Dr. Fun Dr. Fun
Kenneth Koch was one of the merrier in the bunch known as the New York School of poets. But he was more than just a poet of humor. He sought the essential nature of human existence...
Jan 4, 2006 / Books & the Arts / Melanie Rehak
How Do We Know FISA Is Working? How Do We Know FISA Is Working?
The illegality of the Bush-approved NSA domestic spying program seems obvious, especially with the passage of FISA in 1978, which requires electronic surveillance to be conducted o...
Jan 4, 2006 / Feature / Herman Schwartz
Out of Place Out of Place
Hope and Other Dangerous Pursuits, portraits of the Moroccan immigrants in Spain, gracefully evokes the unease of immigrants caught adrift between the stagnation of their old homes...
Dec 20, 2005 / Books & the Arts / Emily Lodish
Wartime Lies Wartime Lies
As Nazis dropped bombs in Warsaw, poet Czeslaw Milosz wrote a collection of literary criticism that sought to trace the rise of totalitarianism by deconstructing the mythologies of...
Dec 20, 2005 / Books & the Arts / Timothy Snyder
Europa, Europa Europa, Europa
Tony Judt's Postwar, a massive summary of European public life since World War II, is a triumph of narrative that will allow readers familiar with the history to experience it agai...
Dec 20, 2005 / Books & the Arts / Charles S. Maier
Rembrandt’s Year Rembrandt’s Year
2006 marks Rembrandt's 400th birthday, and an array of exhibitions, from the sublime to the silly, will open in Amsterdam, Washington and beyond. As the aesthetic hype escalate...
Dec 19, 2005 / Books & the Arts / Abigail R. Esman
2005 Lenore Marshall Poetry Prize 2005 Lenore Marshall Poetry Prize
Anne Winters's The Displaced of Capital, winner of the 2005 Lenore Marshall Poetry Prize, is a reflective, documentary and visionary volume of poetry inspired by the city of New Yo...
Dec 15, 2005 / Books & the Arts / Robert Pinsky
Farewell to the Working Class Farewell to the Working Class
Two new books on indolence, How To Be Idle and Bonjour Laziness, issue low-energy cries for political apathy, a shorter work week and the fine art of slacking off.
Dec 15, 2005 / Books & the Arts / Austin Kelley
The Oceanic Feeling The Oceanic Feeling
John Banville's latest novel, The Sea, winner of the Man Booker Prize, is a painstaking narrative of memory, grief and many losses, remarkable for what it richly conveys about what...
Dec 15, 2005 / Books & the Arts / Claire Messud
Gene McCarthy Gene McCarthy
Eugene McCarthy was a pure original, a great and good man, whose fundamental historical achievement was to be the standard-bearer for a moral and philosophical campaign against the...
Dec 15, 2005 / Books & the Arts / George McGovern