In an op-ed for the New York Times, Spring 2020 Mary Routt Chair of Writing R.O. Kwon on her attempts to write during the upheaval of the coronavirus pandemic and the grief she discovered was stymying her writing process. ββ¦because many Americans werenβt talking about grief before the pandemic, we donβt know how to name it, let alone voice it,β Kwon writes. βI hope, in this extraordinarily difficult time, to be better than Iβve been at letting myself mourn. Iβll start at the beginning: This is hard. I hurt. If youβre hurting, too, youβre not alone.β