Flat Out of Luck
Listening to a brilliant man who is living in his car, I have, in rapid succession, every reaction I deplore in others.
Society & Culture
This Is No Time for Cynicism
The Great Capitulation has begun. A cynical shrug could entrench it.
What Lies Beneath “Dignity”
Why the French value dignity and the United States despises it. (Only a slight exaggeration.)
Radiant Mischief at the Cathedral of Notre-Dame
Do conservative Catholics even realize what inspired these gorgeous vestments?
Sacred Monotony
This thing that I had avoided for years, that our entire culture avoids, turned out to be, overused but accurate word, transformative.
Stop Trying So Hard!
Oliver Burkeman wants us to work four hours only, relax about to-do lists, and realize what we expect of ourselves is already impossible
Christmas Creep Has Left Us Confused
Like children, we rush the season, celebrating each holiday long before it arrives and growing sick of all of them. Sure, greedy retailers—but does the problem go deeper?
We Drink So We Can Trust Each Other
The three-martini lunch, once standard, turned scandalous in the seventies, hastily replaced by light beer and wine coolers. Then came a defiant resurgence of glam cocktails and cigar bars, followed by a wave of sober-curious shaming....
Architecture Can Heal Us
Our everyday environment “used to be quaint and quirky,” Vishaan Chakrabarti writes. “Now it is mundane and monolithic.”
The National Archives Deletes Our Problematic Past
Slavery, the Holocaust, Japanese internment camps, the birth control pill--all much too messy and confrontational to remember.