Savor the words that made sense of our world
 | By Frank Bruni |
What a challenging year. Many of us struggle to make sense of what’s happening in America. We cope in different ways. Some spend more time in nature. Others retreat into books or the gym.
Still others turn to their keyboards, distilling this unruly world into words.
It’s their work that I honor today (and that I honor regularly in For the Love of Sentences, a feature of my Times Opinion newsletter). I’m revisiting especially fine passages of prose from the past 12 months.
You can go to the Best Sentences of 2023 hereand of 2024 here. Those collections, like this one, wouldn’t exist without your help, so thank you for nominating the standout examples of current journalism and commentary that feed this feature.
And to everyone: Happy (almost) New Year.
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… and they can sign up for themselves here. It’s published every Monday.
The Tempest That Is Trump
In The Contrarian, David Litt questionedcharacterizations of President Trump’s furious first days back in the White House: “One CBS article about his immigration crackdown said Trump ‘invoked muscular presidential powers,’ which is a bit like saying Jeffrey Dahmer ‘displayed omnivorous taste.’” (Thanks to Tim Keenan of Denver and Mike Clark of Morelia, Mexico, for nominating this.)
In The New Yorker, Jill Lepore surveyed the destruction of the administration’s first three months: “Trump felled so much timber not because of the mightiness of his ax but because of the rot within the trees and the weakness of the wood.” (Stan Shatenstein, Montreal)
In The Globe and Mail of Toronto, Tony Keller suggested that Trump’s economic and diplomatic dealings amount to “a failed Hollywood blockbuster” with a nonsensical plot: “It‘s ‘2 Fast 2 Furious’ with no GPS, a steering wheel facing the rear window and a distracted driver who can’t stop going on about his William McKinley decals.” (Nadine Sherwin, Vancouver, British Columbia)
In Golfweek, Eamon Lynch reflected on Trump’s grifting: “There was a time when it would have been scandalous for a sitting U.S. president to use the office to serve his personal business interests, but that was back when America had attorneys general who didn’t think an emoluments clause was the disclaimer on a moisturizer.” (Kelly Parden, Wappingers Falls, N.Y., and Ben Scott, Palm Beach Gardens, Fla.)
In The Washington Post, Dana Milbank responded to some Republicans’ suggestion that the D.C. Metro be renamed the “Trump Train”: “It’s a great idea. Qatar will donate the subway cars, which will be powered by coal. Passengers will pay for fares with cryptocurrency after first showing proof of citizenship. And the trains will reverse themselves regularly and without warning — never quite reaching their original destination.” (Mary Ellen Maher-Harkins, Orwigsburg, Pa.)
Also in The Washington Post, Drew Goins analyzed the suggestion that Americans weather economic hardship by being less acquisitive: “One supposes that President Donald Trump is correct that Americans technically could scrape by with ‘two dolls’ instead of ‘30 dolls.’ The problem is that Americans like having 30 dolls, or 30 pairs of Nikes, or — perhaps not 30 TVs, but at least more than one, because sometimes you and all your dolls want to watch different programs.” (Esther S. Trakinski, Hillsdale, N.Y.)
In The Atlantic, David A. Graham processedthe addition of “Trump” to “Kennedy” in the moniker for Washington’s premier performing arts center: “He asks not what he can do for his country, but what his country can name for him.” (Darrell Ing, Honolulu)
In The Wall Street Journal, Peggy Noonan explained Trump’s vigor: “He’s in good shape because he beats so many dead horses. It keeps the arms and shoulders up.” (Steven R. Strahler, Oak Park, Ill., and Stuart Math, Manhattan, among others)
In her newsletter, Joanne Carducci (a.k.a. JoJoFromJerz) scoffed at the peace prize that FIFA, the international soccer organization, awarded Trump: “It’s a participation trophy for geopolitical corruption. It’s so stupid, it makes my remaining sanity stand up, politely excuse itself and dive headfirst into oncoming traffic.” (Mike Rogers, Wilmington, N.C.)
Other Administration Antics and Political Peculiarities
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| Damon Winter/The New York Times |
In Esquire, Dave Holmes acknowledged that Senator Lindsey Graham was maybe joking that Trump should be the next pope — but maybe not: “You can’t be tongue-in-cheek when you are actively licking the boot. There is just not enough tongue for both jobs.” (Susan Fitzgerald, Las Cruces, N.M.)
