“Freud argued that our personalities and behaviors are governed by a maelstrom of hidden drives and motivations. What we experience as our “conscious life” is in fact only a post hoc rationalization of things we are doing for other reasons “ www.theatlantic.com/magazine/202...

What if Freud Was Right?

A neuroscientist dares to argue that old-fashioned psychoanalysis holds the key to curing mental illness.

theatlantic.com

“The Browns told her it was time to invest in her instead of gthemselves. Lee took the leap. She left her position at the airline and spent the next year focused entirely on her writing. The manuscript she produced during that period became To Kill a Mockingbird. “ mymodernmet.com/harper-lee-t...

Harper Lee’s Friends Gifted Her a Year’s Salary Leading to ‘To Kill a Mockingbird’

This incredible story shows what someone can accomplish when given the chance.

mymodernmet.com

“ From mind-reading scanners to cognitive-enhancing drugs, we are entering an era of brain colonization that threatens the very foundations of our autonomy, freedom of thought, and identity. “ www.thecollector.com/who-owns-you...

Who Actually Owns Your Thoughts in the Age of Neuroscience? | TheCollector

Explore the encroaching ethical crisis of brain colonization and the struggle to protect the last bastion of human privacy.

thecollector.com

“An FDA investigation linked the outbreak that has expanded to nine states to iceberg lettuce sourced from privately held Taylor Farms ⁠operations in central Mexico, but authorities are still looking for other potential sources. “ www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026...

US cyclosporiasis outbreak kills two people in Michigan, officials say

US sees first fatalities due to intestinal illness, though both had significant ​underlying health conditions

theguardian.com

“Medieval parents made immense sacrifices for their children, and seem to have expected little in return. Feeding a child consumed about 15 percent of average income, and parents often continued to support children throughout their adulthood.” worksinprogress.co/issue/did-me...

Did medieval people love their children?  - Works in Progress Magazine

Is it really plausible that children survived the hardship of medieval life without devoted parents?

worksinprogress.co

“A slate of union-backed working-class Democratic candidates is running on an economic-populist platform in swing districts. If the Blue Collar Brigade proves successful, their strategy could set a precedent for winning working-class votes.” jacobin.com/2026/08/blue...

The Blue Collar Brigade Has the Right Messengers

A slate of union-backed working-class Democratic candidates is running on an economic-populist platform in swing districts. If the Blue Collar Brigade proves successful, their strategy could set a pre...

jacobin.com

“Impiety really meant truly testing everybody’s accepted values. Corrupting youth really meant influencing the next generation. When combined, they inferred something extremely serious indeed: Socrates was subverting the fundamental foundations of the community.” www.thecollector.com/socrates-fir...

Was Socrates the First Victim of Cancel Culture? | TheCollector

Socrates questioned everything and paid the ultimate price for it. His trial shows how societies stifle unwanted truth, even in democracies.

thecollector.com

“From figuration through Surrealism to his late Abstract Expressionist style, Rothko turned color into emotion, mortality into presence, and viewing into a spiritual encounter—works that challenge language and linger long after they are seen.” www.thecollector.com/how-did-roth...

How Did Rothko Seek to Transcend the Visible World? | TheCollector

Mark Rothko’s late paintings and color fields reveal the pursuit of transcendence, presence, and human emotion beyond language.

thecollector.com

“Anne and her sister, separated from their parents, persevered through the harsh conditions of the concentration camp yet were ultimately taken by typhus, contracted as a direct outcome of the conditions in which they were forced to live. “ www.thecollector.com/how-did-anne...

How Did Anne Frank Die? The Tragic Final Days of a Young Writer | TheCollector

Anne Frank, who left behind perhaps one of the most complete accounts of Dutch Jewish life during World War II, died at the age of 15.

thecollector.com

“Red is an abiding marker of transgression. The metaphor dates back at least to the Old Testament and is still embedded in everyday language: to be caught “red-handed” is to be discovered committing a crime.” lithub.com/why-the-colo...

Why the Color Red Carries so Much Weight in Film and Literature

Not long into Act Two of Macbeth, husband and wife become obsessed with color. Lady Macbeth, who examines her hands with the tireless diligence of an obsessive-compulsive, is seen scrubbing away fo…

lithub.com

“As a consequence of its sheer polyphonic complexity, Moby-Dick thwarts simple interpretation. To this day, nearly every aspect of this masterpiece remains ambiguous, alluringly unsettled. “ lithub.com/is-moby-dick...

