Adam Gopnik

From the French Revolution to January 6th, crowds have been heroized and vilified. Now they’re a field of study.

The rise of the sport as we know it was centered in Gotham, where big stadiums, heroic characters, and epic sportswriting produced a pastime that bound a city together.

The COVID-19 pandemic affected us in millions of ways. But it evades the meanings we want it to bear.

The civil-rights mastermind was sidelined by his own movement. Now he’s back in the spotlight. What can we learn from his strategies of resistance?

After the English Revolution—and an island’s experiment with republicanism—a genuine restoration was never in the cards.

For all the clouds of publicity, the dream machine is actually a craft business. Have we asked too much of it?

A virtuoso of the eighteenth-century version of viral memes and fake news, he had a sense of political theatre that helped create a radical new reality.

Born after the Civil War, he turned himself into its most powerful witness—and modernized the American novel.

Pioneering cartoonists were experimental, satiric, erotic, and artistically ambitious.

The gourmet’s real genius wasn’t in his recipes but in his packaging. He knew how to serve up the authenticity that his audiences craved.

Revisionist biographers have given us countless perspectives, from Honest Abe to Killer Lincoln. Is there a version that’s true to his time and attuned to ours?

The history of caffeine and capitalism can get surprisingly heated.

What the Civil War tells us about who has the power to shape history.

How John and Jessie Frémont explored the frontiers of legend-making.

During Reconstruction, true citizenship finally seemed in reach for black Americans. Then their dreams were dismantled.

Four nineteenth-century authors offered blueprints for a better world—but their progressive visions had a dark side.

His presidency was known for corruption, scandal, and booze. In a new book, Ron Chernow attempts to rehabilitate it.

Was the American Revolution such a good idea?

What the 1971 uprising and massacre reveal about our prison system and the liberal democratic state.

Why do we lock up so many people?

For the players in the First World War, the goal was not to prevail but to avoid being seen as the loser.