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Articles of NoteJesse Jackson is relieved when he hears footsteps behind him, turns around, sees it’s a white man – and figures he won’t be mugged. Is this acceptable?... more» Suppose we found remnants of algae or a trilobite on another planet? It might be a bad omen for the human race... more» Human beings are impulsive, lazy, busy, inert, irrational creatures prone to all kinds of biases and errors: that’s why they need libertarian paternalism... more» Alice Walker cared so much about other people’s kids, she forgot her own. Her daughter says the writer “resigned from being my mother”... more» If Frederick Douglass were alive today, he would be dismayed by the reluctance of liberals to connect programs with the spirit that animates their politics... more» The book is not for burning. Contra its author’s dying wishes, son Dmitri will publish Vladimir Nabokov’s last novel, Laura... more» If in the end Niels Bohr was not able to explain it all to Margrethe, well, that was nature’s doing, not Bohr’s fault... more» The penalties for prostitution in Iran are severe – whipping and even execution. So how does the oldest profession fare in that land?... more» Saint Walter Cronkite intones in grainy footage or black and white stills – that’s the way it is, at the Newseum. Whatever... more» William Jefferson was inspired by love of his kinfolk to do great things. That’s why he had $90,000 cash in his freezer... more» Augusten Burroughs’s memory: what sort of freakishly bloated cortex retains after eighteen years the color of some random person’s belt?... more» Percival Lowell, a brilliant, rich, charming Boston Brahmin, thought a century ago he could see a network of canals on Mars. He got other people thinking... more» If you think you know who the winners are going to be, come November, it’s time to put your money where your mouth is. Enter the political betting markets... more» The British love their trees, but across the land beautiful old trees are being chopped down in their thousands. The reason? Safety rules and hungry lawyers... more» A child’s body had been found on the island of Jersey, in the grounds of a children’s home, said the BBC, and the media frenzy began... more» An atheist church? “The last thing atheists want to see is their rational set of ideas yoked up with the trappings of a religion,” says Daniel Dennett... more» “To shoot a man because you disagree with him about Hegel’s dialectic is after all to honor the human spirit,” says George Steiner... more» Diana was “a simpering Bambi narcissist,” Mother Theresa a “thieving fanatical Albanian dwarf.” Christopher Hitchens does have opinions... more» Crazy English. Li Yang’s cosmology ties the ability to speak English to personal strength – and national power... more» It is a truth universally acknowledged that available, sociable, and attractive men are hard to find for dinner parties... more» Trace the city walls of Elea today. Maybe Zeno formulated his paradoxes pacing these same stones 900,000 days ago... more» The dirty secret of travel guides: update your edition by plagiarizing another guide, or just Google that town you might have explored on foot... more» “A good English breakfast never lets you down.” No, it kills you, and that’s exactly what it is doing to Brits across their little islands right now... more» Plants are green because the sun that keeps them alive is a type G star. If they’d evolved for a red dwarf, plants would be black... more» Now 35 years on, how does Erica Jong’s Fear of Flying stand up as literature? In Elaine Showalter’s view, very well... more» India is about to create what may be the biggest mass eviction of indigenous people ever. All in the name of conservation... more» You can walk into an elevator one night, with your life in one kind of shape, and emerge from it with your life in quite another. Ask Nicholas White... more» Deconstruction was for M.H. Abrams a problem from the start. He had doubts about the idea that “for hundreds of years people have missed the real point”... more» A bad night at the opera. But at the Met, the talent pool is formidable, and even Tristan und Isolde can end happily. Sort of... more» Much of what we know about the ancient world we owe to Herodotus, the only travel writer in print for 2,500 years. A.P. David explains... part 1 ... part 2 The pop music industry has sadly come to depend on “heritage acts” – wrinkled, dyed-hair, aging stars – to pack houses and make money... more» We need a