Is Moby-Dick the Greatest American Novel?

Near the beginning of his long narrative poem “Letter to Lord Byron,” W. H. Auden writes, “I want a form that’s large enough to swim in.” So too, apparently, did Herman Melv…

lithub.com

“Trotsky was especially taken with Frida’s appearance. Historian Bertrand Patenaude described her as “a striking and exotic beauty with black hair, audacious, almond-shaped eyes beneath batwing eyebrows, and sensuous lips.” lithub.com/frida-kahlo-...

Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera’s Blue House in Coyoacán Was a Refuge for Leon Trotsky… Until It Wasn‘t

At first glance, the Blue House in Coyoacán seemed an oasis of calm. Its sun-drenched courtyard, cobalt-blue walls, and sheltering gardens offered Leon Trotsky and Natalia Sedova a rare reprieve fr…

lithub.com

“The image of Churchill as uncompromising man of war offers a righteous certainty. It is a species of moralism, putting willpower above all, promising that will and principle, right and wrong, can determine everything” engelsbergideas.com/essays/churc...

Winston Churchill, arch-pragmatist

Painting the wartime premier only as an heroic anti-appeaser overlooks the many diplomatic ploys he used to disarm a dangerous world.

engelsbergideas.com

“It allowed words to flow as fast as one’s thoughts. Portable, containing its own inkwell, and requiring almost no pressure against the page, the fountain pen could help make the act of writing a physical, as well as an intellectual joy. “ engelsbergideas.com/notebook/the...

The lost magic of the fountain pen

The fountain pen is among the most personal of our creative technologies. Its retreat from daily life is a tragedy.

engelsbergideas.com

“The inaugural installment sees Picasso’s masterpiece paired with the late South African artist Dumile Feni’s “African Guernica” (1967), a large-scale charcoal drawing that evokes a similar spirit of protest and anguish.” hyperallergic.com/madrid-museu...

Madrid Museum Puts Picasso in Dialogue With "African Guernica"

Dumile Feni’s monumental drawing is part of the Museo Reina Sofía's new program "History Doesn’t Repeat Itself, but It Does Rhyme."

hyperallergic.com

“Despite Rembrandt’s strong start in 1632,ultimately riding high in the Amsterdam art market,even earning a little of the patronage Van Honthorst enjoyed,Rembrandt could not reconcile his own personal vision with the taste of the broader market, and died a pauper.” hyperallergic.com/why-did-remb...

Why Did Rembrandt Die Poor?

Rembrandt pioneered the saleable self, but unlike his rival, Gerard Van Honthorst, failed to reconcile his personal vision with the market.

hyperallergic.com

“the absurd describes a basic contradiction at the heart of all human existence: between man’s innate desire for reason and clarity on the one hand, and his awareness of the irrationality and meaninglessness of life on the other.” www.historytoday.com/archive/port...

The Absurdity of Albert Camus

For Albert Camus understanding the past and predicting the future may hinge on one fact: history is absurd.

historytoday.com

“So for twenty years the uncompleted stump of a tower looked, according to Mark Twain, like “a factory chimney with the top broken off.” After the Civil War, in Savage’s words, “the stump seemed to represent a nation that had lost its way.” daily.jstor.org/why-the-wash...

Why the Washington Monument Looks the Way It Does - JSTOR Daily

For nearly a century, Americans argued over how to honor George Washington. The monument they built reflected those debates.

daily.jstor.org

“The changes it brought ended feudal privileges based on birth and kept the Enlightenment principles from the Revolution. The code also separated the government from the church by creating civil laws for marriage and divorce.” www.thecollector.com/billions-of-...

Why Billions of People Are Still Ruled by Napoleon's Code | TheCollector

Today, billions of people are governed mostly indirectly by Napoleon's Code as it successfully replaced chaotic, feudal laws.

thecollector.com

“But their unwavering rejection of Nazi rule and Resistance interventions were no doubt their most daring act, and setting them apart from the Paris creatives (Gertrude Stein and Salvador Dalí included) who went along with the new Vichy regime.” hyperallergic.com/the-queer-su...

