The Best Books We Read This Week
Our editors and critics review notable new fiction, nonfiction, and poetry.
Originally published by newyorker.com. Syndicated material does not necessarily reflect the views of Grazia British.
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The American Revolution Wasn’t the Main Event
America’s influence went beyond haberdashery. Several of the world’s leading revolutionaries had spent time in the country. The English-born Thomas Paine started his radical career writing…
The Idea That Reshaped Identity Politics Has a Complicated Backstory
Plenty of scholars and journalists have written histories of these contentious terms, “intersectionality” and “critical race theory.” Now Crenshaw has written something different: a…
Barry Blitt’s “Red, White, and Kinda Blue”
For the cover of the May 11 & 18, 2026, special issue, themed around America’s 250th birthday, the cartoonist Barry Blitt portrays George Washington, the country’s first President, caught…
When Sexual Exploitation Is Fundamental to Police Corruption
None of this will be shocking to anyone who’s lived in an American city crippled by disinvestment and self-dealing—or even to anyone who’s watched a David Simon show on HBO. Even so,…