Good essays about art help us learn to see. Wonderful essays about the artists in our lives — which means all the artists through history, because, as Peter Schjeldahl so eloquently puts it, “all art is contemporary” —- help us learn how to live.
The New Yorker
Film Commentary: A Critical Dichotomy — Time to Resolve It
It’s as if critics of silent films were barred from discussing talkies, or devotees of black and white were banned from discussing color.
Cultural Commentary: “The New Yorker” and The Fat Cats — Teaming Up
Yes, The New Yorker cover pillories the superrich as they ignore the pixie proletariat at their feet. But so what?
Visual Arts Commentary: “Portraits of Courage” — Critical Misfire
Why do critics like the New Yorker‘s Peter Schjeldahl rush to absolve G.W. Bush?
Critical Commentary: But Can You Relate?
Fighting for the intellectual integrity and independence of arts reviews means demanding more analysis and less sales talk.
Book Review: “My Mistake: A Memoir” — Notes from a Reticent Memoirist
There will be readers who appreciate Daniel Menaker’s brevity and lack of emotional engagement, but for me, much of “My Mistake” reads like notes for a memoir.
Literature Commentary: The New Yorker Misses an H.G. Wells Anniversary Worth Celebrating
“For an imaginative boy, the first experience of writing is like a tiger’s first taste of blood.’ — H.G. Wells, “The New Machiavelli,” 1911.
Book Review: ‘Making Toast’
Although the memoir has been called luminous, wise, humble, piercing, and all sorts of other laudatory adjectives, it is, nevertheless, not an easy book to read because you keep wondering how you would manage in this situation. Making Toast by Roger Rosenblatt, Ecco Press, 166 pages, $21.00 Reviewed by Roberta Silman At the end of […]