Books and Ideas

Black Flame Hunters

Jazz Fest Is Back. Let’s Dance. (But It’s Complicated.) Jazz Fest Is Back. Let’s Dance. (But It’s Complicated.)

Beyond the confines of a beloved annual event, the future of live music in New Orleans remains unsettled.

May 6, 2022 / Larry Blumenfeld

Red Planet Books and Comics in Albuquerque, New Mexico.

Don’t Fear a Red Planet: The Story of the World’s Only Native Comic Shop Don’t Fear a Red Planet: The Story of the World’s Only Native Comic Shop

Lee Francis IV turned an empty hair salon into a space for “Indigenerds” to let their imaginations run wild.

May 4, 2022 / Cecilia Nowell

An Intimate History of Hong Kong

An Intimate History of Hong Kong An Intimate History of Hong Kong

A conversation with Karen Cheung about her memoir The Impossible City, the nascent Hong Kong literary tradition, and understanding a period of upheaval through art and cultural exp...

May 4, 2022 / Books & the Arts / Rosemarie Ho

Le Pen’s Third Try for the Presidency Fails

Le Pen’s Third Try for the Presidency Fails Le Pen’s Third Try for the Presidency Fails

You ran again and then you ran again, And still the French did not elect Le Pen. They knew you could have done a lot of harm If number three turned out to be the charm. We hope the…

May 3, 2022 / Column / Calvin Trillin

Jennifer Egan’s World Wide Web

Jennifer Egan’s World Wide Web Jennifer Egan’s World Wide Web

Her latest novel tackles a favorite topic of her fiction—the excesses of the Internet and modern technologies.

May 3, 2022 / Books & the Arts / Erin Somers

W.E.B. Du Bois’s Abolition Democracy

W.E.B. Du Bois’s Abolition Democracy W.E.B. Du Bois’s Abolition Democracy

The enduring legacy and capacious vision of Black Reconstruction.

May 3, 2022 / Books & the Arts / Gerald Horne

Nijinska’s Revolutionary Vision of Dance

Nijinska’s Revolutionary Vision of Dance Nijinska’s Revolutionary Vision of Dance

Lynn Garafola’s biography of the dancer and choreographer charts her globetrotting life and radical art. 

May 3, 2022 / Books & the Arts / Jennifer Wilson

The Ambitious and Overstuffed World of Hanya Yanagihara

The Ambitious and Overstuffed World of Hanya Yanagihara The Ambitious and Overstuffed World of Hanya Yanagihara

To Paradise attempts to break out of the common insularity of contemporary fiction, but in doing so it often ends up focusing more on the author.

May 2, 2022 / Books & the Arts / Tope Folarin

Me Too and the Not Me Novel

Me Too and the Not Me Novel Me Too and the Not Me Novel

Julia May Jonas’s new novel is a study of a campus scandal and a woman caught in the middle of it.

May 2, 2022 / Books & the Arts / Laura Marsh

Nazi governor of Poland Hans Frank at the Nuremberg Trials, 1946.

What Is Left of History? What Is Left of History?

Joan Scott’s On the Judgment of History asks us to imagine the past without the idea of progress. But what gets left out in the process?

May 2, 2022 / Books & the Arts / David A. Bell

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