Norman Rockwell died forty-three years ago today. As a visual storyteller he had few peers, and his timing was good, too. His lifespan (1894-1978) tracked the rise and fall of illustrated magazines with striking precision. The fusty family house magazines like Harper’s Monthly, Century, and Scribner’s Magazine began to give way to cheaper, […]
As I made my way through the book, I resisted the urge to cherry-pick essays by my favored cartoonists and writers, plowing straight through, which is probably the wrong way to read this book.
Its professional definition of design may be outdated, but “GO: A Kidd’s Guide” succeeds in demonstrating a visual sensibility, while supplying basic vocabulary for novices.
The Common Reader, a publication of Washington University in St. Louis, offers the best in reviews, articles and creative non-fiction engaging the essential debates and issues of our time.
The real Elvis is American, remember, and America is a consumer society. The desires we project, the stuff we buy—that is what feels real to us. It lets us have any Elvis we want. He left plenty of kitsch in his wake, plenty of pseudo-religion, plenty of Elvis jokes—but he was not, is not, a joke. He lived our contradictions, released our inhibitions, and lost himself in the process.
