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2 weeks ago | 
lithub.com | Peter Hessler
In the spring of 1991, when I was a junior at Princeton, I took John McPhee’s seminar on nonfiction writing. Back then, I was an English major who hoped to become a novelist, and I focused primarily on writing short stories. I had no real interest in nonfiction. I hadn’t published a single word in any campus publication, and I had never considered a career in journalism.
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Jan 6, 2025 | 
businessandamerica.com | Peter Hessler
“The swamp, they thought I would fail!” Boebert shouted to more than two hundred supporters. “But you all welcomed me to Windsor, Colorado. And, rather than failing, I think it’s kind of like an A-plus with extra credit with this G.E.D. right here!”Two years earlier, Boebert had barely won the closest race in the nation, defending her seat in Colorado’s Third Congressional District by only five hundred and forty-six votes.
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Jan 6, 2025 | 
newyorker.com | Peter Hessler
“The swamp, they thought I would fail!” Boebert shouted to more than two hundred supporters. “But you all welcomed me to Windsor, Colorado. And, rather than failing, I think it’s kind of like an A-plus with extra credit with this G.E.D. right here!”Two years earlier, Boebert had barely won the closest race in the nation, defending her seat in Colorado’s Third Congressional District by only five hundred and forty-six votes.
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Oct 14, 2024 | 
theguardian.com | Peter Hessler |Vincent Lai
Our twins spent two years at primary school in Chengdu. Their lessons featured alarming cautionary tales and stories of Chinese superiority, but there was fun and irreverence, too. By Peter HesslerThe Guardian is editorially independent. And we want to keep our journalism open and accessible to all. But we increasingly need our readers to fund our work.
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Oct 1, 2024 | 
chinabooksreview.com | Peter Hessler
This is an episode of the China Books Podcast, from China Books Review. Subscribe at your favorite podcast platform, including Apple Podcasts and Spotify, where a new episode lands early each month. Or listen right here, where you can also watch the video and browse our archive of past episodes.
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Sep 25, 2024 | 
airmail.news | Jim Kelly |Peter Hessler |Simon Read
Bold Strokes by Jane Boon Erika Grieg has a secret: a famed gallery owner in Chelsea by day, at night she is a first-class dominatrix who operates out of a dungeon in the basement. She also is whip-smart (sorry, but who could resist?) and tartly funny as she recounts how she got her start in S&M while at Harvard, and, well, let’s just say the worlds of art, painters, and wealthy bankers intersect in provocative and ultimately deadly ways.
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Sep 9, 2024 | 
kuow.org | Peter Hessler
We often hear about China in the news in big, broad, geopolitical terms like international trade. We rarely hear about life for students and families in China. Author Peter Hessler was a teacher in China in the 1990s. He returned about 20 years later to teach again and enroll his own twin daughters in public school there. And he found profound changes. In just one generation, his students went from more rural to more urban; they were more educated; they grew more wealthy and even grew much taller.
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Sep 1, 2024 | 
literaryreview.co.uk | Peter Hessler
Let me begin with a banal observation: China is a large and complex country with good and bad aspects. Yet somehow it seems difficult to convey this message in view of the steady drumbeat of negative news about the country in Anglophone media outlets. A few years ago, a leading American journalist with extensive experience in China suggested an effective way to engage with the Anglophone reading public.
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Aug 22, 2024 | 
theguardian.com | Peter Hessler
Near the end of third grade, my twin daughters, Ariel and Natasha, officially joined the Young Pioneers of China. This organisation is under the auspices of the Chinese Communist party, and members are between the ages of six and 14. In order to become a Young Pioneer at Chengdu Experimental primary school, the public institution my daughters attended in the south-western Chinese city, there was no application, no interview and no ceremony. Parents were not consulted or informed.
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Jul 23, 2024 | 
chinafile.com | Peter Hessler |Vincent Ni
For a writer, it’s never a good sign when somebody contacts your agent about a used car. My agent’s name is William Clark, and he’s represented me since 1999, when he took a chance on an unsolicited manuscript of River Town that showed up in his slush pile. Back then, I was just starting out, and even the most mundane communication from William—some paperwork, or a question about schedule—made me excited to think that I had embarked on a new life.