deadly sins update. Anyway, Pride, Sloth, and Gluttony are now self-esteem, relaxation, and having gourmet tastes. P.J. O’Rourke offers new sins... more» No wonder Hugo Chavez was upset when Colombia struck at the FARC terrorists in their home camp. He’s been giving them money and arms... more» Paul Theroux depicted V.S. Naipaul ten years ago as a stingy, tantrum-prone, racist snob badly in need of driving lessons. He was far too kind... more» Walt Whitman had imagined his poetry would be read by American workers. But his most receptive audience was the British intelligentsia... more» More than half the world’s building cranes are at present in China. Robert Macfarlane can count 34 of them from his apartment windows... more» Let’s face it: Batman and Robin, as many gay writers have so fondly noted, are a tad campy. They both love flowers... more» With his legit literary career in decline, Rupert Smith took on a nom de porn and entered the parallel universe of erotica... more» Peanut Lolita, a liqueur with a grainy texture and an overwhelming taste of whiskey and peanuts. But what a name... more» The poor suffer, of course. But why do some poor people act to ensure their continued indigence? Charles Karelis wonders... more» How long you live, whether you win or lose cancer lotto or Parkinson’s bingo, have little to do, says Michael Kinsley, with life’s other successes... more» As a waitress in a posh restaurant, she was ally, authority, and confidante for her customers – all within 30 seconds... more» Just before it was to open with an exhibit of Titian, Botticelli, and Caravaggio, a major New York gallery has been shut by a judge... more» ... more» Switzerland: a small country with a skilled workforce, booming exports, and enormous prosperity has become the envy of Europe... more» That “lovable old-fashioned bundle of ink and cellulose,” the newspaper, will land for the last time on a doorstep one day in 2043... more» Does it not demean a woman, every bit as much as it demeans a man, to make of her either a victim of men’s appetites or a fantasist of them?... more» Did Samuel Taylor Coleridge compose a blank-verse translation of Goethe’s Faust and publish it anonymously in London in 1821?... more» Cities declined as they emptied while the suburbs swelled. History moves on, and now it is the suburbs that are poised for decline... more» He sat alone in a room for 24 hours with 6 TVs, a laptop, and 2 radios watching and reading only political pundits and blogs. Yes, it can be done... more» China’s new intelligentsia. Despite the global interest in the rise of China, no one is paying much attention to its ideas and who produces them... more» Like the United States, Ireland is at the tail end of a housing- and consumer-fueled boom – and its luck is running out... more» Religion may have evolved as an adaptive benefit for human beings. But once you know that, you’ll derive no such benefits from religion... more» Suppose you had a nose job, but then decided you liked your old nose better. Maybe with the help of science, you could regrow it... more» By turns adulatory and neglectful, the English did not know what to make of Edward Elgar in his life, and have felt ambivalent about him ever since... more» Arthur C. Clarke, whose visions of the future became scientific fact, is dead at the age of 90... NYT ... LAT ... WP ... AFP ... Guardian ... Telegraph ... London Times ... Salon ... Edward Rothstein Yes, the conservative revolution did get its start in the 1970s, and yes, it did succeed. But not quite as completely as its champions would suggest... more» The dictatorial capitalism of China carries the seeds of its own demise. In the short term, such countries are forces to be reckoned with, but... more» It’s always a shock when firebrands of the left abandon their old politics and turn right. But this sort of thing has a history... more» ... David Mamet is the latest Encyclopedia Britannica’s sales for its 32 volume set peaked in 1990. Today, paper encyclopedias are in deep trouble... more» Catholicism was an immigrant church in the 19th century. As the Pew study shows, it’s on its way to becoming one again... more» Though the rational mind knows what a picture is, it’s hard to hit a baby’s photo on a dartboard: our aim falls prey to deep intuitions... more» Figure skating: fiercely individualistic and starkly conformist, with a fair modicum of corruption. Its popularity is in freefall... more» Gustave Courbet’s Femme nue couchée, an erotic masterpiece of 1862, was lost for 50 