There is hardly a theatrical profession that has recently been so fostered, celebrated, loaded with prizes and grants as young dramatists....
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The New York Review of Books | Mediapart | Gazeta Wyborcza | Caffe Europa | Vanity Fair | The Economist | L'Espresso | Expert Sibir | The New York Times
The New York Review of Books 20.03.2008 (USA)
Novelist Nicholson Baker is so taken with the charms of Wikipedia that his hymn of praise even extends to the vandals who wreak destruction on the more erudite entries. "It's a game. Wikipedians see vandalism as a problem, and it certainly can be, but a Diogenes-minded observer would submit that Wikipedia would never have been the prodigious success it has been without its demons.This is a reference book that can suddenly go nasty on you. Who knows whether, when you look up Harvard's one-time warrior-president, James Bryant Conant, you're going to get a bland, evenhanded article about him, or whether the whole page will read (as it did for seventeen minutes on April 26, 2006): "HES A BIG STUPID HEAD." James Conant was, after all, in some important ways, a big stupid head. He was studiously anti-Semitic, a strong believer in wonder-weapons—a man who was quite as happy figuring out new ways to kill people as he was administering a great university. Without the kooks and the insulters and the spray-can taggers, Wikipedia would just be the most useful encyclopedia ever made. Instead it's a fast-paced game of paintball."
Further articles cover Alan Greenspan's memoirs "The Age of Turbulence" and Peter Carey's little book "His Illegal Self" ("little," writes Cathleen Schine "only in the way that raspberries or bees or nuggets of uranium are little").
Mediapart 10.03.2008 (France)
March 16 sees the launch of the new online daily newspaper Mediapart. Under the aegis of the former editor in chief of Le Monde, Edwy Plenel, this is a project that will be financed solely by online subscriptions of its readers. Only time will tell if the concept will work. On the current "projet" page, Plenel provides a brief overview of the background, personnel and plans, and explains why they agreed on this particular form of financing. "Let's make one thing clear: Mediapart is a journalist paper whose capital is controlled by its founding team, which itself consists overwhelmingly of journalists. Without wanting to point any fingers, we would simply like to emphasise that in the current landscape of daily newspapers, this sort of structural economic independence is exceedingly rare."
Gazeta Wyborcza 08.03.2008 (Poland)
Last weekend Poland was talking about nothing but the 40th anniversary of the Warsaw student protests, their suppression by the communist regime and the brutal anti-Semitic and anti-intellectual campaign that followed. Adam Michnik, editor-in-chief of Gazeta Wyborcza and at the time one of the driving forces behind the demonstrations, tells Jacek Zakowski in an interview how this "March experience" affected him. "I never wanted to be a politician but the historic constellation forced me into it. And all it all happened because I wanted to live in a free, democratic Poland, among honest people and friends, and fight together with them for values close to my heart. In March 1968 I saw that this wasn't going to happen without politics. So I did what I had to do and as well as I could. Nothing more. That March influenced the next 40 years of my life."
Caffe Europa 09.03.2008 (Italy)
From 1909 to 1926 the monthly magazine Lucciola ("little glow worm" or "street girl") was a shining beacon of early feminism in what was then a strongly rural and Catholic Italy, as Francesco Roat reports. "Each edition, printed in a stylish font, put together almost entirely by women (although men did contribute) all writing under pseudonyms, was a 300-page magazine, filled with drawings, photographs, prints, sketches, maps and even embroidery. Lucciola also offered a comprehensive literary and cultural section. There was reportage and a section called "Referendum" which featured debates about fashion, socio-cultural values and politics – or another titled 'Street Girl Book Recommendations' which naturally not only dealt with romantic novels."
Vanity Fair 01.04.2008 (USA)
In a thoroughly researched report David Rose describes how the U.S. government's arms dealings with Fatah-friendly brigades in Gaza turned into a "yet another scandalously covert and self-defeating Middle East debacle: part Iran-contra, part Bay of Pigs". "Vanity Fair has obtained confidential documents, since corroborated by sources in the U.S. and Palestine, which lay bare a covert initiative, approved by Bush and implemented by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Deputy National Security Adviser Elliott Abrams, to provoke a Palestinian civil war. The plan was for forces led by Dahlan, and armed with new weapons supplied at America's behest, to give Fatah the muscle it needed to remove the democratically elected Hamas-led government from power. (The State Department declined to comment.)"
