From tasks performed in Walden, a computer game in which players simulate the life of Henry David Thoreau. The game was developed by Tracy Fullerton at the University of Southern…

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From letters that Marcel Proust wrote to his neighbors Marie and Charles Williams between 1908 and 1916, while he lived at 102 Boulevard Haussmann, in Paris. Charles Williams owned a…

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From voice messages sent on WhatsApp by Abdul Aziz Muhamat, a twenty-four-year-old Sudanese refugee detained on Manus Island, to Michael Green, a journalist, in March and April 2016. That April,…

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From a guide to “common principles of behavior” recommended to Russian tourists visiting foreign countries. The guide was released by the Russian Foreign Ministry in March. Translated from the Russian…

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From minutes at a county council meeting in Kauai, Hawaii, in 2015. Residents gave public testimony regarding the repeal of an ordinance that imposed fines on the owners of barking…

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By Catherine Lacey, from Certain American States, a forthcoming collection of short stories. Lacey’s second novel, The Answers, was published last month by Farrar, Straus and Giroux. She is a…

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From a list of features advertised for I Just Made Love! The cell phone app consists of a user-generated map and social network.  Use your built-in GPS to mark the…

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By Oli Hazzard, from a manuscript in progress. Hazzard has published two volumes of poetry, including, most recently, Within Habit (2014).  calling in sick      for each other in each other’s…

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From We Crossed a Bridge and It Trembled, a collection of interviews with Syrian refugees that were conducted and edited by Wendy Pearlman between 2012 and 2016. The book was…

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By Abu al-Hasan ‘Ali bin Hisn (eleventh century). The poem was translated from the Arabic by Peter Cole and appears in Hymns & Qualms, a selection of his poems and…

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From an FBI manual suggesting conversational techniques to recruit informants. The document was published by The Intercept in January.

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By Alexander Zinoviev, from Homo Sovieticus, a novel that was originally published in 1985 and is included in Boredom, an anthology that was published in January by M.I.T. Press and…

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From a quiz drafted by the police department of Long Beach, California, and used as part of a training presentation. The quiz was cited in a report by the A.C.L.U.…

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From a meeting of Irish Parliament that took place in February. Michael Healy-Rae is a representative for Kerry South. Michael Ring is the minister of state for regional economic development.

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From the website of Holy Smoke, a memorial-services company based in Alabama.

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By Emma Reyes (1919?2003), a painter, from a letter written in 1969 to Germán Arciniegas, a historian and journalist. The Book of Emma Reyes, a memoir, will be published in…

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From advertisements taken out in African-American newspapers by former slaves searching for relatives. The earliest ads appeared in 1863. Villanova University and Mother Bethel African Methodist Episcopal Church, in Philadelphia,…

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From names that parents around the world have attempted to bestow on their children. They are cited in a lawsuit that was filed in a Georgia superior court in March.…

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By Fleur Jaeggy, from I Am the Brother of XX, a collection of short stories that will be published next month by New Directions. Jaeggy is the author of several…

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By Hervé Guibert (1955?91), from Crazy for Vincent, which was published in April by Semiotext(e). Guibert was a photographer, filmmaker, and the author of more than twenty-five books. Translated from…

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