SPOTLIGHT

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 Friday, January 24, 2025

SPOTLIGHT

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 Friday, January 24, 2025

Old Christ Church in Alexandria. Virginia, attended by General Robert E. Lee in his youth and pictured here in 1911 (University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign/Wikimedia Commons)
Book Reviews

Divided Providence

Faith’s pivotal role in the outcome of the Civil War

Asturias Days

Cudillero

Read Me a Poem

“The Terrorist, He’s Watching” by Wislawa Szymborska

Poems read aloud, beautifully

Smarty Pants Podcast

Keepers of the Old Ways

Eliot Stein on the people keeping cultural traditions alive

Next Line, Please

Above the River of Your Longing

Two new prompts

Asturias Days

Casa Gorín

Read Me a Poem

“The Purse-Seine” by Robinson Jeffers

Poems read aloud, beautifully

Book Reviews

Island Royalty

A new biography of a Caribbean revolutionary

Article

The Writer in the Family

The fiction of E. L. Doctorow gave a young man hope of connecting his father and his literary hero

Asturias Days

Birthday Boy

Read Me a Poem

“The Horses” by Ted Hughes

Poems read aloud, beautifully

Portrait of the Artist

Amy Wetsch

Life, magnified

Article

The Weight of a Stone

Searching for stability in an erratic world led Oliver Sacks and other writers to the realms of geology

Asturias Days

New Year, Old Year

Read Me a Poem

“The Horses” by Edwin Muir

Poems read aloud, beautifully

Smarty Pants Podcast

The Snow Maiden

Our final episode of 2018 is a send-off to the solstice

Smarty Pants Podcast

Ho Ho Horror

Why not make this Christmas a little darker?

Asturias Days

A Story for Christmas

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Many of us do not go gentle into that good night

Article

The Fair Fields
loading

Only rarely did the outside world intrude on an idyllic Connecticut childhood, but in the tumultuous 1960s, that intrusion included an encounter with evil

Poetry

The Art of Tuning In

Celebrating 20 years of poetry in the Scholar

Commonplace Book

Winter 2025