Books & the Arts

Svetlana Alexievich in Minsk, Belarus, October 8, 2015, after she was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature.

Conductor of the Anonymous Conductor of the Anonymous

In her oral histories, Svetlana Alexievich orchestrates the voices of Russians trying to reconcile the irreconciliable.

Nov 25, 2015 / Books & the Arts / Sophie Benech

Linda Rosenkrantz with her tape recorder, 1965.

Real, Realist, Realistic, and False Real, Realist, Realistic, and False

Linda Rosenkrantz’s 1968 quasi-novel Talk reminds us that wry self-awareness and anxious fragility are hardly millennial inventions.

Nov 25, 2015 / Books & the Arts / Becca Rothfeld

Through the Slaughter

Through the Slaughter Through the Slaughter

and Bialik
 Sky—have mercy. When flechettes fly forth from a shell,
 shot by a tank
 taking Ezekiel’s
 chariot’s name—
 When their thin fins invisibly whiz, whiflling the air…

Nov 25, 2015 / Books & the Arts / Peter Cole

Luxembourg, one of Europe’s top tax havens.

Happiness and the Hidden Wealth of Nations Happiness and the Hidden Wealth of Nations

Two recent books show how challenging the fight against pernicious inequality remains.

Nov 25, 2015 / Books & the Arts / Timothy Shenk

The Idea of Houses

The Idea of Houses The Idea of Houses

I sold my earrings at the gold store to buy a silver ring in the market. I swapped that for old ink and a black notebook. This was before I forgot my pages on the seat of a train t…

Nov 19, 2015 / Books & the Arts / Iman Mersal

Raising a Glass With an Arab Nationalist

Raising a Glass With an Arab Nationalist Raising a Glass With an Arab Nationalist

The pianist was still droopy-eyed, her face as dark as the keys they left her to press for half a century, though she must have been white as an angel when they first strung her up…

Nov 19, 2015 / Books & the Arts / Iman Mersal

The Window

The Window The Window

You can identify the one who broke apart, the one whose spine they managed to straighten, whose neck they stuck back on his shoulders. From where you stand, drinking coffeee and wa…

Nov 19, 2015 / Books & the Arts / Iman Mersal

“At certain times of the day,” wrote Karl Kraus, in a critique of the mass media taken up by Walter Benjamin, “a particular quantity of work has to have been procured and prepared for the machine.”

Nothing Remains Unchanged but the Clouds Nothing Remains Unchanged but the Clouds

With his worries about the gigantic power of technology and the minuscule moral illumination it can afford, Walter Benjamin remains our contemporary.

Nov 18, 2015 / Books & the Arts / Neima Jahromi

Indian Premier Jawaharlal Nehru (left) and Vietminh President Ho Chi Min in Hanoi, October 18, 1954. (AP)

Michael Walzer, Revolutionologist Michael Walzer, Revolutionologist

The political theorist’s new book on national liberation can’t answer one key question: Why have those words become obsolete?

Nov 18, 2015 / Books & the Arts / Thomas Meaney

James Merrill (left) and David Jackson at the Ouija board in 1983.

A Poet Who Believed in Nothing As in Love A Poet Who Believed in Nothing As in Love

After first writing poetry to impress and entertain his wealthy parents’ guests, cosmopolitan James Merrill went cosmic.

Nov 17, 2015 / Books & the Arts / Ange Mlinko

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