years after the end of WWII... more» The next bubble must be large enough to recover the losses from the housing bubble collapse. How bad will it be? Some rough calculations... more» Kinship and reciprocity are the “twin pillars of altruism in a Darwinian world.” So altruism is an urge wired into us by selfish genes?... more» Despite paranoia about biotech and routine panics over it, America’s gee-whiz attitude toward machines may yet make the country a haven for nanotech... more» Fashion provides a way to now and again liquidate the accumulated dross of consumer lifestyles. The “cleansing effect” is good for us all... more» In 1908 astronomers thought the Milky Way galaxy made up the entire universe – it was an “island universe” in an infinite void. Ideas keep changing... more» Yet another faked memoir: this one from a “mixed-race former child drug-runner” from South-Central L.A.... more» ... Well, it wasn’t a Holocaust memoir ... like this one. Who was it who said women aren’t funny? Chances are it was a man – and these days the joke is on him... more» The New York Times Most Stolen Book List: Philip K. Dick, Charles Bukowski, William S. Burroughs, and Jim Thompson. Or any graphic novel... more» Ethnonationalism is not just a detour in European history: it’s an enduring propensity of the human spirit that must be faced... more» When Gen. Raymond Odierno took over the Multi-National Corps-Iraq in 2006, Iraq was in flames. He has become the Patton of Counterinsurgency... more» William F. Buckley, architect and builder of modern conservatism, is dead... Nat’l Review memorials ... AP ... NYT ... WP ... old columns ... Sam Tanenhaus ... Slate ... Wash Times ... Moderate Voice ... Boston Globe ... Books by Buckley ... Guardian ... Roger Kimball ... Myron Magnet ... Chron Higher Ed ... Time ... David Boaz ... Conrad Black ... Cap Weinberger ... Nat’l Post ... Reason ... Buckley vs Mailer ... John McCain ... Rick Perlstein ... Telegraph ... London Times ... Clive Crook ... Robert Semple ... John Miller ... John Bogert ... Julia Keller ... Michael Seringhaus ... Andrew Malcolm ... Taki ... Peggy Noonan ... Jeet Heer ... David Brooks ... William Kristol ... Terry Eastland ... Andrew Ferguson ... Christopher Hitchens ... Joseph Bottum ... Kevin Mattson Dmitri Nabokov has turned to his dead father for advice on whether to burn the secret manuscript of Vladimir Nabokov’s last novel... more» More expensive wines taste better than cheaper wines, a new study shows. Even when they are exactly the same wine... more» We’re made for math, but only up to a point. Our sense of what a number is stands independent of language, memory, and even reason... more» Assassination works, when you’re trying to get rid of a tyrant. It is a less successful as a way to influence democracies... more» Alain Robbe-Grillet’s 1962 Last Year at Marienbad made little sense to its viewers, but it was perfect for its moment in the history of taste... more» Peter Gelb wanted “theatrical values” for the Metropolitan Opera, and live movie house screenings were his gimmick. Hey, they work... more» Golf in decline: the number of people who play the game 25 times a year or more fell to 4.6 million in 2005 from 6.9 million in 2000... more» “The idea of coming to New York,” says Stephen Koch, “was transformative. You would become a different person here.” Many writers have agreed... more» Americans are deeply divided over the wisdom of making space warfare a part of the national military strategy. Risks are manifold... more» The freaks and geeks of the 9/11 Truth movement are on to something. They just haven’t yet figured out what... more» Alain Robbe-Grillet, an enfant terrible of France’s literary establishment, is dead at the age of 85... Telegraph ... Reuters ... NYT ... BBC ... Le Monde ... Le Figaro ... AP ... l’Humanité ... London Times ... Independent Do professors indoctrinate students by expressing a political ideology in the classroom? Good question. Watch this space... more» “I can’t get a job, I have no money, I can’t get married, what can I say?” For Mr. Sayyid and other young Egyptians, religious fervor offers an answer... more» Libertarians see profit as the basis of stability and opportunity, others see only greed. But a new study shows business creates peace... more» Beware a slightly too-slick essay as part of your college entrance application. It may raise a DDI alert: “Daddy did it”... more» Is the incidence of autism rising? No. It’s a matter of what we now call “autism.” As for MMR vaccines, or