Wonderworks: The 25 Most Powerful Inventions in the History of Literature

Keith P. Mankin is a creative and educational consultant service in Dallas, Texas, and co-producer of the PeerSpectrum Medical Podcast. Born in Pittsburgh and raised in Boston, he earned an AB degree in Classics from Harvard University, and then an MD from University of Pittsburgh. He worked for 30 years as a developmental orthopaedist until retirement from medical practice in 2016. He has authored 11 novels, four children’s books, and four nonfiction works. He has been a staff writer at Theater Jones Arts Journal in Dallas. When not writing or teaching, he is a singer, a Rotarian, and spends time rooting for Boston sports teams in absentia along with his wife, Julia.

Keith P. Mankin

Ed Simon is a staff writer at&nbsp;The Millions. He is a frequent contributor at several different sites including&nbsp;The Atlantic,&nbsp;The Paris Review Daily,&nbsp;Aeon,&nbsp;Jacobin, The&nbsp;Washington Post, The New York Times,&nbsp;Killing the Buddha,&nbsp;Salon, The Public Domain Review,&nbsp;Atlas Obscura,&nbsp;JSTOR Daily, and&nbsp;Newsweek. The author of several books, The author of several books, he most recently authored Pandemonium: A Visual History of Demonology and co-edited, with Costica Bradatan, the collection The God Beat: What Journalism Says About Faith and Why It Matters. He holds a PhD in English from Lehigh University and an MA in literary and cultural studies from Carnegie Mellon University.

Ed Simon

Erik J. Larson is a computer scientist and tech entrepreneur. The founder of two DARPA-funded AI startups, he is currently working on core issues in natural language processing and machine learning. He has written for&nbsp;The Atlantic&nbsp;and for professional journals and has tested the technical boundaries of artificial intelligence through his work with the IC2 tech incubator at the University of Texas at Austin.

Erik J. Larson

Angus Fletcher trained in neurophysiology at Edward Stuenkel’s lab at the University of Michigan Medical School, received his PhD in Literature from Yale, and taught at Teach for America, USC, and Stanford before being recruited to join Ohio State’s Project Narrative, where he is now professor of Story Science. He is currently collaborating with the Ohio State College of Medicine on using literature to reduce burnout in medical students; with Gregory Bunch and the University of Chicago Booth School of Business on increasing innovation; with the US Army and Nurse Corps on training emotional and intellectual resilience; and with the special operations community on antifragile human-AI hybrids. His recent media and publications can be found at angusfletcher.co.

Angus Fletcher

What Is Literature For?: A Symposium on Angus Fletcher’s “Wonderworks”

"Writing only leads to more writing." — Colette

Literary Criticism

Erik J. Larson is a computer scientist and tech entrepreneur. The founder of two DARPA-funded AI startups, he is currently working on core issues in natural language processing and machine learning. He has written for&nbsp;The Atlantic&nbsp;and for professional journals and has tested the technical boundaries of artificial intelligence through his work with the IC2 tech incubator at the University of Texas at Austin.