Summer Reading in JSTOR
Stories by Meg Wolitzer, David Sedaris, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, E. Annie Proulx, Amy Tan, Donna Tartt, Lydia Millet, Lauren Groff, and more.
W.B. Yeats Loved Tarot Cards
The august Irish poet was once a member of a secret occult order called The Hermetic Society of the Golden Dawn. He was also an avid student of the Tarot.
Wild and Finally Free in Lauren Groff’s Florida
Lauren Groff’s latest story collection explores the literary archetype of the Orphan.
How Lizzie Bennet Got Her Books
In Regency England, a novel cost about $100. Subscription-based circulating libraries became a way for women of modest means to gain knowledge.
The Unspeakable Linguistics of Camp
When gay and lesbian people had to invent their own languages with which to talk with each other, camp led the way.
Was Mark Twain a Con Man?
A man named Samuel Clemens received funds from the radical abolitionist Boston Vigilance Committee in 1854. It may have been Mark Twain, pulling a prank.
What a Paragraph Is
On the controversial directive that a paragraph must contain a topic sentence, an idea that theorists, writers, and students have questioned for decades.
Harry Potter, the Arthurian Romance
Perhaps the Harry Potter stories are so potent because they rework the iconic hero stories of medieval French Arthurian romances.
The Bright Future of Bangladesh: Researching The Storm
An interview with Arif Anwar, whose debut novel covers sixty years of Bengali history in five love stories.
My Summer of Watching Little Women
What the author learned from her mother, a feminist academic doing a research project on film adaptations of Little Women.