mercury... more» ... more» With Christianity’s hold over people in decline and Islam on the rise, Europeans are more defensive of their cultural heritage... more» The Wharton business school has what may be the most sophisticated, and most confusing, course-registration system ever devised. It’s an auction... more» Children lie early, and often, for many reasons: to avoid punishment, bond with friends, gain a sense of control. And there’s another reason... more» Aesop gave us hare and tortoise,wolf in sheep’s clothing, the lion’s share, sour grapes, squeaky wheels, and more. Do we really know him?... more» The Stolen Generations is one of the most vexing and disgraceful issues Australia has faced. But what are the numbers of people that it affected?... more» ... response Conflict and artistic tension is the lifeblood of a string quartet. To be open-minded, respectful, and flexible, a quartet can need a marriage manual... more» French women d’un certain âge tend not to get fat and to stay lucky. They don’t see sex as a privilege for the young and beautiful... more» Robert Frost’s handwriting, like the man himself, was cramped and crabbed. But with care, it can be read... more» “Register of Eliminated Villages” looks like a schoolgirl’s lesson book, but it records Saddam’s genocide. Who owns this book?... more» Lopsided love: why do people, both left- and right-handed, tilt their heads to the right when they kiss?... more» A lot of Christians really like Jews! So why are those very Jews less than, uh, entirely happy about it?... more» “I was alone in my room, scribbling away,” says Chinua Achebe, “and if nobody had paid any attention to me, I wouldn’t have been terribly surprised”... more» Vietnam’s civil war did not end in 1975 and will not end till there is a government in Hanoi for all the Vietnamese people... more» John Maynard Keynes’s sex diaries are written in still unbroken code. God knows they’re trying to crack it... more» When Robert Fisk heard that his life of Saddam Hussein was selling well, one thing bothered him: he had never written one... more» Tonics for the aging brain: stay curious and keep learning, writing, going to talks and classes, gardening, and reading this very website... more» Abdul studies by day, but at night he builds bombs for the Islamic Jihad in Gaza. He and his friends can produce 100 every night... more» Are you a successful assassin? It’s the way to a good job in government, or maybe even a seat in the Duma, in today’s Russia... more» The Stasi agent whose job it was to steal Ulrike Poppe’s baby stroller or let the air out of her tires met her after the fall of the Wall. And killed himself... more» China and India are coming up in the world. The rest of us must treat this not as a threat, but as an opportunity for trade, investment, and exchange of ideas... more» With or without religion, good people will do good, and evil people will do evil. But for good people to do evil, that takes religion... more» Amazon’s top reviewer, Harriet Klausner, is a speed reader who can take on 45 books a week. And anyone cares?... more» Edith Grossman isn’t a collector of books, she’s a pack rat. “I like to buy books on the street, but I’m wary now because of bed bugs”... more» Arnold Schoenberg reinvented music with atonality. After a century, we’re still trying to figure out what comes next... more» Why should Acirema care about world peace or the morality of war? Dot Grebdnil and Kered Tellohc wonder... more» Johannes Brahms: “a great baby, gifted enough to play with harmonies that would baffle most grown-up men, but still a baby”... more» For academics, travel is a sacred privilege. They love to jet about the globe. As for those pesky carbon emissions... more» “How will we get the right people to marry each other, if they can refuse on such trivial grounds as lack of love?” This was once a serious question... more» PBS’s The Jewish Americans does not take up the irony of assimilation: the possible end of Jews as a distinctive people in America... more» The most powerful American chess player in history, Bobby Fischer, is dead at the age of 64... NYT ... Telegraph ... Balt Sun ... Guardian ... LAT ... USCF ... Wash Post ... NY Post ... Independent ... LAT ... Slate ... Guardian ... London Times ... Nat’l Post ... Guardian Chess for Fischer was a form of psychic murder. ... London Times ... Guardian ... Wash Post ... Independent ... Jerusalem Post ... Guardian ... London Times ... Smart Set From world-class chess player to world-class crank, he never