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| Compelling, ambitious reads you can’t afford to miss. |
When foreign correspondents Annie Gowen and Simon Denyer began working on a project about the massive imbalance between men and women in China and India more than a year ago, they approached it in a conventional way: four separate stories, each focused on a different aspect of the demographic crisis created by aborting girls. “It was going to be a traditional Washington Post series,” said Gowen, who has been covering India for five years. “It became something much creative.”
That happened when managing editor Cameron Barr suggested merging the stories into one multimedia piece to explore how a strong cultural preference for boys in the two countries had created too many men and too few women. A team of Post graphic artists and designers got to work carrying out that vision while Gowen, Denyer, The Post's Beijing correspondent, and their editor, Will Englund, reshaped the text. The result: a powerful interactive experience that combines graphics, illustration, storytelling and photography to explore what life is like for men who struggle to marry because there simply aren’t enough women.
The response from readers has been incredible, said Gowen, who believes the shift in direction is part of the reason why. “I think it was more impactful to have one big piece from both countries,” she said. “It’s inspired me, too,” to think about new ways to tell stories and engage readers.
— Lynda Robinson, Local Enterprise Editor
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