Raisin Raisin
I dragged my twelve-year-old cousin to see the Broadway production of A Raisin in the Sun because the hip-hop mogul and rapping bachelor, Diddy, played the starring role. An aspiring rapper gave my cousin his last name and the occasional child support so I thought the boy would geek to see a pop hero in the flesh as Walter Lee. My wife was newly pregnant, and I was rehearsing, like Diddy swapping fictions, surrendering his manicured thug persona, for a more domestic performance. My cousin mostly yawned throughout the play. Except the moment Walter Lee’s tween son stiffened on stage, as if rapt by the sound of a roulette ball. Scene: no one breathes as Walter Lee vacillates, uncertain of obsequity or rage after Lindner offers to buy the family out of the house they’ve purchased in the all-white suburb. Walter might kneel to accept, but he senses the tension in his son’s gaze. I was thinking, for real though, what would Diddy do? “Get rich or die trying,” 50 Cent tells us. But then my father sang the country lyrics, “Don’t get above your raisin’,” when as a kid I vowed to be a bigger man than him. That oppressive fruit dropped big as a medicine ball in my lap meant to check my ego, and I imagined generations wimpling in succession like the conga marching raisins that sang Marvin’s hit song. Silly, I know. Outside the theater, my cousin told me when Diddy was two, they found his hustler dad draping a steering wheel in Central Park, a bullet in his head. I shared what I knew of dreams deferred and Marvin Gaye. (When asked if he loved his son, Marvin Sr. answered, “Let’s just say I didn’t dislike him.”) Beneath the bling of many billion diodes I walked beside the boy through Times Square as if anticipating a magic curtain that would rise, where only one of us would get to take a bow.
Jul 12, 2011 / Books & the Arts / Gregory Pardlo
The Oxford Comma-otion The Oxford Comma-otion
Who gives a [insert expletive] about an Oxford comma?
Jul 11, 2011 / Books & the Arts / Maria Kari
NxtGen: Stuff the Cuts NxtGen: Stuff the Cuts
For those concerned that there's no good protest music out there, the English hip-hop group NxtGen is using rap to take searing aim at the British government’s austerity budg...
Jun 30, 2011 / Blog / Peter Rothberg
Erasing Labor History Erasing Labor History
Maine Governor Paul LePage's secret removal of a mural celebrating the state's labor history is just one in a long line of struggles over publicly-funded depictions of American wor...
Jun 29, 2011 / Books & the Arts / Rachel Heise Bolten
Republicans Increase Pressure on Chris Christie to Run for President Republicans Increase Pressure on Chris Christie to Run for President
Our candidates don’t measure up. Compared to Chris their thoughts are woolly. Let’s draft him now. It’s obvious That what we need’s a proper bully.
Jun 28, 2011 / Column / Calvin Trillin
Refutation of the Refutation: On Jeff Wall Refutation of the Refutation: On Jeff Wall
Has success spoiled the photography and the art of Jeff Wall?
Jun 28, 2011 / Books & the Arts / Barry Schwabsky
Cayucos Cayucos
boats used by African emigrants to reach Spanish islands A girl asleep beneath a fishing net Sandals the color of tangerines Off the coast of Morocco A moonlit downpour, God’s skeleton Bark, dory, punt, skiff “Each with a soul full of scents” Day after day spent shaping A ball of wax into a canary Little lamp, little lamp The word “contraband” arrived In English in the 16th century via Spanish Throw your shadow overboard Proverbs, blessings scratched into wood The tar of my country better than the honey of others
Jun 28, 2011 / Books & the Arts / Eduardo C. Corral
Shelf Life: New on DVD Shelf Life: New on DVD
James L. Brooks’s Broadcast News, Alan Rudolph’s Trouble in Mind, Jonathan Demme’s Something Wild.
Jun 28, 2011 / Books & the Arts / Akiva Gottlieb
Pakistan v. Pakistan: On Anatol Lieven Pakistan v. Pakistan: On Anatol Lieven
For Anatol Lieven, Pakistan is a dangerous, fearsome country, a hard place to live and harder still to govern.
Jun 28, 2011 / Books & the Arts / Fatima Bhutto
Unsilenced Unsilenced
The Human Rights Watch Film Festival, Michael Winterbottom’s The Trip, Azazel Jacobs’s Terri, Eve Annenberg’s Romeo and Juliet in Yiddish.
Jun 28, 2011 / Books & the Arts / Stuart Klawans