Among the foremost minds that gave dignity to the Italian language, stands Count Giacomo Leopardi (1798-1837), whose poem “The Infinite” (L’infinito) invites awakening to...

“Our greatest sufferings do not lie in the present, as intuitive representations or immediate feeling, but rather in reason, as abstract concepts, tormenting thoughts.”...

In 1822, Henri Beyle was balding, fat, and prone to plagiarizing and misspelling. How did he become the author we know as Stendhal?   Originally...

Abolish the family! The nuclear family is a terrible way to organize and fulfill our emotional and economic needs, a new book argues  Originally...

As a young woman, Vivian Gornick was determined to be a serious writer. Yet she could not bring herself to write  Originally appeared on...

[Revised entry by James Shelley on October 6, 2022. Changes to: Main text, Bibliography] 18th-century British aesthetics addressed itself to a variety of questions:...

“Relations are simply a tedious pack of people, who haven’t got the remotest knowledge of how to live, nor the smallest instinct about when...

“Vanity is as ill at ease under indifference as tenderness is under a love which it cannot return.” – George Eliot, Daniel Deronda Originally...

by Liz W Faber In the film Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home (1986) – the one with the whales – the crew of...

The Right-Wing victory in the Italian election of this September has generated worries that Italy could be returning to some form of Fascism. But,...

The 2022 Physics Noble Prize is misunderstood even by the Noble prize committee itself. What the work of John Clauser, Alain Aspect and Anton...

In our newest “how can we help you?” thread, a philosopher on the job market asks: What is a ‘short writing sample?’ I’ve seen...