Essays Social

With silence increasingly becoming a stranger to us, one man set out to become its intimate: Pablo d'Ors, a Catholic priest whose life was changed by Zen meditation. With disarming honesty and directness, as well as a striking clarity of language, d'Ors shares his struggles as a beginning meditator: the tedium, restlessness, and distraction. But, persevering, the author discovers not only a deep peace and understanding of his true nature, but also that silence, rather than being a retreat from life, offers us an intense engagement with life just as it is.

In this prize-winning essay for the 2021 Bigelow Institute for Consciousness Studies essay contest, Dr. Ruickbie examines the evidence for the survival of consciousness after death (“life after death”). Initially skeptical, he found that there was sufficient evidence from a wide variety of sources, including apparitions, reincarnation, near-death experiences, after-death communication, and premonitions, that met the contest’s criteria of being “beyond reasonable doubt.”

For C. S. Lewis, reason and logic are the sensible way to approach faith and ethics. Much of the 20th century's ills are caused by ill-founded beliefs and opinions. Lewis' original approach remains as vital today as ever. He is able to take the most convoluted subject, turn it side on and shed bright illumination on it. To be able to see along things rather than at them - just like a beam of sunlight that invades the darkness of a toolshed - is, to Lewis, the way to understanding.

We're Doomed, Now What? addresses the crisis that is our time through a series of brilliant, moving, and original essays on climate change, war, literature, and loss from one of the most provocative and iconoclastic minds of his generation.

One of the most talented and creative authors working today, Neal Stephenson is renowned for his exceptional novels - works colossal in vision and mind-boggling in complexity. Exploring and blending a diversity of topics, including technology, economics, history, science, pop culture, and philosophy, his books are the products of a keen and adventurous intellect. Stephenson ponders a wealth of subjects, from movies and politics to David Foster Wallace and the Midwestern American College Town; and more.

In When the Facts Change, Tony Judt's widow and fellow historian Jennifer Homans has assembled an essential collection of the most important and influential pieces written in the last 15 years of Judt's life, the years in which he found his voice in the public sphere. Included are seminal essays on the full range of Judt's concerns, including Europe as an idea and in reality, before 1989 and thereafter; Israel, the Holocaust and the Jews; American hyperpower and the world after 9/11.

Revolutionary, philosopher, litterateur, and seer, Sri Aurobindo remains one of the brightest minds India has ever had. This book captures the evolution of his thought through excerpts from his political articles and speeches, essays, talks with and letters to disciples and public messages - presented chronologically. It includes his views on Jawaharlal Nehru and Subhas Chandra Bose; his doubts about Gandhi’s method to attain freedom and insistence on Ahimsa; and his very distinctive contribution to the nascent Nationalist Movement.

Salman Rushdie's Imaginary Homelands is an important record of one writer's intellectual and personal odyssey. The 70 essays collected here, written over the last 10 years, cover an astonishing range of subjects.

Serenity Found takes the contents of Finding Serenity even further, exploring not just the show but the events of the film as well, to create an anthology that's even more thought-provoking, fascinating, and far-thinking than its predecessor.

In America and in England, faltering economies at home and failed wars abroad have generated a political and intellectual hysteria. It is a derangement manifested in a number of ways: nostalgia for imperialism, xenophobic paranoia, and denunciations of an allegedly intolerant left. These symptoms can be found even among the most informed of Anglo-America.

As the creator of "Cathy", Cathy Guisewite found her way into the hearts of fans more than 40 years ago and has been there ever since. Her hilarious and deeply relatable look at the challenges of womanhood in a changing world became a cultural touchstone for women everywhere. Now, Guisewite returns with her signature wit and warmth in this debut essay collection about another time of big transition, when everything starts changing and disappearing without permission: aging parents, aging children, aging self stuck in the middle.

India has unmatched talent and ambition with an inherent tendency to work hard; then what is it that keeps India from overtaking the world? Why does India as a nation settle for the ordinary when the extraordinary is well within reach? Dr. Kalam shares his dream of a nation that is unrivaled, he discusses how he has, from his experience, met such skilled people whose visions can transform the nation.

What is the Internet doing to us? What is college for? What are the myths and metaphors we live by? What is the purpose of art, and what can we learn from the past? The End of Solitude brings together more than forty essays from such publications as Harper's and the Atlantic and introduces four that are published here for the first time. Drawing on the past, they ask how we got where we are. Scrutinizing the present, they seek to understand how we can live more mindfully, more meaningfully, more freely.

Pathways is a collection of Quintus Curtius’ very best short essays from 2015. Speaking in an original and compelling voice, these essays cover an amazing variety of subjects in history, philosophy, current events, ethics, biography, physical health, travel, and language.

Everybody Loves a Good Drought is the established classic on rural poverty in India. Twenty years after publication, it remains unsurpassed in the scope and depth of reportage, providing an intimate view of the daily struggles of the poor and the efforts, often ludicrous, made to uplift them. An illuminating introduction accompanying this 20-anniversary edition reveals, alarmingly, how a large section of India continues to suffer in the name of development so that a small percentage may prosper.

America Ferrera has always felt wholly American, and yet, her identity is inextricably linked to her parents’ homeland and Honduran culture. Speaking Spanish at home, having Saturday morning salsa-dance parties in the kitchen, and eating tamales alongside apple pie at Christmas never seemed at odds with her American identity. Still, she yearned to see that identity reflected in the larger American narrative. Now, in American Like Me, America invites 31 of her friends, peers, and heroes to share their stories about life between cultures.

The essays in The Two Fundamental Problems of Ethics have a rather special place in Schopenhauer’s work, both being written as entries to Scandinavian philosophy competitions, one in Norway and one in Sweden.

Words matter. They wound, they inflate, they define, they demean. They have nuance and power. "Effortless", "Sassy", "Ambitious", "Aggressive": What subtle digs and sneaky implications are conveyed when women are described with words like these? Words are made into weapons, warnings, praise, and blame, bearing an outsized influence on women's lives - to say nothing of our moods.

When Phil Klay left the marines a decade ago after serving as an officer in Iraq, he found himself a part of the community of veterans who have no choice but to grapple with the meaning of their wartime experiences—for themselves and for the country. American identity has always been bound up in war—from the revolutionary war of our founding, to the civil war that ended slavery, to the two world wars that launched America as a superpower. What did the current wars say about who we are as a country, and how should we respond as citizens?

One of Granta’s Best of Young American Novelists, Joshua Cohen arrives with his first collection of nonfiction, the culmination of two decades of writing and thought about life in the digital age. In essays, memoir, criticism, diary entries, and letters—many appearing here for the first time—Cohen covers the full depth and breadth of modern life.