Loretta Lynn performs on stage at the Country Music Festival held at Wembley Arena, London in April 1977.

Loretta Lynn: More than a Great Songwriter

A spokeswoman for white, rural, working-class women, Loretta Lynn used music to articulate the fears, dreams, and anger of women living in a patriarchal society.
Photograph: Art restorer, Claire Wilkins, at work restoring a self-portrait of the Spanish artist, Velasquez, after flooding at the Uffizi Gallery in Florence, 1966

Source: Terry Fincher/Getty

Restoration Recipes

Need to clean your sixteenth-century distemper painting? Try a piece of bread (at your own risk).
Portrait of Frances Theresa Stuart, Duchess of Richmond and Lennox by Peter Lely, 1662

The Woman Famous for Not Sleeping With a King

As a lady-in-waiting to the Queen of England, Frances Stuart was known as much for her ability to fend off the advances of King Charles II as for her beauty.
Lionel Trilling, c. 1970

’Twas Thrilling When Trilling Wrote a Blurb

The renowned literary critic famously withheld his imprimatur from the books of peers and students, with two notable exceptions. What do they reveal?
Gwendolyn MacEwen

Remembering Gwendolyn MacEwen

The Canadian poet was inspired by everything from Ancient Egyptian mythology to folk magic, from Gnosticism to global politics.
Digitally pixelated farm produce

Digital Farms, Getting Moving, and the Next Pandemic

Well-researched stories from Slate, Sapiens, and other great publications that bridge the gap between news and scholarship.
Igbo women

Women Leaders in Africa: The Case of the Igbo

In the precolonial Igbo states of West Africa, power was often wielded by male chiefs or elders, but women had their own forms of authority as well. 

A Natural History of Dragons

Dragons began life as snakes, but natural historians gradually began describing them in more fantastical ways.
King Charles III and Camilla, Queen Consort take part in an address in Westminster Hall on September 12, 2022 in London, England.

Royal Succession, Reformed

British history is witness to a long struggle to curtail the power of monarchs and redefine the regulations governing succession to the throne.
Mary Wollstonecraft

Was This Book the Original Eat, Pray, Love?

Letters Written During a Short Residence in Sweden, Norway, and Denmark was arguably the most popular book ever written by Mary Wollstonecraft.