History

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

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
There Isn’t Going to Be Any Trouble
Jane Hayward reads two recent books on China’s post-Mao reform period.
Jane HaywardJun 30
- History
- Politics
Cracked, Costly Fantasies
Dan O’Sullivan traces the legacy of right-wing ideologies in California.
Dan O’SullivanJun 28
- Politics
- History
Things Still to Be Salvaged
Laurie Winer assesses Damion Searls’s new translation of “The Third Reich of Dreams: Nightmares of a Nation” by Charlotte Beradt.
Laurie WinerJun 26
- History
Never a Patient Woman
Emmeline Clein finds pockets of faith in feminist writer Shulamith Firestone's ostensibly airless spaces in an essay from LARB Quarterly no. 45: “Submission.”
Emmeline CleinJun 24
Movement Injuries
Christopher T. Fan explores two new novels, Brian Hioe’s “Taipei at Daybreak” and Yáng Shuāng-zǐ’s “Taiwan Travelogue.”
Christopher T. FanJun 24
- Fiction
- History
A Map to Black Paris
Doyle D. Calhoun visits “Black Paris: Artistic Circulations and Anti-Colonial Struggles, 1950–2000” at the Centre Pompidou.
Doyle D. CalhounJun 8
- Art & Architecture
- History
Fetishizing the Right, from McCarthy to Musk
L. Benjamin Rolsky explores Quinn Slobodian’s “Hayek’s Bastards: Race, Gold, IQ, and the Capitalism of the Far Right.”
L. Benjamin RolskyJun 8
- Politics
- History
Two Maoisms
Guobin Yang dives into two new books on Mao-era China.
Guobin YangJun 7
- History
- Cultural Studies
Every Word Is to Be Construed in Favor of Liberty
Joshua D. Rothman reviews Zaakir Tameez’s biography “Charles Sumner: Conscience of a Nation.”
Joshua D. RothmanJun 3
- Biography & Autobiography
- History
The First Rough Draft of the United States’ Homegrown Nazis
Michael Bobelian considers the renewed relevance of “Under Cover,” Arthur Derounian’s 1943 exposé of the United States’ Nazi underworld.
Michael BobelianJun 3
- History
- Politics