Literary Essays

A collection of the year’s best essays, selected by Pulitzer Prize–winning critic Wesley Morris and series editor Kim Dana Kupperman. “Imparting some piece of yourself—any part—is arduous and warrants some kind of commendation,” writes guest editor Wesley Morris in his introduction...

In a gauntlet-throwing essay at the start of this brilliant assemblage, Cynthia Ozick stakes the claim that, just as surely as critics require a steady supply of new fiction, novelists need great critics to build a vibrant community on the foundation of literary history. For decades Ozick herself has been one of our great critics, as these essays so clearly display. She offers models of critical analysis of writers from the mid-20th century to today, from Saul Bellow, Bernard Malamud, and Kafka to William Gass and Martin Amis, all assembled in provocatively named groups.

Emily Nemens’s Clutch follows a group of five friends as they navigate the biggest challenges of their lives, asking: When you’re hanging on by your fingernails, how can you extend a hand to the ones you love? As undergrads, Gregg, Reba, Hillary, Bella, and Carson formed the kind of rare...

"All first-rate criticism first defines what we are confronting," the late, great jazz critic Whitney Balliett once wrote. By that measure, the essays of Christopher Hitchens are in the first tier. For nearly four decades, Hitchens has been telling us, in pitch-perfect prose, what we confront...

David Hume (1711-1776) remains a major figure in British philosophy, particularly for two or three works, including A Treatise on Human Nature and An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding. But he was also a prolific essayist and historian. During his lifetime Essays Moral, Political and Literary went through a number of editions and collections, far outselling his philosophy. Now, the situation is reversed. But listening to the essays today it is difficult to see why.

“Refreshingly candid...Niazi is telling her story in medias res, inviting readers to figure the whole mess out with her—and in this era of gentle-parenting TikToks and general advice oversaturation, that feels like a gift.” —Emma Specter, Vogue Channeling the subversive and sharp-eyed...

People often believe relationships succeed or fail because of emotion. More often, they succeed or fail because of patterns no one realizes they are repeating. Identity does not form in isolation. It forms through attachment, approval, rejection, and adaptation. Long before people consciously choose who they want to be, relationships have already begun shaping who they become. Metaphors We Live By: Love, Relationships, & Identity is a collection of forty essays exploring how connection quietly shapes identity, belonging, and the versions of ourselves we carry into adulthood. Inside, you ...

Every novel Louisa May Alcott wrote about growing up — all eight, in one edition. Plus two critical essays that read them the way they deserve to be read. Louisa May Alcott published Little Women in 1868 under pressure: from her publisher, from her readers, from a market that wanted girls to behave. She spent the rest of her career writing around that pressure — eight novels, dozens of stories, a body of work that kept asking the same question in different ways: what does it cost a woman to become herself in a world designed to prevent it? This edition collects all eight novels and ...

This work offers glimpses of North Mississippi from the time the Chickasaws (led by powerful mixed-blood families) were forced by give up the last of their Mississippi lands and move west. We see settlers flocking to our homeland ( billed as cotton’s last empire), buying land, building, and establishing institutions. The 1850’s issued in a golden age of great prosperity. This ended with a destructive war. After the war, a culture reformed itself. Throughout the decades, a literary strain was developing. Under the influence of this peculiar history and the problems of race emerged a ...

A new rip-roaring essay collection from the smart, edgy, hilarious, unabashedly raunchy, and bestselling Samantha Irby. Irby is forty, and increasingly uncomfortable in her own skin despite what Inspirational Instagram Infographics have promised her. She has left her job as a receptionist at a...

Author Peter Ackroyd has won the Somerset Maugham Award, the Whitbread Novel of the Year, and the Guardian Fiction Prize, and was shortlisted for the Booker Prize. Based on Geoffrey Chaucer’s immortal work, this retelling of The Canterbury Tales follows a party of travelers as they tell stories amongst themselves about love and chivalry, saints and legends, travel and adventure. Through allegory, satire, and humor, the tales help pass the time during their journey.

In this autobiography, woven from personal pieces composed over the course of a celebrated writing life of more than 50 years, you'll meet William Buckley the boy, growing up in a family of 10 children; Buckley the daring young political enfant terrible, whose debut book, God and Man at Yale, was a shocking New York Times best seller; Buckley the editor of National Review, widely hailed as the founder of the modern conservative movement; and Buckley the husband and father.

Introduction by New York Times bestselling author Henry Louis Gates Jr. Spanning more than 35 years of work, the first comprehensive collection of essays, criticism, and articles by the legendary author of the Harlem Renaissance, Zora Neale Hurston, showcasing the evolution of her distinctive...

Six novels. One life. The complete arc of the most beloved heroine in Canadian literature — from the red-haired girl who arrived uninvited at Green Gables to the woman who sent her sons to war. Lucy Maud Montgomery published Anne of Green Gables in 1908 after years of rejection. The manuscript had been turned down so many times she had put it away in a hat box. When it finally appeared, it sold out within months and made her famous overnight. She spent the rest of her life writing sequels she hadn't planned, living a life considerably less free than the one she had imagined for Anne. Anne...

The four novels that gave American literature its voice — and two essays that explain why one of them changed everything. Mark Twain invented American literature twice. The first time was The Adventures of Tom Sawyer in 1876 — a boy's world of summer, caves, and the Mississippi River, told with the warmth of a man who remembered childhood as a country you could never return to. The second time was Adventures of Huckleberry Finn in 1884, where the same river becomes a moving argument about freedom, race, and the cost of conscience. Hemingway said all modern American literature comes from...

NAMED A MOST ANTICIPATED BOOK OF THE YEAR BY TIME, NPR, OPRAH DAILY, KIRKUS REVIEWS, DEBUTIFUL AND MORE! “In equal measure compelling and heart wrenching. ” —Claire Messud “Overwhelming and exquisite–in a word, sublime.” —Namwali Serpell “A novel of remarkable delicacy and power...

This is Irving Stone's powerful and passionate biographical novel of Michelangelo. His time: the turbulent Renaissance, the years of poisoning princes, warring popes, the all-powerful Medici family, the fanatic monk Savonarola. His loves: the frail and lovely daughter of Lorenzo de Medici; the...

A collection of the year’s best short stories, selected by celebrated bestselling author Lauren Groff, author of Matrix and The Vaster Wilds, and series editor Heidi Pitlor. “There have never been as many exquisitely built stories in existence than there are now,” proclaims guest editor...

Brought to you by Penguin. THE SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER The incredible first memoir from the Booker-winning radical icon Arundhati Roy, author of The God of Small Things Arundhati Roy’s first work of memoir, this is a soaring account, both intimate and inspiring, of how the author became the...

Brought to you by Penguin. This Penguin Classic is performed by Saul Reichlin, known for their roles in War and Peace and Miss Marple. This definitive recording includes an introduction by R.J. Hollingdale, also read by Saul Reichlin. Nietzsche was one of the most revolutionary thinkers in...