Books & the Arts

A Huawei store in Beijing, 2024.

Want to Understand the New Cold War? Look to Huawei. Want to Understand the New Cold War? Look to Huawei.

The tech company has come to symbolize the ongoing struggle between America and China.

Apr 22, 2025 / Books & the Arts / Brett Christophers

The “Visscher Map of the New World” including North and South America, 1658.

The Impossibly Intertwined History of the Americas The Impossibly Intertwined History of the Americas

A conversation with Greg Grandin about his groundbreaking new book America, América: A New History of the New World.

Apr 21, 2025 / Books & the Arts / Daniel Steinmetz-Jenkins

David Cronenberg, Transformed

David Cronenberg, Transformed David Cronenberg, Transformed

Two works—a new film, The Shrouds, and a career-spanning monograph by the film critic Violet Lucca—present a more sanguine image of the master of body horror.

Apr 17, 2025 / Books & the Arts / John Semley

Robert Redford in “The Great Gatsby” (1974).

Will There Ever Be Another “Great Gatsby”? Will There Ever Be Another “Great Gatsby”?

A century on, F. Scott Fitzgerald’s great Jazz Age novel still speaks to what ails America.

Apr 15, 2025 / Books & the Arts / Mark Chiusano

Sigrid Nunez On and Off the Big Screen

Sigrid Nunez On and Off the Big Screen Sigrid Nunez On and Off the Big Screen

Two new films—Pedro Almodóvar’s The Room Next Door and Scott McGehee and David Siegel’s The Friend—attempt to adapt her work. Do they succeed?

Apr 9, 2025 / Books & the Arts / Sarah Chihaya

A depiction of Herod the Great.

Zora Neale Hurston’s Lost Roman Epic Zora Neale Hurston’s Lost Roman Epic

In The Life of Herod the Great, we get a novel full of intrigue, betrayal, and revolution.

Apr 9, 2025 / Books & the Arts / Edna Bonhomme

Old Chapel Lane, Skibbereen, County Cork in 1846.

What Caused the Irish Famine? What Caused the Irish Famine?

A new book offers a comprehensive and heartbreaking account of the most terrible catastrophe to befall Ireland in the modern era.

Apr 8, 2025 / Books & the Arts / John Banville

The Rebellions of Murray Kempton

The Rebellions of Murray Kempton The Rebellions of Murray Kempton

One of his generation’s most prolific journalists, Kempton never turned a blind eye to the inequalities all around him.

Apr 8, 2025 / Books & the Arts / Vivian Gornick

Nation Poetry

Make It New Make It New

Apr 8, 2025 / Books & the Arts / Emily Skaja

Agnes Callard and the Examined Life

Agnes Callard and the Examined Life Agnes Callard and the Examined Life

In her new book, Callard makes the case that we should all live more philosophically but where does politics fit in?

Apr 8, 2025 / Books & the Arts / Olúfémi O. Táíwò

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