“A Foggy Day in London Town …”

In the eight chapters that comprise Corton’s book, fog emerges as an active, even murderous protagonist in the city, enticing, disorienting, and even poisoning those caught in its grip. Descending suddenly and often lingering for days, fogs would periodically cast London in an inescapable cloud of chill and gloom.

The King of Panama

Roberto Durán made and spent millions, winding up broke, as most poor boys who became successful athletes do. During his salad days, he had a huge entourage, manzanillos, the “Panamanian slang for people who leech off the rich and famous,” as Durán puts it in his autobiography, to whom he gave away thousands a day. He drank, ate, whored, had children out of wedlock for which his wife forgave him. He apologizes for none of it. His autobiography is a defense of his life, an apologia, not an expression of contrition.

UN Antibiotic Resistance

Penicillin, up close and chemical.

When most of us think about bacteria, we think of fairly routine infections that can be cured with a trip to the doctor and a prescription for antibiotics. Unfortunately, this is no longer the case.

Bacterial resistance to antibiotics is quickly rising, and now more than…

Head First

Concussion is replete with virtues and vices. It is vivid, sympathetic, in some ways convincing, in some ways balanced. On the other hand, it is often dumbed down to the point of being childish.

Roaming Rebels

How mainstream transgender appeals to bathroom privacy and equality buy into the sanitization of American spaces and lives.

Lady and the Trump

For Schlafly, Trump, as a personality, is clearly a break from the moderately conservative Republican nominees of the last few elections like Romney and McCain, which is part of Trump’s appeal. His crudity, his bluntness, and his bouts of incoherence are signs of authenticity, of an utter refusal to submit to the sensibilities of liberal/leftist zeitgeist.

Black Woman at the White House

Alone atop the Hill affords a unique look into the life and times of Alice Dunnigan, an African American pioneer of journalism in an age spanning Jim Crow to the beginnings of the civil rights movement.

The Catskills Come to Half-Life

When we read a book about a place, be it a city, a state, a country, or a less geo-politically oriented “region,” we ideally want a convincing case for what exactly makes the area in question compelling, or at least a definite idea from the authors what about that place attracts them. While reading this book I found myself wondering who the intended or imagined reader might be.

Rights of Ownership

Peter Baldwin's The Copyright Wars explores the roles and histories of technological innovations, culture, political and legal institutions on incentives influencing writers, publishers, and audiences. However, his analysis is not always consistent or rigorous.

Brazil’s Black and Tan Fantasy of Whiteness

Brazil's showcasing of "The Girl from Ipanema" at the Rio 2016 Olympic Opening Ceremony demonstrated the extent to which Brazil, and the famous bossa nova song, construct a national story celebrating diversity while also relying on symbols rooted in stereotypes.

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