It’s uncertain where the term “starving artist” originates, but I wouldn’t be surprised to find it attributable, at least in part, to the 1890 novel Hunger by Knut Hamsun. Hamsun’s unnamed narrator is a high-minded writer with ...

Sometimes reading really depressing books can be good for you. From Aristotle’s classic theory of catharsis to the modern ‘misery memoir,’ I explore how encountering literary tragedy can actually be uplifting.   The classical t...