realized he’d unwittingly blundered into checkmate. Vladimir Nabokov wanted all of his final, unfinished work destroyed. Should his son get out the matches?... more» Let the National Endowment for the Arts do what it does well, and not try to choose trends in contemporary art which it is unfit to judge... more» We’re in danger of losing a major cultural force, the muse behind much art, poetry, and music. We are blithely getting rid of melancholia... more» Mary Anning was only 12 when she found her first fossil, an ichthyosaurus, in 1812 on England’s “Jurassic Coast”... more» Women are becoming the new fix-it guys, with DIY tools replacing stylish totes as the latest female life-style accessories... more» Think Botox is a beauty step too far? How about a skull-lift? Maybe you want a fat-harvested bust augmentation... more» “I think religion is ineradicable,” says Ian McEwan, “and I think it is a terrible idea to suppress it, too”... more» Muhammad was a genius in the way he united the myriad of fissiparous, feuding Bedouin tribes of Arabia into a cohesive polity... more» “The Israelis did a wonderful job,” said Hannah Arendt of the Six-Day War, “I like Dayan a lot.” Yet her view of Zionism... more» “It is to the poor that I turn for musical greatness,” Antonin Dvorak once said. He meant the black musicians of America... more» When Paul Ehrlich claimed the “battle to feed all of humanity is over,” and millions would starve, he hadn’t counted on Norman Borlaug... more» The death of high fidelity. In the age of MP3s, sound quality is worse than ever. It’s gotta be loud, loud, loud... more» Locke and Mill both believed in being open to the other side’s ideas. They are still inspiring free debate, such as we expect to see on Bigthink... more» George MacDonald Fraser, creator of that “elitist, racist, sexist swine,” Flashman, is dead... more» His hero was not made for today’s Britain. As economists like to say, talk is cheap. So when it comes to a problem like losing weight, go ahead and put a price on it... more» What have you changed your mind about, and why? John Brockman’s Edge put the question to over a hundred scientists and scholars... more» People are not generally negative about their own lives. But more than ever they think the world is going to hell in a handbasket. Why?... more» “I’m a person who gets energized by deadlines, even when I’m well past them,” says lunatic editor Bill Buford... more» Dreams are much more likely to be shaped by events of the past week than any childhood trauma... more» The Sidney Awards for 2007 are out, and with them euphoria and psychic costs for the winners. David Brooks does the honors... part I ... part II About 12,000 years ago the human race embarked on an experiment called agriculture. The planet has never quite recovered... more» Giving to charity can induce an endorphin high not unlike sensations people get from drugs such as morphine or heroin... more» Have you written your thank-you letters yet? Mother’s words continue to dog most of us for life. As well they should... more» A philosophers’ cat fight: it is so bitter, so unforgiving, so unwittingly hilarious. Radical externalism? Tosh!... more» Repressed memory of trauma is such a striking effect. Why did no one notice it till the 20th century? Maybe because it never existed in the first place... more» Cranberry and rich chocolate in the aroma of that pinot noir? Yes, if the grape is a transgenic pinot with DNA spliced to include those very flavors... more» You cannot but live by faith of one kind or another. But does it require the Virgin Birth? The divinity of Jesus? Any religion at all?... more» After two weeks of poker, with daily games lasting up to 16 hours, Jerry Yang went home $8.25 million richer. Why not you?... more» Had a sexual encounter with a current member of Congress or a high-ranking government official? Larry Flynt wants to know... more» Statistically, the global temps in 2007 come out to be the same as 2006 and every year since 2001. Has global warming stopped?... more» A good index is a thing of beauty, and some of the best have been crafted in a warren of rooms on lower Fifth Avenue... more» You can have a scapula for $125, but a skull with teeth will set you back $1200. India outlawed trade in skeletons, but still... more» Stressed? Maybe you need to have your aura read at the Mind, Body, and Spirit Expo. Unless that stresses you even more... more» Ordinary freedom of speech would be a dangerous thing in Iran. No wonder Ramin Jahanbegloo found himself