Reads tagged with “history”

Incomparable Things Said Incomparably Well: Emerson’s Extraordinary Letter of Appreciation to Young Walt Whitman

“I rubbed my eyes a little, to see if this sunbeam were no illusion.”

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Darwin’s Battle with Anxiety

A posthumous diagnosis of the paralyzing mental malady that afflicted one of humanity’s greatest minds.

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Maurice Sendak’s Rare, Sensual Illustrations for Herman Melville’s Greatest Commercial Failure and Most Personally Beloved Book

“The strongest and fieriest emotions of life defy all analytical insight.”

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Maya Angelou on Courage and Facing Evil

“There is nothing quite so tragic as a young cynic, because it means the person has gone from knowing nothing to believing nothing.”

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Charity and Sylvia: The Remarkable Story of How Two Women Married Each Other in Early America

“For 40 years… they have shared each other’s occupations and pleasures and works of charity while in health, and watched over each other tenderly in sickness.”

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The Book of Miracles: Rare Medieval Illustrations of Magical Thinking

A visual record of humanity’s most eternal fears and our immutable longing for grace, mercy, and the miraculous.

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A Visual History of Romantic Friendship

“Smashes,” “crushes,” “spoons,” and other curious nineteenth-century relationship varieties.

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Why We Hurt Each Other: Tolstoy’s Letters to Gandhi on Love, Violence, and the Truth of the Human Spirit

“Love is the only way to rescue humanity from all ills.”

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“Don’t Read Books!” A 12th-Century Zen Poem

“It’s annoying for others to have to hear you.”

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Ordering the Heavens: Hevelius’s Revolutionary 17th-Century Star Catalog and the First Moon Map

How a visionary manuscript, completed by the first female astronomer of the Western world, survived three fires to become a beacon of scientific dedication.

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Reads tagged with “history”

“I rubbed my eyes a little, to see if this sunbeam were no illusion.”

A posthumous diagnosis of the paralyzing mental malady that afflicted one of humanity’s greatest minds.

“The strongest and fieriest emotions of life defy all analytical insight.”

“There is nothing quite so tragic as a young cynic, because it means the person has gone from knowing nothing to believing nothing.”

“For 40 years… they have shared each other’s occupations and pleasures and works of charity while in health, and watched over each other tenderly in sickness.”

A visual record of humanity’s most eternal fears and our immutable longing for grace, mercy, and the miraculous.

“Smashes,” “crushes,” “spoons,” and other curious nineteenth-century relationship varieties.

“Love is the only way to rescue humanity from all ills.”

“It’s annoying for others to have to hear you.”

How a visionary manuscript, completed by the first female astronomer of the Western world, survived three fires to become a beacon of scientific dedication.

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