Literature

On the 250th anniversary of her birth, Jane Austen still has lessons for readers of history.

Epic of the Earth: Reading Homer’s Iliad in the Fight for a Dying World by Edith Hall sees the signs of environmental collapse amid the adventures of Achilles.

Can Vietdamned: How the World’s Greatest Minds Put America on Trial by Clive Webb rescue Bertrand Russell and Jean-Paul Sartre’s activism from irrelevance?

The monks of Peterborough told strange tales of the Wild Hunt. Were they ghostly apparitions or wishful thinking?

The Brothers Grimm: A Biography by Ann Schmiesing brings folklore’s most famous double act out of the shadowy realm of legend.

According to some, written history began in the 14th century. It may seem ridiculous, but the Phantom Time conspiracy theory has serious implications.

Man-Devil: The Mind and Times of Bernard Mandeville, the Wickedest Man in Europe by John J. Callanan revels in the making of the controversial satirist and philosopher.

A new book for the new year is an old British custom, but an old book can be even better.

A viking mercenary who fought on three sides, who was Thorkell the Tall?

Who Really Wrote the Bible: The Story of the Scribes by William M. Schniedewind asks what authorship meant to the hidden hands behind the Old Testament.