Either Martin Mull or Frank Zappa or Elvis Costello once said writing about music is as pointless as dancing about architecture. Which doesn’t account for how I’ve danced to all these books.
Arts & Culture
Images Present Themselves: A Conversation With Photographer Burk Uzzle
Some of the most iconic images get captured when you’re just out for a stroll. What you do with these images is a political act.
I’ll Be Loving You Forever
My best friend and the New Kids on the Block, 30 years later.
‘Horror Is a Soothing Genre … It’s Upfront About How Scary It Is To Be a Woman.’
Sady Doyle discusses the connection she draws between society’s monstrous treatment of women and woman’s archetypal monstrosity.
Toni Morrison, 1931-2019
An elegy and reading list for Toni Morrison, the Nobel Laureate and Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist who died Monday, August 5, 2019.
The Young Man and the Sea Sponge
SpongeBob SquarePants turned 20 this summer. This is the story of how a marine biology teacher named Stephen Hillenburg gave life to an animated character who continues to delight fans worldwide.
Between Jesmyn and Ta-Nehisi
Author Jesmyn Ward sits down with Ta-Nehisi Coates to discuss slavery, superheroes, and how much you have to hate yourself to enjoy being famous.
Won’t You Be My Neighbor: An Anti-Hate Pop Culture Syllabus
Media and entertainment grounded in empathy are a critical part of a saner culture — and we can all help by actively producing, seeking, and supporting it.
On Beauty and Disability
Examining the body, disability, and the damaging idea of objective beauty.
Nashville contra Jaws, 1975
In their time, “Jaws” and “Nashville” were regarded as Watergate films, and both were in production as the Watergate disaster played its final act.
