butter knife

Of Living Alone

Of course, living alone has few rules—one of its upsides usually—and nobody said you have to be that quiet.

The Rich Ambiguity of “Antifa Founder’s Girlfriend”

It seems fitting that this unnamed woman has so far proved—at least until Noem and her team choose to reveal more—as shadowy as the group she is alleged to have allied with, or was at least sympathetic to.

Baader Meinhof

The World of Left-Wing Terrorist Films Is Bigger Than You Think

Do you harbor secret, romantic longings for doing battle with “The Man,” but without the consequences of violent action and even murderous mayhem such causes reap? If so, you have plenty of films to choose from.

One Battle After Another

Lucky Prescience in One Battle After Another

Paul Thomas Anderson’s films always have dark humor, but I have to think he may have felt a greater need to signal satire back then, which plays a little unevenly now.

John Griswold

Found Objects: Myself

I looked and looked. It was like looking at another part of myself.

How Dickens Helped Us Understand “Neurodiversity”

Mr. Dick and his kite may offer an ideal escape from troubled thoughts, but we are drawn to him because he is also heartfelt enough to be real. As pointed out earlier, ‘David Copperfield’ is Dickens’s most autobiographical work. We read fiction because it is not fact. We also read fiction because it never strays too far from fact.

In and Out of the Shadow of Willie Mays

A Giant Among Giants is not a “life and times” biography. It does not situate McCovey in the social and historical contexts of America beyond baseball. The book is mostly stories and quotes from various ballplayers of McCovey’s era (1959-1980), speaking well of him, of course, but providing a vivid portrait of the man as a ballplayer.

Matt, combat veteran

The Unmoving Grasshopper and the Oddball Friends Who Say “I Love You”

Why is it only certain characters among my friends—the recovered addict who got rich off disaster services, the photographer who did federal time on a RICO conviction, the former scout and paratrooper with traumatic brain injury—tell me they love me? My polite friends, the “normal” ones, the ones with long, seemingly solid marriages and steady white-collar jobs and no priors, do not say such things, despite often having been in my life longer or more directly.

The Work That Holds the World Together

I thought I had changed: I had started talking to Joe, the guy on the margins. I had asked his name and even brought him lunch. For a moment, I patted myself on the back, sure I was not one of the “cold ones.” On the way home, though, something felt off.

Two Nigerians at a Table

How do we fall in love with the countries we ran from? What is the strange alchemy that turns distance into longing, and absence into affection? Distance is not impartial. It decides what to soften and what to sharpen. For some, absence polishes memory into a shining gem; for others, it preserves the edge of the blade.

Skip to content