Lapham’s Quarterly

Episode 22: James Romm on Plato and Tyranny The latest episode of The World in Time.

This week on the podcast, Donovan Hohn speaks with James Romm, historian and classicist, about his new book, PLATO AND THE TYRANT: THE FALL OF GREECE'S GREATEST DYNASTY AND THE MAKING OF A PHILOSOPHIC MASTERPIECE.

Blessing the Sow | The Friends of Attention On the varieties of attentive experience.

"What has happened to human attention over the last century is exactly what has happened to the prairielands of America: a monoculture." —The Friends of Attention

Episode 21: The Friends of Attention The latest episode of The World in Time.

“The Cold War laboratory research identified something real about humans: that we can focus on a stimulus on a screen. But it is hardly an adequate account of what it is to be a human person,” says D. Graham Burnett in this week’s episode of The World in Time.

The Haven Ahead | Donovan Hohn A letter from the acting editor.

“If you have contributed, on behalf of all of us at Lapham’s Quarterly, I thank you for helping us with the labors (Promethean and Pythagorean, Apollonian and Dionysian) of creation.” www.laphamsquarterly.org/roundtable/h...

The Haven Ahead | Donovan Hohn A letter from the acting editor.

Read an end-of-the-year letter from acting editor Donovan Hohn. www.laphamsquarterly.org/roundtable/h...

“The Famous Mr. Hendel” | Charles King Baroque music’s glorious revolution.

Charles King on baroque music’s glorious revolution. www.laphamsquarterly.org/roundtable/f...

Save on back issues through the end of 2025. Forty percent off everything in our web store right now. ssl.drgnetwork.com/ecom/AAF/app...

Episode 20: Charles King on Handel's “Messiah” The latest episode of The World in Time.

This week on the podcast, Donovan Hohn speaks with Charles King about his latest book, “Every Valley: The Desperate Lives and Troubled Times That Made Handel’s Messiah.” www.laphamsquarterly.org/content/epis...

The Ruined Cathedral | Jeremy Eichler On Benjamin Britten and the angels of history.

Read an excerpt from “Time’s Echo: Music, Memory, and The Second World War.” www.laphamsquarterly.org/roundtable/r...

The Ruined Cathedral | Jeremy Eichler On Benjamin Britten and the angels of history.

Jeremy Eichler on Benjamin Britten and the angels of history. www.laphamsquarterly.org/roundtable/r...

Episode 19: Jeremy Eichler on Time’s Echo The latest episode of The World in Time.

This week on the podcast, Donovan Hohn speaks with Jeremy Eichler, author of “Time’s Echo: Music, Memory, and the Second World War.” www.laphamsquarterly.org/content/epis...

This Is Hell, Nor Am I Out of It | Stephen Greenblatt On Christopher Marlowe’s Faustian bargains.

Sometime in the late 1580s, Christopher Marlowe came upon a book that jolted him. Entitled “The History of the Damnable Life and Deserved Death of Doctor John Faustus,” it was an English translation, done by someone who signed himself “P.F. Gent.” www.laphamsquarterly.org/roundtable/h...

This Is Hell, Nor Am I Out of It | Stephen Greenblatt On Christopher Marlowe’s Faustian bargains.

Read an excerpt from “Dark Renaissance: The Dangerous Times and Fatal Genius of Shakespeare’s Greatest Rival.” @wwnorton.com www.laphamsquarterly.org/roundtable/h...

Stephen Greenblatt on Christopher Marlowe’s Faustian bargains. www.laphamsquarterly.org/roundtable/h...

Episode 18: Stephen Greenblatt on Christopher Marlowe The latest episode of The World in Time.

This week on the podcast, Donovan Hohn speaks with Stephen Greenblatt about “Dark Renaissance: The Dangerous Times and Fatal Genius of Shakespeare’s Greatest Rival.” www.laphamsquarterly.org/content/epis...

Episode 17: Queequeg and Ishmael in Love (with Alexander Chee, Aaron Sachs, and Caleb Crain) The latest episode of The World in Time.

In which @alexanderchee.bsky.social and @calebcrain.bsky.social propose that Moby Dick, dedicated to Nathaniel Hawthorne, might be read as “a love letter.” www.laphamsquarterly.org/content/epis...

