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

Death in Drohobych

A new biography of a Polish literary master

Smarty Pants Podcast

A Home in Chinatown

Ava Chin on tracing five generations of Chinese-American history

Fiction

Under Covers

“This is the story Lulu told me when I was little, since before my mom died. There’s a man. He’s very sick. … When girls misbehave, when they don’t do as they’re told, that man comes and takes them.”

Where the Waters Flow

Read Me a Poem

“The Bluebird” by Charles Bukowski

Poems read aloud, beautifully

Portrait of the Artist

Hangama Amiri

Afghan Women’s Lives, Past and Present

Smarty Pants Podcast

Listening to the Dead

Alexa Hagerty on how forensic anthropology exhumes crimes against humanity

Web Essays

The Musical Bard

A turn through the musical museum of folk song and family

Asturias Days

Burning or Being Burned?

NEWSLETTER

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current issue

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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

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