Lost in America Lost in America
In no literature in the world has the immigrant novel been more varied, more original, more persistent than in ours--and this for the most obvious of reasons.
Nov 24, 2004 / Books & the Arts / Vivian Gornick
The Enigma of Return The Enigma of Return
In the largest exodus in recorded history, millions of refugees migrated across the brand new border after India was partitioned in 1947.
Sep 30, 2004 / Books & the Arts / Amitava Kumar
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
Living to Tell the Tale Living to Tell the Tale
Former Presidents have a difficult, even awkward, role. They cope in different ways, but if the past half-century is any guide, we can be certain of one thing: They write their m...
Jul 15, 2004 / Books & the Arts / Stanley I. Kutler
The Searcher The Searcher
In 1965, nearly forty years before the publication of Where I Was From, her most recent and most sustained meditation on her native state of California, Joan Didion wrote “John Way...
Jun 24, 2004 / Books & the Arts / Hilton Als
Unforgettable Unforgettable
"This is a book written in the presence of music." So begins Geoffrey O'Brien's sprawling memoir-cum-critical essay, and the reader is tempted to ask: What book isn't?
Apr 29, 2004 / Books & the Arts / Jody Rosen
My Dinner With Aleksander My Dinner With Aleksander
In 1964 an important if somewhat obscure Polish writer and public intellectual named Aleksander Wat arrived at the University of California, Berkeley, and began the work that wou...
Mar 4, 2004 / Books & the Arts / Benjamin Paloff
What Are They Reading? What Are They Reading?
John Hess, who, it should be said, is one of The Nation's oldest friends and severest critics, once complained to me about an "editor's choice" blurb I'd written, which containe...
Feb 18, 2004 / Books & the Arts / Richard Lingeman
Killing Time Killing Time
From its unification in 1871 until its comprehensive defeat in 1945, Germany was the most bellicose and nationalistic of modern countries.
Feb 12, 2004 / Books & the Arts / Benjamin Kunkel
A Faithful Servant A Faithful Servant
Most Americans take their system of government for granted, as if Moses himself had delivered the Constitution engraved on marble tablets.
Feb 5, 2004 / Books & the Arts / Ian Williams