Cultural Criticism and Analysis

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 Look of Truth The Look of Truth

Photographs are supposed to be unbiased recognitions of reality, but they're really self-portraits of the photographer. The Ongoing Movement, a blend of biography and analysis, exa...

Dec 8, 2005 / Books & the Arts / Peter Plagens

Octoberfest Octoberfest

Four editors of October magazine trace the history of contemporary art. Though Art Since 1900 seeks to be comprehensive, its writers leave out entire movements and impose moralisti...

Dec 8, 2005 / Books & the Arts / Barry Schwabsky

Pop Torture Pop Torture

Pop culture does more than validate the claim that torture could help foil bombs seconds before detonation.

Dec 8, 2005 / Books & the Arts / Richard Kim

Rogue Scholars Rogue Scholars

Defenders of torture dwell not only in the White House and Pentagon, but in the halls of academia. When prominent law professors and academics cite the fantastic "ticking-bomb theo...

Dec 8, 2005 / Books & the Arts / Tara McKelvey

Marxism and Form Marxism and Form

Perry Anderson's Spectrum journeys through the abstract worlds of conservative and liberal intellectual thought, and leaves in its trail insights on the substance and style of idea...

Nov 22, 2005 / Books & the Arts / Stefan Collini

Succès de Scandale Succès de Scandale

American readers have long felt guilty about loving Lolita. As Vladimir Nabokov's nymphet heroine turns 50, Lila Azam Zanganeh traces the impact of a novel that has become both an ...

Nov 17, 2005 / Books & the Arts / Lila Azam Zanganeh

Mystic River Mystic River

Amartya Sen's latest collection of essays explores the rich flow of various peoples in and out of India and how they shaped the politics and spirituality of the nation today.

Nov 17, 2005 / Books & the Arts / Tariq Ali

All the King’s Media All the King’s Media

The scandals suffocating the Bush Administration seem less like Nixon and Watergate and more like Louis XV and pre-Revolutionary France. They are harbingers of a potent cultural ev...

Nov 3, 2005 / Books & the Arts / William Greider

The Power of Fear The Power of Fear

Jill Lepore's New York Burning paints a realistic portrait of a purported slave rebellion in 1741 and the hysteria that followed, a harrowing lesson of how abusers of power become ...

Nov 2, 2005 / Books & the Arts / Russell Shorto

x