Alec Wilkinson

Alec Wilkinson, a longtime contributor to The New Yorker, is the author, most recently, of A Divine Language: Learning Algebra, Geometry, and Calculus at the Edge of Old Age. He is writing a book about prayer. (March 2026)

The Wandering Physicist

Luis Alvarez brought a scientific pragmatism to many of the twentieth century’s greatest mysteries, including the secrets of pyramids, the Kennedy assassination, and the disappearance of the dinosaurs.

Collisions: A Physicist’s Journey from Hiroshima to the Death of the Dinosaurs

by Alec Nevala-Lee

March 12, 2026 issue

Illuminating the Brain’s ‘Utter Darkness’

A new biography considers the peculiar life of Santiago Ramón y Cajal, whose discovery that nerve cells are individual completely overthrew the existing theory of the brain.

The Brain in Search of Itself: Santiago Ramón y Cajal and the Story of the Neuron

by Benjamin Ehrlich

Spark: The Life of Electricity and the Electricity of Life

by Timothy J. Jorgensen

February 9, 2023 issue