The Economist 08.03.2008 (UK)
The cover title asks "What's holding India back?" and provides the answer in the leading and one further article: its bloated civil service. "Indeed, all India's administration is inefficient. According to the Congress-led government's own estimate, most development spending fails to reach its intended recipients. Instead it is sponged up, or siphoned off, by a vast, tumorous bureaucracy. That is why, despite India's commitment to universal health care, water and education, only five countries have a lower portion of health spending in the public sector; over half of urban children are educated privately; and nearly all investment in irrigation is private."
Further articles: A technology supplement deals primarily with the bitter conflict over the future of Wikipedia between "inclusionists", who believe that applying strict editorial criteria will dampen contributors' enthusiasm for the project, and "deletionists" who argue that Wikipedia should be more cautious and selective about its entries. Another article outlines research into maximising online readership which could rationalise normally instinctive editorial choices about the placement of articles on websites. The reviews cover an exhibition of late Titian paintings in Venice, Michael Burleigh's "disappointing" book "Blood and Rage: A Cultural History of Terrorism" and Michio Kaku's popular science study on the "Physics of the Impossible" which informs us that aside from perpetual-motion machines and clairvoyance, nothing is beyond the realm of possibility.
L'Espresso 07.03.2008 (Italy)
Umberto Eco remembers cultural historian Piero Camporesi, a colleague of his at the University of Bologna who died ten years ago. Camporesi published widely on sensuousness and food in the Middle Ages. Eco quotes from one of his essays about cheese, which clearly had a stinking reputation in the Middle Ages. "For centuries popular opinion had it that the badness living inside the cheese, its "diabolicalness" was manifested in and announced by its smell, a smell which most people felt was disgusting and vile. After all it was made of dying matter, it was in a state of decay, shrivelled and rotten, a putrefying substance, harmful to health and bodily fluids. Won from the part of the milk that was separated off, the harmful scoriae, curdled from the worst part, the sludgy and earthy part of the white liquid. The unification of the most base substances, the opposite of butter which comes from the better, purer part of the milk. Cheese is nothing but a 'res foeda, graveolens, immunda, putridaque'. Food for the poor. Nothing for the better off and worthy citizen. Nutrition, in a nutshell, for tramps and vagrants who live off dirt."
Expert Sibir 03.03.2008 (Russia)
"In the early nineties, the Siberian art market was one of the most lively in Russia. But this all changed with the [Rouble] crash in 1998," writes journalist Sofia Goldberg. In her article "Unsaleable art" Goldberg talks to several Siberian gallerists about the situation of the art market in one of Russia's wealthiest regions. Despite the enormous potential, the art scene here, several thousand kilometres outside Moscow, is extremely underdeveloped. "To secure the survival of the galleries, gallerists are either dependent on patrons or income from other non-art-related jobs. In their work the galleries follow the principles of the traditional salon." The reasons for the art market slump in Siberia, Goldberg writes, "are not only the lack of capital or interest in contemporary art; the gallerists, who see their mission as bearers of culture, are unaware that works of art can be profitable."
The New York Times 10.03.2008 (USA)
The New York Times magazine has an interesting dossier on the new philanthropy. James Taub's opening article focusses on the charitable activities of greater and lesser American celebrities, around whom an entire industry has sprouted up. "Just as stars have philanthropic managers to help them with causes, corporations with a cause can turn to celebrity recruiters to find just the right star. Thus Rita Tateel, who describes her occupation as recruiting and coordinating celebrities for 'cause-related marketing and public relations,' recently hooked up Purina, which wanted to support 'small animal-rescue organizations,' with Emily Procter, a star of 'CSI Miami,' who, Tateel says, 'lives and breathes animal rescue.'"
Elsewhere in the dossier, Joe Nocera portrays the billionaire couple Herb and Marion Sandler who commissioned Washington Post journalist Paul Steiger to found ProPublica, a non-profit-organisation for funding investigative journalism.
