Literature

An erotic poem written by Frederick the Great has been discovered in Berlin. Is the Prussian king describing a liaison he had with the Italian philosopher Francesco Algarotti?

Chris Corin ressurects the life of a Soviet survivor whose remarkable and significant career deserves to be better known.

Jane Austen's Sense and Sensibility was first published in London by Thomas Egerton on October 30th, 1811.

The American abolitionist and author Harriet Beecher Stowe was born on 14 June 1811.

The Aeneid, Virgil’s epic Latin poem, offers as profound an insight into the current Libyan crisis as any 24-hour news channel, argues Robert Zaretsky.

Janina Ramirez, presenter of a new BBC documentary on Iceland and its literature, explores the country’s sagas, their wide-ranging legacy and what they tell us about the history and culture of the Arctic island and its peoples.

Though it is immersed in the theological ideas of the Middle Ages, the cosmology of Dante’s Divine Comedy is sophisticated, sceptical and tolerant, argues James Burge.

The Spectator was first published on March 1st, 1711. 

On a research trip to Moscow in the late 1990s, Deborah Kaple was given a package of papers by a former Gulag official who believed its contents would be of great interest to a western audience.

The innocence of France’s Captain Dreyfus – a Jewish officer incarcerated on Devil’s Island after he was accused of spying for Germany – has long been established. But was there a real traitor? And what part did Oscar Wilde play in the murky affair?