ace the coding interview with Python and JavaScript

Mexico City has always been a seat of empire. With its grandiose pretensions, sheer swagger, and staggering proportions, it gives the impression of power exercised over great time and distances. And y

Much of human experience can be distilled to saltwater: tears, sweat, and an enduring connection to the sea. In Vast Expanses, Helen M. Rozwadowski weaves a cultural, environmental, and geopolitical history of that relationship, a journey of tides and titanic forces reaching around the globe and across geological and evolutionary time.Our ancient connections with the sea have developed and multiplied through industrialization and globalization, a trajectory that runs counter to Western depictions of the ocean as a place remote from and immune to human influence. Rozwadowski argues that knowledge about the oceans—created through work and play, scientific investigation, and also through human ambitions for profiting from the sea—has played a central role in defining our relationship with this vast, trackless, and opaque place. It has helped us to exploit marine resources, control ocean space, extend imperial or national power, and attempt to refashion the sea into a more tractable arena

Monsters under Glass explores our enduring fascination with hothouses and exotic blooms, from their rise in ancient times, through the Victorian vogue for plant collecting, to the vegetable monsters o

For millennia, corals were a marine enigma, organisms that confounded scientific classification and occupied a space between the animal and plant kingdoms. Our cultural relationships with coral have b

Public sculpture is a major draw in today’s cities, and nowhere is this more the case than in New York. In the Big Apple, urban art has become synonymous with the municipal “brand,”

Majestic and untwinkling, Jupiter is the grandest of all planets. It is the largest planet in our solar system and among the brightest objects in the night sky. It shines with a noble, steady luster,

Claire Preston’s Bee tells the busy story of our long, complex relationship with this industrious, much-admired insect. Moving from ancient political descriptions to Renaissance debates about mo

At the end of his long, prolific life, Titian was rumored to paint directly on the canvas with his bare hands. He would slide his fingers across bright ridges of oil paint, loosening the colors, blend

Thirty years ago, Prague was a closed book to most travelers. Today, it is Europe’s fifth-most-visited city, surpassed only by London, Paris, Istanbul, and Rome. With a stunning natural setting

In January 2006, a man tried to break Marcel Duchamp’s Fountain sculpture with a small hammer. The sculpted foot of Michelangelo’s David was damaged in 1991 by a purportedly mentally ill artist. Each

Bats have been maligned in the West for centuries. Unfair associations with demons have seen their leathery wings adorn numerous evil characters, from the Devil to Bram Stoker’s Dracula. But the

In remembering the Holocaust, we have largely ignored the contributions made by German artists in the first twenty years after the end of the war. But how did artists in Germany deal with their own ex

With eye-popping colors and shapes, intense flavors, and curious textures, sweets and candy are beloved by people of all ages worldwide. They provide minor treats, lessons in economics for children, a

What is dirt, and what does it really mean to be dirty or clean? Dirt and cleaning are often associated with ideas of guilt, otherness, and social control, but also with living responsibly and in harm

Our bodies are not fixed. They expand and contract with variations in diet, exercise, and illness. They also alter as we age, changing over time to be markedly different at the end of our lives from w

Polar bears are truly majestic animals: the largest land-dwelling carnivore on earth, these white-furred, black-skinned giants can measure up to three meters in length and weigh up to fifteen hundred

Since Antiquity few trees have had a greater impact on the world's culture and economy than the mulberry. The sole food of the silkworm, the leaves of the mulberry brought prosperity not only to ancie

As major actors in the unfolding drama of climate change, glaciers feature prominently in Earth's past and its future. Wherever on the planet we live, glaciers affect each of us directly. They control

Show People offers a comprehensive history of the idea of the film star from Mary Pickford to Andy Serkis, traversing more than one hundred years and drawing on examples from America, Britain, Europe,

Savor a taste of the edible alphabet, from A to Z. Throughout history, visual and performance artists of all stripes and degrees of renown have rendered their visions within the whimsical medium of fo

In the history of food, the tomato is a relative newcomer outside its ancestral home in Mesoamerica. And yet, as we devour pizza by the slice, dip French fries in ketchup, delight in a beautiful Bolog

Since time immemorial, the nocturnal skies have mesmerized us, and heavenly bodies have inspired the imaginations of artists, poets, and scientists. Featuring paintings, sculpture, drawings, watercolo

Fat. Such a little word evokes big responses. While "fat" describes the size and shape of bodies—their appearance—our negative reactions to corpulence also depend on something ta

The most radical and divisive composer of the twentieth century, Arnold Schoenberg remains a hero to many, and a villain to many others. In this refreshingly balanced biography, Mark Berry tells the s

For centuries common primroses have spread breathtaking carpets of pale lemon yellow across the globe, the first sign of spring. Abundant, edible, and beneficial for many ailments, they have supported

Sometimes referred to as the “Father of Biogeography,” Alfred Russel Wallace has come to be known as the co-originator of the theory of evolution through natural selection, and he also wro

In the glorious, boozy party after the first World War, a new being burst defiantly onto the world stage: the so-called flapper. Young, impetuous, and flirtatious, she was an alluring, controversial f

Many human beings have considered the powers and the limits of human knowledge, but few have wondered about the power that the idea of knowledge has over us. Steven Connor’s The Madness of Knowledge i

Victor Hugo is an icon of French culture. He achieved immense success as a poet, dramatist, and novelist, and he was also elected to both houses of the French Parliament. Leading the Romantic cam

In 1568, the Seventeen Provinces in the Netherlands rebelled against the absolutist rule of the king of Spain. A confederation of duchies, counties, and lordships, the Provinces demanded the right of

The British public school is an iconic institution, a training ground for the ruling elite and a symbol of national identity and tradition. But beyond the elegant architecture and evergreen playing fi

Though reaching ever further toward the skies, today’s cities are overshadowed by multiple threats: climate change, overpopulation, social division, and urban warfare all endanger our metropolitan way

What does it mean to feel something? What stimulates our desires, aspirations, and dreams? Did our ancestors feel in the same way as we do? In a wave of new research over the past decade, historians h

For fifteen centuries, legends of King Arthur have enthralled us. Born in the misty past of a Britain under siege, half-remembered events became shrouded in ancient myth and folklore. The resulting ta

Great Economic Thinkers presents an accessible introduction to the lives and works of thirteen of the most influential economists of modern times: Adam Smith, David Ricardo, John Stuart Mill, Karl Mar

Could a book by any other name smell as sweet? Absolutely not. The rose is the world’s favorite flower—and always has been. It is our greatest floral symbol of love and romance, and it is

Elegant, rich in history, and supremely useful, birches have played an extraordinary yet largely unrecognized part in shaping both our natural environment and the material culture and beliefs of milli

In colonial India, a range of administrators, soldiers, surveyors, and others invested large parts of their lives in attempting to inventory and comprehend the vast country, its teeming populations, a

What do they all mean—the lascivious ape, autophagic dragons, potbellied heads, harp-playing asses, arse-kissing priests, and somersaulting jongleurs to be found protruding from the edges of medieval

There is no other way to put it: Elvis is the King. Note the present tense: even though Elvis (supposedly) died nearly forty years ago, he has lived on in our hearts, as a sound, as an image, and as a