in prison... more» Russia is deeply unhappy about its place in the world: a big country with an equally big inferiority complex... more» ... more» ... more» Italy is getting there too. Poetry Stand. To the surprise and delight of all, a bright group of high school poets learned to provide verse on demand... more» Oprah glamorizes misery and fills people’s heads with hackneyed nostrums about life. But even with that... more» Thinking alone: all those endless editions of the Daily Me over the web can produce suspicion, feed unjustified rage, and make for social alienation... more» American beauty? He’s lived on both sides of the Atlantic, and Tad Safran says British women are unkempt and lazy about grooming... [cattiness advisory] Philosophers don’t observe, they sit in their armchairs, lost in thought. This traditional view is changing... more» Neo-Hamiltonians are eager to chop up the past and make it conform to their politics. But who was Alexander Hamilton?... more» Whether belted out in song, swelling in the background, or lilting just below notice, music on screen moves in mysterious ways... more» One part, one material, one purpose. Not much to the toothpick, you may think, but its technology carries a history... more» Stalin obsessed over John Wayne, while Brezhnev had a crush on Chuck Connors. The Soviets had this thing about cowboy movies... more» Buffalo won’t become a boomtown with a few subsidies. Better it be a small but vibrant city: shrinking to greatness... more» Shakespeare’s art works like the cry of “action” on a film set, by sudden peaks of excitement and drama breaking through into consciousness... more» Jurassic Tennis. Before lawn tennis, Jeu de Paume was the rage in France, played by monks, peasants, and nobility... more» Elizabeth Hardwick, critic, essayist, fiction writer, and co-founder of The New York Review of Books, is dead at the age of 91... more» ... more» ... more» Google’s much-hyped project to digitize 32 million books sounds like a good idea. Why are so many people taking shots at it?... more» There is an air of eternal youth about France, a sense still that this is a land where every new season brings a harvest of genius... more» Name a teddy bear after a little boy in your class and they want your head on a platter. Just another gaffe... more» Vladimir Putin controls state security, oil and gas money, and the media. What’s left? Time to take over the art world... more» “Wars may be fought with weapons,” Gen. George Patton said, “but they are won by men.” Men, not robots... more» For Ellen Dissanayake, the artistic impulse is a trait so ancient, universal, and persistent that it is almost surely innate... more» Driven by a wave of cheap labor, the spa industry in New York is huge. What once were luxuries are now “needs”... more» Tom Stoppard’s The Coast of Utopia ought not to work in Moscow: no glamour, no farce, no postmodern twist. And yet... more» North Korea: a pitiable, stagnant pond left over from the flood of Leninism. But it has nowhere to drain away... more» Chess is a game of pure reason, without luck or chance or subjectivity. It has always attracted free spirits... more» The middle child is difficult, the eldest bossy, the youngest wild. But are the clichés of birth order true?... more» One of the mysteries of the universe is that it speaks the language of mathematics – in exactly 248 dimensions?... more» Yale has a motto: Lux et Veritas. Then there is Swarthmore’s Guilt Without Sex and the University of Chicago’s Where Fun Goes to Die... more» The Joneses are college grads and have ten books at home. The Smiths only went to high school but own 100. Whose kids have the edge?... more» ... NEA report (pdf) Aliens among us? Are microbes from outer space hiding in plain sight, before our very eyes?... more» Managing Vladimir Horowitz, Peter Gelb came to realize the pianist was not just eccentric, he was crazy. So when Gelb took over the Met... more» There can be only one catch and that is Catch-22. Heller wanted Catch-18, but Leon Uris put paid to that... more» Anne-Sophie von Otter’s CD of songs from the Terezin concentration camp goes back to her father and an SS man named Gerstein... more» Mahmoud Ahmadinejad expresses a meticulously crafted, politically astute message of pious populism... more» Tim Weiner has won a National Book Award for his history of the CIA... more» Legacy of Ashes is also reviewed at the CIA website... more» Does it take women longer on average to be served in coffee shops? The answer in Boston, it seems, is yes. But why?... more» For Neanderthals, hunting big game was women’s work too, but the high casualty rate among fertile women hunters spelled doom... more» |
