Arts & Culture
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When to quit a book
Some give up without guilt while others insist going cover to cover. Harvard readers share their criteria.
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Lace up gloves, enter ring, and write
Novelist and boxer Laura van den Berg says the two practices have a lot in common
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Unearthed papyrus contains lost scenes from Euripides’ plays
Alums help identify, decipher ‘one of the most significant new finds in Greek literature in this century’
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A photographer who makes historical subjects dance
Wendel White manifests the impetus behind his new monograph during Harvard talk
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LeVar Burton got his Du Bois Medal, and the crowd couldn’t resist
‘Reading Rainbow’ theme breaks out at ceremony honoring Black luminaries — including trailblazers in sports, arts, politics, and more
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When the act of writing itself is part of the art
Calligrapher Wang Dongling creates piece with ‘chaotic script’ before Harvard Art Museums audience
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Why ‘The Exorcist’ is really more of zombie thing
English course offers kaleidoscopic, cross-disciplinary look at horror classic as film, potential play, cultural artifact with long shadow.
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Are drill musicians chronicling violence or exploiting it?
Rappers, activists, scholars debate controversy surrounding subgenre of hip-hop.
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What set them off were the bodies on wall
“The Handmaid’s Tale” author Margaret Atwood, M.A. ’62, whose speculative fiction about women and power has made her both a beloved feminist icon and a repeated object of censorship, returned to Harvard to speak at Sanders Theatre.
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Deep roots of multicultural American art
New Harvard Art Museums show explores interactions between European, Indigenous, and African civilizations in works from Spanish Empire.
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Time for homework. Where’s my Nintendo Switch?
Games have inspired dozens of movies and TV shows recently. A new English class studies growing critical scholarship on the subject.
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‘That’s not how the story went’
Novelist Joshua Cohen and professor James Wood discuss the creation of Cohen’s book, “The Netanyahus: An Account of a Minor and Ultimately Even Negligible Episode in the History of a Very Famous Family.”
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Old as Chaucer, new as #MeToo
Scholar Anna Wilson looks at the role #MeToo plays in Zadie Smith’s “The Wife of Willesden,” an adaption of Chaucer’s “The Wife of Bath’s Tale.”
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Rich history of DIY publishing
Creative people have bypassed gatekeepers for centuries to distribute “what they wanted to share so badly.”
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So who is included in King’s ‘beloved community’?
Black queer poet, scholar Cheryl Clarke discusses achieving Martin Luther King Jr.’s vision.
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If loving you is wrong – let’s explore the ethics
Assistant Professor Quinn White studies the ethics of love and relationships.
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First lesson in Japanese boatbuilding: Don’t speak.
Students make 22-foot skiff in “silent” workshop that puts emphasis on observation — and a good hammering rhythm.
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Finally, taking a bow
Many in jazz circles knew music of these four women, but Radcliffe fellow wants to make sure the rest of us do too.
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Plea from 1980s New York: ‘Please Stay Home’
Darrel Ellis exhibition at Carpenter Center looks back yet feels of the moment with its themes of family history, identity, loss.
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Free Thursday evenings? Like theater? Mixed media? Dance?
The ArtsThursdays initiative increases accessibility and availability of Harvard arts for University affiliates and the wider community.
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Life seeking answers at Giza, Nubia
Egyptologist George Reisner transformed the field, and a biography by Peter Der Manuelian explores not just his career, but his life during what some consider the golden age of Egyptian archaeology.
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Seeing ourselves in different light
Giuliana Bruno’s new book, “Atmospheres of Projection: Environmentality in Art and Screen Media,” reclaims concepts of “projection” as positive force connecting us to one another, affirming possibility of change.
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War-scarred land
Makeda Best on images she chose for award-winning “Devour the Land,” which depicts environmental toll of militarism in U.S.
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Taking fresh shot, once again, to debunk myth of Jewish conspiracy plot
Dasha Bough ’23 created an animated documentary challenging one of the world’s oldest and most dangerous and persistent conspiracy theories.
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New translation of Mishnah looks to make ‘unyielding’ text accessible
Hebrew literature and philosophy professor’s project aims to make ‘unyielding’ text of ancient Jewish accessible.
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Keeping up with the Joneses 2.0
Author and Harvard alum W. David Marx digs into how social aspirations underlie all our choices.
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Finding herself in chapter, verse
Far from her native Indianapolis, Alyssa Gaines steeps herself in life on Harvard’s campus.
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Scene-stealing puppets of ‘Pi’
Nick Barnes talks about animal puppets he co-designed for stage version of best-selling novel, now playing at Harvard’s A.R.T.
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Hollywood’s messaging problem: Sometimes people feel insulted
Experts took a virtual look at the role of satire in pushing climate change action, with reviews mixed on a recent film.
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A singular poet
Creative process and Jewish tradition were central to a lively conversation as Nobel Prize-winning poet Louise Glück delivered the Center for Jewish Studies’ annual Doft Lecture.
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What coin tells you about realm
New classics professor Irene Soto Marín mines answers to question about ancient Egyptian life, economy from everyday artifacts.
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Book as tree, inside and out
A Pittsburgh artist who seeks to honor authors has transcribed Richard Powers’ Pulitzer Prize-winning “The Overstory” onto a scroll reminiscent of a redwood tree’s 160-foot cross section. It’s on display through January at the Arnold Arboretum.
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The boy king’s throne
On the 100th anniversary of discovering Tutankhamun’s tomb, an Egyptian jewel comes to Harvard Museum of the Ancient Near East.
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Laverne Cox, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar among Du Bois winners
Hutchins Center for African and African American Research returned after three years to award the W.E.B. Du Bois Medal to seven luminaries.
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Face to face with ancient Egyptians
Realistic mummy portraits, on view at Harvard Art Museums, shed light on life, death in multicultural Roman era 2,000 years ago
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Buffeted by unending tides of grief
Namwali Serpell’s novel explores reality, memory, and race, class of broken family after the death of a child.