In The Times, Maureen Dowd rolled her eyes at how Trump and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth peddled the bombing of Iran: “It could not simply be an impressive mission; it had to be, as Hegseth said, ‘the most complex and secretive military operation in history.’ (Move over, D-Day and crossing the Delaware.)” (Marc Truitt, Sackville, New Brunswick)
Also in The Times, David Brooks explainedmany Republicans’ affinity for Russia’s president: “One of the reasons MAGA conservatives admire Putin is that they see him as an ally against their ultimate enemy — the ethnic studies program at Columbia.” (Jenny O’Farrell, Steamboat Springs, Colo., and Jessica Fitch, Corpus Christi, Texas, among many others)
And Glenn Thrush, Alan Feuer and Adam Goldman remarked on the right-wing ire that confronted Kash Patel and Pam Bondi as they failed to substantiate accusations they once made: “They are running what amounts to a conspiracy theory fulfillment center with unstocked shelves.” (Jeff Lebsack, Buffalo, and Marianne Painter, Tacoma, Wash., among others)
In The Toronto Star, Vinay Menon questioneda role proposed for military planes: “The operating cost of a C-130E can exceed $70,000 per hour. Using such an aircraft to ‘repatriate’ migrants is about as fiscally sound as taking your child to school in a hot-air balloon.” (Selina Abetkoff, Toronto)
In Slate, Jim Newell reported on the announcement by Senator Joni Ernst, Republican of Iowa, that she wouldn’t run for a third term in 2026: “She said that she wanted to spend more time with her family, but she didn’t specify which lobbying firm she meant.” (Harold Gotthelf, Fords, N.J.)
In The Deseret News, Addison Graham explained the lopsided logic of Senator Lisa Murkowski’s vote for Trump’s megabill: “Murkowski delivered a dessert bar to America’s billionaire class just to take home some Tootsie Rolls to Alaska.” (Jim Meehan, San Francisco)
Elsewhere Around the Globe
On the BBC website, Sean Coughlan chartedthe long mortification of the former Prince Andrew: “A few clicks on Google will find decades of stories raising doubts about his suitability, often accompanied by pictures of Andrew in a top hat, like a renegade Monopoly piece.” (Ellen Langille, Mount Dora, Fla., and Jane Wilhoite, Cary, N.C., among others)
In The Irish Times, Patrick Freyne reviewed a British dating show: “Meeting the contestants is also an opportunity to see job descriptions that the labor economist Richard Scarry never dreamed of. Ryan, for example, is a ‘tanning business owner.’ And Yolanda is ‘a Mel B impersonator.’ Fake tan and the Spice Girls are, of course, Britain’s main industries since Brexit.” (D.M. O’Donnell, Dublin)
In The New Yorker, Sam Knight contemplatedBritain’s diminished place in the world: “Old empires are like old stars in the sky. You can’t tell whether the light actually burned out years ago.” (Margaret Wayne, Evanston, Ill., and Douglas R. Melin, Findlay, Ohio)
In The Washington Post, Jesús Rodríguez traced America’s history with the Gulf of Mexico: “‘Do we wish to acquire to our own confederacy any one or more of the Spanish provinces?’ Thomas Jefferson mused to President James Monroe in an 1823 letter, as if the Western Hemisphere was a West Elm catalog.” (Jennie Fogarty, Bethesda, Md.)
In The Atlantic, Helen Lewis reported from the Riyadh Comedy Festival, which paid big-name comedians big bucks to come to Saudi Arabia: “The festival is an outgrowth of Vision 2030, the grand Saudi project to prepare for the kingdom’s post-oil future. The old Saudi brand was ‘austere theocracy,’ but the new one is ‘fun, fun, fun, but still with beheading.’” (Harold Gotthelf, Fords, N.J.)
Anchovies and Appetites
In The Times, Mia Leimkuhler mulled culinary marriages: “With all due respect to steak and lobster, I think the best surf ’n’ turf combination is chicken and anchovies. It’s an opposites-attract situation: The chicken is large and plump with a soft-spoken umami; it says: ‘How nice to meet you. I’m looking forward to working together.’ Anchovies, scrawny and electric with salty savoriness, kick in the door, press play on the boombox and say: ‘I’m here. Let’s do this.’” (Jo Wollschlaeger, Portland, Ore., and Sandy Shroyer, Montpellier, France)
Also in The Times, Matt Hongoltz-Hetling considered the importance of an annual communal feast to a Vermont town’s special fellowship: “Whether a vibrant community created the potluck or the potluck created a vibrant community is like asking which came first, the fried chicken or the deviled egg.” (Stacey Somppi, Cottonwood, Ariz., and Hillary Ellner, Durham, N.C., among others)
Ligaya Mishan extolled the egg’s uses in baking: “The whites alone, whipped steadily, foam up into a paralyzed surf and, when folded into batter — carefully, with as little effort as possible — bring a cake near levitation. Gravity ends here. This is how angels eat.” (Kate Kavanagh, Concord, Mass.)