The Queer Surrealists Who Fought Nazis With Paper Bullets

Claude Cahun and Marcel Moore shared a magnificent life as both romantic and creative partners, one in which gender proved as mercurial as the political climate of World War II.

hyperallergic.com

“Victorian beauty ideals were unsurprisingly obsessed with pallor: upper class white women chased even whiter skin, a symbol that their privilege never left them working in the sun. “It was all about how to make your skin more translucent,” www.atlasobscura.com/articles/the...

“The play, he insisted, strove to avoid definition. This strategy of avoidance leaves us to gaze at a landscape void of meaning, one that by turns is the source of our bemusement and amusement.” theamericanscholar.org/beckett-the-...

Beckett the Prophet - The American Scholar

We are all, it seems, still waiting for Godot

theamericanscholar.org

“Frost had been inspired to write the poem by Thomas’s habit of regretting whatever path the pair took during their long walks in the countryside—an impulse that Frost equated with the romantic predisposi­tion for “crying over what might have been.” lithub.com/this-week-in...

This Week in Literary History: Robert Frost’s “The Road Not Taken” is Published in The Atlantic Monthly

This first appeared in Lit Hub’s Literary History newsletter—sign up here. Robert Frost’s most famous poem, “The Road Not Taken,” “has confused audiences literally from the beginning,” David Orr ha…

lithub.com

“During the second half of the 20th century, it was dangerous for women to speak their minds in the manner Gloria did. She openly challenged then-taboo subjects, such as abortion rights, pay equality, and domestic violence. “https://www.thecollector.com/gloria-steinem-journalist-feminist-icon/

Gloria Steinem: The Journalist Who Became a Feminist Icon | TheCollector

Gloria Steinem is one of the most prolific feminist activists, journalists, and essayists. In 2013, she received the Medal of Freedom for her work and activism.

thecollector.com

“Oscar Wilde created “art for art’s sake.” Nevertheless, the supernatural characters who appear in the fairy tales of Oscar Wilde, as well as his poem and novel, impart moral lessons to the reader.” www.thecollector.com/supernatural...

9 Supernatural Creatures in the Works of Oscar Wilde | TheCollector

Mermaids, giants, and witches are some of the supernatural characters readers encounter in the words of the brilliant writer Oscar Wilde.

thecollector.com

“Trump administration has asked the supreme court to clear the way for an executive order that could dramatically change mail-in voting. The emergency appeal comes after an appeals court upheld a ruling blocking the president’s order in nearly half the country” www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026...

DoJ urges supreme court to allow Trump order targeting mail-in voting

Emergency appeal comes after court upheld ruling blocking president’s order ahead of November midterms

theguardian.com

“The Trump administration’s fixation on the Smithsonian has spiraled from critiquing its “woke” narrative to threatening the majority of the institution’s funding unless it handed over the didactics, staff information, and planned programming “ hyperallergic.com/smithsonian-...

Smithsonian Hearing's Most Bizarre Moments Ranked by Tier

“Is Mickey Mouse racist?” Texas Republican Congressman Brandon Gill asked National Museum of American History Director Anthea Hartig.

hyperallergic.com

“Grotesque Head of an Old Woman” is one of several studies by Leonardo exploring exaggerated facial expression and character that he termed visi monstruosi, “monstrous faces.” hyperallergic.com/how-leonardo...

How Leonardo’s “Monstrous” Drawings Inspired Modern Caricature

"Grotesque Head of an Old Woman," recently acquired by the National Gallery of Art, is one of several studies by Leonardo exploring exaggerated facial expression.

hyperallergic.com

“The president is fighting to persuade Congress to approve legislation, the Save Act, that would allow the US federal government greater control over elections. Trump has also called for the federal government to take direct control of elections in some states” www.theguardian.com/news/ng-inte...

How Trump could undermine the midterms

The president really has no power over elections – but that hasn’t stopped Trump from laying the groundwork to challenge results in November

theguardian.com

“There are many ways humans can achieve a hive mind’, Slingerland writes, ‘but liquor is certainly the quickest.’ Its primary social purpose, he argues, was getting ‘a selfish, suspicious, narrowly goal-oriented primate to loosen up and connect with strangers “ engelsbergideas.com/notebook/the...

The civilising wonders of wine

The decline in alcohol consumption in Western societies suggests a gradual weakening of a shared civilisational inheritance.

engelsbergideas.com