Quiz Guy John Chaneski’s puzzle about synonyms might have you reaching for a thesaurus. For example, what 19th-century novel might have been titled Self-respect and Bias? This is part of a complete episode.
Steve from Wilmington, North Carolina, wonders about a phrase his mother used: “Everybody to their taste,” said the old lady as she kissed the cow, meaning “Different things appeal to different individuals.” It’s an...
Ray Bradbury’s dystopian novel Fahrenheit 451 (Bookshop|Amazon) takes its title from the temperature at which book pages burn. Some 200 copies of the first edition of the book were bound with an unusual material: asbestos. A few are still...
An ornithologist says there’s a growing movement to change the name of a pink-footed bird currently called the flesh-footed shearwater. The movement reflects a growing understanding that using flesh-colored for “pink” fails to...
What we’re reading: Crystal Wilkinson, a member of the Affrilachian Poets, is author of The Birds of Opulence, a quiet, lyrical novel about relationships between family members, and between humans and nature, about things said and unsaid with...
Victor Hugo’s 1874 novel Ninety-Three includes a terrifying description of a heavy cannon coming loose on board a ship, an event he calls “perhaps the most dreadful thing that can take place at sea.” This is part of a complete...