Books
The Charles, by Arthur Bernon Tourtellot. Illustrated by Ernest J. Donnelly. New York: Farrar & Rinehart, Inc., 1941.
An historical narrative that describes the Charles’s crucial role in the development of early Boston and the forming of the United States.
The Blithedale Romance, by Nathanial Hawthorne. First published circa 1852.
In the conclusion of The Blithedale Romance, the character Zenobia drowns in the Charles River.
The Handmaid's Tale, a science fiction novel by Margaret Atwood. Toronto: McClelland & Stewart, 1985.
Characters walk along the Charles River parklands to have private conversations. The Hyatt Hotel is the site of a bordello.
The Fourth Hand, a novel by John Irving. New York: Random House, 2001.
The novel describes contemplative walks along the Charles River while the character uses a lacrosse stick to pick up his dog’s droppings.
The Sound and the Fury, by William Faulkner. New York: Jonathan Cape & Harrison Smith, 1929.
The character Quentin, a student at Harvard, loads his jacket with flatirons and commits suicide by jumping off a bridge into the Charles after dishonor is brought to his sister.
The Bell Jar, by Sylvia Plath. Heinemann, 1963.
The protagonist, Esther, briefly considers committing suicide by jumping off a bridge into the Charles.
Inventing the Charles River, by Karl Haglund, published jointly by The MIT Press and the Charles River Conservancy: Cambridge, Mass., 2003. Introduction by Renata von Tscharner, Founder and President of the Charles River Conservancy.
Karl Haglund's long interest in urban planning and landscape design led him to write this history of the Charles River Basin, creating a great resource through its rich text and extensive use of full-color illustrations that help to document the many changes over the years.
Short Stories and Poems
“To the River Charles” by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. Ballads and Other Poems, 1842. Excerpt:
Thou hast taught me, Silent River!
Many a lesson, deep and long;
Thou hast been a generous giver;
I can give thee but a song.
“Just Once” by Anne Sexton. The Complete Poems. Mariner Books, 1999.
Just once I knew what life was for.
In Boston, quite suddenly, I understood;
walked there along the Charles River,
watched the lights copying themselves,
all neoned and strobe-hearted, opening
their mouths as wide as opera singers;
counted the stars, my little campaigners,
my scar daisies, and knew that I walked my love
on the night green side of it and cried
my heart to the eastbound cars and cried
my heart to the westbound cars and took
my truth across a small humped bridge
and hurried my truth, the charm of it, home
and hoarded these constants into morning
only to find them gone.
El Encuentro (The Meeting), by Jorge Luis Borges. The Aleph and Other Stories, 1933–1969. Edited and translated by Norman Thomas di Giovanni in collaboration with the author. New York: E. P. Dutton, 1970.
A short story in which a mature Borges sits on the bank of the River Charles and comes faces to face with a younger version of himself. He determines that in the past he must have had the encounter during a dream and dismissed it as fantasy, though later accepting it as real.