Culture

The Anti-Intellectualism of the Silicon Valley Elite The Anti-Intellectualism of the Silicon Valley Elite

How the self-styled know-it-alls atop the knowledge economy want to dismantle the pursuit of knowledge for its own sake

Elizabeth Spiers

Rock and Roll’s Dutch Old Master Rock and Roll’s Dutch Old Master

How Anton Corbijn’s photographs shaped the history of rock music.

Books & the Arts / Andrew Holter

The Enigma of Gertrude Stein The Enigma of Gertrude Stein

Why do we misunderstand one of modernism’s great writers?

Books & the Arts / David Schurman Wallace

Books

The Riotous Worlds of Thomas Pynchon

The Riotous Worlds of Thomas Pynchon The Riotous Worlds of Thomas Pynchon

From “The Crying Lot of 49” to his latest noirs, the American novelist has always proceeded along a track strangely parallel to our own.

Books & the Arts / Benjamin Kunkel

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Letters From the March 2026 Issue Letters From the March 2026 Issue

Basement books… Kate Wagner replies… Reading Pirandello (online only)… Gus O’Connor replies…

Our Readers, Kate Wagner, and Gus O’Connor

Taipei, June 2025.

How Taiwan Became the Chipmaker for the World How Taiwan Became the Chipmaker for the World

A new book tells the story of the island-nation’s transformation into a central hub for technological development and manufacturing.

Books & the Arts / Yangyang Cheng

Film

The Great Table Tennis Renaissance The Great Table Tennis Renaissance

Josh Safdie’s latest movie Marty Supreme spurred a renewed national interest in ping-pong. I played my way through New York City to try to find out more.

Joshua Levkowitz

Who Will Win Big at the Oscars? Who Will Win Big at the Oscars?

It’s that time of year again. 

Books & the Arts / The Nation

How Jane Fonda Is Rethinking the Hollywood Resistance How Jane Fonda Is Rethinking the Hollywood Resistance

The actress’s revived Committee for the First Amendment is taking aim at industry mergers as well as threats to the freedom of expression.

Ben Schwartz

The Cinema of Societal Collapse The Cinema of Societal Collapse

This year’s Oscar-nominated international feature films—especially The Secret Agent and Sirāt—tackle what it means to live and die under tyranny.

Books & the Arts / Vikram Murthi

Television

The Fictitious Capital of HBO’s Industry

The Fictitious Capital of HBO’s Industry The Fictitious Capital of HBO’s “Industry”

In the show’s fourth season, everyone has a story to sell and very few are true.

Books & the Arts / Jorge Cotte

How Jane Fonda Is Rethinking the Hollywood Resistance

How Jane Fonda Is Rethinking the Hollywood Resistance How Jane Fonda Is Rethinking the Hollywood Resistance

The actress’s revived Committee for the First Amendment is taking aim at industry mergers as well as threats to the freedom of expression.

Ben Schwartz

“The Pitt” Shows Doctoring Uncensored

“The Pitt” Shows Doctoring Uncensored “The Pitt” Shows Doctoring Uncensored

The second season tackles everything from the role of AI in medicine to Medicaid cuts. But above all, it is about burnout.

Books & the Arts / Zoe Adams

Architecture

Robert A.M. Stern gives a construction tour of the George W. Bush Presidential Center.

The Neoliberalism of Robert A.M. Stern The Neoliberalism of Robert A.M. Stern

The passing of postmodern architecture’s last living holdout marks the end of an era—and reminds us that we’re in a new, worse one.

Kate Wagner

Letters Icon

Letters From the March 2026 Issue Letters From the March 2026 Issue

Basement books… Kate Wagner replies… Reading Pirandello (online only)… Gus O’Connor replies…

Our Readers, Kate Wagner, and Gus O’Connor

A migrant worker at a Riyadh construction site.

The Line, a Saudi Megaproject, Is Dead The Line, a Saudi Megaproject, Is Dead

It was always doomed to unravel, but the firms who lent their name to this folly should be held accountable.

Column / Kate Wagner

Music

Bad Bunny’s Stunning Redefinition of “America” Bad Bunny’s Stunning Redefinition of “America”

His joyous, internationalist, worker-centered vision was a declaration of war against Trumpism.

Greg Grandin

Springsteen Defends the Promised Land Against ICE’s “Gestapo Tactics” Springsteen Defends the Promised Land Against ICE’s “Gestapo Tactics”

Mourning for Renee Nicole Good, the singer decried the Trump administration and the threat to freedom posed by “heavily armed masked federal troops invading an American city.”

John Nichols

Blood Orange’s Sonic Experiments Blood Orange’s Sonic Experiments

Dev Hynes moves between grief and joy in Essex Honey, his most personal album yet.

Books & the Arts / Bijan Stephen

Who’s the Boss? Who’s the Boss?

A bowdlerized biopic of Bruce Springsteen, starring Jeremy Allen White, flattens a musician whose politics and identity are much more complicated.

Books & the Arts / Naomi Gordon-Loebl

Publishing

Ishmael Reed Portrait Oakland

Ishmael Reed on His Diverse Inspirations Ishmael Reed on His Diverse Inspirations

The origins of the Before Columbus Foundation.

Ishmael Reed

Chester Himes’s Harlem Noirs

Chester Himes’s Harlem Noirs Chester Himes’s Harlem Noirs

Himes helped reinvent the idea of the detective novel. He also transformed it into a powerful vehicle for social criticism.

Books & the Arts / Gene Seymour

James Baldwin’s Radical Politics of Love

James Baldwin’s Radical Politics of Love James Baldwin’s Radical Politics of Love

While Baldwin was persecuted in part because of whom he loved, it was love that impelled him to bring about a more utopian future in which such persecution was not possible.

Books & the Arts / Elias Rodriques

Latest in Culture

Ruth Asawa, 1973.

Communing With Ruth Asawa Communing With Ruth Asawa

A retrospective of the California artist’s work emphasizes her sense that art should not be frozen in time in a gallery but belongs in the world, at home and in public.

Mar 23, 2026 / Books & the Arts / Quinn Moreland

One Year Performance 1978–1979

Tehching Hsieh—an “Artist Without Art” Tehching Hsieh—an “Artist Without Art”

In his performances, he questioned whether or not an artwork needed to supply a specific meaning in order to generate a feeling.

Mar 11, 2026 / Books & the Arts / Jillian Steinhauer

Women wait to undergo a medical check in Paris in October 1944.

The Greatest Love Is Grieving The Greatest Love Is Grieving

I spent years as a labor organizer. Marguerite Duras’s war novel taught me that the strongest fighters are always the women hurting the most.

Mar 7, 2026 / Haley Mlotek

A page taken from the Merriam-Webster's Desktop Dictionary, 2016.

Can the Dictionary Keep Up? Can the Dictionary Keep Up?

In Stefan Fatsis’s capacious, and at times score-settling, personal history of the reference book, he reveals what the dictionary can still tell us about language in modern life

Mar 4, 2026 / Books & the Arts / Lora Kelley

The Bad Vibes of “Wuthering Heights”

The Bad Vibes of “Wuthering Heights” The Bad Vibes of “Wuthering Heights”

Keeping its distance from the novel, Emerald Fennell’s film ends up offering us a mirror of our own times.

Mar 2, 2026 / Books & the Arts / Sarah Chihaya

Werner Herzog, 1984.

Werner Herzog Between Fact and Fiction Werner Herzog Between Fact and Fiction

The German auteur’s recent book presents a strange, idiosyncratic vision of the concept of “truth,” one that defines how he sees the world and his art.

Feb 25, 2026 / Books & the Arts / Lowry Pressly

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