For The Book Obsessed
[ad_1] Reports of the death of Donald “Sully” Sullivan are somewhat exaggerated. In Somebody’s Fool, Richard Russo’s terrific new book in his North Bath, NY series, characters talk to Sully’s grave, look for the dead man to join them at the bar, and, when they are in a bind, they ask—maybe against their better judgment— What … Read more
[ad_1] Martha C. Nussbaum, one of the greatest living moral philosophers, explores the moral lives of nonhuman animals in her urgent new book, Justice for Animals: Our Collective Responsibility. In this brilliant and accessible work, Nussbaum develops an account of the moral lives of animals that is stronger than other philosophers’ accounts and relevant to … Read more
[ad_1] Near the beginning of the novel, a man comes across dead bodies that have been dead for a while. He knows there’s more to the scene than he can see. And for seeing what he sees, he will be pursued by a force he does not understand. The novel is The Passenger, Cormac McCarthy’s … Read more
[ad_1] In the essays in In the Margins: On the Pleasures of Reading and Writing, Elena Ferrante—perhaps the greatest living novelist—describes her formation as a writer and her views on writing. Although In the Margins may appeal most to Ferrante devotees like me eager to read about the ideas of fiction that led to novels … Read more
[ad_1] In Primo Levi: An Identikit, the Italian critic Marco Belpoliti pieces together Primo Levi’s life as a writer, Jewish citizen of Italy, public intellectual, and survivor of Auschwitz. Like an identikit, or composite sketch, the book presents a mosaic image of the author composed of stories of different parts of his life and work. … Read more
[ad_1] Reading the poet Mary Jo Bang’s new translation of Dante Alighieri’s Purgatorio, I thought of a widely-circulated photograph from the COVID pandemic. An Italian doctor in a surgical gown and two face masks holds a sign reading, “When this hell ends:/…And then we emerged again to see the stars.” The quote is from the … Read more
[ad_1] Before creating his world-beating radio program The Best Show, Tom Scharpling wrote punk zines, covered the NBA, produced the TV show Monk, and auditioned (unsuccessfully) for The New Monkees. Every indie musician’s favorite comic, Tom writes and performs with Superchunk drummer Jon Wurster and has directed videos for artists including Kurt Vile, Aimee Mann, … Read more
[ad_1] “Two deaths you cannot have and one you cannot avoid.” So goes a Russian saying Mikhail Iossel remembers in his excellent new collection Love Like Water, Love Like Fire. Funny thing about Iossel’s stories of Soviet life, though: they are filled with men and women living second lives, drunks who avoided death (to their … Read more
[ad_1] Across his fiction, journalism, and letters, Fyodor Dostoevsky spoke in many voices. He spoke as a radical who would face mock execution and years in prison for plotting against the tsar. He spoke as a Russian Orthodox believer excoriating liberal society for its smallness and lack of faith. He spoke as a prophet carrying … Read more
[ad_1] On December 30, 1936, workers took over the General Motors factory in Flint, Michigan and held it for 44 days, facing down bosses, vigilantes, and police. Through their strike, workers won a living wage, better working conditions, and recognition of their union, the United Automobile Workers of America (the UAWA, later known as the … Read more