Essays
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Page 99
Vidocq: Philadelphia's Sherlock Holmes
Corrupt but dedicated: Philadelphia's answer to Sherlock Holmes
Sherlock Holmes, Charlie Chan and Sam Spade are all legendary but fictitious private eyes. But Edgar Allan Poe and Victor Hugo were inspired by a real Philadelphia gumshoe of literary dimensions, as I discovered behind the door of the Vidocq Society in Center City.
Essays
5 minute read
Philadelphia Science Fiction Conference
Science fiction vs. science fantasy
I've been defending science fiction against various onslaughts ever since I started reading it. For me, it's a literary response to the knowledge that the future will be different from the present-- probably very different.
Essays
5 minute read
Félix Fénéon Teaches You How To Write
Give me three lines, and I'll give you the world
The art critic and anarchist Félix Fénéon was above all a man who understood that brevity is the soul of wit. His collection of three-line novels, circa 1906, is an exercise in style that belongs on every bookshelf.
Essays
4 minute read
An ad man makes his case
Confessions of an advertising man, or:
Why my mother took the subway to Macy's
Many people, filled with smug self-satisfaction, claim to be above it all. They tell us that they're just not influenced by ads or commercials. This is self-delusion.
Essays
3 minute read
Life imitates Hollywood
Stranger than fiction
A preposterous incident in the 1939 Howard Hawks film Only Angels Have Wings actually occurred this month. What, if any, are the implications for America’s incoming administration?
Essays
3 minute read
Satirizing a black president
Obama and Bush walk into a bar...
With Obama’s election, satirists must grapple with the unique problem of walking the tightrope between humor and racism. We all need some practice— not in recognizing satire, but in sorting it out from racism in satire’s clothing.
Essays
2 minute read
Obama: The guilt-by-association ploy
On 'pal-ing around' with William Ayers
Campaign attempts to link Obama to William Ayers, Jeremiah Wright and Zbigniew Brzezinski beg a larger question: So what? Why should we worry if a candidate "pals around with" former terrorists or critics of Israel?
Essays
2 minute read
Baseball, love and rock "n roll
The very last baseball metaphor, or:
Love, life and the Phillies' World Series victory
Sometimes the concert is perfect and there are seven encores. But how many times did you send your soul's Mitch Williams out there and watch your own hopes, like a baseball, sail over the back wall into hellish oblivion and black nights?
Essays
2 minute read
Bush: The final days
The case for impeachment (even now)
Most Americans have forgotten George W. Bush as his administration winds down. Yet the pace of its destructiveness has accelerated as January 20th approaches. The case for impeachment still needs to be made, if only for America’s self-protection between now and the inauguration.
Essays
7 minute read
Studs Terkel: The art of winging it
Studs Terkel:
The virtues of a life played by ear
The empathic mensch interviewer Studs Terkel, who died on October 31, reached voraciously for life’s opportunities and rarely paused for breath. You don’t get to choose your parents, but I and thousand of others were blessed by Terkel’s tutelage. He taught me how to look and ask questions.
Essays
4 minute read