####Torching the Modern-Day Library of Alexandria by James Somer

In 1996, when Larry Page and Sergey Brin met in Stanford University to work on a student project that later became Google, they wanted to create a huge database of all the books in the world: a universal digital library. In 2002, Page scanned a 300-page book in 40 minutes — and then approached the University of Michigan, to borrow all their books and scan them for the project. Google soon made deals with Michigan, Harvard, Stanford, Oxford and the New York Public Library — and in less than a decade’s time, their database had amassed over 25 million books. What happened to this ambitious project? Read about the fate of Google’s ambitious universal digital library in this longform piece by James Somer.

####Can China Replace the West? by Jessica T. Matthews

In this essay, Jessica T. Matthews reviews British journalist Gideon Rachman’s book Easternization: Asia’s Rise and America’s Decline from Obama to Trump and Beyond. Rachman, Matthews writes, is dealing with the following central question in his book: how is the rise in Asian economic power changing world politics? Reviewing Rachman’s book, Matthews is also dealing with that same question herself. In this short piece, she asks, and in part provides, a historical and present survey of the politics of the region — between China and North Korea — and the politics that govern and are being governed by the rise of the East. The piece and, ultimately, Rachman’s book also asks questions that Samuel Huntington was contending with two decades ago: what is easternization? And who is being easternized in the backdrop of the so-called West?

####Against Literary Nationalism by Jan Clausen Literature has always been a tool of dissent. Occasionally, it has also been a tool of oppression and propaganda. Jan Clausen writes about the literary discourse surrounding Donald J. Trump’s presidency, the politics surrounding that discourse and the organization PEN America. Providing a brief overview into the political makeup of PEN America and its seeming adoption of political and administrative America as its creed and muse, Clausen writes about the dangers of finding comfort in nationalist thought for the literati. Citing writers like James Baldwin and Adrienne Rich, Clausen asks American writers and her readers: why aren’t we taking a stand against creedal nationalism? A powerful piece that undoes the very foundations of what Clausen thinks is the mainstream American literary scene, this piece is an important reminder of the power and concomitant responsibility of literature.

####Reading Emily Dickinson by Stephen Akey If you thought reading Dickinson was hard, it just got harder — so writes Stephen Akey, in this longform piece about the state of Dickinson scholarship. Dickinson was known to have messed around with her writing. Her original manuscripts revolutionize and, indeed, confuse us with their irregular use of dashes, punctuation, line breaks and the like. Akey contends with questions surrounding Dickinson’s poetry — should the punctuation be standardized? Should reading Dickinson be made easier, or should we read her in her original form? The questions are many, and Akey wrestles with them.