Major Jackson’s poetry is clear, fluent, and musical, sometimes relying on formal structure, sometimes referencing pop culture, and often investigating how seemingly disparate subjects can interact and inform each other. He asserts that a poem “becomes a kind of time capsule,” and as such, can contain references to both Kanye West and ancient Greek mythology, … Read more

“I believe that art is the highest expression of the human spirit,” Joyce Carol Oates declares in The Faith of a Writer, “I believe that we yearn to transcend the merely finite and ephemeral; to participate in something mysterious and communal called ‘culture.’” Oates has dedicated herself to life as an artist. She’s produced over … Read more

Andre Dubus’s fiction dives into the underbelly and wrestles with copies we often turn away from: crime, poverty, infidelity, violence, merciless bullying, and pathetic sex. His lush layers sensory detail ground the reader in the smallest moments of his characters’ lives and their often unresolved conflicts. We tumble along with them, with rarely a redemptive branch … Read more

The voice in a Steve Almond story or essay or blog post is unmistakable, shaped by a tone typically anchored in dry wit, and a sharp, hungry intelligence that seems capable of taking us anywhere. The world, as Almond observes it, is at once hilarious and pathetic, sad and intensely beautiful. And it’s his willingness to … Read more