On a November evening in 1989, Laura Levitt was raped in her own bed. Her landlord heard the assault taking place and called 911, but the police arrived too late to apprehend Laura’s attacker. When they left, investigators took items with them—a pair of sweatpants, the bedclothes—and a rape exam was performed at the hospital. However, this evidence was never processed. Decades later, Laura returns to these objects, viewing them not as clues that will lead to the identification of her assailant but rather as a means of engaging traumatic legacies writ large. The Objects That Remain is equal parts personal memoir and fascinating examination of the ways in which the material remains of violent crimes inform our experience of, and thinking about, trauma and loss. Considering artifacts in the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum and evidence in police storage facilities across the country, Laura’s story moves between intimate trauma, the story of an unsolved rape, and genocide. Throughout, she asks what it might mean to do justice to these violent pasts outside the juridical system or through historical empiricism, which are the dominant ways in which we think about evidence from violent crimes and other highly traumatic events. Over the course of her investigation, the author reveals how these objects that remain and the stories that surround them enable forms of intimacy. In this way, she models for us a different kind of reckoning, where justice is an animating process of telling and holding.

In this broadly conceived study Steven Conn examines the development of American museums across the twentieth century with a historian's attention and a critic's eye. He focuses on an array of museum types and asks illuminating questions about the relationship between museums and American cultural life.

Looks at how whole domains of phenomena come into being and sometimes pass away as objects of scientific study. With examples from the natural and social sciences, ranging from the 16th to the 20th centuries, this book explores the ways in which scientific objects are both real and historical.

Mark Doty's prose has been hailed as "tempered and tough, sorrowing and serene" (The New York Times Book Review) and "achingly beautiful" (The Boston Globe). In Still Life with Oysters and Lemon he offers a stunning exploration of our attachment to ordinary things-how we invest objects with human store, and why.

What makes something sexy? Why are some things regarded as sacred and others profane? Why do mourners face such difficulty in parting with their beloved’s possessions? Why do we often feel distraught when we lose something, even when the object has little real value? We spend our lives in a meaningful dialogue with things around us. Sometimes the conversation is loud, as in a collector’s passion for coins or art. More often, the exchange is subtle and muted, even imperceptible. We are surrounded by things, and they affect our emotions and impact our thoughts. The arrival of a dozen flowers from a lover or a letter from a grandchild makes our day; an old photo album or an afghan knitted by a favorite aunt offers comfort when we are troubled. From exploring what makes something “beautiful” to why we place such value on antiques and artifacts from the past, Objects of Our Desire offers insights, both deep and delightful, into the ways we invest things with meaning and the powerful roles they play in our lives. Notice the inviting contours of that sofa, the glint of a knife’s edge, the sparkle of a diamond ring. Feel the softness of the pashmina around that woman’s milky shoulders. Look at the majesty of a large jet plane. Take in the somberness of a gravestone. Put on an old pair of shoes. Clutch a warm mug of freshly brewed coffee. Sit on a rocking chair. Feel the sumptuous leather seats of a new car. We are surrounded by things. We are involved with them, indebted to them. We speak to things and things speak to us. To say that we are interdependent is banal. Let us be courageous. Let us admit it: we are lovers. —From Objects of Our Desire

Berlin, 1938. When Beatrice, a young Irish Protestant lace maker, is whisked away from her dreary life to join the household of Felix and Dorthea Metzenburg, she feels like she’s landed in the middle of a fairy tale. Art collectors, and friends to the most fascinating men and women of Europe, the Metzenburgs are part of a world where there is more to desire than she ever imagined. However Germany has launched its campaign of aggression across Europe, and, before long, the conflict reaches the family’s threshold. Retreating to their country estate, the Metzenburgs do their best to ignore the encroaching war until the realities of hunger, illness, and Nazi terror begin to threaten their very existence. In searing and emotional detail, The Life of Objects illuminates Beatrice’s journey from childhood to womanhood, from naïveté to wisdom, as a continent collapses into darkness around her.

Tamen's concern is to show how inanimate objects take on life through their interpretation--notably, in our own culture, as they are collected and housed in museums. It is his claim that an object becomes interpretable only in the context of a "society of friends." Thus, he suggests, our inveterate tendency as human beings to interpret the phenomenal world gives objects not only a life but also a society.