Books

Book Interview: Jay Wexler on the State of “Our Non-Christian Nation”

September 5, 2019
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The book deals with how Atheists, Wiccans, Summums, Muslims, and Satanists “fought to have their voices heard” in communities dominated by Christians and others who were skeptical of their claim that the First Amendment applies equally to all religions.

Book Review: “De Gaulle” — An Exemplary View of the Man and His Times

September 4, 2019
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For anyone interested in the man or that era, De Gaulle is indispensable.

Book Review: “Rabbit’s Blues” — The Reserved Tenderness of Johnny Hodges

September 2, 2019
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Johnny Hodges was originally a Cambridge/Boston guy, and one of the most interesting sections of Con Chapman biography is his knowledgeable description of the local jazz scene in the 1910’s and ’20s.

Book Review: “The Nickel Boys” — Keeping the Faith

August 30, 2019
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Colson Whitehead’s work is political in the sense that he has an incredibly keen eye for the insidious ways in which institutions and structures of power work.

Book Review: “William Walker’s Wars” — Revisiting US Slavery’s Soldier of Fortune in Latin America

August 30, 2019
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A new biography of the oft-forgotten ‘filibuster’ provides ample facts and little thesis. Is that enough — don’t we need more?

Book Review: A Memorial to Lucette Lagnado’s Two Remarkable Memoirs

August 29, 2019
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To have such a remarkably courageous voice as Lucette Lagnado’s silenced forever at such a young age is, simply, not fair.

Book Review: “Underland: A Deep Time Journey” — Between Despair and Hope

August 28, 2019
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Robert Macfarlane’s ability to limn the pull between beauty and cataclysm provides a dynamism that elevates this book well above the level of simple “nature” writing.

Book Review: “The Future is Asian” — Challenging Western Ideology

August 27, 2019
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Marshaling statistics, maps, scholarly literature, news articles, and reports, The Future is Asian cogently dramatizes the reasons behind Asia’s re-ascendance to economic, political, and cultural primacy.

Critics Lab: Our Goal — To Nurture Young Arts Reviewers of the Future

August 26, 2019
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This is the first in a series of pages in which in one of our critics, working with a young person, comes up with an arts review.

Poetry Review: “One Lark, One Horse” — Michael Hofmann’s Comic Skepticism

August 22, 2019
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Michael Hofmann nicely captures our age of truthiness and alternate facts and multiple perspectives, the hollowness of everything from the news-cycle to pop-up restaurants, all of the distractions driven by money and advertising.

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