By Jim Shepard, J. Leland Miller Professor of American History, Literature, and Eloquence. Alfred A. Knopf, May 2021. When an 11-year-old boy named Aleq breathes in long-buried molecules that have just been exposed by mining, he becomes the first victim of an epidemic outbreak. Yet, unlike many… Continue reading »
By Susan Engel, Senior Lecturer in Psychology and The Class of 1959 Director of Program in Teaching at Williams College. Harvard University Press, January 2021. What are children thinking as they encounter the world around them? How do they solve problems and explain new concepts? Are adults… Continue reading »
By Alan Hirsch MA ’12, Lecturer in Humanities, Chair of Justice and Law Studies. City Lights Books, March 2020. What happens when a U.S. presidential election becomes controversial? A close election in 2000 tested the limitations of the current system, and President Trump’s refusal to accept the results… Continue reading »
By Soledad Fox Maura, V-Nee Yeh ’81 Professor of Spanish and Comparative Literature. Arcade Publishing, November 2020. As a student, Odilia is swept away by one of her professors from Madrid to the United States, but he soon disappears. Left behind with her baby, Lola, Odilia chooses to… Continue reading »
By Thomas M. Kohut, the Sue and Edgar Wachenheim III Professor of History. Routledge, April 2020. A comprehensive consideration of the role of empathy in historical knowledge, informed by the literature on empathy in fields including history, psychoanalysis, psychology, neuroscience, philosophy and sociology. Continue reading »
By James L. Nolan Jr., Chair and Washington Gladden 1859 Professor of Sociology. Harvard University Press, August 2020. After his father died, James L. Nolan Jr., took possession of a box of private family materials. To his surprise, the small secret archive contained a… Continue reading »
By Amanda Eyre Ward ’94. Ballantine Books, March 2020. Can four lost adults find the peace they’ve been seeking by reconciling their childhood aches and coming back together? The Jetsetters is an intelligent novel about the courage it takes to reveal our true selves,… Continue reading »
By Darra Goldstein, Willcox B. and Harriet M. Adsit Professor of Russian, Emerita. Ten Speed Press, February 2020. Available on Amazon. Through recipes, photos and essays, Professor Goldstein explores the heart of Russian food, and brings to life a portrait of the country’s people and its… Continue reading »
By W. Anthony Sheppard, Marylin & Arthur Levitt Professor of Music. Oxford University Press, October 2019. To what extent can music be employed to shape one culture’s understanding of another? In the American imagination, Japan has represented the “most alien” nation for over 150… Continue reading »
By Peter Murphy, John Hawley Roberts Professor of English. Stanford University Press, August 2019. Thomas Wyatt didn’t publish “They Flee from Me.” It was written in a notebook, maybe abroad, maybe even in prison. Today it is in every poetry anthology. How did it survive?… Continue reading »
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