Arts & Culture
Explore Harvard’s vibrant arts scene—from campus exhibitions and theater to cultural analysis and literary reviews. Discover how creativity shapes the Harvard experience.
Harvard Faculty Debate Plan to Cap A Grades
At a lively meeting, faculty members weighed a grade inflation plan that most agreed is imperfect.
Laughing at Slavery
In Laughing Fit to Kill: Black Humor in the Fictions of Slavery, Glenda Carpio describes how slavery has provided a background and a source of raw material for African-American humor.
The Alcotts, Père and Fille
John Matteson, who left the law to pursue literature, won a Pulitzer Prize for Eden’s Outcasts, his double biography of Bronson and Louisa May Alcott.
From Literature to the Lab
In this excerpt from his new book, The Art and Politics of Science, Nobel laureate Harold Varmus reflects on his switch from graduate work in English to medical school.
On Judicial Interpretation
Paul M. Barrett reviews The Invisible Constitution, by Loeb University Professor Laurence H. Tribe.
Off the Shelf
Recent books with Harvard connections
Second-Life Photography
A profile of cultural photographer Lee Smith
A Scourge Remembered
A new film by G. Wayne Miller looks back to a time when tuberculosis gripped America.
Advice on Art and Life from Yo-Yo Ma
The cello virtuoso speaks to students interested in arts careers, and President Faust announces progress on arts offerings.
Zellweger Gets Her Pudding Pot
Traffic came to a stop in Harvard Square today for a parade with Renée Zellweger, the Hasty Pudding "woman of the year."
A Death in the Harvard Family: John Updike ’54, Litt.D. ’92
Noted author John Updike ’54, Litt.D. ’92, died of lung cancer on January 27 at the age of 76.