In the Saturday Essay, Rachel Wilkinson shares her findings after watching seventy-eight episodes of the competitive reality show Shark Tank in only six weeks. Shark Tanks‘s business moguls decide on the air, with all the requisite pageantry, whether they want to provide venture capital for the contestants’ small businesses. To Wilkinson, a “left-leaning” “liberal” academic, the surprise is that the mogul ideology is comprehensible.
Then, Kelly Thompson summons painful memories in the Sunday Essay. A self-destructive and abusive boyfriend, the tragic death of a ten-year-old boy, and the unplanned pregnancy and birth of her child come to the fore. The act of exposing her fears in writing provides Thompson with a kind of strength.