And in a restaurant review, Ligaya extolled the eccentricity of a briny hideaway in Manhattan’s East Village: “To describe Smithereens as a New England-style seafood spot is like calling ‘Moby-Dick’ a story about fishing. The restaurant is darker and weirder, a love letter to the North Atlantic at its most ominous and brooding, written in seaweed and smashed lobster heads.” (Bob Altizer, Phoenix, and Jodie Wohl, Seattle, among others)
In The Boston Globe, Christopher Muther visited a New England roadway rest stop with food options beyond the norm and ordered the poutine: “I know what you’re thinking. ‘Rest stop poutine? Are you sure?’ Rest stop poutine sounds like the name of an indie rock band, or a French Canadian laxative.” (Jane Abbott, Hubbardston, Mass.)
In The Atlantic, Rachel Sugar questioned many Americans’ quests for a weeknight meal that they prepare, sort of, but that equals the ease of delivery or takeout: “You cannot have a meal that both is and is not homemade: Schrödinger’s salmon over couscous with broccoli rabe.” (Nan Valrance, Apex, N.C.)
In Switchboard, Celia Aniskovich described the wisdom — the religion — received by those who’ve graduated from Hot Dog University, an actual place for hot dog vendors. “They all know the cardinal rule, taught by their P.H.D. (that’s professor of hot dogs): no ketchup,” she wrote. “Unless you still ride a tricycle (and can prove it), you’re pregnant (we don’t argue with cravings) or it’s your wedding day (and we’d better see the dress).” She added that the school itself tells “a story about failure and second chances, hustle and hope, and the deeply American belief that a sidewalk, a spatula and a dream might still be enough.” (Dick Chady, Chapel Hill, N.C.)
Let’s Get Physical
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| Al Goldis/Associated Press |
In The San Jose Mercury News, Dieter Kurtenbach emphasized the importance of the “human flamethrower” Stephen Curry to the success of the Golden State Warriors this basketball season: “At 37, he looks like he’s aging backward, which is both a miracle of modern sports science and a testament to subsisting on a diet solely of opposing coaches’ tears.” (Geoffrey Burr, Cupertino, Calif.)
Kurtenbach separately defined the special shame of the three interceptions that the San Francisco 49ers quarterback Brock Purdy threw in a game against the Carolina Panthers: “These weren’t tipped balls or receiver errors or passes that were caught in the wind. They were floating, wobbling invitations to the Panthers’ secondary. He threw with the velocity of a heavy sigh.” (Gary Brauch, Los Altos Hills, Calif.)
In The Times, Sapna Maheshwari examinedhow many college athletes like Jake Dailey are tempted by lucrative social media opportunities: “Dailey, who has 90,000 TikTok followers and 32,000 on Instagram, said he would be thrilled to become a full-time influencer. Otherwise, he plans to become a dentist.” (Charles Kelley, Merrimack, N.H.)
In The Athletic, Brendan Quinn and Brendan Marks visited with the young Duke basketball sensation Cooper Flagg and his parents, Kelly and Ralph: “Mom has a tendency to dominate chats like this, cutting in like an 18-wheeler changing lanes with no signal. Cooper is said to get his basketball moxie from her.” (Bob Lahue, Moycullen, Ireland, and Maeve Sullivan, Durham, N.C., among others)
In The Wall Street Journal, Jason Gay rued the effect of obsessive replays on the determination of what, in pro football, constitutes a catch. “It’s the affliction of overthinking: If it walks like a duck, and talks like a duck, wait, hold on, it must be a chandelier,” he wrote. “It’s further evidence humans can ruin the spirit of anything, if given the time and technology.” (Bill Sclafani, Rockport, Mass.)
