Peter Kuper's INterSECTS Reading List

By NYPL Staff

January 12, 2022

photograph of Peter Kuper in front of a wall displaying his drawings

The New York Public Library's exhibition INterSECTS presents excerpts from artist Peter Kuper’s forthcoming graphic novel, which he developed during his tenure as a fellow at The New York Public Library’s Dorothy and Lewis B. Cullman Center for Scholars and Writers in 2020–21. Finding himself virtually alone in the vast Beaux-Arts rooms and hallways of the Stephen A. Schwarzman Building, Kuper began imagining arthropods occupying this unexpectedly and unprecedentedly vacant environment. The exhibition is on display in the Stephen A. Schwarzman Building's Rayner Special Collections Wing through August 13, 2022.

Peter Kuper is an award-winning cartoonist and lifelong insect enthusiast, who has authored over two dozen graphic novels. His comics and illustrations have appeared regularly in The New Yorker, The New York Times, The Nation, Mad, and Charlie Hebdo. He lectures widely and teaches cartooning at Harvard University and the School of Visual Arts.

If you enjoyed the exhibition, or have an interest in arthropods in the world, Peter Kuper has recommended a range of titles, which you can find below, for readers of all ages—from his own work to the books that have inspired the art you'll find in INterSECTS. You can learn more about INterSECTS and access free coloring pages and the exhibition audio guide by clicking here.

Selected Books by Peter Kuper

Ruins, 2015

Diario de Oaxaca: A Sketchbook Journal of Two Years in Mexico, 2009

The Metamorphosis, 2002

Kafkaesque: Fourteen Short Stories, 2018

Joseph Conrad's Heart Of Darkness, 2020

World War 3 Illustrated: 1979-2014 co-edited with Seth Tobocman, 2014

Drawn to New York, 2013

The System, 2012

Suggested Reading

Adventures Among Ants: A Global Safari with a Cast of Trillionsby Mark W. Moffett, 2010

The Ants by Edward O. Wilson, 1990

The Butterfly Effect: Insects and the Making of the Modern World by Edward D. Melillo, 2020

Bug Music: How Insects Gave Us Rhythm and Noise by David Rothenberg, 2013

Buzz: The Nature and Necessity of Bees by Thor Hanson, 2018

Chrysalis: Maria Sibylla Merian and the Secrets of Metamorphosis by Kim Todd, 2007

Edible Insects and Human Evolution by Julie J. Lesnik, 2018

Evolution of the Insects by David Grimaldi and Michael S. Engel, 2005

Extraordinary Insects: The Fabulous Indispensable Creatures Who Run Our World by Anne Sverdrup-Thygeson, 2019

Fine Lines: Vladimir Nabokov’s Scientific Art edited by Stephen H. Blackwell and Kurt Johnson, 2016

Flight Behavior by Barbara Kingsolver, 2012

The Fly Trap by Fredrik Sjöberg, 2004

For Love of Insects by Thomas Eisner, 2003

Four Wings and a Prayer: Caught in the Mystery of the Monarch Butterfly by Sue Halpern, 2001

Half-Earth: Our Planet’s Fight for Life by Edward O. Wilson, 2016

Here by Richard McGuire, 2014

The Human Swarm: How Our Societies Arise,Thrive, and Fall by Mark W. Moffett, 2019

Innumerable Insects: The Story of the Most Diverse and Myriad Animals on Earth by Michael S. Engel, 2018

Insectopedia by Hugh Raffles, 2010

Memoirs of Black Entomologists: Reflections on Childhood, University, and Career Experiences edited by Michelle Samuel-Foo, Eric W. Riddick, Alvin M. Simmons, and Willye W. Bryan, 2015 (on order)

Metamorphosis insectorum Surinamensium by Maria Sibylla Merian, 1705

Monarchs and Milkweed: A Migrating Butterfly, A Poisonous Plant, and Their Remarkable Story of Coevolution by Anurag Agrawal, 2017