Cover Story
Leaks and Consequences
Why treating leakers as spies puts journalists at legal risk
by Lincoln Caplan
Articles
Federal Student-Loan Sharks
Why is the government gouging our college kids? The new law on loan rates just makes things worse
by William J. Quirk
To Live Is an Act of Courage
The crisis of suicide among our soldiers and veterans must end. Here’s how we can stop it
by Jennifer Michael Hecht
Is There a Word for That?
We have long invented language to fill gaps in our vocabulary, but not all coinages are created equal
by Ralph Keyes
Lost and Found
An ancestral home holds the relics of a family’s past—and the promise of its future
by Edward McPherson
The Number One Funeral Home
The memorial service for my father, the doctor who attended to Chiang Kai-shek, was no ordinary affair
by Pauline Yu
Departments
Letter From …
Tuning Up
Works in Progress
Fiction
Commonplace Book
Book Essay
Examined Lives
A mystery exists at the heart of all literary biography: How does the mush of experience get turned into glittering artifact?
Phyllis Rose
Book Reviews
Soaring Ambitions
Early hot-air balloonists ascended to previously unimaginable heights, stirring humanity’s sense of perspective and possibility
