For the past one hundred seventy-five years, Harper’s Magazine has been both a witness to and a participant in history—the moments when once-familiar certainties collapsed and gave way to new worlds. This collection, assembled to commemorate our anniversary, presents both original essays and selections from our archives that capture transformative periods in America and beyond.

Three essays examine influential figures whose work with Harper’s has documented and shaped America’s greatest crises. Matthew Karp reveals how the relentlessly moderate Henry Jarvis Raymond, an early editor of the magazine, transformed himself into a revolutionary force during the Civil War; John Jeremiah Sullivan explores Mark Twain’s enduring relevance; and Harmony Holiday examines James Baldwin’s freighted legacy. These perspectives are complemented by seven readings from our archive that capture pivotal moments of historical rupture: Abraham Lincoln’s contemplation of his ghostly double image shortly before his assassination; Twain’s satirical report on the collapse of parliamentary order in Austria; Edith T. Hegan’s chronicle of the early stages of the Russian Revolution; Edna St. Vincent Millay’s poetic witness to the Spanish Civil War; Baldwin’s observations of the mounting of racial tensions in Harlem; Edward W. Said’s return to his dispossessed family home in Jerusalem; and Don DeLillo’s reflections on the aftermath of September 11.

Taken together, these voices offer some comfort in considering what it means to live through the collapse of the established order, and insight into how revolutionary moments reshape our understanding of ourselves and our world.

—Christopher Carroll