RSS
In Prospect, Tim Berners-Lee invites the world to play with the British government's data. England, not Nigeria belongs on the terrorist list, literary Nobel laureate Wole Soyinka informs The Daily Beast. In Rue 89, Beppe Grillo explains why Sarkozy is more dangerous than Berlusconi. In Tygodnik Powszechny, Stefan Chwin mourns for the Polish idealist. Polityka reveals where a Pole turns to when he's not allowed to marry. Olga Tokarczuk walks her Polish tangle around Amsterdam for Salon. And the Guardian thinks about Armenian women rubbing their soft breasts on a stone.
In Wired, Chris Anderson celebrates the next industrial revolution - taking place in garages near you. The Boston Globe serenades the camel - Nabati style. In El Pais Semenal, the sociologist Edgar Morin complains about European lethargy. Outlook India asks why the Australians hate the Indians. Odra and Tygodnik are still debating the impact of freedom on literature. In OpenDemocracy, Salome Zourabichvili mourns for the wilted petals of the rose revolution. In Prospect, Martin Amis divides the literary sheep from the goats, according to the pleasure principle. The NYT profiles a dyed-in-the-wool jihadist from Alabama.
Das Magazin reports on the dramatic increase in the number of pupils who have threatened to gun down their classmates. The Spectator warns City bankers about gun-wielding dominatrices in Switzerland. In Sinn und Form, Marc Fumaroli remembers the man whose name shall not be mentioned: Mario Praz. In the New Humanist, Laurie Taylor remembers the holy men who sexually abused him as a child. The Guardian asks why Theo von Doesburg slipped into avant garde oblivion. And in the NYRB, Garry Kasparov asks why computer chess programmers are so uninspired?
OpenDemocracy explains why a novel called "Paranoia" suddenly disappeared from Belarussian bookshops. Prospect fears that a ban on Islam4UK could undermine British democracy. The Gazeta Wyborcza explores Polish-Jewish relations. Le Monde diplomatique watches the carving up of Africa. In El Pais Semanal, maths whizz Marcus du Sautoy explains the sex appeal of suduko. And Gerhard Richter manages to surprise the Nation.
The New Yorker buries itself in the Arab novel. In Le Monde, Bernard-Henri Levy heaps scorn on the state-run caricature of a debate. Qantara points to the person responsible for all the misery in the Arab world: Daddy. In L'Espresso, Umberto Eco takes a pin to the overblown daily paper. The Nation has earmarked 30 billion dollars to save journalism. In Tygodnik Powszechny, the writer Wojciech Albinski explains what makes Poland exotic. And the Spectator waves a tear-stained old hanky as shabby chic fades into the past.
In Merkur, art historian Wolfgang Ullrich defines a new type of artist: the contractor. In Nepszabadsag, writer Peter Nadas considers the crisis in Hungary and how it might end. In NouvelObs, Francis Ford Coppola explains why DVDs should be free. Eurozine introduces Lithuanian literature. In the New York Review of Books, Wyatt Manson asks why Pleiade is omitting Celine's anti-Semitic trilogy from the collected works. In Express, Philippe Gavi reminds us that Mohammed was not a crazed killer. A Californian marvels in NZZ Folio, at the reincarnation of an Indian factory worker. And confronted with the recent proliferation of literary cuddling, the New York Times yearns for a bit of Philip Roth.
Wired tracks James Cameron's 32-year quest to out-Lucas Lucas. In Nouvel Obs, Alain Finkielkraut and Alain Badiou tear each other apart over immigration and national identity. Tygodnik Powszechny introduces the pioneering artist Miroslaw Balka. Andras Bozoki asks why Hungarians are undermining democracy. In The New Statesman, Leo McKinstry explains why the bombing of Coventry was an inspiration to the British Air Staff.
Vanity Fair goes in search of a superpartner. Elet es Irodalom reads a new collection of essays by Imre Keresz. Outlook India complains about journalistic corruption. The New Yorker reads a new Koestler biography. Nepszabadsag foresees the next French revolution. Rue89 wonders about the provenance of prawns. And in the New Republic, Moshe Halberthal celebrates the sublime humility of Amartya Sen.
