The Opposite of Junk
A dozen journals left to us by my wife’s Scottish grandmother were destined for the recycling bin—until we took a look at what was inside.
Herman Goodden
· 11 min read
History
A collection of 341 posts
Science and Civil Liberties: The Lost ACLU Lecture of Carl Sagan
Around 1987, Sagan gave an uncannily prescient lecture to the Illinois state chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union.
Steven Pinker
· 15 min read
The Alchemist Emperor of Prague
As the Holy Roman Empire descended into religious conflicts, its Habsburg ruler surrounded himself with magicians, astrologers, and scryers.
Martyn Rady
· 8 min read
Conquering a Balkan Blood Feud—in Bovey, Minnesota
An American family descended from Serbian and Croatian immigrants finds a way to overcome old-world hatreds.
Jon Zobenica
· 15 min read
Israel’s Perilous Moment, Then and Now
Herf tells the complicated and often surprising story of the internal political struggles in Western capitals, as well as in the halls of the United Nations, that erupted at the end of the Second World War.
Sol Stern
· 14 min read
The Tragedy of American Diplomacy: A Rebuttal
Williams, W. A. (1962). The Tragedy of American Diplomacy. New York: Dell Pub. Co. When the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) pinned Putin’s recent invasion of Ukraine on NATO’s “imperialist expansionism,” many policymakers and journalists on both sides of the political spectrum lambasted the organization for its half-hearted
Niranjan Shankar
· 15 min read
The Aztec Way of Empire
Six imperial rulers expanded the Mexica domain from 1430 until 1519, until the Spaniards first set foot in Tenochtitlan and disrupted the Aztec imperial agenda.
Frances F. Berdan
· 11 min read
Putinism and the Stalinist Legacy
From the beginning of the invasion of Ukraine, justifications offered for Moscow’s aggression must have struck most non-Russian observers as unrealistic, to say the least. Many observers were incredulous that any educated Russian could possibly believe Putin’s claim that Ukraine required “denazification and demilitarization,” or that the country
Tomislav Kardum
· 7 min read
Remembering the Jewish Yugoslavia that the Nazis Destroyed
The story of how I came to know one of those survivors, and chronicle her life.
Geoffrey C. Kabat
· 12 min read
Jennifer Raff’s ‘Origin: A Genetic History of the Americas’—A Review
Jennifer Raff’s Origin: A Genetic History of the Americas was published with much fanfare in February, garnering a rave New York Times review. And as of this writing, it is listed as one of the top 10 books about genetics on Amazon. The success reflects the fact that the
Elizabeth Weiss
· 13 min read
How the Christian Bible Became Separated Into ‘Old’ and ’New’
There is no firmly established technical term for the Bible in Judaism. The Hebrew scriptures may simply be referred to as “the Bible,” and the term “Jewish Bible” is sometimes used to distinguish it from the Christian Bible. In Hebrew, terms such as miqra (“scripture”) or kitve haqqodesh (“sacred texts”
Konrad Schmid and Jens Schröter
· 10 min read
The Pathologies of Imperialism
An earlier version of this article appeared in the German language newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung on March 4th, 2022. February 24th, 2022, constituted a shock to the European psyche. The invasion of Ukraine, without any plausible casus belli, the massive use of military force against civilians, the attempted hunting down
Harold James
· 11 min read
Vladimir Putin’s Medieval Mindset
In 1338, the story has it, a notorious French exile named Robert of Artois strutted into the London palace of King Edward III, bearing a stuffed heron on a silver platter. “Clear the way, you miserable failures,” he said to the assembled lords. “I have a heron … the most cowardly
Jonathan Kay
· 5 min read
The Maus That Roared
Maus was important to my life, but there's nothing wrong with protecting kids from encountering the world’s worst horrors before they are old enough to understand them.
Thomas P. Balazs
· 9 min read
A World of Waste, Stripped of Transcendence: James Joyce’s ‘Ulysses’ at 100
Few novels become institutions, to have departments rigged up around them, whole constituencies and spheres of scholarship, as works of lifelong study, fascination and confusion. Ulysses, whose publication centenary will be observed on February 2nd, is one such book. Like Marx’s Kapital, Joyce’s door-stopping opus has kept academics
Jared Marcel Pollen
· 13 min read