Harper's Magazine

HARPER’S MAGAZINE, the oldest general interest monthly in America, explores the issues that drive our national conversation through such celebrated features as Readings, Annotation, and Findings, as well as the iconic Harper’s Index.

Harper’s Magazine

LETTERS

EASY CHAIR • Daylight Dispels the Magic

TEXTUAL CHEMISTRY • By Katie Kadue, adapted from “Grist for the Mill: Christopher Ricks on Cliché,” an essay that appeared in Close Reading for the Twenty-First Century, which was published in October by Princeton University Press.

META VERSES • From “AI For Humanity: Ethics and Morality for a Flourishing Future,” a talk delivered by Patrick Gelsinger, the executive chairman of the faith-based technology platform Gloo, at Colorado Christian University in October.

EVASIVE MANEUVERS • From the transcript of the deposition, in 1975, of Sidney Gottlieb, the head of the CIA’s secret MK-Ultra program, which used LSD and other drugs to alter human behavior. The deposition was conducted by the professional staff of the Senate’s Select Committee to Study Governmental Operations with Respect to Intelligence Activities and declassified in October.

BEASTS OF BURDEN • By Keston Sutherland, from Jokes, which was published in November by The Last Books.

ROMAN ELEGIES • By François-René de Chateaubriand, from Memoirs from Beyond the Grave: 1815–1830, the third volume of his posthumously published autobiography, a new edition of which was issued in December by New York Review Books. Translated from the French by Alex Andriesse.

LICENSE TO KILL • By Jonathan Miles, from Eradication: A Fable, which will be published by Doubleday this month.

CROWD SOURCES • From posts shared on X by journalists seeking sources for articles since 2022.

MOON MARBLE • By Patricia Lockwood, from Agate Head/Stone Soup, which will be published this year by Penguin Poets.

All the conversation topics you need for the whole year.

ON TILT • America’s new gambling epidemic

RULES OF THE GAME THE BEST SPORTS WRITING FROM HARPER’S MAGAZINE

BOTTOM DOLLAR

ANOTHER LONDON • Excavating the disenchanted city

THE SANCTUARIUM • The Philippines reckons with its war on drugs

HAVE MERCY • Do we need the presidential pardon?

SOLUTION TO THE JANUARY PUZZLE

SIGHT AND SOUND • The political possibilit ies of graphic notation

THE PRECIPICE

NEW BOOKS

THE ZONE OF SILENCE • Beryl Bainbridge’s dramas of failed attachment

COIN COLLECTION

FINDINGS

Like Harper's, but ALL science.