In The Washington Post, Chelsea Janes paidfitting — no, obligatory — tribute to the masterpiece of a baseball game that Shohei Ohtani played on the cusp of the World Series: “This is Beethoven at a piano. This is Shakespeare with a quill. This is Michael Jordan in the finals. This is Tiger Woods in Sunday red. This is too good to be true with no reason to doubt it. This is the beginning of every baseball conversation and the end of the debate: Shohei Ohtani is the best baseball player who has ever played the game, the most talented hitter and pitcher of an era in which data and nutrition have made an everyman’s sport a game for superhumans.” (Jonathan Weker of Montpelier, Vt., and Todd Lowe, Anchorage, Ky.)
Where Colons Meet Commas
In The Washington Post, Mark Lasswell tracedthe lineage of a polarizing punctuation mark: “Too demure to be a colon but more assertive than a comma, the semicolon was introduced in 1494 by Venetian printer and publisher Aldus Manutius. What a useful little tool it has been in its primary role of inserting a graceful pause between two related independent clauses, as in: ‘R.F.K. Jr. came to my house; he tore out the medicine cabinet with a crowbar.’” (Dorit Suffness, Dallas, and Nancy Loe, San Luis Obispo, Calif., among others)
Also in The Washington Post, Ron Charles assessed “The Little Book of Bitcoin,” by the supremely self-confident pitchman Anthony Scaramucci: “In one passage, he touts the convenience of transporting $500 million in Bitcoin on a thumb drive, which is the best news I’ve heard since my yacht got a new helipad.” (Stephen S. Power, Maplewood, N.J., and Hannah Reich, Queens, among others)
Charles also observed that the scolds who ban books have taken issue with “Maurice Sendak’s ‘In the Night Kitchen,’ which has been proven in the state of Florida to turn straight white Christian boys into polygender Marxists who eat only quinoa.” (Jill Gaither, St. Louis, and John Jacoby, North Andover, Mass.)
In The Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, Philip Martin praised the writer Walter Isaacson’s depictions of the authors of the Declaration of Independence in his new book, “The Greatest Sentence Ever Written,” about the document’s opening words: “He doesn’t carve them into monuments. He lets them breathe as men at work, leaning over a draft, arguing about commas, listening for cadence.” Those founding fathers believed “that words, if built well, can hold our contradictions long enough for us to grow into them.” (Nancy Bellhouse May, Little Rock, Ark.)
In The Times, John McWhorter analyzed the president’s loopy language: “Even Trump’s most positive-sounding coinages are acts of a certain kind of verbal aggression. I sometimes stop to marvel that the House passed something with the actual official title the One Big, Beautiful Bill Act. That goofy bark of a name is a boisterous clap back against opposing views, an attempt to drown out inconvenient facts with braggadocio. It is a linguistic snap of the locker room towel.” (Matt Masiero, Richmond, Mass., and Sue Hudson, Simi Valley, Calif., among many others)
Also in The Times, Dwight Garner noted a lacuna in “Sister Europe,” by Nell Zink: “No real sex takes place in this novel, though it’s gently pervy, like Mr. Whipple squeezing the Charmin.” (John Jacoby, North Andover, Mass.)
Altitude, Attitude, Internment and A.I.
In The Boston Globe, Beth Teitell scaled the pampering heights of a luxury high-rise: “It was frigid out, and so icy that all over town pedestrians were tumbling. But on the 35th floor of the Millennium Residences at Winthrop Center, life felt as easy as a summer afternoon, and Richard Baumert was marveling at the lap pool: 75 feet long, surrounded by floor-to-ceiling windows, its water a bewitching shade of … let’s call it concierge blue.” (Emily Andreano, Swampscott, Mass.)
In The Pickup, John Paul Brammer took issuewith a proposal to build the tallest skyscraper in the United States in flat Oklahoma City: “I don’t mean to say OKC doesn’t deserve iconic architecture. Far from! I simply think that buildings should reflect the character of a place, like how Santa Fe is all adobe and how Dallas looks designed by a sentient Ford F-150.” (Perry Sailor, Longmont, Colo.)
In The Times, Kevin Roose worried that when it comes to regulations, the stately metabolism of institutions is no match for the velocity of A.I.: “It feels, at times, like watching policymakers on horseback, struggling to install seatbelts on a passing Lamborghini.” (Conrad Macina, Landing, N.J.)
Also in The Times, Kwame Anthony Appiah sounded a hopeful note for movie scripts created by flesh-and-blood humans rather than A.I.: “There will always be an audience for work that spurns the template — for writers who, shall we say, think outside the bot.” (Alfred Sainato, Metuchen, N.J.)
