Arts Fuse Editor
The thrilling visuals in this documentary about skydiving get some things right, but the film ends up sensationalizing the sport rather than illuminating it. “Adrenaline Rush: The Science of Risk” at the Museum of Science, IMAX, through January 23, 2010. Reviewed by Kate Vander Wiede I started skydiving for a few reasons. The first was…
Read MoreReviewed by William Webster In Boston’s world of classical music, Winsor Music is indeed a gem; its current director and founder (1996) Peggy Pearson, has done an incredible job pursuing the three dimensions of this organization — chamber music concert series, the commission of new works and a community outreach program engaging talented students in…
Read MoreAuthor Noah Wardrip-Fruin argues that each of the sometimes tangentially related processes in a video game shapes “the audience’s experience as fundamentally as the specifics of the images used in a motion picture.” Expressive Processing: Digital Fictions, Computer Games, and Software Studies by Noah Wardrip-Fruin. The MIT Press, 480 pp, $34.95. Reviewed by Mark Nolan…
Read MoreA novel about sexual obsession, inspired by “Lolita,” stretches the limits of credulity. Rupert: A Confession By Ilja Leonard Pfeijffer, Translated from the Dutch by Michele Hutchison, Open Letter, $12.95, 131 pages Reviewed by Tommy Wallach I consider myself something of an expert in the seldom studied theme of impotence in film and literature. Most…
Read MoreBy Anna Razumnaya An erudite, absorbing, and often very funny account of Russia’s pathological inability to condemn the Communist Party. Inside the Stalin Archives: Discovering the New Russia, by Jonathan Brent. Atlas & Co. Publishers, 335 pages A certain jealous vigilance is to be expected when a Russian reads a book about Russia written by…
Read MoreA brilliant Dutch novel that explores the connections to the disconnected. The Twin By Gerbrand Bakker Translated from the Dutch by David Colmer. Archipelago Books, 343 pages. Reviewed by Tommy Wallach It isn’t easy to write a compelling novel about loneliness, for the simple reason that loneliness is boring. It makes for something of a…
Read MoreCharlotte Roche is one of the most famous authors in Germany. Thomas Mann must be spinning in his grave. Wetlands By Charlotte Roche. Translated from the German by Tim Mohr. Grove Press, 240 pages. By Tommy Wallach On the subject of literary criticism, Martin Amis has written that “quotation is the reviewer’s only hard evidence.”…
Read MoreAn assured novel that celebrates, with considerable stylistic facility, an extraordinary engagement with the history of literature. Rex by Jose Manuel Prieto Translated from Spanish by Esther Allen. Grove Press, 288 pages Reviewed by Alexander Nemser Jose Manuel Prieto’s “Rex” is an adventure through time: not historical time, or physical time, so much as literary…
Read MoreThe handsomely produced bilingual volume reflects a committed and passionate marriage of an exacting poet-translator and Yiddish poetry. With Everything We’ve Got: A Personal Anthology of Yiddish Poetry Edited and translated by Richard J. Fein. Host Publications, 218 pages. Reviewed by Anna Razumnaya Fortuitously, just before the publication of Richard Fein’s new anthology With Everything…
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Arts Commentary: Rich in Creativity — But Nothing Else