The Making of Rita Hayworth
To become a Hollywood star and icon, Rita Hayworth had to transcend not just her waistline or her hairline, but her own ethnicity.
When Virginia Woolf Wore Blackface
In February 1910, Virginia Woolf, her brother, and some and friends pulled a prank known to history as the Dreadnought Hoax.
Marguerite Duras on Her Remarkable Mother
Noted novelist and screenwriter Marguerite Duras on how her fictional mothers are all really her own (complicated, difficult, inimitable) mother.
The Many Different Annes of Green Gables
Anne Shirley, created almost 100 years ago, has been reimagined countless times. Why do we still love Lucy Maud Montgomery's plucky orphan?
The FBI Goes to the Movies
In its hunt for communists in Hollywood, the FBI criticized the 1946 classic It's "A Wonderful Life" as subversive propaganda.
Can Fiction Really Spark Suicide?
The Netflix drama 13 Reasons Why is so powerful—and so controversial—it's sparked a national debate about teenage suicide.
The Literary Life of Jean Stein
Among her other literary accomplishments, Jean Stein edited Grand Street for 14 years. Here are two of her interviews for the magazine.
Mexican-Americans Have Always Battled Movie Stereotypes
Stereotyping and discrimination in Hollywood has elicited different responses from Mexican-Americans and Mexicans in Mexico.
Women Were Pirates, Too
Maybe you've never heard of Anne Bonny and Mary Read, but they were real-life women pirates who cross-dressed to get on ships.
5 (Free!) Works of Flash Fiction
Flash fiction by Grace Paley, Helen Phillips, Clemens Setz, Vanessa Gebbie, and Josefine Klougart, available for free PDF download.