Mitt Romney Explains Why He Lost Mitt Romney Explains Why He Lost
Obama was clever as clever could be; To targeted groups he gave gifts that were free: Say, healthcare for free until age 26, And free contraceptives (for sex just for kicks). Debates in the primaries left our team bruised From harsh accusations the White House then used. Whatever the reason for losing might be, Of one thing I’m sure: it could not have been me. I’m perfect.
Nov 20, 2012 / Column / Calvin Trillin
Writing Without a Mattress: On Louise Glück Writing Without a Mattress: On Louise Glück
Louise Glück’s poems aim to get to the bottom of her experience without making an idol of “reality” or brute suffering.
Nov 20, 2012 / Books & the Arts / Robert Boyers
Ragged, Unkempt, Strange: On William Faulkner Ragged, Unkempt, Strange: On William Faulkner
For all the ways it is rife with tenderness, fury and ugliness, William Faulkner’s fiction is stubbornly persistent in its artistry.
Nov 20, 2012 / Books & the Arts / Joanna Scott
Motives and Apprehensions: On Edward P. Jones Motives and Apprehensions: On Edward P. Jones
Edward P. Jones’s characters know that everything they’ve worked for might suddenly be taken from them.
Nov 20, 2012 / Books & the Arts / Aaron Thier
Shelf Life Shelf Life
Edward Luttwack’’s The Rise of China vs. the Logic of Strategy
Nov 20, 2012 / Books & the Arts / Stephen Wertheim
Chicken Wire and Telephone Calls: On Robert Caro’s LBJ Chicken Wire and Telephone Calls: On Robert Caro’s LBJ
In The Passage of Power, Robert Caro shows that LBJ’s brilliance as a politician lay not in his idealism but his opportunism.
Nov 20, 2012 / Books & the Arts / Thomas Meaney
I’m Nobody, Who Are You? On Zadie Smith’s ‘NW’ I’m Nobody, Who Are You? On Zadie Smith’s ‘NW’
If you get to the top, only to find that the voice hounding you with charges of inauthenticity is your own, what then?
Nov 20, 2012 / Books & the Arts / Alexandra Schwartz
Republican Soul Searching Republican Soul Searching
We’re searching our souls and we’re wondering why We got beat so badly our rivals are gloating. It’s obvious now where our campaign went wrong: We should have prevented more people from voting.
Nov 14, 2012 / Column / Calvin Trillin
Oliver Stone’s ‘Untold History’ Oliver Stone’s ‘Untold History’
Missed opportunities, roads not taken—these are the central themes of Stone's new documentary.
Nov 14, 2012 / Books & the Arts / Jon Wiener
The Noble and the Base: Poland and the Holocaust The Noble and the Base: Poland and the Holocaust
Can the two central images of Poland during World War II—a country of heroes and a country of collaborators—ever be combined?
Nov 14, 2012 / Books & the Arts / John Connelly