The recent health care “debate” had both the blue team AND the red team stooping to lows of hysteria and vitriol, getting Americans riled up rather than taking advantage of an opportunity for understanding and education. So it is refreshing to see someone take the latter path, rather than the …

Though you should be familiar with Beowulf, the 8th century Anglo-Saxon heroic epic that has influenced Western thought and storytelling for centuries, you’ve probably never read John Gardner’s Grendel–it’s Beowulf from Grendel’s perspective.

This version is wonderful, not only because of the …

The Age of Innocence, by Edith Wharton, is a book that modern readers will perhaps find hard to appreciate. Not so much from the writing itself — Wharton is one of the masters of literary craft and this book won her the Pulitzer Prize for literature in 1921. Rather, modern readers, raised in an age …