Katabasis
By Lucía Estrada
Longlisted for the 2020 PEN Award for Poetry in Translation Lucía Estrada’s Katabasis, winner of the 2017 Bogotá Poetry Prize, is the first full collection of poetry by a Colombian woman to be translated into English. It takes its title from the Greek word for descent, referring to both classical knowledge quests into the underworld […]
The Black Widows of The Eternal City
The true story of Rome's most infamous poisoners
“The Black Widows of the Eternal City” offers, for the first time, a book-length study of an infamous cause celebre in seventeenth-century Rome, how it resonated then and has continued to resonate: the 1659 investigation and prosecution of Gironima Spana and dozens of Roman widows, who shared a particularly effective poison to murder their husbands. […]
Since 1948
Israeli Literature in the Making
A portrait of Israeli literature in its full transnational and multilingual complexity. Toward the end of the twentieth century, an unprecedented surge of writing altered the Israeli literary scene in profound ways. As fresh creative voices and multiple languages vied for recognition, diversity replaced consensus. Genres once accorded lower status—such as the graphic novel and […]
‘Truths and Reckonings’
“Amnesia is not the right word,” said Geoff K. Ward, “because we’ve forgotten without ever really knowing.” In “Truths and Reckonings,” the show he curated for Washington University’s Kemper Art Museum, Ward confronts histories of racist violence with the aim of untangling their continuing legacies.
Hope in a time of uncertainty
Unprecedented times present the opportunity to develop innovative, lasting and positive change. It’s in this spirit that the 8th McDonnell International Scholars Academy Symposium will proceed, beginning with a virtual global town hall meeting Oct. 8. The event, featuring scholars and leaders from around the world, is free and open to the public.
‘Uncontrollable Blackness’
In his new book, “Uncontrollable Blackness: African American Men and Criminality in Jim Crow New York,” historian Douglas Flowe at Washington University in St. Louis investigates the meanings of crime, violence and masculinity in the lives of those facing economic isolation, segregation and overt racial attack.
Wicked Flesh
Black Women, Intimacy, and Freedom in the Atlantic World
The story of freedom pivots on the choices black women made to retain control over their bodies and selves, their loved ones, and their futures.
War, reporting and the Tower of Babel
Richard Chapman, executive producer of “Dateline-Saigon,” discusses the documentary, the dangers journalists faced during the early years of the Vietnam War, and lessons for contemporary reporters and readers.
Juneteenth and collective progress
Douglas Flowe, assistant professor of history, discusses the history of Juneteenth and its continued resonance for all Americans.
When the conspiracy is real
Umbrella Man. Outside agitators. Agents provocateur. As protests sparked by the killing of George Floyd continue, conspiracy theories and “false flag” charges have flown fast and furious. But sometimes the conspiracy is real. In “F.B. Eyes: How J. Edgar Hoover’s Ghostreaders Framed African American Literature” (2015), William J. Maxwell, professor of English in Arts & Sciences at Washington University in St. Louis, details a decades-long harassment campaign waged against prominent African American writers and activists.
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