The Morning: 20 years of Modern Love

What you learn from years of sharing people's most intimate stories.

View in browser|nytimes.com October 12, 2024 Good morning. Today, in celebration of the 20th anniversary of Modern Love, I've invited my colleague Dan Jones to write about what he's learned from years of sharing people's personal stories. —Melissa Kirsch Brian Rea Love lessons By Daniel Jones I have been editing Modern Love for two decades. The Modern Love column debuted 20 years ago this month — on Halloween, scarily enough — with a story by a lifelong bachelor, Steve Friedman, who was trying to feel OK about being dumped. He wrote: "She dumped me. What's important are not the details but the pronoun placement, 'she' preceding 'me.' But there is no villain here. My therapist suggests I repeat this mantra to myself. So I do. There is no villain here." So began my editorship of this intimate, emotional space, where every week I talk to strangers about some of the most perplexing and devastating experiences in their lives and then publish their stories for the world to read. It is an odd mix of the oh-so-private and the couldn't-be-more-public. The effect can be validating, squirm-inducing, instructive, revelatory. All Modern Love essays fall into one (or more) of three categories: finding love, losing love, and trying to keep love alive. Conveniently, our three most popular columns perfectly represent each of those. Even if you're not familiar with Modern Love, there's a good chance you've heard about one of them. In the first, published way back in 2006, Amy Sutherland explored using exotic animal training techniques on her husband to try to keep their love alive in "What Shamu Taught Me About a Happy Marriage." She overpraised her husband like a sea lion in training for putting his dirty clothes in the hamper and changed his feeding patterns in the kitchen by moving the salsa from the counter to the table, among other techniques. And it worked. Their marriage improved. In 2015, Mandy Len Catron and an acquaintance asked each other 36 intimate questions to try to expedite the process of falling in love in "To Fall in Love With Anyone, Do This." The questions — which you can read here — start easy: "Would you like to be famous?" But they quickly go deep: "What is your most terrible memory?" "How do you feel about your relationship with your mother?" Then you're supposed to stare into each other's eyes for four minutes, which Mandy and her friend did. And they fell in love! After the essay was published, so did a lot of other people. We were flooded with messages from readers crediting those questions for their new relationships, marriages or deepened friendships. A few years after that, Amy Krouse Rosenthal, who had terminal cancer and was near death, wrote "You May Want to Marry My Husband" — an essay that served as a kind of dating profile for her husband in the hope that he would find love after she was gone. "He is a sharp dresser," she writes, with "a flair for fabulous socks. He is fit and enjoys keeping in shape." Amy and I edited her essay while she was in hospice, and she died 10 days after it was published. For Modern Love's 20th anniversary, we wanted to celebrate what has made this work so meaningful to so many. From readers, we wanted to hear whether certain stories had especially affected them. From writers, we wanted to know what had changed in their lives and how they looked back on their stories. From our longtime illustrator, Brian Rea, we wanted to know how he turns these essays into art. People always ask what I have learned from reading some 200,000 love stories and publishing more than 1,000 of them. After all, when I started doing this work, I was a 41-year-old married father of two young children. Now, I am 61, separated for three years, and my children are long out of the house. I have lost love, found love and tried to keep love alive. And I have distilled all that reading and editing and living into seven lessons about how to love better. I offer them to you. More on Modern Love's 20th Anniversary How did Modern Love begin? And what did David Bowie have to do with it? The column's founders talk about it. The lives of many readers have been deeply affected by these stories. Here are some of the most moving examples. Are you curious how some writers' lives have changed in the years since publishing their essays? We asked 12 of them to