Casey Cep
Casey Cep is a staff writer at The New Yorker and the author of “Furious Hours: Murder, Fraud, and the Last Trial of Harper Lee,” which was a New York Times best-seller and named one of the best books of the year by the Washington Post and others. She is a graduate of Harvard College and the University of Oxford, where she studied as a Rhodes Scholar. She lives with her family on the Eastern Shore of Maryland.
What It Means to See Jesus
A new book, at once skeptical and devotional, considers visions of Christ from the early days of Christianity to the present.
Should We Believe the Stories of Men Mistaken for Gods?
A new book casts a mostly skeptical eye over the tales long told about Christopher Columbus, Captain Cook, and many more.
Anne Carson’s Obsession with Herakles
In “H of H Playbook,” the poet considers war, guilt, and the mythological strongman.
What American Christians Hear at Church
Drawing on newly ubiquitous online services, Pew has tried to catalogue the subject matter of contemporary sermons.
Coins, the Overlooked Keys to History
A delightful new book argues that numismatics—the study of coins—is the “beautiful science of civilizations.”
Edward Gorey’s Toys
The brilliantly macabre writer and illustrator also made his own stuffed dolls, which have a stylishness and craftsmanship in keeping with all his art.
Noticing the Mothers of the Old Testament
As the novelist Marilynne Robinson says, Biblical history so often depends on the birth of a baby.
Why Did So Many Victorians Try to Speak with the Dead?
Many explanations have been offered for Spiritualism, but the movement was more than a fad.
What We Can and Can’t Learn from a New Translation of the Gospels
Sarah Ruden aims to return familiar texts to the fresh clay from which they were made.
A Kansas Bookshop’s Fight with Amazon Is About More Than the Price of Books
The owner of the Raven bookstore, in Lawrence, wants to tell you about all the ways that the e-commerce giant is hurting American downtowns.
When the Barbizon Gave Women Rooms of Their Own
The story of New York City’s most famous women-only hotel is also a story of class and sexual politics in the twentieth century.
The Blackwell Sisters and the Harrowing History of Modern Medicine
A new biography of the pioneering doctors shows why “first” can be a tricky designation.
Science’s Demons, from Descartes to Darwin and Beyond
How supernatural conceptions have advanced our understanding of the natural universe.
William Faulkner’s Demons
In his own life, the novelist failed to truly acknowledge the evils of slavery and segregation. But he did so with savage thoroughness in his fiction.
The Tennessee Solution to Disappearing Book Reviews
Chapter 16 is one of only a few nonprofit media outlets in the country dedicated to coverage of the arts.
Marilynne Robinson’s Essential American Stories
The author of “Housekeeping,” “Gilead,” and, now, “Jack” looks to history not just for the origins of America’s ailments but for their remedy, too.
My Local Confederate Monument
I thought that the statue would finally come down this summer. I was wrong.
“Do You Think You’re Not Involved?” The Racial Reckoning of “Blood at the Root”
The poet Patrick Phillips’s painful survey of a decades-long reign of terror in rural Georgia stands out as the kind of reckoning that other Americans might well undertake now, wherever they call home.
Telling the Stories of the Dead Is Essential Work
In the age of the coronavirus, obituaries have started to run long—not individually but, tragically, collectively.
What It Means to See Jesus
A new book, at once skeptical and devotional, considers visions of Christ from the early days of Christianity to the present.
Should We Believe the Stories of Men Mistaken for Gods?
A new book casts a mostly skeptical eye over the tales long told about Christopher Columbus, Captain Cook, and many more.
Anne Carson’s Obsession with Herakles
In “H of H Playbook,” the poet considers war, guilt, and the mythological strongman.
What American Christians Hear at Church
Drawing on newly ubiquitous online services, Pew has tried to catalogue the subject matter of contemporary sermons.
Coins, the Overlooked Keys to History
A delightful new book argues that numismatics—the study of coins—is the “beautiful science of civilizations.”
Edward Gorey’s Toys
The brilliantly macabre writer and illustrator also made his own stuffed dolls, which have a stylishness and craftsmanship in keeping with all his art.
Noticing the Mothers of the Old Testament
As the novelist Marilynne Robinson says, Biblical history so often depends on the birth of a baby.
Why Did So Many Victorians Try to Speak with the Dead?
Many explanations have been offered for Spiritualism, but the movement was more than a fad.
What We Can and Can’t Learn from a New Translation of the Gospels
Sarah Ruden aims to return familiar texts to the fresh clay from which they were made.
A Kansas Bookshop’s Fight with Amazon Is About More Than the Price of Books
The owner of the Raven bookstore, in Lawrence, wants to tell you about all the ways that the e-commerce giant is hurting American downtowns.
When the Barbizon Gave Women Rooms of Their Own
The story of New York City’s most famous women-only hotel is also a story of class and sexual politics in the twentieth century.
The Blackwell Sisters and the Harrowing History of Modern Medicine
A new biography of the pioneering doctors shows why “first” can be a tricky designation.
Science’s Demons, from Descartes to Darwin and Beyond
How supernatural conceptions have advanced our understanding of the natural universe.
William Faulkner’s Demons
In his own life, the novelist failed to truly acknowledge the evils of slavery and segregation. But he did so with savage thoroughness in his fiction.
The Tennessee Solution to Disappearing Book Reviews
Chapter 16 is one of only a few nonprofit media outlets in the country dedicated to coverage of the arts.
Marilynne Robinson’s Essential American Stories
The author of “Housekeeping,” “Gilead,” and, now, “Jack” looks to history not just for the origins of America’s ailments but for their remedy, too.
My Local Confederate Monument
I thought that the statue would finally come down this summer. I was wrong.
“Do You Think You’re Not Involved?” The Racial Reckoning of “Blood at the Root”
The poet Patrick Phillips’s painful survey of a decades-long reign of terror in rural Georgia stands out as the kind of reckoning that other Americans might well undertake now, wherever they call home.
Telling the Stories of the Dead Is Essential Work
In the age of the coronavirus, obituaries have started to run long—not individually but, tragically, collectively.