Nicholas Lemann was the editor of the Washington Monthly from 1977 to 1979. He has also worked for The Texas Monthly and The Washington Post. He is currently a national correspondent for The Atlantic Monthly. He has written several books, including his bestseller, The Promised Land: The Great Black Migration and how It Changed America (David Mckay, 1991), and The Big Test for which he received the 1999 Washington Monthly political book award.