write about it. Modern Love has been illustrated by Brian Rea for the last 14 years. In video and words, he describes his artistic process and how doing this work has changed him. We collected 20 "Words of Wisdom" — aphorisms about relationships pulled from Modern Love essays and Tiny Love Stories. THE WEEK IN CULTURE Film and TV Jeremy Strong, left, and Sebastian Stan. Geordie Wood for The New York Times Sebastian Stan and Jeremy Strong, the stars of the Donald Trump biopic "The Apprentice," see their movie as a tragedy, not a mockery. (Read our review.) "We Live in Time," a drama starring Florence Pugh and Andrew Garfield, is one of six movies our critics are talking about this week. Ali Wong's latest standup special, "Single Lady," is a gossipy portrait of divorce and singlehood as a celebrity, Jason Zinoman writes. Recent revelations about contestants on "The Bachelor" have shattered the franchise's fantasy that reality TV is a secure place to look for love. Ahead of Halloween, read a roundup of horror movies based on true stories. Theater Mathieu Kassovitz's musical adaptation of his 1995 cult movie, "La Haine," opened in Paris. It will soon tour France. Jonathan Groff, who won his first Tony this summer, will return to Broadway next spring to play Bobby Darin in a biomusical. Art "Cadence," an installation by the Nigerian artist Otobong Nkanga, opened at the Museum of Modern Art. Its centerpiece is a luxuriously woven tapestry that stretches more than 60 feet. Monet and his fellow impressionists spurred a revolution 150 years ago. They are not just the world's favorite painters, but also the most misunderstood, Jason Farago writes. More Culture Lawyers for Sean Combs accused the government of leaking surveillance footage of the hip-hop mogul beating his former girlfriend and asked for the video to be banned from his trial. In the memoir "From Here to the Great Unknown," Elvis Presley's daughter and granddaughter take turns exploring their family's messy legacy. Read our review. A sophomore on Boise State's beach volleyball team went viral for her goth-inspired makeup. George Washington, comedy icon? On "Saturday Night Live," the founding father knows how to crack a joke. THE LATEST NEWS 2024 Election Donald Trump at a rally on Friday. Doug Mills/The New York Times Donald Trump campaigned in Aurora, Colo., which he has falsely described as "occupied" by armed Venezuelans. He vowed to use a 1798 law to deport suspected gang members without due process. Kamala Harris, speaking to Republican supporters in Arizona, pledged to create a bipartisan council of advisers if elected. "We have to have a healthy two-party system," she said. In an interview with The Times, JD Vance repeatedly refused to say that Donald Trump lost the 2020 election and said he would not have certified the results. Trump's campaign has asked for more security, including classified military assets and flight restrictions. The campaign said it has had to move, reschedule or cancel events because of the Secret Service's limited resources. A parade of world leaders has met with Trump in Florida and New York, treating him as a shadow president even as President Biden occupies the White House. Other Big Stories The death toll from Hurricane Milton rose to 14 people, most of them in eastern Florida. About 1,600 people were rescued from flooded homes and vehicles. Lebanon's caretaker prime minister, Najib Mikati, asked the U.N. to adopt a resolution calling for an immediate cease-fire between Israel and Hezbollah. Boeing plans to cut 17,000 jobs, 10 percent of its work force, in an effort to reduce costs and improve plane production. "No one is on our side": Indian lawmakers who could protect sugar laborers from abuse often own the mills they work in, and profit from exploiting the workers. A subscription to match the variety of your interests. News. Games. Recipes. Product reviews. Sports reporting. A New York Times All Access subscription covers all of it and more. Subscribe today. CULTURE CALENDAR By Alexis Soloski 🎤 "Death, Let Me Do My Show" (Tuesday): Most comedians fear the hook. Rachel Bloom worries about the scythe. A comedy about existential dread with occasional songs, Bloom's solo-ish special arrives on Netflix after a multicity theatrical run. Inspired by the birth of her daughter and the death of her longtime collaborator Adam Schlesinger, this show finds Bloom, who created "Crazy