Beauty and the Beast

How Disney Movies Teach Straightness

Despite the perils of mistaken identities, evil stepmothers, and cruel curses, in a Disney movie the princess always finds her prince.
Parrot

What the Folk? The Charming Yet Totally Malappropriate Story of Folk Etymology

Etymology is a funny thing. Even if you're not a word nerd, you might have wondered why so many English idioms we use are Just. So. Weird.
Ghostly road

A Belief in Ghosts: Poetry and the Shared Imagination

An essay from poet Dorothea Lasky on poetry, ghosts, and the shared imagination.
Gloria Naylor's Women of Brewster Place

Gloria Naylor

The critically acclaimed novelist Gloria Naylor has died at age 66.
Octavia Butler the Golden Chain

When Science Fiction Becomes Real: Octavia E. Butler’s Legacy

Ten years after her death, the writing of Octavia E. Butler has a persistent influence—one that spans well outside of the science fiction genre.
JSTOR Daily Friday Reads

Wuthering Heights

We asked JSTOR Daily readers what books they remembered most from childhood. Here is one of them, plus related ...
Shirley Jackson, The Haunting of Hill House

Shirley Jackson and the Female Gothic

Critic Ruth Franklin has published a new biography on the criminally overlooked novelist, short story writer, and essayist Shirley Jackson.
Oracle bone pit

How to Read the Bones Like a Scapulimancer

In Shang Dynasty China, fortune-telling with oracle bones was the key to political power.
Roanoke baptism

Our Long Roanoke Nightmare

The sixth season of Ryan Murphy’s American Horror Story focuses on the mysterious lost colony of Roanoke.