

Literature and Poetry
Book Review: You Came Here to Die, Didn't You?
It’s always easier to write about the causes of fear than every-day drudgery, and the author’s descriptions of these scares and others make her summer sound exciting – in both senses of the word. She does this as though she’s writing a novel; her account of these events is gripping. more »
CultureWatch, January 2011 Edition
Cleopatra: A Life — In the end, we must ask ourselves if Stacy Schiff, one of the most gifted American biographers currently writing, has successfully peeled away two millennia of myth and propaganda or, rather, given us a new myth, a Cleopatra who fits modern, Western feminist thinking. In the Pursuit of Happiness — To call Maria Kalman's work idiosyncratic isn’t nearly powerful enough to describe what she has produced. It is an explosion of such brilliance that one scarcely knows where to start more »
The Diary: Three Centuries of Private Lives at the Morgan Library
For centuries, people have turned to private journals to document their days, sort out creative problems, help them through crises, comfort them in solitude or pain, or preserve their stories for the future. "The museum is noted for its holdings of manuscripts, sketches, letters, drawings, and other items that speak to the creative mind at work" more »
Arthur Szyk: Miniature Paintings and Modern Iluminations
He broke from contemporary Modernist ideals by avoiding abstraction in favor of figurative work. Szyk preferred to work in elaborate detail, recalling the intricate illumination present in medieval manuscripts, Near-Eastern miniature paintings and traditional Polish folk arts more »