What We Are Reading Today: Soul and Substance

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Updated 08 March 2023
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What We Are Reading Today: Soul and Substance

Author: Jay Wright 

Jay Wright is widely recognized as one of the most important American poets of the past half century. But in recent years, he has also written a series of unconventional essays that he calls “examination papers,” which he defines as “designated inquiries to myself.”

In these linked essays, most of which resemble prose-poems, with only a few lines set on each page, Wright explores abiding artistic and philosophical concerns, including language, aesthetic form, knowledge, time, and death. “Soul and Substance” presents these pieces for the first time.


What We Are Reading Today: ‘Island in the Net’ by Steffen Kohn

Updated 11 February 2026
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What We Are Reading Today: ‘Island in the Net’ by Steffen Kohn

Until just a few years ago, Cuba was one of the least-connected countries in the world. But as digital technology has become increasingly available, Cubans have found inventive ways to work around such remaining barriers as slow speeds, high costs, and inadequate infrastructure.

In “Island in the Net,” Steffen Kohn examines Cuba’s nascent digital culture and how it has reconfigured the relationship between the state and its citizens.

Each chapter is accompanied by a multimodal anthropology work: a video game, interactive installations, video art, and an ethnographic documentary.