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Classics

A selection of old favorites.
Robert E. Lee astride Traveller

FeatureHow Did Robert E. Lee Become an American Icon?

The man was remembered, but not his cause.

By James C. Cobb

humanities, July/August, 2011, Volume 32, Issue 4
Image of Josh White with guitar

FeatureThis Land Is Our Land

The Popular Front and American culture.

By Michael Kazin

humanities, May/June, 2011, Volume 32, Issue 3
Image of segregated bus station in Durham, North Carolina, 1940

FeatureFreedom Riders

Telling 436 stories in one documentary.

By Amy Lifson

humanities, May/June, 2011, Volume 32, Issue 3
Young Union soldier with bayoneted musket, knife, and revolver.

Feature"Daybreak Gray and Dim"

How the Civil War changed Walt Whitman's poetry.

By Randall Fuller

humanities, January/February, 2011, Volume 32, Issue 1
Sir Isaac Newton, by Samuel Freeman, (1773–1857)

FeatureNewton, The Last Magician

The great man of science had more than a passing interest in alchemy.

By Sam Kean

humanities, January/February, 2011, Volume 32, Issue 1
Pablo Picasso’s Les Demoiselles d’Avignon, 1907

FeatureWhy Paris?

Two neighborhoods—Montmartre and Montparnasse—helped shape Picasso and a generation of innovators.

By James Panero

humanities, November/December, 2010, Volume 31, Issue 6
“The Political Quadrille, Music by Dred Scott", 1860

FeatureThe Man Who Came in Second

In 1860, John C. Breckinridge ran for president against Lincoln, and broke the Democrats in two.

By Meredith Hindley

humanities, November/December, 2011, Volume 31, Issue 6
Barry Faulkner’s 1936 rendition of the Constitutional Convention

FeatureThe First Dissenters

George Mason swore he would rather "chop off his right hand" than sign the Constitution.

By Pauline Maier

humanities, November/December, 2010, Volume 31, Issue 6
Moliere dining with Louis XIV

FeatureBurying Molière

How the French Revolution reappropriated the favored playwright of Louis XIV.

By Steve Moyer

humanities, May/June, 2010, Volume 31, Issue 3
Image of Dolley Madison.

FeatureThe Politics of Love

Dolley Madison gained influence through kindness.

By Catherine Allgor

humanities, January/February, 2010, Volume 31, Issue 1