Books
421 results
Page 39
John Lukacs's 'History and the Human Condition'
A pragmatic Cold Warrior's last hurrah
Was World War II necessary? How about the Cold War? History and the Human Condition places the historian John Lukacs squarely in the humanist tradition of the public commentator who invites us to reflect on the values of a shared past, unlike the trendy and sometimes trivial work that characterizes too much of his profession today.
Articles
8 minute read
Two male authors, at opposite extremes
Wet dreams and clean pants, or: What do women want from men?
One best-selling male author writes books about a neutered man; another about a stallion near a mare in perpetual heat. When I see the kind of books that women read, I feel embarrassed for my gender.
Articles
3 minute read
The Third World in America
When Nigerians and Pakistanis start to think like Americans
Can today's global conflicts be disguised as love stories? Yes, and very effectively, when the lovers are Nigerians or Pakistanis studying at Ivy League universities.
Articles
5 minute read
The comic art of Al Williamson
The power of sex (and visual images too), or: 50 women I'll never forget
Through the tilt of their heads, the sideways glances of their languid eyes, the inviting way they leaned against doorways, Al Williamson's women tapped impulses within us prepubescent boys that we couldn't fully identify but also couldn't fail to notice.
Mary Sue Welsh's "One Woman in a Hundred'
She didn't sleep her way to the top
Edna Phillips was the first female principal player in any major symphony orchestra. She worshipped Stokowski (who hired her) and despised Ormandy (who made passes at her).
Articles
3 minute read
Marcel Proust, poet
… And he wrote poetry, too!
It probably shouldn't come as a shock that Marcel Proust set his hand to writing verse. His poems about great artists of the past are pleasant but unremarkable— no better or worse than those of his Symbolist contemporaries.
Articles
2 minute read
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Mary Roach cruises the alimentary canal
There's something about Mary
Mary Roach is to writers what the Mütter Museum is to museums. She joyfully mines human taboos, from human cadavers to feces to the alimentary canal, and consequently seems to have cornered a lucrative market.
Articles
5 minute read
A Dan Hoffman memory
To him, Whitman was more than a bridge
The late Dan Hoffman, my favorite Philadelphia poet, was the kind of poet that Walt Whitman asked Americans to cherish.
Articles
2 minute read
Andrei Codrescu's "Bibliodeath'
Requiem for the printed word
Andrei Codrescu grew up in Communist Romania, where printed words were deemed more dangerous than bombs. Now he lives in a virtual world inundated with too many instantly disposable virtual words. Ah, but he has a solution.
Articles
5 minute read
Jim Quinn's "Waiting For the Wars to End'
What did you do in the war (and don't ask which one)?
The former food and language critic Jim Quinn now writes unflinching yet tender characterizations of people slogging through life. Both of these stories are sadly funny and horrifically real.
Articles
3 minute read