Books and Ideas

Joshua Shaw’s “The Deluge towards Its Close,” 1813.

Do Humans Really Understand the World’s Disorderly Rivers?  Do Humans Really Understand the World’s Disorderly Rivers? 

In James C. Scott’s last book, In Praise of Floods, he questions the limits of human hegemony and our misplaced sense that we have any control over the Earth’s depleted watershed....

Feb 24, 2026 / Books & the Arts / Daniel Sherrell

Nation Poetry

Tímarit Tímarit

Feb 23, 2026 / Poems / Fríða Ísberg

The Long Shadow of the “Jewish Question”

The Long Shadow of the “Jewish Question” The Long Shadow of the “Jewish Question”

After the Holocaust, Israel was hailed as the solution to an essentially antisemitic debate. Now, as another genocide unfolds—in Gaza—Jews are once again questioning the question....

Feb 16, 2026 / Feature / Joseph Dana

The Repeating History of US Intervention in Venezuela

The Repeating History of US Intervention in Venezuela The Repeating History of US Intervention in Venezuela

A look back at The Nation’s 130 years of articles about Venezuela reveals that the more things change, the more they stay the same.

Feb 13, 2026 / Column / Richard Kreitner

How Capitalism Transformed the Natural World

How Capitalism Transformed the Natural World How Capitalism Transformed the Natural World

In her new book, Alyssa Battistoni explores how nature came to be treated as a supposedly cost-free supplement of capital accumulation.

Feb 11, 2026 / Books & the Arts / Kohei Saito

Letters Icon

Letters From the March 2026 Issue Letters From the March 2026 Issue

Basement books… Kate Wagner replies… Reading Pirandello (online only)… Gus O’Connor replies…

Feb 10, 2026 / Our Readers, Kate Wagner, and Gus O’Connor

Nation Poetry

Rome, take your amethyst back Rome, take your amethyst back

Feb 10, 2026 / Books & the Arts / Ricardo Maldonado

The Riotous Worlds of Thomas Pynchon

The Riotous Worlds of Thomas Pynchon The Riotous Worlds of Thomas Pynchon

From “The Crying Lot of 49” to his latest noirs, the American novelist has always proceeded along a track strangely parallel to our own.

Feb 10, 2026 / Books & the Arts / Benjamin Kunkel

A World War II–themed party held by the residents of Rose Mount, Birkby, 1986.

Barbara Pym’s Archaic England Barbara Pym’s Archaic England

In the novelist’s work, she mocks English culture’s nostalgia, revealing what lies beneath the country’s obsession with its heritage.

Feb 6, 2026 / Books & the Arts / Ashley Cullina

Sir William Gell’s “The Removal of the Sculptures from the Pediments of the Parthenon by Lord Elgin,” 1801.

Why We’re Still Fighting Over Elgin’s Marbles Why We’re Still Fighting Over Elgin’s Marbles

In A.E. Stallings’s Frieze Frame, the poet retells the many conflicts, political and cultural, the ransacked portion of the Parthenon has inspired.

Feb 5, 2026 / Books & the Arts / Nicolas Liney

x