Books & Literary Life

Literary criticism, author interviews, and book culture from within and beyond Harvard.

Karla Cornejo Villavicencio smiling beside the pink cover of her novel "Catalina" featuring a jeweled star and eye.

Being Undocumented in America

Karla Cornejo Villavicencio’s writing aims to challenge assumptions. 

by Nina Pasquini

Portrait of Rachel Gable, author of new book on first-generation students at elite colleges

Timely guidance for colleges enrolling first-generation and low-income students

Rachel Gable’s research on helping first-generation and low-income students succeed at elite colleges

by John S. Rosenberg

An illustration by James Steinberg shows a heavenly hand extending down to the U.S. Capitol and attempting to influence members of Congress

Benjamin Friedman on faith and American socioeconomic policy

How faith shapes economic and social policy

Archival photograph of John F. Kennedy as an undergraduate, circa 1939, studying papers

Fredrik Logevall, “JFK: Coming of Age…” excerpt

An unusual senior thesis

Photograph of a giant cuttlefish, “Sepia apama,” at Cabbage Tree Bay, Australia: among Peter Godfrey-Smith’s subjects for his research on cognition

Recent books with Harvard connections

Recent books with Harvard connections

Collage of Cover of Fevers, Feuds and Diamonds by Paul Farmer and a Headshot of Paul Farmer.

Paul Farmer on the West Africa Ebola Epidemic

The 2014 epidemic was rooted in centuries of exploitation and war, Paul Farmer argues.

by Jonathan Shaw

Photograph of the cover of To Make Their Own Way in the World: The Enduring Legacy of the Zealy Daguerreotypes

See Their Faces

Confronting “some of the most challenging images in the history of photography”

by Marina N. Bolotnikova

Harvard Advocate Spring 2020 issue front cover and back cover

Publishing The Harvard Advocate Despite the Pandemic

The coronavirus delays—but can’t stop—the revered literary magazine.

by Kristina DeMichele

Portrait photograph of a middle-aged Lorenzo Tañada as a Philippine senator

Lorenzo Tañada

Brief life of a Philippine patriot: 1898-1992

by Christopher Capozzola

Black and white photo of a group of Vietnamese children, titled “Schoolchildren Playing Cards”

Photographer Mark Erickson’s street scenes of 1990s Vietnam

Photographer Mark Erickson on the Vietnam he never knew

by Dan Kelly

Dan Chiasson at home in front of a “sometimes delightful, sometimes disturbing” mural by David Teng Olsen, which appears in The Math Campers.

Dan Chiasson's Poetry and Criticism

Poet-critic Dan Chiasson and The Math Campers

by Lydialyle Gibson