“A simple microscope, concealed within a book binding,” 1820. (Courtesy of the Wellcome Collection) Have you read a book review recently? The ones that make the rounds, dropped in DMs and threaded ...

J onathan Kramnick’s book Criticism and Truth is more modest than its title suggests. Essentially an apologia for the nuts-and-bolts work of literary studies, it is best described not as “ambitious” — ...