Meghan O'Rourke

How to Write Better Drafts What Elizabeth Bishop’s drafts can teach us about letting go and just starting.

Elizabeth Bishop wrote sixteen drafts of "One Art." The first is practically a journal entry. The last is one of the greatest poems in English. What happened in between was play. I wrote a new Substack post on drafting, play, and forgetting what you know: substack.com/home/post/p-...

Thrilled to share that @yalereview.bsky.social has been named a finalist for two National Magazine Awards — General Excellence (in Science, Literature and Politics) and Fiction! I know how fierce the competition is. So proud of our small but mighty team and are amazingly hard-working writers. 🎉

Come do a workshop with me in Aspen this June at the Aspen Words Conference!

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"my experience of being ill led me to see that our bodies may feel autonomous, but we all live in the nexus of radical interconnection." ~ @meghanor.bsky.social

I just started The invisible Kingdom: Reimagining Chronic Illness, and I can already tell it's gonna be good. #booksky #spoonie

One horrific thing about reading the Epstein files and the aftermath is not just the abuse, but the tone and scope: powerful men insisting on their own injury or blamelessness while propping up a system that treats women as collateral. This isn’t aberration but an intact culture.

A must watch. (And Shakespeare, my god: "Your mountainish inhumanity" is the perfect phrase.)

Yes, sure; and indeed The Yale Review. But objectively there are many fewer venues than there were when my editorial career started, and, in particular, fewer newspaper book reviews reaching a broader audience than TNR, Harpers, and even New Yorke etc. My sense is it impacts nonfiction most of all.

We need to reinvigorate books coverage in this country; the WaPo news is a very sad new development. But there is already a shrinking coverage in newspapers and magazines, and a real need to reimagine how we talk about and write about books

A staggering statement from former Washington Post editor Marty Baron: "This ranks among the darkest days in the history of one of the world's greatest news organizations."

What Endings Really Do A writer and editor's guide to shaping the last lines of your work — from Rilke to The Great Gatsby.

I wrote a new Substack about endings. It began as a craft talk but became something a bit broader — a way of thinking about why endings are so hard, and what they actually do. If you struggle with endings (don’t we all!) you might enjoy it: meghanorourke.substack.com/p/what-endin...

Black text in grey rectangle against pink backdrop. Text reads: In this issue Vincenzo Latronico Searching for sleep Jhumpa Lahiri On Thomas Hardy Aria Aber My life at the club Jorie Graham A new poem Emma Copley Eisenberg A short story Dale Peck Dogsbody Clare Carlisle Solvej Balle’s eternal day Spring 2026 Volume 114, No. 1

Coming soon. Our Spring 2026 Issue. Subscribe by February 5 to receive your copy: shop.yalereview.org/products/the...

A bit late to the party about sharing this news, but so excited to be announcing our open-label trial of tafenoquine for treating chronic babesiosis! Babesia is a parasite that is often carried by ticks and it is a common co-infection alongside #lyme.
investors.60degreespharma.com/news-release...
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Glad to see so many wonderful books on the NBCC prizes' short list, and many more I need to read; congrats to my friends Katie Kitamura and Kevin Young whose books I loved: www.bookcritics.org/awards/

“Changing Table” “The thing about children is: / they disappear.”

Thrilled to share my poem “Changing Table” which is out in this week The New Yorker (Jan 19, 2026). It’s the first poem I’ve sent out in a while. Grateful to Kevin Young and @newyorker.com for publishing it! www.newyorker.com/magazine/202...

In The Invisible Kingdom: Reimagining Chronic Illness, @meghanor.bsky.social also writes about the challenges of diagnosis and treatment for illnesses that medicine does not yet sufficiently understand, in part because of deep sexism.

“Changing Table” “The thing about children is: / they disappear.”

LOVED this poem about parenthood by @meghanor.bsky.social! In this week’s @newyorker.com

We are saddened to hear of the death of Kai T. Erikson, a distinguished sociologist and former editor of The Yale Review. Penelope Laurans—former associate editor of TYR—offers a remembrance of Erikson's life and work. news.yale.edu/2025/11/11/k...

I'm so honored to have my work featured on the Slow Down! Thank you, @maggiesmithpoet.bsky.social.

Wonderful timing, as I'm writing poems again and trying to finish a manuscript. New poems coming soon from some magazines near you! ✨

My son is texting me for the first time and it's quite the wild ride. How do they learn to be so Gen Alpha without even practicing?

Looking forward to chatting with Ann Packer about her wonderful new book in New Canaan at Elm Street Books this Wednesday at 6pm!

Poster describing Meghan O'Rourke's talk BEYOND DIAGNOSIS: THE ETHICS OF RECOGNIZING INVISIBLE ILLNESS on Nov 5, 2025 at 7pm, Room 353, Rollins Bldg, 1531 Dickey Drive, Atlanta, GA.

Excited to talk about invisible illness and the ethics of recognizing suffering tonight at 7pm at Emory's Center for Ethics. @emorycenters.bsky.social. Come by if you are in town. www.emory.edu/home/events/...

Last night my 9-year-old showed me his first essay. I gave him notes.

Today he got home and said, "I’ll finish it myself. I didn’t like your edits.” When I burst out laughing, he asked, “Is that the first time a writer’s been honest with you?”

the chaos of this interview

Remembering Ellen Bryant Voigt Catherine Barnett, Victoria Chang, Meghan O’Rourke, and Carl Phillips remember the poet Ellen Bryant Voigt.

Ellen Bryant Voigt—poet and founder of the first low-residency MFA program—transformed American poetry and the way it’s taught. Catherine Barnett, @victoriachang.bsky.social, @cphillipspoet.bsky.social, and @meghanor.bsky.social pay tribute to a singular mentor. yalereview.org/article/trib...

Medicine is uncertain: embracing that makes doctors better | Aeon Essays From late-night calls to unsolved symptoms, uncertainty is woven into every doctor’s day. They should learn to embrace it

An interesting essay by Zoe Cunniffe on how uncertainty shapes medicine—and what doctors gain by acknowledging it. It touches on many of the questions I explored in The Invisible Kingdom (and I'm quoted in it!): aeon.co/essays/medic...

New Bookforum. @xlo.bsky.social @sashafrerejones.bsky.social @meghanor.bsky.social @hermionehoby.bsky.social @ryanruby.bsky.social @adamwilson.bsky.social @jenniferkrasinski.bsky.social www.bookforum.com/print

A Shakespeare and Company Interview: Neige Sinno on her memoir Sad… Shakespeare and Company’s Adam Biles discusses form, memory, childhood sexual abuse, and the paradoxes of testimony with novelist and memoirist Neige…

Thrilled to announce a dream collaboration dreamed up by me and Adam Biles: @yalereview.bsky.social + @shakespeareandcompany.com .Together, we’ll publish author conversations from the legendary Paris bookshop—beginning with Neige Sinno on her extraordinary Sad Tiger. yalereview.org/article/shak...

A new Yale study finds a striking rise in self-reported cognitive disability among U.S. adults — especially younger people. What role might Covid and Long Covid be playing? We urgently need more studies. news.yale.edu/2025/09/24/g...

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