Then he was given the opportunity of a lifetime: From 1959 to 1960, Claxton was commissioned to document the American jazz scene at the height of the "golden era" of the music genre.

NPR: 'Jazz Life': Images of a Golden Era of Music

No more chilling document exists in recent American life than the 2005 annual report of the biggest of these firms, the Corrections Corporation of America.

NEWYORKER: The Caging of America

Even before the INS memo became public, the American Civil Liberties Union released a document setting forth a list of constitutional rights it said that even non-U.S. citizens are entitled to when they face questioning by law enforcement officials, such as the right to an attorney.

CNN: INS memo cites possible detention for those questioned in terror probe

In the two zones of action (they hardly count as stories), Tati plays Monsieur Hulot, a tall, spring-jointed, aging Everyman who goes to see a bureaucrat about a document, while a busload of American tourists blithely disembark in a Paris of iconic landmarks that they see only fleetingly as distant reflections in glass doors.

NEWYORKER: Playtime

The American Aerospace Medical Association Commercial Spaceflight Working Group published a document in 2009 saying that most individuals with "well controlled medical conditions" could withstand the acceleration forces involved in the launch and landing of a commercial spaceflight.

BBC: What are the health risks of space travel?

Its draft offer document, now being shown around by Morgan Stanley, reveals an American court case.

ECONOMIST: Russian steel

Our American partners, as I understand, intend to proceed quickly to present this document to the Senate for ratification.

WHITEHOUSE: Signing of New START Nuclear Arms Treaty with Russia

The Brooklyn-born Irish-American comedian kicks off his new one-man off-Broadway show by wondering why that document is so darn fascinating.

WSJ: Colin Quinn has fun with the US Constitution

Yet the document likely to be most thumbed through for clues about the world's nuclear future will be the American Defence Department's next nuclear-posture review, due in early 2009.

ECONOMIST: Nuclear disarmament