In Wilson Quarterly, the economist Tyler Cowen sings an ode to multitasking. Prospect has seen the monsters of the left. The Boston Globe follows James C. Scott to the new Shangri-La in the mountains of Tibet. Weltwoche is up in arms about the criticism of Switzerland's anti-minaret vote. In the Novel Obs, Pierre Nora applies his mind to the bestseller. New Criterion knows why the Pop art bubble won't pop. NZZ Folio examines the chicken nugget. Al Ahram asks what political Islam wants. The Walrus mourns for the first victim of the C-58. In Resetdoc, Joseph Massad explains why Arab homosexuals are an invention of the West.
Slovenian poet Ales Debeljak argues for a fusion of cultures in Eurozine. Umberto Eco agrees in Le Monde. The Nation portrays the Salvadorian author Horacio Castellanos Moya, who himself explains in Babelia why 200 years after independence there's nothing to celebrate in a number of Latin American countries. Polityka lies Poland down on the couch. La vie des idees reads a book on Jews and the resistance in France. Americans read more than Europeans, writes historian Peter Baldwin in Merkur. And in The New York Review of Books Robert Darnton makes two bold proposals for a new Book Settlement.
The New Yorker searches for the ultimate difference between male and female. Elet es Irodalom comments on the Imre Kertesz interview in die Welt. Prospect assesses the development of Swedish crime writing. Walrus finds out from the conductor Yannick Nezet-Seguin why it's sometimes necessary to get a little rough with the score. In Polityka, the historian Jerzy W.Borejsza remembers the assimilators, accommodators and collaborators in Poland's history. In the Guardian, Zadie Smith defends the novel against the essay.
In OpenDemocracy, the Moscow poet Tatiana Sherbina tears her hair out over Russia's obsession with Stalin. Polityka celebrates a film where it's okay not to be heroic. The London Review of Books cements its friendship with Roland Barthes. In Espresso, Umberto Eco suggests removing Christ from classroom crucifixes. In the New York Review of Books, Timothy Garton Ash talks velvet and guillotines. Magyar Narancs talks candidly about the Roma. The New Yorker eats in secret with a Michelin inspector. In Letras Libras, writer Cesar Aira explains why people shouldn't be forced to read. And Newsweek sings a swansong to America, the land of innovation.
In Open Democracy, Neal Ascherson wishes that the 1989 had had more French revolutionary zeal. Tygodnik remembers that Polish dissidents wanted German unity as far back as 1954. In Newsweek, Niall Ferguson argues that 1989 was not a patch on 1979. Laszlo Borhi hurls a rotten egg at Austrian's Social Democrats in Eurozine. Outlook India travels to Arunachal. Wired visits the Henry Ford of the information age. The New Republic embarks on a Peter Zumthor pilgrimage.
OpenDemocracy tells of the Russian waves which are doing away with the Iranian sparrows. The London Review reads new books on honour killings. The Nation goes in search of the last Yugoslav, Dusan Makavejev. The Walrus weeps for the printed book. The Guardian navigates its way through Michael Haneke's oeuvre. Polityka tells the Poles that you can have ethics without Catholicism, or even God. In Dawn, Arundhati Roy defends the Maoist guerillas in India. In Frontline, the Maoist guerilla leader, Koteswa Rao, chats about revolutionary executions. In Le Monde, Vaclav Havel is still fascinated by his critics. And HVG explains why the Hungarians think capitalism comes from the communists.
When Karadzic goes on trial in The Hague, the Hungarian plague will be tried alongside him, says the Magyar Narancs. The New Yorker explains why robots are better than husbands. In the New Republic, Enrique Krauze asks why Gabriel Garcia Marquez had such a thing for dictators. Europe has a sure footing in Turkey, Orhan Pamuk assures the Nouvel Obs. History is no recipe for how to live our lives today, the historian Karol Modzelewski tells Tygodnik Powszechny. N+1 tracks the rise of the neuronovel, and the TLS reads new Trotsky biographies.