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New Books“Inscriptions and bird droppings are the only two things in Egypt that give any indication of life.” Flaubert said it, or so says Edward Said... more» Shopping gives our choices tangible effect. The enthusiasm with which people shop contrasts with their view of work... more» Nikola Tesla feared earrings, peaches, and touching people’s hair. Sure, another nutty inventor. But men like him changed our world... more» Philosophers often cannot resist writing about Shakespeare, with his depth and complexity. Alas, they are mostly ill-equipped to do so... more» Prokofiev’s dry wit resulted in some fine, bitchy one-liners. Mahler’s 7th Symphony was “like kissing a stillborn child”... more» Today we have nannies, but in the 19th century they had governesses. That plain Jane Eyre, for example... more» Classical music: abandoned, left behind sulking in its tent as culture moves on, with the action happening somewhere else... more» The house embodies our ideas of intimate family life and serves as our haven in a cold world. It’s also the site of Sisyphean labor, mostly female... more» The RAND Corporation remains one of the most potent and complex purveyors of U.S. imperialism. Its influence, positive and sinister, continues to be felt... more» In Peter Gay’s reading, modernist thinking is reduced to a psychological impulse: the lure of heresy. Yes, but... more»
Antiquity cannot be owned by any culture or any nation state. It is the inheritance of all humanity and ought to be open to all, preserved in museums... more» ... excerpt Women: enslaved by patriarchal views of proper domestic toil, or expected to get a high-paying job. Susan Pinker explains... more» “Rapunzel, Rapunzel, let down your hair.” So she stands at the tower window, her magically long golden hair hanging down... more» As a student, Tony Judt was an ardent backer of Labor Zionism, worked on a kibbutz and volunteered in the 1967 war. But times change, and so did he... more» Dorothy Wordsworth’s story is one of bad dentistry, migraines, voyeurism, incest, and even “post-coital intensity” in prose style... more» Snake-oil merchants who knowingly prey on terminal cancer patients are the lowest form of moral life. Yet they thrive... more» A beautiful home ... a first wife ... jealousy, a wreck ... a terrible event. But Daphne du Maurier did not yet know what would happen to Rebecca... more» While the student left marched in the 1960s, the right was quietly building toward the Reagan and Thatcher revolutions... more» In 1879 Vera Zasulich, 29, tried to kill the governor of St. Petersburg. He lived, but, oddly, so did she – as a celebrity... more» Arthur Rubinstein was as much a born playboy as a born pianist: always good for a party, a game of pool or poker... more» Richard Nixon told his friend and advisor Leonard Garment, “You’ll never make it in politics, Len. You just don’t know how to lie”... more» The red-state/blue-state paradigm is not only anti-democratic, it is deliberately so, in ways not unlike the USSR’s one-party state... more» Life in a hotel is bound to make you “idle and lazy, and dyspeptic from the want of exercise – a mere puppet and machine”... more» Okay, so Isaac Newton didn’t get bonked on the head by an apple. But he did have weird ideas about sex, gold, and religion... more» There is no biological evidence showing that women should stay home and raise babies. Nor is there evidence they’d prefer to be captains of industry... more» I ♥ Adorno. So does the great critic of pop culture and capitalism himself become a brand. Right there on a T-shirt... more» Only the defeat of Rommel at El Alamein kept German forces from entering Palestine and carrying out operations against the Jewish population... more» “When enough people share a delusion, it loses its status as a psychosis and gets a religious tax exemption instead.” Ronald De Sousa on how we think... more» Richard Florida has a point, but bike paths and arts festivals won’t matter much to the creative class if a city’s crime rate is like Detroit’s... more» Youth is not entirely wasted on the young. That long, long human childhood has its pluses, as David Bjorklund explains... more» Laetitia Pilkington’s memoirs are based on the idea that “men are bastards.” First and foremost her rebarbative husband... more» Orthodox