“Worth the Wait,” by Lynne Scott, Illustrations by Laurie Lemrise Lynne Scott of Worthington, a retired special education teacher, had long wanted...
Another COVID-19-related cancellation: book clubs. Unless you want to meet online.And why not? That’s the spirit behind “Restless Reads,” a virtual...
Last month, I found myself rereading “The Worst Hard Time,” Timothy Egan’s excellent narrative account of the Dust Bowl, which won a National Book...
At first glance, it looked like a scene from a typical day at Amherst College: about 100 students sat in a lecture hall, on tiered seating on three...
I bought a lottery ticket a few months ago. It was foolish of me. Playing the lottery strikes me as a waste of time. It represents an investment on...
by Steve PfarrerTHE OVEN: AN ANTI-LECTUREBy Ilan StavansPhotographs by Bill HughesUniversity of Massachusetts Pressumass.edu/umpressAside from...
A few weeks ago, I gave my students a special assignment: to plagiarize a text, whichever they chose, with the expressed intention of improving it....
Israel — which turns 70 on May 14, Yom Ha’atzmaut — is one of the youngest nations in the world. It is also one of the oldest. Reconciling this...
He’s one of Shakespeare’s most tragic characters: a soldier and lord who, egged on by his wife, a seeming prophecy from three witches, and his own...
Not long ago, an acquaintance of mine said to me: “During a flight, I chatted with the passenger next to me. And guess what, Ilan? He knew you well...
“Hell is other people,” writes Jean-Paul Sartre in his play No Exit (1944). The statement feels particularly accurate in America today. Those we...
In 1922, the Spanish philosopher José Ortega y Gasset published a book called “España Invertebrada.” In it, he argued that Spain, as a result of an...