Ex-Girlfriend," attempting raunchy, absurdist bits, only to find herself increasingly distracted by thoughts of mortality. It's a side-splitter for anyone who has tried to fake fine while staring straight into the abyss. RECIPE OF THE WEEK Linda Xiao for The New York Times By Melissa Clark Quick Chicken and Dumplings Do you feel a slight chill in the evening air? Alexa Weibel's quick chicken and dumplings recipe is a fast way to satisfy all your bubbling desires when the weather turns nippy. Inspired by the Southern classic, this streamlined recipe calls for store-bought rotisserie chicken and a package of gnocchi to be simmered in chicken broth and an herby cream. Adding an array of vegetables makes this even more complex; carrots and celery are standard, but cubed winter squash, parsnips, mushrooms and fennel are also excellent. It takes only 20 minutes from start to finish and is just the thing to warm your bones. REAL ESTATE Stephen Downard in London. Sam Bush for The New York Times The Hunt: A longtime renter, unable to afford his own apartment in London, decided to buy a two-bedroom flat with a friend for under £1 million. Which did they choose? Play our game. What you get for $900,000: A Colonial Revival-inspired stone house in Bala Cynwyd, Pa.; an 1894 farmhouse in Germantown, N.Y.; or a wood-frame 1767 Colonial house in Essex, Conn. Piano man: Billy Joel grew up gawking at the mansions on Long Island Sound. Now, he's selling one for nearly $50 million. LIVING Photo Illustration by The New York Times; Photographs by Alaïa, iStock/Getty Images The Dachshund bag: Some brands are embracing a new handbag shape that evokes the elongated bodies of wiener dogs. On the trail: She didn't see other Black hikers, so she founded a group to make Britain's countryside more inclusive. The grind: Some of America's most lauded chefs don't want restaurants anymore. Protein and purists: Opinions abound on how to customize a Diet Coke. (Dua Lipa mixes hers with pickle juice and jalapeño sauce.) ADVICE FROM WIRECUTTER Make your jack-o'-lantern last longer A typical jack-o'-lantern has about a three-day life expectancy. But there are a few tricks you can use to extend that. First, make sure you're picking a pumpkin in peak shape: the greener the stem, the better. If you're storing it before you carve, do so either outdoors or in the fridge — pumpkins like cool temperatures. And, lastly, when it comes to carving: Stop cutting a hole in the top! The stem is crucial to preserving a pumpkin's structural integrity, so cut a hole in the bottom or back side instead. — Rose Maura Lorre GAME OF THE WEEK Courtney Williams shooting the ball in Game 1 on Thursday. Wendell Cruz/USA TODAY Sports, via Reuters Minnesota Lynx vs. New York Liberty, W.N.B.A. finals: In Game 1, the Lynx pulled off one of the most remarkable comebacks in league history. Down by 15 with a little over five minutes to play, they stormed back and eventually beat the Liberty in overtime, thanks to ferocious defense by the team's star forward, Napheesa Collier, and a wild 4-point play by the guard Courtney Williams (see the highlight here). If the Liberty hope to win their first-ever title, they'll need more from Breanna Stewart, who shot 6-of-21 and missed a layup at the buzzer. Game 2 is Sunday at 3 p.m. Eastern on ABC NOW TIME TO PLAY Here is today's Spelling Bee. Yesterday's pangrams were dormant and mordant. Take the news quiz to see how well you followed this week's headlines. And here are today's Mini Crossword, Wordle, Sudoku, Connections and Strands. Thanks for spending part of your weekend with The Times. — Melissa Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. Reach our team at themorning@nytimes.com. Editor: David Leonhardt Deputy Editor: Adam B. Kushner News Editor: Tom Wright-Piersanti Associate Editor: Lauren Jackson News Staff: Desiree Ibekwe, Sean Kawasaki-Culligan, Brent Lewis, German Lopez, Ian Prasad Philbrick, Ashley Wu News Assistant: Lyna Bentahar Saturday Writer: Melissa Kirsch Need help? Review our newsletter help page or contact us for assistance. You received this email because you signed up for the Morning newsletter from The New York Times, or as part of your New York Times account. To stop receiving The Morning, unsubscribe. To opt out of other promotional emails from The Times, including those regarding The Athletic, manage your email settings. 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