Poems inspired by Vermeer's paintings of women.

Rediscovering the patron saint of all the flawed and haunted seekers of modernity.

Reading for "soul-culture."

To all appearance, a biographer writes, "Eliot was conventional, mild, decorous, yet the hidden character was daring and savage."

Special Section: White/Other

Trekking to the Holy Land.

I've got it all. So why do I want a husband?

Revisiting Chesterton's masterpiece.

A response to Stephen Williams.

A stickler for accuracy flubs her facts, while a producer of page-turners leaves his readers reflective

For the writer, working in metaphor is a life-and-death matter.

The odyssey of Robert Silverberg, virtuoso of speculative fiction, from prodigy to jaded prizewinner to wily old wizard.

Never mind the flap over the Modern Library 100. Why read novels at all?

How the New Yorker's William Shawn gave a home to the brilliant autobiographer Ved Mehta.

Susan Howatch weaves a tangled spiritual web for her Anglican clerics.