The Life of the Mind The Life of the Mind
Isaiah Berlin once told his biographer, Michael Ignatieff, that "I have a natural tendency to gossip, to describing things, to noticing things, to interest in human beings and th...
Aug 26, 2004 / Books & the Arts / Sunil Khilnani
State of the Union, 2004 State of the Union, 2004
This article is excerpted from Gore Vidal's latest book, Imperial America, just published by Nation Books.
Aug 26, 2004 / Books & the Arts / Gore Vidal
Letter From Ground Zero Letter From Ground Zero
Is the United States--as so many have said, in celebration or dismay--a planet-mastering empire or not? The question presses upon us as George W.
Aug 26, 2004 / Books & the Arts / Jonathan Schell
Bad Brains Bad Brains
More than once in Jonathan Demme's reimagining of The Manchurian Candidate, a distraught Denzel Washington jabs at his skull and rasps, "They got in here." He means it literally.
Aug 12, 2004 / Books & the Arts / Stuart Klawans
The Middle Man The Middle Man
Over the century that followed the Napoleonic wars, the Ottoman Empire contracted and eventually disappeared from the map.
Aug 12, 2004 / Books & the Arts / Mark Mazower
The Lost Steps The Lost Steps
American policy-makers may be divided into two schools of thought on the Arab-Israeli conflict: the evenhanded and the Israel-first.
Aug 12, 2004 / Books & the Arts / Avi Shlaim
What Are They Reading? What Are They Reading?
I could hardly believe it when I heard Jane Jacobs was still alive and that she had written a new book, Dark Age Ahead, at the age of 88.
Aug 3, 2004 / Books & the Arts / Ben Adler
Shadows and Smog Shadows and Smog
I paid to see Will Smith fight legions of robots, and what I got was a trip back to Wabash Street.
Jul 29, 2004 / Books & the Arts / Stuart Klawans
Holy Water Holy Water
Walden Pond is America's environmental holy land, the naturalist's sacred site and Concord's local swimming pool.
Jul 29, 2004 / Books & the Arts / Jane Holtz Kay
Latin America’s Longest War Latin America’s Longest War
In May, Jan Egeland, the United Nations Undersecretary for Humanitarian Affairs, called a news conference in New York to declare publicly what he had been warning people about fo...
Jul 29, 2004 / Books & the Arts / Peter Canby