On Grief
Love, Loss, Memory
The unflinching Pulitzer Prize–winning essay on mourning and recovery in the wake of an inconceivable tragedy. An Atlantic Edition, featuring long-form journalism by Atlantic writers, drawn from contemporary articles or classic storytelling from the magazine’s 165-year archive.
When Bobby McIlvaine died in the Twin Towers on September 11, 2001, his loved ones spun off in radically different directions, each mourning in his or her own distinct—and often highly idiosyncratic—way. Twenty years later, Jennifer Senior, a family friend and award-winning reporter, revisits the McIlvaines, examines their present lives, and contemplates what grief really means, in all its jagged complexity.
Jennifer Senior is a staff writer at The Atlantic and winner of the 2022 Pulitzer for Feature Writing for "Twenty Years Gone." Previously, she was a daily book critic and then columnist for The New York Times and a staff writer for New York Magazine. Her book All Joy and No Fun spent eight weeks on The New York Times bestseller list. Senior has also won a GLAAD award, two Front Page awards, and the Erikson Prize in Mental Health Media. She lives in New York with her husband and son.
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