SPOTLIGHT

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

SPOTLIGHT

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

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

Book Reviews

Connect or Die

The high cost of going it alone

Asturias Days

Fluttering Bird

Portrait of the Artist

Madeline Donahue

The paradox of motherhood

Tuning Up

Lionized

The life and death of a celebrity puma—and what it really means to be wild  

Talking Pictures

“Mr. Lucky” Didn’t Know Who He Was

How Cary Grant’s magical film career paralleled a lifelong identity crisis

Asturias Days

Atocha

Read Me a Poem

“Lullaby” by May Sarton

Article

Origin Stories

What we know of  Flannery O’Connor’s childhood—and how her views on race took shape—is incomplete if her caretaker Emma Jackson remains in obscurity

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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

Article

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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

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Celebrating 20 years of poetry in the Scholar

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Winter 2025