Books and Ideas

Poetry Makes Nothing Happen? Ask Laura Bush Poetry Makes Nothing Happen? Ask Laura Bush

So Laura Bush will not, after all, be discussing the works of Emily Dickinson, Walt Whitman and Langston Hughes with a selected group of American poets at the White House on Fe...

Feb 6, 2003 / Books & the Arts / Katha Pollitt

Jump at de Sun Jump at de Sun

Anthropologist, novelist, folklorist, essayist and luminary of the Harlem Renaissance, Zora Neale Hurston dazzled her peers and patrons almost immediately upon her arrival in N...

Jan 30, 2003 / Books & the Arts / Kristal Brent Zook

Among the Lotus-Eaters Among the Lotus-Eaters

In 1886 the British are fighting an imperial war on another continent with the express goal of suppressing and maintaining control of the natives. Sound familiar?

Jan 30, 2003 / Books & the Arts / Dr. Marc Siegel

Death at an Early Age Death at an Early Age

In October 1968, at the height of the Ocean Hill-Brownsville crisis, New York Mayor John Lindsay got heckled off the stage at a synagogue in Brooklyn.

Jan 30, 2003 / Books & the Arts / Michael E. Staub

‘Random’ Destruction ‘Random’ Destruction

Once again, changes at Random House have made headlines in papers throughout the country.

Jan 30, 2003 / Books & the Arts / André Schiffrin

Familia Faces Familia Faces

Genealogy rules Latino literature tyrannically.

Jan 23, 2003 / Books & the Arts / Ilan Stavans

Forced to Bowl Alone? Forced to Bowl Alone?

Being a citizen in America today feels a bit like being the student at the bottom of the class. We are continually reminded of how we are falling down on the job. Not enough of...

Jan 23, 2003 / Books & the Arts / Palma J. Strand

Was It Sexy, or Just Soviet? Was It Sexy, or Just Soviet?

Given the number of prematurely world-weary young men and women who followed the lure of easy money, cheap alcohol and even cheaper sex to the geopolitical discount bins of the...

Jan 16, 2003 / Books & the Arts / Eliot Borenstein

Dissident or Apologist? Dissident or Apologist?

The Iraqi-American writer and Brandeis professor Kanan Makiya is nowadays considered by many in the United States to be the Iraqi dissident par excellence.

Jan 16, 2003 / Books & the Arts / Sinan Antoon

The Rest of Love The Rest of Love

The hive is for where
the honey was.
Was findable there,

then not.
Sometimes, I think I dreamed it,
or I am saying it like a thing

Jan 16, 2003 / Books & the Arts / Carl Phillips

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