I am an award-winning freelance journalist based in Brooklyn (formerly based in Providence, R.I.), an erstwhile fact-checker at Esquire, and an Adjunct Lecturer in the English Department at Brooklyn College. I recently graduated with a Master of Fine Arts in creative nonfiction from the New School, where my graduate thesis was a book-length work of narrative journalism about hepatitis C and addiction. This is not a blog, but rather a collection of some of my work.

My favorite stories are about people: people who do unlikely or awe-inspiring things, people with dreams and visions and singular voices, people and communities whose voices are marginalized or forgotten by the popular press. I have a special interest in the criminal justice system and health care for the underserved and disenfranchised, particularly HIV/AIDS. (Before I became a journalist, I worked as an outreach worker and research assistant at an HIV clinic.) I also write news and book reviews, and have been known to write enthusiastically about music, politics, contraception, and goofy antics.

Thanks for stopping by to take a look at my clips.

Forward>Schmooze>Finding Harmony




Finding Harmony

By Beth Schwartzapfel
November 3, 2006

Those who went to synagogue Saturday morning and then to the movies Saturday night may have experienced a little bit of déjà vu. The section of the Torah read in synagogues last week included Genesis 11:1-9, the story of the Tower of Babel, and among the movies that hit theaters last Friday was “Babel,” the new film by Mexican director Alejandro González Iñárritu.

In the Torah portion, residents of the land of Shinar (in modern-day Iraq) work together to build a tower “with its top in the sky.” Dismayed by their hubris, God prompts the builders to start speaking a multiplicity of languages, rendering communication impossible and grinding construction to a halt. In the film, an American man vacationing in Morocco is in a desperate race to save the life of his injured wife. Parallel storylines and characters in Mexico and Japan are woven into the action, resulting in a fast-paced back-and-forth set in four countries and seven languages.

The film, which stars Cate Blanchett and Brad Pitt, is the third of Iñárritu’s full-length features to be released in the United States, after “Amores Perros” (2000) and “21 Grams” (2003). It earned him the best director award at the Cannes Film Festival. Executives at Paramount Vantage, which released the film, say that it evokes the major themes of the biblical story of Babel — namely “the mistaken identities, misunderstandings, and missed chances for communication that, though often unseen, drive our contemporary lives,” according to the studio’s production notes. As for the timing of the film’s release, “it was a coincidence,” a studio spokesperson said.

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