In August 2019, The New York Times launched The 1619 Project, a multi-media initiative to commemorate the arrival of the first enslaved Africans on the shore of the land that would become the United States and to reckon with the impact of slavery on U.S. culture and society. This chapter explores this initiative through the lens of the relational approach to engaged literature developed in the previous chapters while zeroing in on the essay. It shows how The 1619 Project draws on the tradition of the essay—for Frankfurt School thinker Theodor Adorno “the critical form par excellence” (1988: 166)—and adapts it to our continually evolving media environment in ways that revamp its form and reinforce its aesthetic, critical, and political potential. Assessing this claim from the perspective of the reading public, this chapter tracks some of the strategic advantages of the essay form when it comes to engaging readers as publics, while also asking if the engagement strived for by a new generation of activist journalists will deepen existing divides within US society or help to build new coalitions.