Authors Aren’t Perfect. Why Should Readers Have to Be?

A Writer Wrestles With Separating the Art from the Artist

In April 2024, British author J.K. Rowling appeared in the news for the same reason she’s been wont to gain attention lately—not for writing acclaimed new books, but for writing long social-media rants against the transgender community. In the latest iteration, she offered to go to jail under Scotland’s new Hate Crime and Public Order Act.

Many fans—including queer and trans readers who took refuge in the world that the Harry Potter series conjured—feel that Rowling has betrayed them. They find themselves in the position of choosing whether to renounce a …

by Emily R. Zarevich | July 24, 2024

Who Is the Real Monster in Frankenstein?

Mary Shelley’s Novel and Its Many Adaptations Challenge Us to Explore Bias and Belonging

by Daniel A. Olivas | June 13, 2024

In 2022, I found myself reaching back to my childhood’s favorite monster for literary inspiration.

That year’s midterm elections had brought with them another round of angry MAGA candidates promoting the …

Reading Animal Farm in Zimbabwe

From Minority White Rule to Dictatorship and Beyond, Orwell’s 1945 Novel—Now in a New Translation—Has Proved Prescient

by Beaven Tapureta | April 17, 2024

I began to notice Animal Farm references proliferating in Zimbabwe in 2008.

That was the year hyperinflation nosedived the economy, and long-time leader Robert Mugabe felt threatened enough by a newly …

In Mexico, a New Vocabulary for Grief and Justice

Most Murders in the Country Go Uninvestigated. Activists and Writers Are Coming Together to Demand Accountability

By Natalia Villanueva-Nieves | February 15, 2024

“Almost everyone lost someone during the war,” writes Cristina Rivera Garza in The Restless Dead: Necrowriting and Disappropriation.

In 2006, Mexican president Felipe Calderón initiated the …

How a French Nobel Laureate Remembers Things Past

On Paper and Film, Annie Ernaux Probes History for Questions, Not Answers

by Tom White | September 7, 2023

Memory is an imperfect reflector of lived experience. We look back through a series of lenses, and our focal mechanisms shift with the light. Personal memory is shape-shifted by history—what …

Are We Ready to Listen to René Girard?

The Philosopher Saw a World of Scapegoats and Persecutors. On His 100th Birthday, His Insights Into Human Nature Are as Relevant as Ever

by Cynthia L. Haven | August 7, 2023

Years ago at a conference, French theorist René Girard faced a tough question about his unconventional methods.

The Stanford professor’s research involved a close reading of archaic and classical texts from …

literature