Judaism, not unlike more familiar kinds of Christian fundamentalism, uses the Old Testament to keep the minds of believers in bondage... more» Herodotus and Thucydides invented history as a secular genre, distinct from the annals and king-lists of the ancient Near East... more» The compact between Jean-Paul Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir was a travesty of their claims to honesty and freedom. They were glued together by their lies... more» Cheese crumbs placed in front of a pair of copulating rats may distract the female, but not the male. One more sex ’n’ science factoid... more» Sir Vidia’s wife, Pat, loved him, supported him, organised and advised him, was his devoted reader. And yet... more» ... more» ... more» ... more» ... more» Social awareness ribbons are must-have fashion accessories. They show you care. Especially about exhibiting what a caring person you are... more» “All human effort against me is useless,” said Napoleon, “for I succeed in all I undertake. Those who declare themselves my enemies die”... more» Whether it’s artisanal coffee, hand-made furniture, or bespoke suits, economies of the West routinely create niche markets for craftsmen... more» Death of the author: you fall out of print, move to a book dealer’s website, or a grad student does a thesis on you. Finally, a last reader will turn the last page... more» Migrant women make a choice to take their chances abroad. They are not passive victims, even if they choose to work in the sex industry... more» If all of John Steinbeck is in print 40 years after his death and is still force-fed to school kids, why is he so decisively off the literary map?... more» J.S. Mill’s idea of freedom did not imply that truths are equal, but rather that truth is arrived at in the clash of ideas, in open debate... more» “Shakespeare wallahs,” Germaine Greer stridently insists, created “a Bard in their own likeness, that is to say, incapable of relating to women”... more» “Suicide-mass murder,” writes Martin Amis about Palestinian Arab terrorism, “is more than terrorism: it is horrorism. It is a maximum malevolence”... more» September 7, 1940, “one of the fairest days of the century, a day of clear warm air and high blue skies,” the day the Blitz began... more» The Soviet-Polish war of 1920 was prelude to a terrible future. Few commanders who played a role in it died peacefully in their beds after 1940... more» It is easy to regard the Dalai Lama as the plaything of movie stars and millionaires. But he is a formidable force... more» Is the U.S. a deeply anti-intellectual land? To answer yes is a no-brainer. And that is where the problem begins... more» ... more» Okay, so half of the French don’t bathe daily. They still continue to lead Europe in the use of perfumes and cosmetics... more» It’s hard to believe that comic books could be a center of debate, but they were once as controversial as communism... more» Electricity from the sun is the closest we have to a renewable solution to our energy problems. Now if only we had an effective storage battery... more» Georges-Louis Buffon’s grandeur, his true genius, lay in the incredible way he could plunder, recycle, and interpret the work of others... more» Kipling said that never the twain shall meet, but East and West have actually been meeting for 2,500 years, often with bloody results... more» Pain and coercion in interrogation are not likely to elicit good information. There must be better ways for the U.S. to protect itself... more» Henry Fielding’s History of Tom Jones was known to be fiction. The history of Margaret Jones was thought to be fact. Entertainment – and lies... more» Are you happy? Sure, we all are. Maasai herders, Scarsdale soccer moms, Amish, Inughuits in Greenland, Croatian shoe salesmen... more» Academic literary criticism is not just dying as a scholarly profession: it has lost its very will to live... more» Marcel Proust’s Jewishness may have allowed him to perceive more sharply the hypocrisy and hostility exposed in the Dreyfus affair... more» If professors of literature go about denying the value of the very books they teach, is it any surprise that English departments are in trouble?... more» A book that cites Joseph Goebbels as an authority to vilify Churchill has lost touch with any moral bearings. Human Smoke cannot be taken seriously... more» American living standards will decline as U.S. exploitation of China fades in an economically transformed world. Maybe... more» Lacking a vivid imagination, Peter Mark Roget wa |
