Literature

For years we have been fascinated with the artistic prowess of Leonardo da Vinci.

A new generation is waiting for the whimsy and wit of Dr. Seuss.

A primer on the infinite of knowledge waiting to be learned.

Transport yourself to other worlds and states of mind.

Looking up big, fancy words won't make your writing better. But a thesaurus can help – if you use it like this.

Not so much.

The Canadian professor has an extensive collection posted on his site.

They marveled at it.

The Harvard psychologist loves reading authors' rules for writing. Here are his own.

We look at the most common New Year's resolutions and get expert advice to help you check them off 2019's to-do list.

From the cosmic blast into another being's mind, to rolling bliss or obedient mind-slavery, fictional drugs have it all.

The great mythologist reminds us that our bliss is part of our suffering.

Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Jose Antonio Vargas shares the books that shaped his life.

The renowned author plans to publish a follow-up to the 1985 bestseller in September 2019.

Turn on, tune in, and drop out and into a good psychedelic book.

The best-selling author tells us his methods.

With his collected letters recently being published, it's time to revisit this extraordinary thinker.

The stories we tell define history. So who gets the mic in America?

The comics titan worked for more than half a century to revolutionize and add nuance to the comics industry, and he built a vast community of fans along the way.

These great thinkers remind us that taking an unpopular, bold stance might not be madness.

The 71-year-old author suggests replacing the adjective "amazing" with something more "pungent & specific".

James Patterson on teaching kids to read.

His book warns us of the dangers of mass media, passivity, and how even an intelligent population can be driven to gladly choose dictatorship over freedom.

A new study finds that simply growing up in a home with enough books increases adult literacy and math prowess.

Sticklers, pedants, and English teachers love to correct your grammar, but they can put their red pens down when it comes to these six folk errors.

Novels open us to the nuances of being human.

Man Booker prize winners Olga Tokarczuk and her translator Jennifer Croft on maps that lead nowhere, plasticized anatomies, and humor across national borders.

America isn't immune to attempts to remove books from libraries and schools, here are ten frequent targets and why you ought to go check them out.

What does it really mean when something is "Dickensian"? Or "Kafkaesque"? Sometimes these words are overused to the point where they lose their meaning. Here's how these and 6 other words got their origin. 

The big, unknowable questions in life are seductive, but without small, trivial questions as insulation, those large mysteries can consume us.