What Are They Reading? What Are They Reading?
I've never had a strong appetite for travel literature.
Dec 7, 2004 / Books & the Arts / Stacy Torres
False Promises False Promises
In American Dream, his masterful new book about welfare reform, Jason DeParle brings together two groups of people who rarely seem to meet: welfare policy-makers and welfare reci...
Dec 2, 2004 / Books & the Arts / Jennifer Egan
Of Love and Other Demons Of Love and Other Demons
The first chapter of Too Brief a Treat: The Letters of Truman Capote follows our hero's adventures from 1936 through 1948, a particularly heady period of his life.
Nov 24, 2004 / Books & the Arts / Nathaniel Rich
Little Big Man Little Big Man
No musical life has been told more often than Wagner's. Biographies have wafted incense around him, or been incensed by him.
Nov 24, 2004 / Books & the Arts / Paul Griffiths
Patriot Acts Patriot Acts
In September 1950, four months into the Korean War, Congress passed the draconian Internal Security Act (ISA), known as the McCarran Act, after its sponsor, the Nevada Democratic...
Nov 24, 2004 / Books & the Arts / Mike Marqusee
Pop and Circumstance Pop and Circumstance
You may recall the to-do occasioned two winters past by a certain shift in the mise-en-scène at the United Nations.
Nov 24, 2004 / Books & the Arts / J. Hoberman
Masters of Their Universe Masters of Their Universe
Beginning in the fifteenth century, Africa, Europe and the Americas came together in the Atlantic to create new economies, new cultures and new societies.
Nov 11, 2004 / Books & the Arts / Ira Berlin
The Gods Must Be Crazy The Gods Must Be Crazy
"Our government makes no sense unless it is founded on a deeply felt religious faith--and I don't care what it is." Thus spoke the noted theologian Dwight Eisenhower on Flag Day ...
Oct 28, 2004 / Books & the Arts / Daniel Lazare
Learning to Love the Bomb Learning to Love the Bomb
While I saw Edward Teller at several scientific conferences and heard him lecture, I met him only once. It left an indelible memory. It was at the end of April 1954.
Oct 14, 2004 / Books & the Arts / Jeremy Bernstein
Picking Up the Pieces Picking Up the Pieces
Brian Wilson began recording his masterpiece, Smile, in 1966; the project collapsed a year later, unfinished.
Oct 7, 2004 / Books & the Arts / Douglas Wolk