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Two novels that changed my life

Let us now praise obscure men: Two authors who changed my life

To an alienated teenager growing up in the conformist ‘50s, Warren Miller's The Cool World and The Hustler by Walter Tevis were Bibles of hope that I clung to for survival. In retrospect, these novels served me better than they served their authors, who were far more troubled than I was.

Bob Levin

Oct 13, 2009 Articles 5 minute read

Moore: Unions are good, bankers are bad.

Michael Moore's "Capitalism: A Love Story' (1st review)

Man with a (heavy-handed) mission

Shooting fish in a barrel, Michael Moore's latest gotcha documentary provides abundant evidence that American capitalism is out of control. Unfortunately, Moore steps on his own feet by repeatedly inserting himself into the drama.

Adam Lippe

Sep 29, 2009 Articles 4 minute read

Roald Dahl's adult stories

Second helpings: Roald Dahl for grownups

Roald Dahl is famous for his offbeat children's stories, like Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. His adult tales, however, are far stranger— graceful and congenial, tightly constructed and as disturbing as Edna St. Vincent Millay's best sonnets.

Sep 25, 2009 Articles 4 minute read

Bartram at work: Plants as tools of empire.

Sharon White's "Vanished Gardens'

A journey in a hiccupping time machine

In Vanished Gardens, Sharon White takes readers on an impressionistic tour de force through Philadelphia's green spaces, past and present. She's a stylish writer, but fitting all the pieces of her broad mosaic together is no easy task.

Judy Weightman

Aug 25, 2009 Articles 4 minute read

Bartusiak's "The Day We Found the Universe'

Our long march across the cosmos: Humankind gets something right

A talented science writer tells the story of one of history's great intellectual sagas: how a group of semi-rational primates on an obscure planet discovered the true size and scope of the universe.

Tom Purdom

Aug 25, 2009 Articles 5 minute read

Yale and those Muhammad cartoons

Great moments in publishing: Judgment by committee at Yale

To avoid potential violence, Yale University Press has announced that the controversial 2005 Danish newspaper cartoons satirizing the prophet Muhammad (like the one at left) will be omitted from a forthcoming book about the global riots provoked by those cartoons. Is this a case of responsible behavior or intellectual cowardice?

Matthew Jakubowski

Aug 22, 2009 Articles 4 minute read

Sozer, Furmann, Hoss: Who's manipulating whom?

Christian Petzold's "Jerichow'

A German talent worth watching

Christian Petzold's Jerichow, a sly thriller from Germany that raises disturbing questions, recycles a twice-told noir classic, The Postman Always Rings Twice, but with the focus on the seeming victim rather than the seedy lovers. German film has never fully recovered from Hitler and rarely gets international distribution, but Jerichow announces a talent worth watching.

Aug 18, 2009 Articles 6 minute read

James Herrick's "Scientific Mythologies'

How many sci-fi writers can dance on the head of a pin?

James Herrick, a Christian apologist at a fundamentalist college, sees pop culture and science fiction supplanting traditional religious myths as the cutting force of spirituality today. Not to worry, professor: Steven Spielberg, Carl Sagan and the makers of Star Wars and Star Trek are mostly pouring old wine into new bottles.

Mitchell Gordon

Aug 04, 2009 Articles 3 minute read

"Bruno' and male neuroses

Who's that squirming in the audience?

Bruno, the latest comic vehicle for the entrapment artist Sacha Baron Cohen, seems at first glance a tasteless porridge of adolescent humor— a second serving of Cohen's parody of former Soviet republics, Borat. But look again: Bruno might be ripping off the scabs covering many of our cultural hang-ups, especially male ones.

Anne R. Fabbri