Books & Literary Life

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

Woman with long hair, smiling, wearing a black sweater, in a textured beige background.

For This Poet, AI is a Writing Partner

Sasha Stiles trained a chatbot on her manuscripts. Now, her poems rewrite themselves.

by Lydialyle Gibson

Photograph of Mao Zedong during what is thought to be the Long March, 1934-1935

Under Review: Tony Saich on Chinese Communism at 100

The first century of the Chinese Communist Party—and what impends

Illustration of open doors, tied to concept of commitment instead of just seeking opportunities

Open Book: the case for commitment

Pete Davis expands on his Commencement address.

Melvin B. Miller

Melvin Miller ’56: “Not going…to stand aside”

The founder, editor, and publisher of The Bay State Banner profiled

by Juliet Isselbacher

An illuminated manuscript page from thirteenth-century Iraq showing two men on a camel arriving in a village, depicted as two-story white buildings with people looking out the windows

al-Hariri, a master storyteller

Brief life of a master storyteller

by Michael Cooperson

Photograph of someone wearing a Juneteenth T-shirt

The Racial Tensions That Roiled Texas

Annette Gordon-Reed on the real history of Texas, and Juneteenth

Portrait photograph of Marilyn Booth

Arabic translator Marilyn Booth

Marilyn Booth translates Arabic literature for Anglophone readers.

by Spencer Lee Lenfield

Reproduction of Veronese’s “The Wedding Feast at Cana” (1563), the subject of a new book about art theft by Cynthia Saltzman

Recent books with Harvard connections

Recent books with Harvard connections

Photograph of a carved relief showing orator dictating to a scribe, from the fourth-century Roman Temple of Hercules at Ostia Antica

Secretaries’ role in history of information

From a huge new book on the history of information, an excerpt on the role of secretaries

Portrait photograph of Maggie Shipstead

Novelist Maggie Shipstead and “Great Circle”

Maggie Shipstead’s time-spanning, globe-circling new novel

by Dan Kelly

Photograph of earth scientist Andrew Knoll at work in the field

Andrew Knoll, “A Brief History of Earth,” reviewed by Jonathan Shaw

Andrew Knoll on the planet’s past—and fraught future

by Jonathan Shaw