When Landscape Painting Was Protest Art
The landscape painter Thomas Cole celebrated the American landscape, but also expressed doubts about the limits of civilization.
The Restoration’s Filthiest Poet (and Why We Need Him)
Creature of the court, royalist and fop, dandy and dilettante, John Wilmot, Second Earl of Rochester, knew how to scandalize with verse.
The Lost Language of American Loggers
Logger slang may have coined terms like "punk," "haywire," and "pie in the sky." One lexicographer attempted to catalogue the industry's slang in 1942.
The Art of Walking
Walking as an art has a deep history. By guiding participants, or their own bodies, on walks, artists encourage us to see the extraordinary in the mundane.
Revisiting the Messy Language of the Second Amendment
The debate over the Second Amendment is not just about guns—it's also about grammar.
What, Prithee, Is a Poetess?
The loss and recovery of a poetic genre shows how the canon of literary history treats women writers the moment they start to gain attention and approval.
The Privileged and Impoverished Life of Phillis Wheatley
The first African American to publish a book of poetry has remained a controversial figure in the Black community.
Should We Thank Frig it’s Friday?
The Anglo-Saxon goddess Frig has often been cited as the origin of the word Friday, but one scholar questions whether such a deity ever existed.
The French King Who Believed He Was Made of Glass
King Charles VI of France was the most exalted representative of a rash of "Glass Men," who appeared throughout Europe between the 15th and 17th centuries.
The New Sameness of Leslie Jamison’s Addiction Memoir
Leslie Jamison's The Recovering is self-aware about being the same old story, recalling the redemption narratives of Rousseau and St. Augustine.