2 THENEWYORKER,JULY27, 2020
Michael Specter (“Public Nuisance,”
p. 40), a staff writer at The New Yorker
since 1998, is an adjunct professor of
bioengineering at Stanford University.
Sandra Cisneros (Poem, p. 44) received
the 2019 PEN/Nabokov Award for
Achievement in International Litera-
ture. Her books include the novel “The
House on Mango Street,” the poetry
collection “Loose Woman,” and the
memoir “A House of My Own.”
Judith Thurman (Books, p. 54) first ap-
peared in the magazine in 1987 and
became a staff writer in 2000. She won
the 2019 Mary McCarthy Award.
Ellen Willis (The Talk of the Town,
p. 13), who died in 2006, was The New
Yorker’s first pop-music critic.
Calvin Trillin (“Plane to Mississippi,”
p. 16), a contributor to the magazine
since 1963, has written thirty-one books,
including “Jackson, 1964” and “About
Alice.” The story in this issue is an
excerpt of the original, which can be
read in full on newyorker.com.
N EWS DESK
Lizzie Widdicombe on a couple’s
trek to Ukraine, amid lockdown, to
reach their surrogate-born baby.
LETTER FROM EUROPE
Elisabeth Zerofsky reports on
how Munich turned its coronavirus
outbreak into a scientific study.LEFT: TARA ANAND; CENTER: MANUEL NIEBERLE FOR THE NEW YORKER; RIGHT: CAMILLE CHEVRILLON
CONTRIBUTORS
THISWEEKON NEWYORKER.COM
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and humor, plus this week’s magazine and all issues back to 2008.Elizabeth Kolbert (“The Catastrophist,”
p. 24) has been a staff writer since 1999.
Her book “The Sixth Extinction: An
Unnatural History” won the 2015 Pu-
litzer Prize for nonfiction.Jelani Cobb (“The Matter of Black Lives,”
p. 18) teaches in the journalism program
at Columbia University.Shirley Jackson (Fiction, p. 50), who died
in 1965, wrote six novels, including “The
Haunting of Hill House” and “We Have
Always Lived in the Castle.”Cornelius Eady (Poem, p. 27) most re-
cently published the chapbook “The
War Against the Obvious.” He co-
founded Cave Canem, which in 2016
received the National Book Founda-
tion’s Literarian Award for Outstand-
ing Service to the American Literary
Community.Charlayne Hunter-Gault (The Talk of
the Town, p. 12) is the author of “In
My Place,” “New News Out of Africa,”
“To the Mountaintop,” and “Correc-
tive Rape.”FLASHFICTION
Sheila Heti’s story “Grayness” is
the second in The New Yorker’s online
summer series of bite-size fiction.Hilton Als (“Ghosts in the House,” p. 30),
an associate professor of writing at
Columbia University, won the 2017
Pulitzer Prize for criticism. He will be a
Presidential Visiting Scholar at Prince-
ton University starting in the fall.Christoph Niemann (Cover) has pub-
lished numerous books, including
“Sunday Sketching,” “Souvenir,” and
“Hopes and Dreams.” This is his thirty-
third cover for the magazine.Masha Gessen (The Talk of the Town,
p. 14), a staff writer, is the recipient of
the 2017 National Book Award for
nonfiction for “The Future Is History.”
Their latest book is “Surviving Autoc-
racy, ” which came out last month.Nathan Heller (A Critic at Large, p. 60),
a staff writer, has contributed to the
magazine since 2011. He is at work on
a book about the Bay Area.Hannah Goldfield (Tables for Two,
p. 9) is the magazine’s food critic. She
has contributed to The New Yorker
since 2010.