The American Scheme of Things, by Henry Freedland We've recently updated our website to make signing in easier and more secure

“‘It’s awful,’ the historian said.

‘All true,’ I said.”

A collage essay from @hernyfreebland.bsky.social, published by @laphamsquarterly.bsky.social.

Episode 17: Queequeg and Ishmael in Love (with Alexander Chee, Aaron Sachs, and Caleb Crain) The latest episode of The World in Time.

Aaron Sachs, author of Up from the Depths, speaks with Donovan Hohn about chapter 72 of Moby Dick for @laphamsquarterly.bsky.social’s The World in Time podcast:

Another Cruise | Caleb Crain Re-reading Moby Dick at Ahab’s age.

I am now the age of Ahab, who, in chapter 132 of Moby Dick, tells Starbuck that he started whaling as “a boy-harpooneer of eighteen” and has spent “forty years on the pitiless sea.” I, too, have reached my implacability-and-fixed-purpose era. www.laphamsquarterly.org/roundtable/a...

Another Cruise | Caleb Crain Re-reading Moby Dick at Ahab’s age.

Re-reading Moby Dick at Ahab’s age. An essay by @calebcrain.bsky.social. www.laphamsquarterly.org/roundtable/a...

Episode 17: Queequeg and Ishmael in Love (with Alexander Chee, Aaron Sachs, and Caleb Crain) The latest episode of The World in Time.

In an extended, 3-part installment of our intermittent series on Moby Dick and the history of the sea, this podcast considers the novel’s love story—the story of Queequeg and Ishmael’s friendship and marriage—as well as the novel’s dedication to Hawthorne. www.laphamsquarterly.org/content/epis...

Episode 17: Queequeg and Ishmael in Love (with Alexander Chee, Aaron Sachs, and Caleb Crain) The latest episode of The World in Time.

In which I reminisce with @laphamsquarterly.bsky.social about my long career of queering Melville . . .

Episode 17: Queequeg and Ishmael in Love (with Alexander Chee, Aaron Sachs, and Caleb Crain) The latest episode of The World in Time.

I spoke to Donovan Hohn of @laphamsquarterly.bsky.social for their Moby Dick podcast. We talked about Chapter 4, my Queequeg and Ishmael fanfic (Quishmael for my fellow old Tumblr heads) and Melville’s unrequited love for Nathaniel Hawthorne.
www.laphamsquarterly.org/content/epis...

The American Scheme of Things, by Henry Freedland We've recently updated our website to make signing in easier and more secure

“That’s the trouble with dreams of power. It stimulates anxiety about a catastrophe that has yet to happen. ”

@hernyfreebland.bsky.social in a collage essay which was published by @laphamsquarterly.bsky.social.

Episode 16: Brenda Wineapple on the Scopes Trial The latest episode of The World in Time.

“One of the poignancies of Darrow’s life is that it was hard for him to feel better. He wanted people to feel better. There was so much cruelty in the world. I wonder if, in his heart of hearts, Bryan also couldn’t stand that meaninglessness.” www.laphamsquarterly.org/content/epis...

The Trial of the Century | Brenda Wineapple On the hundredth anniversary of Tennessee v. Scopes

Brenda Wineapple on the hundredth anniversary of Tennessee v. Scopes. www.laphamsquarterly.org/roundtable/t...

Episode 16: Brenda Wineapple on the Scopes Trial The latest episode of The World in Time.

This week on the podcast, Donovan Hohn speaks with Brenda Wineapple, longtime member of the Lapham’s Quarterly editorial board. www.laphamsquarterly.org/content/epis...

The American Scheme of Things, by Henry Freedland

The collage essay I put together for @laphamsquarterly.bsky.social out of Lewis Lapham’s sentences is excerpted in the new issue of @harpers.bsky.social.

Feels fittingly full circle: I sourced many of the sentences from his Harper’s columns, and LQ is effectively Readings through history.

Episode 15: Elizabeth Kolbert The latest episode of The World in Time.

This week on the podcast, Donovan Hohn speaks with Elizabeth Kolbert about her new book, “Life on a Little-Known Planet: Dispatches from a Changing World.” www.laphamsquarterly.org/content/epis...