Novel Ideas: Puzzle #102
"Place to get free spirits"
Literature
Yes, You Could Be Both Openly Gay and Conservative in the '80s
The novelist Thomas Mallon's journals reveal a side of the '80s that the standard gay histories—and standard conservative histories—tend to ignore.
Helen Lewis: The Dark Side of Genius
In The Genius Myth, the journalist delivers a sharp, funny takedown of our obsession with "brilliant" men, showing that behind every so-called genius is a crowd and a big PR machine.
The Liberal Legacy of Mario Vargas Llosa
The Peruvian novelist, who passed away this Sunday, was a lifelong defender of freedom in all its forms.
Leigh Stein and Julius Taranto: Did Wokeness and Trump Kill Literary Satire?
The novelists join the podcast for a sharp, satirical dive into fiction, free speech, and the absurdity of modern culture.
The Socialists and Suffragettes of Oz
Long before Wicked came along, America's homegrown fairyland was filled with politics.
Wicked and the Importance of the Public Domain
Movies like Wicked draw on classic works no longer under copyright protection.
The 2024 Gift Guide for Freedom Lovers
From art to vice to games and maybe a little magic, Reason's staff is here to help you with your gift giving.
The Libertarian Pioneer Who Wrote for America's Biggest Black Newspaper
To Rose Wilder Lane, African Americans' achievements were all the more amazing given their disadvantaged starting point.
Rachel Maddow: Liking The Lord of the Rings Is 'Far-Right'
Yes, J.D. Vance likes J.R.R. Tolkien. So do most people.
Review: Charles Fort's Underrated Influence
The eccentric writer cast a long shadow, leaving a mark not only on the world of Bigfoot hunters and UFO buffs but in literature and radical politics.
Literary Subfields, Ecocriticism, and the Eclipse of the Humanities
Len Gutkin in Liberties on the decline of the humanities.
Freedom Towns: A Vast but Largely Forgotten Movement of Black Self-Rule
Zora Neale Hurston’s hometown of Eatonville, Florida, was one of the first all-black municipalities incorporated in the U.S.
Review: The Florida Novels of Charles Willeford
“Just tell the truth, and they’ll accuse you of writing black humor.”
Sandra Newman: Reimagining 1984 from Julia's Perspective
At the behest of George Orwell's estate, the acclaimed novelist has brilliantly recast his most famous work.
Salman Rushdie: 'Literature Is Powerful, Writers Are Fragile'
"If we can't trust ourselves as a culture to accommodate ideas we don't like," the novelist said at the Library of Congress, "then our ideas lose their value as well, because they become authoritarian."
Milan Kundera's Eternal Feud With Václav Havel
In clashing bitterly over how an individual should best confront government evil, the two most famous Czech anti-communists unwittingly demonstrated how totalitarianism mangles human lives.
Agatha Christie Books Get Woke Makeover, Join Roald Dahl and Ian Fleming
Books by the acclaimed mystery author have been edited, ostensibly to comport with modern sensibilities.
E.E. Cummings Celebrated Libertarian Utopia
His most popular book, The Enormous Room, was recently reprinted for its 100th anniversary.
A Thursday Bonus Reason Roundtable! Live From Reason Weekend in California
Plus: did the editors sing Happy Birthday to Adam Smith?
A Thursday Bonus Reason Roundtable! Live From Reason Weekend in California
Plus: did the editors sing Happy Birthday to Adam Smith?
Kat Rosenfield: Why It's Important for Novelists To Speak Freely
The mystery writer and cultural critic is an outspoken defender of free thinking and cultural appropriation.
Save Roald Dahl Books From the Dreaded Sensitivity Readers
Let Augustus Gloop be fat.
Hulu's 1619 Project Docuseries Peddles False History
The first episode paints an enslaver, plantation master, and Royalist autocrat as a leading and even celebrated agent of emancipation.
Prattle, a Shakespearean Version of Wordle, Won't Let You Guess 'Slave'
"This anti-free speech, anti-intellectual, anti-common-sense action deserves all the scorn it can get," says Roy Thomas, former editor in chief of Marvel Comics.
Now Anybody Can Write a Sherlock Holmes Story
Nearly a century after author Arthur Conan Doyle's death, the character is finally free.
Are We Entering an Era of #MeToo Reckoning?
The movement's net caught a lot of men like writer Junot Diaz—ordinary jerks rather than formidable serial predators.
How George Dawes Greene's The Moth Reinvented Storytelling
The novelist talks about The Kingdoms of Savannah and creating The Moth.
How Stalin Toyed With Mikhail Bulgakov
The author of The Master and Margarita faced a bewildering mixture of rewards and censorship.
George Dawes Green: Why the Past—and Storytelling—Is Never Dead
The creator of The Moth talks about why the past is never dead, especially in his new novel The Kingdoms of Savannah.
Zora Neale Hurston's Inconvenient Individualism
The author of Their Eyes Were Watching God defies easy political categorization.
Review: The Second Shooter
Despite caricaturing (some) gun owners, Nick Mamatas' conspiracy-fueled science fiction novel avoids moralizing in favor of dark humor.
Nathan Rabin: Why Gen X Is Super Media-Literate
The Joy of Trash author talks about how D.A.R.E., bad TV, Weird Al Yankovic, and 9/11 created a generation of ironic idealists.
Nathan Rabin: Confessions of a Trash-Culture Connoisseur
Nathan Rabin celebrates The Joy of Trash—and Gen X irony and cynicism—one terrible movie, book, and TV show at a time.
Lambda Literary Awards Reject LGBTQ Author After She Defended a Friend Accused of Transphobia
"I am a queer woman, and I was silenced most of my life," writes Lauren Hough, author of Leaving Isn't the Hardest Thing.
Kat Rosenfield: Meet Joe Rogan's Dumbest Fans
The novelist and essayist attacked CNN's handling of Neil Young vs. Joe Rogan—and promptly drew the ugly ire of the podcaster's admirers!
When the 'Native Son' Became 'The Man Who Lived Underground'
One of Richard Wright's best books went unpublished in his lifetime, due to "unbearable" scenes of police brutality. Now at last it is in print.
Poetry Tuesday!: "The Dormouse and the Doctor" by A.A. Milne
"There once was a Dormouse who lived in a bed / Of delphiniums (blue) and geraniums (red) / And all the day long he'd a wonderful view / Of geraniums (red) and delphiniums (blue)...."
Poetry Wednesday!: "somewhere i have never travelled,gladly beyond" by e.e. cummings
"(i do not know what it is about you that closes and opens; / only something in me understands / the voice of your eyes is deeper than all roses) / nobody,not even the rain,has such small hands"
Poetry Wednesday!: "Стихи о Петербурге" ("Verses About Petersburg") by Anna Akhmatova (Russian)
"Вновь Исакий в облаченье / Из литого серебра. / Стынет в грозном нетерпенье / Конь Великого Петра...."
Poetry Tuesday!: "A-Sitting on a Gate" by Lewis Carroll
"I'll tell thee everything I can; / There's little to relate, / I saw an aged, aged man, / A-sitting on a gate...."
Louis Menand: 'Freedom Was the Slogan of the Times'
Why postwar culture from Jack Kerouac to Andy Warhol to James Baldwin to Susan Sontag to Yoko Ono battled boundaries hemming them in.
