Books & Literary Life

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

America’s Past, Opera's Future: 11 New Books from Harvard Authors

These newly released novels, histories, and memoirs grapple with identity in all its forms.

by Gabriella Gage

Off the Shelf

An editorial sampling of recent books with Harvard connections

"Working Sisters"

Pan Tianshu reviews Leslie Chang's new book Factory Girls: From Village to City in a Changing China

by Pan Tianshu

Chapter & Verse

A correspondence corner for not-so-famous lost words

Storytelling Scholar

Marie Rutkoski blends sixteenth-century history with fantasy in The Cabinet of Wonders, a new novel for young adults.

by Brittney Moraski

Day-After Thoughts: "Words Have Made a Comeback"

Reflections from Humanities Center scholar-in-residence Kiku Adatto on the roles of images and rhetoric in the 2008 campaign and its media coverage

Chapter & Verse

Correspondence on not-so-famous lost words

Blindspot: A Novel

History professor Jill Lepore is the coauthor, with Jane Kamensky, of the historical novel Blindspot, set in colonial Boston.

by Jonathan Shaw

Off the Shelf

Recent books with Harvard connections

Poetic Patriarch

Craig Lambert profiles the poet Richard Wilbur.

by Craig Lambert

Stinging the Dinosaurs

An excerpt from The Superorganism: The Beauty, Elegance, and Strangeness of Insect Societies, by Bert Hölldobler and E. O. Wilson