Literature

The Social Contract, which was originally published under the longer title On the Social Contract; or, Principles of Political Right, is a much-misunderstood book. Like many books, its ‘ideas’ are more familiar than the specific contents of the book itself. Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s 1762 book is often regarded as a rousing call for liberty and revolution,

June 7, 2022, 10:37am Dorothy Parker was famed for her quips, her wit, and her sharp tongue. She had a witty comeback for every occasion—even her own death. She publicly hated on beloved children’s classics and literary icons. Best of all, she quit her job at The New Yorker because it “cut in too much on

June 7, 2022, 9:05am I’m not particularly superstitious but there are some very bad vibes coming off Noah Baumbach’s Netflix adaptation of Don DeLillo’s White Noise. While the headline is how much the thing is allegedly costing—$140 million for a lot of recursive academic dialogue between Adam Driver and Greta Gerwig? Not even a CGI

‘The Veldt’ is a short story by the American author Ray Bradbury (1920-2012), included in his 1952 collection of linked tales, The Illustrated Man. The story concerns a nursery in an automated home in which a simulation of the African veldt is conjured by some children, but the lions which appear in the nursery start

June 6, 2022, 1:00pm It seems like everyone (ahem) has a summer reading list for you this week—even Bill Gates. As you probably know, Gates loves to read—and he also loves to write about books on his blog, GatesNotes, where today he published a list of his recommendations for the season. But don’t expect any

“Summer Reading” may be a fraught concept in the world of literary thinkpieces and book promotion, but here’s something that’s the opposite of fraught: kicking back with a good novel on a warm summer evening. So let’s not overthink this, okay? Here are just a few of the books hitting shelves this season that the

Have you heard the one about the goddess and the Syrian? Perhaps it sounds unfamiliar when phrased like that, but we’re talking about the myth of Venus and Adonis, one of the great tragic love stories from classical mythology. But what exactly is the story of Venus and Adonis? Let’s take a closer look at

Every month, all the major streaming services add a host of newly acquired (or just plain new) shows, movies, and documentaries into their ever-rotating libraries. So what’s a dedicated reader to watch? Well, whatever you want, of course, but the name of this website is Literary Hub, so we sort of have an angle. To

An escape from history seems impossible for 2015 Nobel laureate Svetlana Alexievich. After chronicling the Soviet Union through her “documentary novels,” her own genre often mistaken for oral history, since 1985, she had begun working on two new books, one on love and another on aging and death. She saw these topics as an opportunity

Who is Achilles? And what was his role in myth? How should we analyse his character, and the meaning of the story of Achilles? And where did the phrase ‘Achilles heel’ come from? Let’s take a closer look at the stories about Achilles from Greek mythology. Before we come to an analysis of the myth,

June 3, 2022, 11:30am I love Pizza Hut with a white hot passion, and I do firmly believe that it should always be trending because of its cheesy goodness. They had stuffed crust ages before Papa John’s deigned to attempt it. (My only beef with them is that they do not deliver to my apartment…

TODAY:  In 1924, E. M. Forster’s A Passage to India is published. “I realized that I was no longer a skeptical observer of the Northern hypothesis of Shakespeare authorship; I had become a collaborator.” Michael Blanding on the (extremely compelling) Sir Thomas North theory. | Lit Hub History David Yoon’s 13 Habits of Highly Effective Writers. | Lit

Fathers are often domineering or formative presences in fiction, and the following classic short stories all focus on the important influence of fathers on their children, even though, in at least one of the stories listed here, the father is absent from the story itself. These stories are among some of the best – and

For the people who love book events but who hate getting off the couch, this one’s for you! * In Conversation: Lydia Conklin and Leslie JamisonJune 6 @ 7pm EST In Lydia Conklin’s Rainbow Rainbow, queer, trans, and gender-nonconforming characters seek love and connection in hilarious and heartrending stories that reflect the complexity of our

TODAY: In 1926, Allen Ginsberg is born.    “We need to rid ourselves of this arrogance, of the primitiveness of the authoritarian systems.” A conversation with Belarusian journalist Svetlana Alexievich. | Lit Hub Politics A George Saunders adaptation, Jeff Bridges’ return to TV, and a queer spin on Pride and Prejudice all feature among the

The book known variously as the Song of Solomon, the Song of Songs, and Solomon’s Song is something of an oddity in the Bible, in that it is an unabashed description of romantic and erotic love between a man and a woman. Despite its common title, however, Solomon didn’t write it, and many scholars now