The current rage for inserting the personal/confessional in everything from cookbooks to literary criticism can go too far.
Robert Israel
Book Review: John Edgar Wideman — Masterful Stories that Bear the Weight of Reality
A singular muscularity infuses these short stories, a confidence that astonishes.
Book Review: “Jew-ish: Reinvented Recipes from a Modern Mensch” — Nosh Nirvana?
Jake Cohen is “modern” in that he takes a contemporary approach at spreading the gospel; he is an expert at using social media.
Arts Feature: Best Stage Productions of 2020
Our theater critics pick some of the outstanding productions of a year truncated by COVID-19.
Arts Remembrance: Terrence McNally — Dramatist and Father of the Serious Contemporary Musical
The late Terrence McNally was more than just a masterful playwright. He also forged new roads in musical theater.
Theater Review: “The Children” — After the Damage Has Been Done
An apocalyptic backdrop gives the play urgency, especially given the current worldwide struggle to contain the Corvid-19 virus, which has already claimed thousands of lives.
Theater Review: “Pass Over” — An Unforgiving World
If one of the aims of art is to create a distinctively imaginative world, than Pass Over succeeds in generating a landscape of devastation, a hopeless place filled with gaping wounds and visible scars.
Author Interview: Boston’s Poet Laureate — Porsha Olayiwola
“I wrote those poems because I think people need to read the truth and to hear the truth about romantic sensibilities between gay people.”
Jazz Concert Review: A Third Report from the 40th Montreal Jazz Festival — Harmony Amidst Chaos
This year’s Montreal Jazz Festival Festival would have been more successful had it not been for all the construction ripping apart the city.
Book Review: The Critic as Wildean Artist — Peter Schjeldahl’s Elements of Surprise
Peter Schjeldahl debunks (and praises) works of art, while also acknowledging the strategic importance of beauty.