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
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
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
In the Mushroom
True foraging isn’t the domain of the weekend warrior; it’s serious, serious business
By Michael Autrey Monday, December 2, 2024
The Brahmin and His Imaginary Friend
How a classic paean to the honest virtues of a Maine fisherman obscured several ugly truths
By Janna Malamud Smith Monday, December 2, 2024
Granaries of Language
Dictionaries are far more than alphabetized collections of words
By Ilan Stavans Monday, December 2, 2024
Reborn in the City of Light
At a time when Paris was an incubator of modernism, a group of bold American women arrived to make art out of their lives
By Rosanna Warren Thursday, October 24, 2024
Thoreau’s Pencils
How might a newly discovered
connection to slavery change
our understanding of an abolitionist
hero and his writing?
By Augustine Sedgewick Thursday, October 17, 2024
Park of Ages
Far more than just an urban retreat, Hyde Park is a living archive of British culture and history
By Amanda Foreman Monday, June 10, 2013
Playing at Violence
Having grown up amid the horrors of Burundi’s civil war, a young man is bewildered by the American lust for warlike video games
By Pacifique Irankunda Monday, June 10, 2013
Intimacy With the Inevitable
A doctor’s journey, from student to resident to consoler of the dying
By William Harless Monday, June 10, 2013
At Sixty-Five
After the excesses of youth and terrors of middle age, a writer faces the contingencies of being old
By Emily Fox Gordon Monday, June 10, 2013
Color Lines
How DNA ancestry testing can turn our notions of race and ethnicity upside down
By W. Ralph Eubanks Friday, March 1, 2013
Good Fences Make Good Bankers
Too Big to Fail Becomes Too Big to Jail: an Update
By William J. Quirk Friday, March 1, 2013
A New Course
Universities face problems that Christopher Lasch identified 34 years ago. Has the time come to fix them?
By Magdalena Kay Friday, March 1, 2013
One Road
Driving through postwar Yugoslavia was nearly impossible, but a young poet and his new wife struggled through the desolate landscape to Athens
By Donald Hall Friday, March 1, 2013
Lessons of a Starry Night
A Rachel Carson essay teaches a new mother how to imbue her growing child with an awe for nature
By Kelly McMasters Friday, March 1, 2013
Kodachrome Eden
With purple prose and oversaturated images, National Geographic reimagined postwar America as a dreamspace of hope and fascination
By James Santel Friday, March 1, 2013