And Andi Zeisler appraised the stage persona of the pop star Sabrina Carpenter: “She presents as a half-pint pinup doll whose doe eyes, big Bardot hair and frothy, lingerie-inspired costumes evoke two iconic Hollywoods (Old, and Frederick’s of).” (David Baer, Concord, Calif., and Ilene V. Smith, Manhattan)
Revving Up and Slowing Down
In The Wall Street Journal, Dan Neil recounteda spin in a luxury convertible and conceded the mismatch of a chariot with few miles on it and a charioteer with many: “For a man of my age and grooming to rumble through downtown Palm Springs alone in a drop-top Aston Martin the color of Superman’s eyes … well, it suggests I’m looking for a party. If anything, I’m just looking for a bathroom.” (Trevor Hale, Washington, and Saul Himelfarb, Baltimore)
In The Autopian, Matt Hardigree explained one carmaker’s advantage: “You don’t buy a Subaru so much as you ascend into your final form as an outdoorsy Subaru owner when a ray of light beams down from the nearest REI, and all your clothes vanish from your body and are replaced by Patagonia.” (Carol Goland, Granville, Ohio)
In her newsletter, Fresh Hell, Tina Brown reacted to an invitation from someone decades younger than she: “A friend of mine in her 40s hosted a birthday party last week at New York’s most glamorous new club with the dress code of ‘drop-dead sexy,’ which gave me a burst of insecurity. People in my circle are very good at ‘drop dead.’ Sexy, not so much.” (Rich Moche, Brookline, Mass.)
In The New Yorker, Burkhard Bilger shareddental details: “My bottom teeth lean this way and that in a wandering line, like first graders on a field trip.” (Max Sinclair, DeKalb, Ill., and Ken Logsdon, Columbia, Mo., among others)
In The Times, James Hamblin parodied the typical message and script of a television drug ad: “You will frolic on the beach at sunset psoriasis-free, with a golden retriever, smiling into the distance. You also may experience sudden loss of cardiac function, seizures of the arms or intermittent explosive ear discharge. Talk to your doctor.” (Susan Casey, Palm City, Fla.)
Also in The Times, Vanessa Friedman weighed in on fuselage fashion: “The way we dress to fly suggests we’ve surrendered to the mortification of the experience. And yet there is nothing worse than disembarking from a plane in full rumple, waiting for your bags at the luggage carousel and running into someone you know while looking like the most crushed version of yourself.” (Rob Reilly, Darien, Conn.)
Parting Thoughts
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| Will Warasila for The New York Times |
In The Washington Post, Robin Givhan made a crucial distinction: “Patriotism is like the love that a parent has for a child; nationalism is akin to believing that one’s child can do no wrong.” (David Ballard, Reston, Va.)
In the quarterly journal Sapir, Bret Stephens surrendered to the heavily partisan slant of so much cable television news: “To demand scrupulous impartiality on their broadcasts is like expecting fancy linens at a Motel 6.” (Naomi Lerner, Short Hills, N.J.)
In The Dispatch, Kevin D. Williamson gave thanks for academia, despite its flaws: “The American university system is the envy of the world, and we are burning it down because there’s a couple of nonbinary gender studies professors at Bryn Mawr who say crazy stuff from time to time and there is a brain-dead gaggle of Jew-hating weirdos at Columbia. Of course, there is room for reform. But you don’t have to love every feather on the goose when it is laying golden eggs.” (Dan Markovitz, Corte Madera, Calif.)
In The BMJ, Kamran Abassi composed a eulogy for honest, factual information. “We live in a world of lies, damned lies, and A.I. hallucinations,” he wrote. “A lie, they say, travels halfway around the world before the truth gets its boots on. Today, a lie travels so fast that the truth might as well stay in bed.” (Harold Goll, Baltimore)
In The Times, A.O. Scott sang a similar song: “Occam’s razor, the venerable philosophical principle that the truest explanation is likely to be the simplest, has been thrown away. We’re living in the age of Occam’s chain saw, when the preferred answer is the one that makes the loudest noise and generates the most debris.” (Charles Kelley, Merrimack, N.H., and Trisha Houser, Durham, N.C., among others)
Also in The Times, Terry Tempest Williams described an effect that time in America’s national parks — in nature — can have. “Public lands are our public commons, breathing spaces in a country that is increasingly holding its breath,” she wrote, adding, “We stand before a giant sequoia and remember the size of our hearts instead of the weight of our egos.”
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