May 2020
Red London

Conventional accounts of London’s history concentrate on the ‘two cities’—twin centres of wealth and power, each with its monumental buildings...
Read MoreWith a Care

I came to realize in a series of waves the enormous impact this pandemic would have on the domestic workforce. The first was quite early on, before the travel ban, school closures, and state shutdowns.
Read MorePeople Look Like Emails by David Beer

In pandemic times I’m picturing Jason Fearn sat amongst his chaotic equipment, formulating a sinister and foreboding soundtrack...
Read MoreClassic Dom

Like many proverbs in English, the term comes from Shakespeare. A “petard” was a small bomb, used for blowing up the fortifications of castles.
Read MoreHow the Art World Worked in a Non-market Context

Klara Kemp-Welch’s latest book, Networking the Bloc: Experimental Art in Eastern Europe 1965-1981, challenges the idea of unconnected isolated art production
Read MoreStay Arrogant?

Amid the weight and seriousness of life-changing and life-ending events, how can the national conversation be dominated for three days by the bad behaviour of Dominic Cummings during the lockdown?
Read MoreStaying Power

Foucault remains one of the most cited 20th-century thinkers and is, according to some lists, the single most cited figure across the humanities and social sciences.
Read MoreStay Sileni

In Titian’s early 16th century painting, as Meis reads it, the somnolent Silenus, who echoes the alert god’s posture as he is carried behind him by his followers...
Read MoreClose Reading Bob Dylan by Ed Simon

Temperamentally conservative poetry critic David Lehman chose only one lyric by Bob Dylan to include in his 2006 The Oxford Book of American Poetry.
Read MoreJanice Lee: After Benny

When I was a child, I didn't see the connection between dreams and life the way I do now. I didn’t see the way that parallel realities influence each other...
Read MoreCabo Verdeans

We shared a Creole language and the open, relaxed customs, known as morabeza, that are unique to Cabo Verde; only we knew how to compose and sing morna music...
Read MoreRainbow Drive-Ins

To visit Hana, a small, remote town on the island of Maui, most people wake at the crack of dawn, hop in convertible Mustangs, and drive the 45 miles from the regional airport...
Read MoreSusanna Crossman: Riding the Baking Edge #5

When I was a teenager, my friend Maude would bake Chelsea buns: swirls of sweet dough, studded with jet-back currants, dressed up in melted butter...
Read MoreJane Rosenberg LaForge: Spring Without Witness

This spring has arrived with a disturbing similarity, behind the storm and soundproof windows of my New York apartment. Jesus rises, Jews are delivered...
Read MoreMass Mahatma

Talat Ahmed’s political biography of Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi’s life is a welcome addition to the existing literature attempting to theorize his principles of nonviolence...
Read MoreWe were both young…

Imagine two couples, each at home for dinner. The first couple spends the whole meal caressing each other’s hair, calling each other cheesy monikers
Read MoreBe the Only

It’s my birthday. I’m 68. I feel like pulling up a rocking chair and dispensing advice to the young ‘uns. Here are 68 pithy bits of unsolicited advice...
Read MoreArtificial Wives

Five summers ago, I was invited to visit an eccentric acquaintance on a picturesque island off the East Coast. The island was divided into two parts: the shingled, sea-beaten summer homes of the inherited wealthy...
Read MoreThat Wonderful Softcore Series

Until our current quarantine began, the last time I had intentionally watched a TV show was when TV sets had knobs, and TV signals came down into them...
Read MoreThe tea should be strong. For a pot holding a quart, if you are going to fill it nearly to the brim, six heaped teaspoons would be about right...
Read MoreThe thing about new blooms is that they tend to bleed— / Those petals birthed / hugging close / that come warmer weather are tricked into jumping away...
Read MoreI spent a good part of my childhood at home staring outside my bedroom window, following the trail of planes approaching the nearby Paris airport in the sky from my banlieue. I envied the passengers...
Read MoreThe tea should be strong. For a pot holding a quart, if you are going to fill it nearly to the brim, six heaped teaspoons would be about right...
Read MoreThe thing about new blooms is that they tend to bleed— / Those petals birthed / hugging close / that come warmer weather are tricked into jumping away...
Read MoreI spent a good part of my childhood at home staring outside my bedroom window, following the trail of planes approaching the nearby Paris airport in the sky from my banlieue. I envied the passengers...
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