From Mysticism, which was published last month by New York Review Books. “Mysticism” is the word for what we modern, critical philosophers are meant to distrust in the name of enlightenment. It is all ...

On minor characters and human possibility ...

This month’s Letters section is devoted to remembrances of Lewis H. Lapham (1935–2024), the editor of Harper’s Magazine from 1976 to 1981 and from 1983 to 2006. I first worked for Lewis just out of ...

From Mourning a Breast, which was published in July by New York Review Books. Translated from the Chinese by Jennifer Feeley. Every fall, my friends and I get together to admire the lanterns of the ...

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Does anyone believe in college education anymore? Republicans certainly don’t—a mere 19 percent of them expressed “a great deal” or “quite a lot” of confidence in higher education in a Gallup poll ...

Before going up Millstone Hill the crowd waited in a field for darkness to fall. As the long summer day trailed on, they twirled colored ribbons and tossed devil sticks in the air, a jam band played, ...

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This article is only available as a PDF to subscribers.

In the summer of 2023, California legislators approved a bill banning discrimination on the grounds of caste. Defined in the bill as “an individual’s perceived position in a system of social ...

Number of different forms of torture the Syrian government is suspected of having used during the country’s civil war : 72 Factor by which women are more likely than men… ...