Poetry

Arts in Society

When the State Fears a Poet

Celebrated Indian poet, human rights activist, and political prisoner Varavara Rao, now eighty and in frail health, is in mortal danger of succumbing to COVID-19 if he is not released from prison, where he has been on and off since 2018 on trumped-up conspiracy charges.

Varsha Gandikota-Nellutla

Arts in Society

The Prophet of the Far Right

Michel Houellebecq’s Islamophobia and chauvinism have made him a favorite intellectual of right extremists. So why does he appeal to so many on the left as well?

Martin Gelin

Arts in Society

Solidarity Through Poetry

When Celes Tisdale led poetry workshops at Attica State Prison, soon after the 1971 uprising, some of the prisoners were still recovering from gunshots. Their writings demonstrates the power of poetry to help oppressed people heal from trauma and organize their political thinking.

Mark Nowak

Arts in Society

Arts in the Time of Quarantine

A Special Project from Boston Review’s Arts in Society Program

Arts in Society

Emily Dickinson Escapes

Until recent decades, Dickinson was most often depicted as a sentimental spinster or reclusive eccentric. A new biography and TV show reveal instead a self-aware artist who created a life that defied the limits placed on women.

Lynne Feeley

Arts in Society

The Bird at the Window

Since 1970 North America has lost 29 percent of its bird population. New York City alone kills almost a quarter of a million birds each year. More than most people, poets have tried to respond to these unremarked—and mostly preventable—deaths.

Calista McRae

Arts in Society

Herman Melville the Poet

The author of Moby Dick is best known for his novels, but he devoted the second half of his life to writing poetry. What can a new Complete Poems teach us about his place in the canon of American letters?

Gillian Osborne

Arts in Society

Announcing the 2019 Boston Review Annual Poetry Contest Winner and Finalists

Congratulations to C. X. Hua!

Boston Review

Arts in Society

The Country Without a Post Office

As news leaks of India’s forced communications blackout in Kashmir, the work of poet Agha Shahid Ali is tragically timely—both its depiction of Kashmiri suffering and the poet’s attempt to imagine a better future for his home.

Manan Kapoor

Arts in Society

Walt Whitman’s Boys

On the poet’s bicentennial, we will see praise for his political idealism and gauzy reclamations of him as an LGBT ancestor. But it remains difficult to talk about the connection he saw between patriotism and his love of young men.

Jeremy Lybarger

Arts in Society

Looking for Solidarity

The work of Haitian-Dominican poet Jacques Viau Renaud recalls a time when the two sides of the Caribbean island were united by their visions for an equal society.

Sophie Maríñez

Arts in Society

Announcing Boston Review’s new Arts in Society project

A radical revisioning of our creative writing programs.

Boston Review