When Ideas Mattered
How “freedom from” became “freedom to”
By Michael Sherry Tuesday, April 20, 2021
THE FREE WORLD: Art and Thought in the Cold War by Louis Menand
Jenny Freestone
Transforming the material and the natural
By Noelani Kirschner Monday, April 19, 2021
Seconds from Midnight
Busting the myth that skilled diplomacy saved the world
By Gregg Herken Friday, April 16, 2021
Nuclear Folly: A History of the Cuban Missile Crisis by Serhii Plokhy
Caracara, Caw Caw
Meet the smartest bird you’ve never heard of
By Stephanie Bastek Friday, April 16, 2021
Poetry in the Abstract
What happens when scientists write haiku?
By Christopher Cokinos Thursday, April 15, 2021
“Everyone Sang” by Siegfried Sassoon
Poems read aloud, beautifully
By Amanda Holmes Tuesday, April 13, 2021
Swimming the River of Song
How a young scholar demystified the ancient oral tradition
By A. E. Stallings Tuesday, April 13, 2021
Hearing Homer’s Song: The Brief Life and Big Idea of Milman Parry by Robert Kanigel
Surviving the Anthropocene
Can we reverse-engineer our way out of catastrophe?
By Stephen J. Pyne Monday, April 12, 2021
Under a White Sky: The Nature of the Future by Elizabeth Kolbert
Four Masks and a Funeral
On the loss of freedoms in Hong Kong
By Jeffrey Wasserstrom Saturday, April 10, 2021
“The Purse-Seine” by Robinson Jeffers
Poems read aloud, beautifully
By Amanda Holmes Tuesday, January 14, 2025
Island Royalty
A new biography of a Caribbean revolutionary
By Madison Smartt Bell Monday, January 13, 2025
The First and Last King of Haiti: The Rise and Fall of Henry Christopheby Marlene L. Daut
The Writer in the Family
The fiction of E. L. Doctorow gave a young man hope of connecting his father and his literary hero
By Jonathan Liebson Wednesday, January 8, 2025
The Weight of a Stone
Searching for stability in an erratic world led Oliver Sacks and other writers to the realms of geology
By Megan Craig Thursday, January 2, 2025
“The Horses” by Edwin Muir
Poems read aloud, beautifully
By Amanda Holmes Tuesday, December 31, 2024
