Miriam Krule
Slate
New York, NY, United States
Contact Miriam
Discover and connect with journalists and influencers around the world, save time on email research, monitor the news, and more.
| Recent: |
|
| Past: |
|
Past articles by Miriam:
Is Transparent Season 2 Even Better Than Season 1?
In this special edition of Slate Plus’ members-only TV Club coverage, television critic Willa Paskin, Outward editor June Thomas, and assistant editor Miri → Read More
All the Crazy Names in The Hunger Games, Explained
This is a revised and expanded edition of a previously published post. There are many shocking elements in The Hunger Games, the dystopic young adult serie → Read More
Can This Website Change the Way Young Jews Interact With Their Religion?
Since its founding 10 years ago, New York’s Soho Synagogue has been trying to reimagine the way that young, hip Jews interact with their religion. The tren → Read More
What It’s Like to Sign a Song: An Interview With Two of the Stars of Deaf West’s Spring Awakening
The hottest ticket on Broadway this fall for a show that doesn’t involve rapping patriots is a revival of Spring Awakening. The original, Tony-winning production of Steven Sater and Duncan Sheik’s musical about teenagers discovering their sexuality in a repressed 19th-century Germany closed just six years ago—after launching the careers... → Read More
How Empire Pulls Off Its Crazy, Breakneck Plot Developments
About halfway through the Season 2 premiere of Empire, an entire coup was conceived, implemented, and thwarted. Cookie and her two scorned sons, Andre and Hakeem, conspired with Mimi (Marisa Tomei) to buy controlling shares of Empire, confronted the new head of the company (her other son, Jamal) in a... → Read More
Why Do So Many Religions Fast?
Earlier this month, NPR’s Morning Edition featured a story on Jains in India who practice sallekhana—fasting to death. Although the practice is fairly rare—NPR reports that it’s only performed when people are sick or close to death and that only about 200 people attempt it each year—it’s controversial. India’s Supreme... → Read More
Can a Traditional Prayer Book Be LGBTQ-Friendly? The Reform Movement Believes So.
This Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, many Reform congregations in America will be praying from a new book, Mishkan HaNefesh. The familiar prayers, like “Kol Nidre,” are there, but the first new machzor, or High Holiday prayer book, to be issued by the Reform movement since 1978 aims to be... → Read More
You Can Now Use Popemojis to Talk About How Much You Love Pope Francis
As Pope Francis continues to please the masses by worrying about the environment, fast-tracking annulments, and not judging people for being gay, it can be hard to come up with new ways to express excitement at just how great he is. With his arrival in the U.S. imminent, the Catholic... → Read More
The Pope’s New Line on Annulments Is Good News for Religious Women Everywhere
The Catholic Church doesn’t recognize divorce, even though, according to a Pew Poll released last week, one in four American Catholics has gone through with one. The accepted out has long been annulment, though the process can be complicated and costly. On Tuesday, Pope Francis announced new procedures that aim... → Read More
First Aid Is the Most Important Class You Could Ever Take
The summer after my senior year of high school, I took an EMT class. I thought I might become a doctor, and training to be an emergency medical technician seemed like the best way to ease into a life of saving lives. It turns out I was not cut out... → Read More
The Danish Hit Show Borgen Is Finally Available to Stream in Its Entirety in the U.S. Go Watch It!
The hit Danish political drama Borgen, often compared to The West Wing, topped many critics’ best-of lists in 2013, and is finally available in full in the U.S. thanks to iTunes just in time for your Labor Day binge. The show was available for awhile via Los Angeles’ KCET, but... → Read More
Transgender Muslim Told She’s Not Woman Enough to Pray in the Mosque's Women’s Section
On Aug. 24, Sumayyah Dawud, a transgender Muslim, uploaded an hourlong video to YouTube in which, her face covered with a full-face niqab veil, she tells the harrowing story of how officials at the Islamic Cultural Center of Tempe, Arizona, told her she needed to dress and pray like a man or provide medical... → Read More
“Dressing a Refined Story With a Touch of Vulgarity”: An Interview With Elena Ferrante’s Art Director
The much-anticipated fourth and final book in Elena Ferrante’s Neapolitan novels will be released in English on Tuesday. In anticipation of The Story of the Lost Child, I interviewed Sandra Ozzola, co-founder, publisher, and, more importantly for these purposes, co-art director of Europa Editions and Eizinioi E/O, which publishes Ferrante’s... → Read More
Difficult People May Not Be a Great Show, but Its Jewish Jokes Are Perfect
The Amy Poehler–produced Hulu original series Difficult People stars real-life pals Julie Klausner and Billy Eichner playing the meanest possible versions of their pop-culture loving selves. The show’s shtick revolves around their struggling comedy careers and how they can’t figure out why other people are succeeding where they’ve somehow failed.... → Read More
USA Delays Mr. Robot’s Graphic Finale After the Virginia Shooting. Sadly, There’s Lots of Precedent.
Wednesday’s hotly anticipated season finale of Mr. Robot has been delayed a week following the tragic shooting of a TV reporter and cameraman in Virginia. In a statement USA Network explained, “The previously filmed season finale of Mr. Robot contains a graphic scene similar in nature to today’s tragic events in Virginia. Out of respect to the... → Read More
Poignant Short Stories Composed Entirely of Example Sentences From the Dictionary
One of my favorite parts of the Scripps National Spelling Bee is when the contestants ask for a word to be used in a sentence. The sentences—which occasionally name-drop Drake or quote Kelis— are gems in their own right, but are rarely actually helpful when it comes to understanding how... → Read More
This Glass-Encased “Sky Pool” Is Not for Those Afraid of Heights
Have you ever gone swimming and thought to yourself, Gee, this is fun, but it would be a whole lot better if I were doing this about 10 stories in the air and it felt like I were flying? Well, you’re in luck: London’s glass-encased, 82-foot “sky pool” is perfect for you. → Read More
Sesame Street Will Now Air on HBO. It Also Has a Lively History of Spoofing HBO
Sesame Street, the beloved children’s show that has spent the past 45 seasons on PBS, will air its next five seasons on HBO, the New York Times reported Thursday. The new partnership will result in an increase in episodes—an estimated 35 a season—and Sesame Workshop, the nonprofit behind the show,... → Read More
Ph.D. Student in England Finds Quran Fragments From the Time of Muhammad
Researchers at the University of Birmingham in England said Wednesday that they had discovered part of what is likely one of the world’s oldest manuscripts of the Quran. The fragment is said to be at least 1,370 years old, which would mean it was written within a few years of... → Read More
The Best Part of Trainwreck? LeBron James.
If the New Yorker is to be believed, Amy Schumer cast LeBron James in her feature film debut Trainwreck by default—he was the only basketball player she could name. The film, whose script she also wrote, is, in theory, about Amy (Schumer), a female journalist at a men’s magazine who... → Read More