Livia Gershon is a freelance writer in Nashua, New Hampshire. Her writing has appeared in publications including Salon, Aeon Magazine and the Good Men Project. Contact her on Twitter @liviagershon.
Feeling guilty about kicking back with a paperback during vacation? There’s a precedent for escapist holiday reading, particularly during times of anxiety.
In the eighteenth century, doctors recognized melancholy as a disease endemic to groups forcibly displaced from their homes, particularly enslaved Africans.
In the nineteenth century, the state used a new education system to shape young citizens' attitudes toward a shrinking empire and the emerging Republic.
