If there’s one writer who’s identified with the Mississippi River, it’s Mark Twain. He grew up in Hannibal, Missouri — on the river’s edge — and as a young man, he worked as a steamboat pilot. And then he wrote the “Adventures of Huckleberry Finn,” the novel that turned the Mississippi into myth. But it also created one of the most enduring controversies in American literary history: how to depict race relations in America's past. In this interview, Andrew Levy says that "Huckleberry Finn" is actually anti-racist — and when it was first published, the big controversy was about Twain’s depiction of wild children.
Intelligent. Optimistic. Curious.
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Merge is a quartet that combines poetry with jazz music. Cassandra Cleghorn and Erik Lawrence talk with Jim Fleming about their art and how much they have in common with the Beats.
Lawrence Millman wrote the foreward and saw through the publication of Edward Beauclerk Maurice's diary.
Rahna Reiko Rizzuto was unclear how to elicit the stories of Hiroshima survivors. And then September 11th happened.
Peter Handel reviews mystery novels for Pages magazine. He talks about the rise of interest in mystery writers from such countries as Italy, France, Scotland and Sweden.
For centuries, the oddities of nature - like two-headed cats and conjoined twins - fascinated people. Science historian Lorraine Daston says a history of wonders is to some degree a history of pre-modern science.
In 1776 there were no radios or telephones or honking cars, but there were other sounds. The church bell, the town crier, and women beating their laundry all had distinct sounds.
The Book of Revelation is the Bible's last - and most controversial - book. Renowned historian Elaine Pagels explains the enduring power of this apocalyptic story.
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