Biographies

A memoir by Nicholas Kristof and a biography of Barbara Walters invoke halcyon days in the news business. What can we learn from their lives?

His latest show is titled “Industry,” a word that defines not just the subject matter but the artist.

The genre presents very particular artistic challenges, but here are thirty-three films that transcend them.

In nineteenth-century New York, abortion was shrouded in secrecy and stigma. But, for Madame Restell, there was no such thing as bad press.

The economist’s lifelong pugilism wasn’t in spite of his success—it may have been the key to it.

A new biography provides a glimpse into the life of the celebrated classicist.

Almost everyone in the world believes that Sam Bankman-Fried is guilty. In “Going Infinite,” the writer takes the kind of risk that his characters often do, and asks us to question that assumption.

The New Yorker’s critics discuss a new biography of Elon Musk, how the archetype of the tech entrepreneur has shifted over time, and how we might move beyond it.

The cartoonist discusses the subtle brilliance behind the comic strip, and the meditative experience of reading it.

A new biography of the Zappos executive depicts him as a narcissist and an addict who tossed around half-baked ideas and rarely saw them through.

He thought his success was just a matter of hard work and good luck. Other people had a different perspective.

As the groundbreaking artist enters the canon, a new biographical comic situates her firmly in her own times.

In her life and in her writing, the author of post-colonial works such as “Wide Sargasso Sea” met adversity—inflicted and self-inflicted—with an unflinching eye.

He fought for liberties, undaunted by his persecutors—and took liberties, unconcerned for his victims. Can we make sense of the Enlightenment libertine?

Authorities who investigated Jane Stanford’s mysterious death said the wealthy widow had no enemies. A new book finds that she had many.

The English novelist was coming into her prime when publishers decided that she was outdated. But some of her contemporaries knew better.

The artist’s experiences in the Civil War and after helped him transcend stereotypes in portraying Black experience.

Institutions meant to secure peace, from NATO to the U.N., date back to Truman’s Presidency. So do the conflicts threatening that peace.

How Marcel Duchamp, Walter and Louise Arensberg, and their many friends empowered the American avant-garde.

The most beloved writer of his age, he had an unfailing sense of what the public wanted—almost.