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
Her Own Society
When Emily Dickinson and her radical friend Thomas Wentworth Higginson met for the first time
By Brenda Wineapple Sunday, June 1, 2008
The Bout
When George Plimpton, the boyish editor of The Paris Review, went three rounds with the light-heavyweight champion of the world
By Blair Fuller Sunday, June 1, 2008
Buoyancy
In literature, as in life, the art of swimming isn’t hard to master
By Willard Spiegelman Sunday, June 1, 2008
The Broken Balance
The poet Robinson Jeffers warned us nearly a century ago of the ravages to nature we now face
By Edward Hoagland Saturday, March 1, 2008
Passing the Torch
Why the eons-old truce between humans and fire has burst into an age of megafires, and what can be done about it
By Stephen J. Pyne Saturday, March 1, 2008
The Liberal Imagination of Frederick Douglass
Honoring the emotions that give life to liberal principles
By Nick Bromell Saturday, March 1, 2008
What Kind of Father Am I?
Looking back at a lifetime of parenting sons and being parented by them
By James McConkey Saturday, March 1, 2008
Rome’s Gossip Columnist
When the first-century poet Martial turned his stylus on you, you got the point
By Garry Wills Saturday, March 1, 2008
Shipwrecked
Like Robinson Crusoe after the storm, a daughter salvages what she can after her mother’s death
By Janna Malamud Smith Saturday, March 1, 2008
A Slow Devouring
Banter, beer, and bar food smooth a disciplined but difficult passage through Finnegans Wake
By Steve Macone Saturday, March 1, 2008
