Books and Ideas

Nation Poetry

Natalie Eilbert, by User 4357 Natalie Eilbert, by User 4357

  There’s there there. A sweet empty vacuum bag smells of industry, its provenance. I try a xylophone note, a sound like burnt yellow. Approximations don’t mimic; they stand i…

Jan 13, 2022 / Poems / Natalie Eilbert

Author Kathy Acker

Strange and Intimate Encounters With Kathy Acker Strange and Intimate Encounters With Kathy Acker

In Philosophy for Spiders, McKenzie Wark revisits Acker’s work to fashion a different kind of literary theory—one more personal and erotic.

Jan 13, 2022 / Books & the Arts / Alyse Burnside

Lucille Clifton and the Task of Remembering

Lucille Clifton and the Task of Remembering Lucille Clifton and the Task of Remembering

The poet’s memoir Generations is both a chronicle of her ancestral lineage and lesson in the centrality of Black women to the story of American history.

Jan 12, 2022 / Books & the Arts / Marina Magloire

Nation Poetry

Letter to June Jordan in September Letter to June Jordan in September

  I cannot pass the anniversary of that first news event of childhood without returning to your poem. How from my house I watched. And watching, watched my grief-stricken pare…

Jan 11, 2022 / Poems / Lena Khalaf Tuffaha

About 2021

About 2021 About 2021

Disasters happened all year long. Whatever could go wrong went wrong. So, ’21, it’s simply true: We’re glad to see the back of you.

Jan 11, 2022 / Column / Calvin Trillin

Rise of the Far-Right Ultras

Rise of the Far-Right Ultras Rise of the Far-Right Ultras

In Far-Right Vanguard, John Huntington shows just how porous the dividing line has been between the far right and mainstream conservatism.

Jan 11, 2022 / Books & the Arts / Kim Phillips-Fein

When Sidney Poitier Picked Up the Gun

When Sidney Poitier Picked Up the Gun When Sidney Poitier Picked Up the Gun

Notes on a couple of native sons.

Jan 10, 2022 / Gene Seymour

The Black Arts Movement’s Revolution in the South

The Black Arts Movement’s Revolution in the South The Black Arts Movement’s Revolution in the South

A new book offers a sweeping history of the radical art and institutions created in the South by the Black Arts Movement.

Jan 10, 2022 / Books & the Arts / Elias Rodriques

Randall Kennedy Says It Loud

Randall Kennedy Says It Loud Randall Kennedy Says It Loud

A conversation with the Harvard law professor about his new essay collection, the state or racial politics, campus activism, and much more.

Jan 6, 2022 / Q&A / Daniel Steinmetz-Jenkins

Nation Poetry

Stay Stay

after Dr. Elizabeth Sawin If only someone had told you your true extent how you connect to mountain glaciers and tropical orchids. How this is your time for young children, excessi…

Jan 6, 2022 / Poems / Elizabeth Metzger

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