In Dialogue with Lucas Bessire and Emmet Gowin April 29, 2022 In The One Hundred Circle Farm, renowned photographer Emmet Gowin (b. 1941) presents stunning aerial images of center-pivot irrigation systems in the western and midwestern United States. In this short discussion with anthropologist and National Book Award finalist Lucas Bessire, author of Running Out, Gowin offers insight into his powerful photographic survey of the impact of irrigation systems on landscape. Read More
Andrei Sourakov and Rachel Warren Chadd on The Lives of Moths April 29, 2022 While butterflies may get more press than moths, Andrei Sourakov and Rachel Warren Chadd reveal that the lopsided attention is unjust. Read More
Kafka’s “Ultimate Things”: A new reading of the Zürau aphorisms April 27, 2022 As Princeton University Press celebrates the launch of a new annotated and freshly translated edition of Kafka’s aphorisms, the Press has invited me to supply a couple of amuse-bouches from the two introductory passages to the collection, namely my Translator’s Note plus a brief excerpt from Reiner Stach’s Foreword. Read More
A Vertical Art: On Poetry April 26, 2022 In A Vertical Art, acclaimed poet Simon Armitage takes a refreshingly common-sense approach to an art form that can easily lend itself to grand statements and hollow gestures. Read More
Jeff Deutsch on In Praise of Good Bookstores April 26, 2022 Do we need bookstores in the twenty-first century? If so, what makes a good one? In this beautifully written book, Jeff Deutsch—the director of Chicago’s Seminary Co-op Bookstores, one of the finest bookstores in the world—pays loving tribute to one of our most important and endangered civic institutions. Read More
The universe from a 3D perspective April 25, 2022 The universe is huge. If we could travel at the speed of light (and we can’t) it would take us only about a second to go to the Moon. Read More
Poems from After Callimachus April 20, 2022 In After Callimachus, esteemed poet and critic Stephanie Burt’s attentive translations and inspired adaptations introduce the work, spirit, and letter of Callimachus to today’s poetry readers. Read More
Why tech innovation alone isn’t good enough April 20, 2022 The list of crises we face today seems to grow daily. As if inequality and civil wars and global warming and refugee crises weren't enough, we have also grappled with a global pandemic and the sudden threat of nuclear war. Read More
R. Douglas Arnold on Fixing Social Security April 20, 2022 Since its establishment, Social Security has become the financial linchpin of American retirement. Yet demographic trends—longer lifespans and declining birthrates—mean that this popular program now pays more in benefits than it collects in revenue. Read More
Listen in: Africa’s Struggle for Its Art April 14, 2022 For decades, African nations have fought for the return of countless works of art stolen during the colonial era and placed in Western museums. In Africa’s Struggle for Its Art, Bénédicte Savoy brings to light this largely unknown but deeply important history. Read More
Join us in support of our Earth April 13, 2022 With our global commitment to publishing science books that illuminate the nature of the planet, Princeton University Press is delighted to partner with EarthDay.org and the Canopy Project in supporting the ecology and evolution of planet Earth. Read More
Margaret Cohen on The Underwater Eye April 12, 2022 In The Underwater Eye, Margaret Cohen tells the fascinating story of how the development of modern diving equipment and movie camera technology has allowed documentary and narrative filmmakers to take human vision into the depths, creating new imagery of the seas and the underwater realm, and expanding the scope of popular imagination. Read More
Fortune’s knave April 11, 2022 In the spring of 1924, Stalin’s nemesis and rival, Lev Trotsky, told the “Old Bolshevik” Vladimir Smirnov, “Stalin will become the dictator of the USSR.” “Stalin?” Smirnov reacted. “But he is a mediocrity, a colorless non-entity.” Read More
Scientific rationalism in an irrational world April 08, 2022 As a young student in the mid-1980s, I read a popular science book called To Acknowledge the Wonder by Euan Squires about the then latest ideas in fundamental physics. At a time when I was contemplating a career in physics, the chance to acknowledge the wonders of the physical world was what really inspired me to devote my life to science. Read More
Vladimir Putin’s case April 07, 2022 Law is neither dead nor irrelevant in wartime. It permeates the bureaucratic, legalistic structure of the modern war machine. All world leaders, including Vladimir Putin, acknowledge the post–World War II legal basis for waging war. Read More