E. Hanford interviewed D. Owen

What did the author of the New Yorker story on dyslexia tell Ms. Hanford?

Over on APM Reports for 28 April 2026, Emily Hanford dropped another installment in the Sold a Story podcast series. It is an interview with David Owen, author of a piece about dyslexia published in the New Yorker with the headline, “Dyslexia and the Reading Wars: Proven methods for teaching the readers who struggle most have been known for decades. Why do we often fail to use them?” In the interview, Ms. Hanford and Mr. Owen discuss issues that range from their own histories as writers to what it’s like to have a journalism beat. There’s not a whole lot about reading and reading instruction, but the podcast is long on human interest.

The installment is entitled “Dyslexia and the Reading Wars’: Emily Hanford’s Conversation with The New Yorker’s David Owen” Here’s APM’s description:

The New Yorker staff writer David Owen opened a recent piece with a personal story: To hide that she couldn’t read, his niece would pretend she was reading, turning pages when her classmates did. Owen joined Emily Hanford for a live conversation about his December 2025 article “Dyslexia and the Reading Wars.”

AI-generated cartoon about the anachronism of disagreements about promoting literacy competence. This image is just me playing with the term, ‘reading wars.’ It’s not a characterization of Ms. Hanford’s podcasts! Image © 2026 John Wills Lloyd, Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0)

Regular readers will likely recall that 27 December 2025 SET published my observations about Mr. Owen’s article under the headline “A New Yorker article on dyslexia and reading instruction: What did the widely read magazine’s report say?”¹

Readers will also likely recall that SET has published 10-or-a-dozen articles about Ms. Hanford’s Sold a Story. Look for them by searching the archives using her name or the name of the podcast series. (Some may be behind the paywall, but plenty are available to free subscribers.)

Footnote

1. I also sent a letter to the editor of the New Yorker citing problems with Mr. Owen’s article. The editor did not publish my missive, as far as I know. If any interested reader would like to have a copy of that letter, I can share it; just send me a request.