A passionate, probing collection gathering nearly thirty years of groundbreaking reflection on culture and society alongside four new essays, by one of our most respected essayists and critics.What is the internet doing to us? What is college for? What are the myths and metaphors we live by? These are the questions that William Deresiewicz has been pursuing over the course of his award-winning career. The End of Solitude brings together more than forty of ...

An eloquent memoir of a young man's life transformed by literature.In A Jane Austen Education, Austen scholar William Deresiewicz turns to the author's novels to reveal the remarkable life lessons hidden within. With humor and candor, Deresiewicz employs his own experiences to demonstrate the enduring power of Austen's teachings. Progressing from his days as an immature student to a happily married man, Deresiewicz's A Jane Austen Education is the...

A deeply researched warning about how the digital economy threatens artists' lives and work—the music, writing, and visual art that sustain our souls and societies—from an award-winning essayist and criticThere are two stories you hear about earning a living as an artist in the digital age. One comes from Silicon Valley. There's never been a better time to be an artist, it goes. If you've got a laptop, you've got a recording studi...

This elegant and thoughtful work offers an important new way of understanding Jane Austen by defining the fundamental impact and influence of British Romanticism on her later novels. In comparing the earlier and later phases of Austen's career, Deresiewicz addresses an important yet neglected issue regarding her work: the longstanding critical consensus that Austen's last three novels (Mansfield Park, Emma, and Persuasion) represent far greater artistic achieveme...

A deeply researched warning about how the digital economy threatens artists' lives and work—the music, writing, and visual art that sustain our souls and societies—from an award-winning essayist and criticThere are two stories you hear about earning a living as an artist in the digital age. One comes from Silicon Valley. There's never been a better time to be an artist, it goes. If you've got a laptop, you've got a recording studio...

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?These are the questions that William Deresiewicz has been pursuing over the course of his award-winning career. In "The Disadvantages of an Elite Education," his viral piece from 2008, he sounded the alarm about the Ivy League admissions frenzy and the kind of student it produces. In "Solitude and Leadership," his 2009 a...

An eloquent memoir of a young man's life transformed by literature.In A Jane Austen Education, Austen scholar William Deresiewicz turns to the author's novels to reveal the remarkable life lessons hidden within. With humor and candor, Deresiewicz employs his own experiences to demonstrate the enduring power of Austen's teachings. Progressing from his days as an immature student to a happily married man, Deresiewicz's A Jane Austen Education is the...

Bloomsbury presents Why Plato Matters Now written and read by Angie Hobbs.Professor Angie Hobbs proves in this persuasive and intelligent book that Plato is more relevant than ever.Does Plato matter? An ancient philosopher whose work has inspired and informed countless thinkers and poets across the centuries, his ideas are no longer taught as widely as they once were. But, as Angie Hobbs argues in this clear-sighted book, that is a mistake....

How did America cease to be the land of opportunity?LONGLISTED FOR THE PORCHLIGHT BUSINESS BOOK AWARDWe take it for granted that good neighborhoods—with good schools and good housing—are only accessible to the wealthy. But in America, this wasn’t always the case.Though for most of world history, your prospects were tied to where you were born, Americans came up with a revolutionary idea: If you didn’t like your lot in life, you coul...

A different kind of politics for a new kind of society—beyond work, scarcity, and capitalismIn the twenty-first century, new technologies should liberate us from work. Automation, rather than undermining an economy built on full employment, is instead the path to a world of liberty, luxury, and happiness—for everyone. Technological advance will reduce the value of commodities—food, healthcare, and housing—towards zero.Improvements in renewable energies will...

A monumental and exhilarating history of European thought from the end of Antiquity to the beginning of the Enlightenment—500 to 1700 AD—tracing the arc of intellectual history as it evolved, setting the stage for the modern era.Charles Freeman, lauded historical scholar and author of The Closing of the Western Mind (“A triumph”—The Times [London]), explores the rebirth of Western thought in the centuries that followed the demise of the classical ...

“Oligarchy is a system in which a small number of extremely wealthy individuals control the economic, political, and media life of a nation. It is a system in which ordinary people have very little power to determine the future of their country. If you’re an American, it is the system in which you’re living. That must change. In the wealthiest nation on earth we must build a political movement that creates a government that represents all Americans, not just a handful of billionair...