March 14, 2017
“What Have We Done?” Charles M. Blow on Donald Trump
On a Saturday afternoon in mid-February, Charles M. Blow, New York Times op-ed columnist and author of the memoir Fire Shut Up In My Bones, spoke at Cleveland Public Library. […]
July 15, 2015
Old News: The Consequences of our Cultural Obsession with Newness
There’s nothing new about our love of newness. “Men love that song which is newest on their ears”—that’s Homer, writing as early as Europe’s second epic poem. The problem […]
March 31, 2015
Whitman’s Obituary, Slightly Annotated
I spent part of last week thinking about Whitman’s final days: his misreported final day and his actual final day. In the course of this thinking (and thinking may just […]
December 13, 2013
To Review or not to Review
Should reviewers write negative reviews, or pass over books they don’t like in silence? Should they make a point only to write positive reviews? Should they review writers they know? […]