History

"Hegel was right when he said that we learn from history that man can never learn anything from history." — George Bernard Shaw

Spooking the Censors
Michael O’Donnell reads Charlie English’s “The CIA Book Club: The Secret Mission to Win the Cold War with Forbidden Literature.”
Michael O’DonnellAug 13
- History
- Politics
Delicate and Dirty
Ben Arthur revisits a transformative moment in American culture through the lens of J. Hoberman’s “Everything Is Now: The 1960s New York Avant-Garde—Primal Happenings, Underground Movies, Radical Pop.”
Ben ArthurAug 7
- History
- Cultural Studies
An Active Project of Exclusion
Geertje Bol and Jan Eijking review “Erased: A History of International Thought Without Men,” by Patricia Owens.
Geertje Bol, Jan EijkingAug 5
- Gender & Sexuality
- History
In the Shadow of Stalin
Ed Pulford reviews Ben Nathans’s “To the Success of Our Hopeless Cause: The Many Lives of the Soviet Dissident Movement” and Perry Link and Wu Dazhi’s “I Have No Enemies: The Life and Legacy of Liu Xiaobo.”
Ed PulfordAug 3
- History
- Politics
No, Time to Die: The Biden Years On-Screen, Part Two
In the second installment of a quarterly series, Brendan Boyle and Adam Nayman consider the cinema of the Biden years.
Brendan Boyle, Adam NaymanJul 26
- Film
- History
Golden Age Titans
Michele Willens talks with film critic Kenneth Turan about Hollywood Golden Age moguls Louis B. Mayer and Irving Thalberg.
Michele WillensJul 22
- Film
- History
They Can’t Throw Us All Out
Christine Terrisse interviews Nate Jackson and Daniel Kohn about their new book “Tearing Down the Orange Curtain: How Punk Rock Brought Orange County to the World.”
Christine TerrisseJul 19
- Music
- History
Kill in the Name of AutoZone
Devin Thomas O’Shea reviews Patty Heyda’s “Radical Atlas of Ferguson, USA.”
Devin Thomas O’SheaJul 17
- Politics
- History
Love in a Time of Revolution
Torsa Ghosal speaks with Nishant Batsha about his new novel, “A Bomb Placed Close to the Heart.”
Torsa GhosalJul 8
- Fiction
- History
Unveiling a Hidden Narrative
John G. Turner explores Molly Worthen’s “Spellbound: How Charisma Shaped American History from the Puritans to Donald Trump.”
John G. TurnerJul 7
- History
- Philosophy & Religion
Fourth of July Reading List
Here’s to another year of freedom.
Medaya OcherJul 4
From Democracy to “Safety”
Kristen R. Ghodsee considers the anti-communist contexts that birthed the alt-right, in a review of Quinn Slobodian’s new book “Hayek’s Bastards.”
Kristen R. GhodseeJul 3
- Politics
- History