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Painting of passengers in a 19th century bus, featuring men and women in period dress, one holding a basket of flowers.

Elegance and hustle

How French modernists from Proust to Mallarmé were alarmed and inspired by the voracious dynamism of the newspaper world

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Painting of passengers in a 19th century bus, featuring men and women in period dress, one holding a basket of flowers.

essay

Stories and literature

Elegance and hustle

How French modernists from Proust to Mallarmé were alarmed and inspired by the voracious dynamism of the newspaper world

Max McGuinness

Popular this month

Photo of a man in a red shirt praying on a church pew, hands clasped, with a notebook beside him in dim lighting.

essay

Cognition and intelligence

The power of prayer

Praying is a cognitive practice full of problem-solving resources. You can learn from it even if you don’t want to do it

Eleanor Schille-Hudson

Painting of a historic city square with a tall clock tower, statues, carriages, and groups of people in period clothing.

essay

History

Why history is always political

In his work on republicanism as a living idea, J G A Pocock showed that contesting history is part of a robust civic life

Rosario López

Photo of a dark, rugged rock formation emerging from blurred ocean waves under a cloudy sky.

essay

Deep time

Roaming rocks

Metamorphic rocks are our emissaries from the deep, travelling to alien realms and revealing the restless nature of Earth

Marcia Bjornerud

Digital artwork of a forest inside a circular frame with geometric lines, displayed against a black background.

essay

Stories and literature

Laboratories of the impossible

By testing the boundaries of reality, Spanish-language authors have created a sublime counterpart to experimental physics

Joshua Roebke

Heron standing on a small patch of greenery surrounded by calm water with a lush forest in the background.

essay

Earth science and climate

The planetary fix

Despite decades of inaction we can avert the climate Hellocene and restore the atmosphere to keep our world habitable

Rob Jackson

Aerial photo of an archaeological excavation site in a barren landscape with workers digging and examining the area.

video

Archaeology

What’s an ancient Greek brick doing in a Sumerian city? An archeological investigation

16 minutes

A masked nurse in scrubs sitting in a hospital waiting area.

essay

Bioethics

Moral resilience

Nurses experience deep suffering when they can’t act according to their moral compass. Our research shows a way forward

Cynda Hylton Rushton

Photo of three women viewed from behind near a lake with trees. One holds a megaphone and wears a colourful embroidered shirt.

video

Family life

The migrants missing in Mexico, and the mothers who won’t stop searching for them

21 minutes

Illustration of a hand dropping a coin into another hand within an eye-shaped frame on a textured background.

video

Virtues and vices

Why Jean-Jacques Rousseau and Adam Smith were divided on the virtues of vanity

5 minutes

Painting of a bustling 17th-century market square with people, horses and a church, surrounded by historic buildings and boats on a waterway.

essay

Global history

There are no pure cultures

All of our religions, stories, languages and norms were muddled and mixed through mobility and exchange throughout history

Inanna Hamati-Ataya

Line drawing of a frog from a below perspective, with circles of various sizes indicating ripples.

video

Ecology and environmental sciences

The tree frog die-off that sparked a global mystery – and revealed a dark truth

15 minutes

Photo of a man in a red shirt praying on a church pew, hands clasped, with a notebook beside him in dim lighting.

essay

Cognition and intelligence

The power of prayer

Praying is a cognitive practice full of problem-solving resources. You can learn from it even if you don’t want to do it

Eleanor Schille-Hudson

Painting of a stormy sea with two sailing ships in distress and people struggling on the rocky shore.

video

Beauty and aesthetics

In art, the sublime is a feedback loop, evolving with whatever’s next to threaten us

9 minutes

Photo of three vertical beams of red laser light in a dark room creating a glowing effect on the floor.

essay

Philosophy of science

Aha = wow

We surveyed thousands of scientists in four countries and learned just how important beauty is to them

Bridget Ritz & Brandon Vaidyanathan

Vintage sepia photo of a Black man in a buttoned coat against a plain background with decorative border.

video

History

From Afghanistan to Virginia – the Muslims who fought in the American Civil War

22 minutes

Colourful painting depicting a range of people eating, drinking and engaging in other activities, with floral patterns.

essay

Art

Threads of resistance

Knitting and embroidery are laden with stereotypes of domestic femininity – and the subversive potential for protest

Gemma McKenzie

Painting of a historic city square with a tall clock tower, statues, carriages, and groups of people in period clothing.

essay

History

Why history is always political

In his work on republicanism as a living idea, J G A Pocock showed that contesting history is part of a robust civic life

Rosario López

Illustration of two people observing ants on a forest floor with a textured tree background.

video

Family life

One family’s harrowing escape from postwar Vietnam, told in a poignant metaphor

10 minutes

Digital artwork of a forest inside a circular frame with geometric lines, displayed against a black background.

essay

Stories and literature

Laboratories of the impossible

By testing the boundaries of reality, Spanish-language authors have created a sublime counterpart to experimental physics

Joshua Roebke

A beach with a white S U V, chairs and a bird in the foreground, and a rocket on a launch pad in the background.

video

Fairness and equality

Visit the small Texas community that lives in the shadow of SpaceX launches

14 minutes

Photo of a dark, rugged rock formation emerging from blurred ocean waves under a cloudy sky.

essay

Deep time

Roaming rocks

Metamorphic rocks are our emissaries from the deep, travelling to alien realms and revealing the restless nature of Earth

Marcia Bjornerud

Close-up photo of a textured surface with vibrant purple, orange and blue abstract patterns.

video

Film and visual culture

Our world has very different contours when a millimetre is blown up to a full screen

8 minutes

Vintage black-and-white photo of a colonial-era courtroom with seated officials and standing West African defendants in traditional attire.

essay

Human rights and justice

What’s in the rule of law?

The British Empire used a great democratic ideal to manufacture racial difference and rationalise colonial domination

Kanika Sharma

Photo of Daniel Dennett looking to the side with a white beard and glasses wearing a suit against a black background.

essay

Philosophy of mind

The stories of Daniel Dennett

Often metaphorical and allusive, the philosopher’s work will long be remembered for how it grappled with everyday thought

Tim Bayne

Black and white photo of British and German First World War soldiers wearing winter uniforms and hats, one with a cigarette, looking at the camera.

video

War and peace

A frontline soldier’s moving account of the fabled ‘Christmas truce’ of 1914

12 minutes

Ancient fresco showing two figures in flowing robes dancing against a dark blue background, one holding a tambourine.

essay

Dance and theatre

Why the old man dances

Religious ritual to appease the gods or free expression of human agency? For the ancient Romans, dance could be both

Karin Schlapbach

Cartoon of three surgeons wearing scrubs and masks performing surgery on a patient, with surgical lights overhead.

video

Bioethics

What a 1970 experiment reveals about the possibility and perils of ‘head transplants’

6 minutes

Black and white photo of a large group of boys and a few adults standing on bare ground, all dressed in 1960s attire.

essay

Education

A valiant experiment

The progressive and remarkably innovative Woodmead School briefly flourished amid the viciousness of apartheid South Africa

David Dyzenhaus