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
Verde
Learning a foreign language isn’t just about improving cognitive function—it can teach us to sense the world anew
By Jesse Lee Kercheval Thursday, December 12, 2024
Aging Out
Many of us do not go gentle into that good night
By Anne Matthews Thursday, December 5, 2024
Golden Years: How Americans Invented and Reinvented Old Age by James Chappel
Under a Spell Everlasting
Thomas Mann’s Magic Mountain, published a century ago, tells of a world unable to free itself from the cataclysm of war
By Samantha Rose Hill Monday, December 2, 2024
Divided Providence
Faith’s pivotal role in the outcome of the Civil War
By Robert Wilson Monday, December 2, 2024
Righteous Strife: How Warring Religious Nationalists Forged Lincoln’s Union by Richard Carwardine
The Fair Fields 
Only rarely did the outside world intrude on an idyllic Connecticut childhood, but in the tumultuous 1960s, that intrusion included an encounter with evil
By Rosanna Warren Monday, December 2, 2024
Ideology as Anatomy
How shifting ideas about women’s bodies have affected their lives
By Sierra Bellows Monday, December 2, 2024
Immaculate Forms: A History of the Female Body in Four Parts by Helen King
A Name Not Writ in Water
Revisiting an immortal 19th-century English poet
By A. E. Stallings Monday, April 25, 2022
Keats: A Brief Life in Nine Poems and One Epitaph by Lucasta Miller
The Last Naturalist
A zoologist happiest in the fields and streams of Ohio wrote major works about the state’s birds and fishes
By Parker Bauer Thursday, April 21, 2022
American Mandarins
David Halberstam’s title The Best and the Brightest was steeped in irony. Did these presidential advisers earn it?
By Edward Tenner Thursday, March 24, 2022
Making the List
Finding the right page required centuries of experiment
By Charles Trueheart Monday, March 21, 2022
Index, A History of the: A Bookish Adventure from Medieval Manuscripts to the Digital Ageby Dennis Duncan
From Cold War to Y2K
Looking back on a decade that was often dumb but never dull
By Malcolm Jones Monday, March 14, 2022
The Nineties: A Book by Chuck Klosterman
Safer Than Childbirth
Abortion in the 19th century was widely accepted as a means of avoiding the risks of pregnancy
By Tamara Dean Friday, March 4, 2022
Searching for Tommy and Rosie
What my mother’s diaries told me about her life and my own
By Mike Rose Thursday, March 3, 2022
2022: A Space Emergency
Without international agreements, we are making the heavens dangerously crowded and potentially lethal
By Jeffrey Lewis Tuesday, March 1, 2022
