, the problem with anti-racist self-help, morning people, why Millennials love dogs, Sally Rooney, Douglas Tompkins, and more.
Cover Story
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What New York Looked Like After 9/11
Photographs from before the smoke cleared
How the Bobos Broke America
The creative class was supposed to foster progressive values and economic growth. Instead we got resentment, alienation, and endless political dysfunction.
His Name Was Emmett Till
In 1955, just past daybreak, a Chevrolet truck pulled up to an unmarked building. A 14-year-old child was in the back.
I Found the Feminism I Was Looking For in the Lost Writings of a 17th-Century Priest
François Poulain was ahead of his time—and ours.
Dispatches
Illustration by Paul Spella; image by Henny Ray Abrams / AFP / Getty 9/11 Was a Warning of What Was to Come
It was the first sign that the 21st century would be a period of shock and disaster.
Illustration by Dakarai Akil; images by H. Armstrong Roberts / ClassicStock / Getty; Pictorial Parade / Hulton Archive / Getty; Marty Caivano / Digital First Media / 'Boulder Daily Camera' / Getty; National Archive / Newsmakers / Getty This Is the End of Affirmative Action
What are we going to do about it?
Jason Fulford and Tamara Shopsin Why So Many Millennials Are Obsessed With Dogs
The only thing getting me through my 30s is a cranky, agoraphobic chihuahua named Midge.
Culture & Critics
Illustration by Katie Martin; image by Heritage Images / Getty Joseph Campbell’s Woman Problem
In the writer’s classic study of world myths, women were in the background. A new book aims to change that.
Chris Jones The Would-Be Savior of Patagonia
Are environmental crusaders like Douglas Tompkins good for the planet?
Laura Peretti Sally Rooney Addresses Her Critics
The Irish writer has been accused of being overly sentimental and insufficiently political. In her new novel, she makes the case for her approach to fiction.
Illustration by Vahram Muradyan; images by Les Byerley / Shutterstock; QuartoMundo / CGTrader Robin DiAngelo and the Problem With Anti-racist Self-Help
What two new books reveal about the white progressive pursuit of racial virtue
Departments
Katie Martin The Commons: ‘We Proudly Wore Confederate Symbols’
Readers respond to our June 2021 cover story and reflect on their own experiences reckoning with history and memory.
Tim Lahan An Ode to Not Being a Morning Person
Morning people fizzle. Non-morning people get stronger as the day wears on.
Poetry
Paul Spella / The Atlantic
