In beautifully written and powerfully thought prose, A World Out of Reach offers a crucial record of the cataclysmic spring of 2020—a record for us to share with one another, and for posterity, in the voices of writers of disparate backgrounds.

When the coronavirus outbreak came to the West, The Yale Review began asking writers to think out loud on the page about the unfolding international crisis, to capture the immediacy of a swiftly changing global pandemic. This crisis has mostly been told through the voices of journalists, scientists, and politicians, but in this collection, poets, essayists, scholars, and health care workers provide a more intimate and diverse account. Ranging from high matters of policy to ancient history to personal stories of how individuals were surviving their days, this vivid compilation presents a first draft of one of most tumultuous periods in modern history.
Contributors:
Katie Kitamura