•  Liz Waldner’s 2002 collection, Dark Would (the missing person), is a tough and often funny group of poems that uses Dante’s idea of the dark wood and incorporates references to pop songs, other poems, and gender politics.

•  Brian Greene’s The Fabric of the Cosmos: Space, Time, and the Texture of Reality (2004) discusses concepts of spacetime and relativity and the fundamental nature of matter.

•  For readers interested in the complex relationships between art and perception, John Berger’s Ways of Seeing (1972) remains a useful book. These essays discuss art, feminism, politics, and the business of publicity and self-promotion.

•  Henry David Thoreau’s Walden (1854) is a classic exploration of the intimate relationships between man and nature.