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Read an Excerpt from “The Great American Transit Disaster” by Nicholas Dagen Bloom

Many a scholar and policy analyst has lamented American dependence on cars and the corresponding lack of federal investment in public transportation throughout the latter decades of the twentieth century. But as Nicholas Dagen Bloom shows in The Great American Transit Disaster, our transit networks are so bad for a very

What Exactly Is “Creativity”?

With his new book, The Cult of Creativity: A Surprisingly Recent History, Samuel W. Franklin uncovers how the now-ubiquitous concept of creativity was formed in the mid-twentieth century. Now one of American society’s signature values, creativity as we know it was a concept that didn’t always exist. In this post,

Take a Tour of 5 Independent Bookstores in 5 Different Chicago Neighborhoods

Whether you’re a Chicago native or just passing through for the summer, there is so much to find if you travel through the city’s sprawling neighborhoods and visit their many bookstores! Readers can make an all-day trek from the Northside down to the Southside and discover the wonder of some

Listen to Chicago in Song

This May, we’re reading Country and Midwestern: Chicago in the History of Country Music and the Folk Revival by Mark Guarino for our #ReadUCP Twitter book club. Get in the mood by listening to this playlist drawn from the book, and join us on Twitter on May 25 at 1

Elisabeth S. Clemens Receives the 2023 Laing Award

The University of Chicago Press is pleased to announce that Civic Gifts: Voluntarism and the Making of the American Nation-State by Elisabeth S. Clemens is the recipient of the 2023 Gordon J. Laing Award. The award was presented by the University of Chicago President Paul Alivisatos at a gala reception

Read an Excerpt from “American Born” by Rachel M. Brownstein

American Born is an incisive memoir of Rachel M. Brownstein’s seemingly quintessential Jewish mother, Reisel Thaler, a resilient and courageous immigrant in New York. Living life as the heroine of her own story, Reisel reminds us how to laugh despite tragedy, find our courage, and be our most unapologetically authentic

Five Questions with David K. Johnson, author of “The Lavender Scare”

On April 27, 1953, President Eisenhower signed Executive Order 10450, “Security Requirements for Government Employment,” which authorized investigations to determine whether the “employment or retention of employment in the Federal service of the person being investigated is clearly consistent with the interests of the national security.” Among the list of

An Earth Day 2023 Reading List

University Presses like Chicago are committed to making available works that not only keep us informed but also help us to better understand the world and climate around us. To celebrate Earth Day, we have put together a reading list of recent books from Chicago and our client publishers that

A Reading List for National Poetry Month from Chicago and Our Client Presses

For National Poetry Month, celebrated every April, we are happy to recognize the work of our brilliant distributed publishers. Over the years, we have been lucky to work closely with poetry and fiction publishers such as Acre Books, Autumn House, CavanKerry Press, Omnidawn, and Seagull Books. Plus, you can often

Celebrate National Poetry Month with the Phoenix Poets series

This National Poetry Month is extra special for us here at the University of Chicago Press since this year marks the publication of the first books in our newly relaunched Phoenix Poets series. Established in 1983, the series has been given a fresh look, open calls, and a new editorial

Read an Excerpt from “The Varnish and the Glaze” by Marjolijn Bol

Panel painters in both the middle ages and the fifteenth century created works that evoke the luster of precious stones, the sheen of polished gold and silver, and the colorful radiance of stained glass. Yet their approaches to rendering these materials were markedly different. In her forthcoming book, Marjolijn Bol

Read an Excerpt from “The Last Consolation Vanished” by Zalmen Gradowski

The Last Consolation Vanished is a unique and haunting first-person Holocaust account by Zalmen Gradowski, a Sonderkommando prisoner killed in Auschwitz. His extraordinary account, accompanied by a foreword and afterword by Philippe Mesnard and Arnold I. Davidson, is a voice speaking to us from the past on behalf of millions

Read an Interview with Annelyse Gelman, author of “Vexations”

As we enter the relaunch of the Phoenix Poets series, we’re introducing the new editors and poets through a series of short interviews. Here, we spoke with Annelyse Gelman, whose new book, Vexations, has been awarded the James Laughlin Award from the Academy of American Poets. Annelyse dives into the

Five Questions with Allison M. Prasch, author of “The World Is Our Stage”

Crowds swarm when US presidents travel abroad, though many never hear their voices. The presidential body, moving from one secured location to another, communicates as much or more to these audiences than the texts of their speeches. In The World is Our Stage, Allison M. Prasch considers how presidential appearances

Five Questions with Christina Dunbar-Hester, author of “Oil Beach: How Toxic Infrastructure Threatens Life in the Ports of Los Angeles and Beyond”

San Pedro Bay, which contains the contiguous Ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach, is a significant site for petroleum shipping and refining as well as one of the largest container shipping ports in the world—some forty percent of containerized imports to the United States pass through this so-called America’s