Once a semester, a Cornell University instructor requires her students to complete an in-class assignment using typewriters -- an exercise to help them understand what writing, thinking and classrooms were like before everything turned digital.

The human subconscious is such an interesting thing. No matter how much you think you’ve got it figured out, it’ll always spit out the most random stuff. Take me, for example. After coming home from a...

“That something exists outside ourselves and our preoccupations, so near, so readily available, is our greatest blessing.”