Construction of the Elbe Philharmonic is underway, with its opening planned for autumn, 2011. Hamburg?s creative artists are not alone in seeing a new landmark for their city in this spectacular concert hall....
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In Asharq al-Awsat, Amir Taheri reminds Western critics of the West that Arab critics of the Arab world are either dead, in jail or in exile. Nepszabadsag wishes for a common history book for central Europe. Bernard-Henri Levy has fallen prey to Barack Obama's seduction in Le Point. Outlook India demands more realism in Indian literature. The New Yorker, Economist and New York Times have all plunged into the French elections.
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Vanity Fair presents Annie Leibovitz' star photos of Knut. Outlook India portrays India's most popular writer Khushwant Singh. The New York Review of Books is captivated by Tintoretto's brushstrokes. In the Nouvel Obs, Vladimir Sorokin characterises the Homo Putinus. Letras Libras thinks it highly unlikely that "The Life of Others" will be screened in Cuba. DU magazine looks at the latest form of terrorism that will affect us all eventually. In Le Point, historian Madeleine Ferrieres describes the nourritures canailles. And the New York Times describes Pope Bendict XVI as an intellectual siren.
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Merkur wonders why Europeans keep kowtowing to Tehran. Folio is considering marriage. In Le Monde, Claude Lanzmann gets in a huff over Paris' new traffic system under the reign of ecological chubby cheeks. In Gazeta Wyborcza, Norman Davies thinks about what a European history book might look like. The NRC Handelsblad describes the immoral consequences of too many prohibitions. In Literaturen, Gerd Koenen sees the old problems of the Soviet Union re-emerging in Putin's Russia. And the New Yorker has spotted a literary paradigm shift: food instead of sex.
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In Lettre International, anthropologist Filip de Boeck examines the bodies that move through Kinshasa. The New York Review of Books asks whether the overflowing prisions in the USA might make sense after all. Taslima Nasrin reviews Ayaan Hirsi Ali's autobiography in Outlook India. In ResetDoc, Martha Nussbaum asks why Hirsi Ali doesn't go to India instead of the USA. Umberto Eco presents the detective-philosophers in L'Espresso. Tygodnik Powszechny can already see the UK ruled by two kings. In Elsevier, Afshin Ellian demands more information on what the EU intends to do. And The Spectator reports from the size-zero hell at a girls' school.
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Vanity Fair portrays the king of the mercenaries. Gazeta Wyborcza speaks out against forcing Polish homosexuals into partial non-existence. In The Spectator, Churchill's biographer Sir Martin Gilbert is adamant that Churchill was not an anti-Semite. In DU magazine, Suad Amiry advises against going to the gym in Ramallah. The New Yorker meets Iraqi translators. Il Foglio visits a swinger club where almost anything that's any fun is forbidden. And Die Weltwoche watches a Sheik buy art.
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In the New York Review of Books, Julian Barnes looks at the mild French queasiness. In ResetDoc the Nobel Prize Winner for Peace Shirin Ebadi gets annoyed about Enlightenment fundamentalists. The American Scholar doesn't think that Peter Handke is such a genius that we should forgive his admiration of Milosevic. In Nouvel Obs, Alain Minc says he 's going to vote for Sarkozy, even if it means being laughed at in the Cafe de Flore. In Espresso, Umberto Eco makes a plea for Uffiziland. Elet es Irodalom wonders why the Piresen are so hated in Hungary.
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In Al Ahram, the Canadian Hadeel Al-Shalchi finds that Egyptian woman wear the headscarf for the wrong reasons. The Economist reports on light and shadows in South Africa. Asharq al-Awsat looks at Arab intellectuals and the French elections. Merkur asks why the Germans have such a loathing for class society. And Elet es Irodalom recommends Hungarians should take a more sobre view of democracy.
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Seymour Hersh explains in The New Yorker why the USA bolsters extremist Sunni groups in the Middle East that are sympathetic to Al Qaeda. In Outlook India, writer Nayantara Sahgal defends the Indian diaspora. The Nation asks why workers have disappeared from American films. In NRC Handelsblad, sociologist Paul Jungbluth criticises the feminisation of schools. The Gazeta Wyborcza expresses thanks for Volker Schlöndorff's film "Strike".
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De Groene Amsterdammer considers whether sex for Islamicists might not work wonders in combating the jihad. In The Spectator, John Gray bids farewell to the national aspiration to unite Brits of all colours. Asharq al-Awsat describes the religiously-motivated student unrest in Beirut. Alberto Fuguet travels into the digital night for Revista de Libros. In the Nouvel Obs, Bernard-Henri Levy lists three rules for the political engagement of intellectuals in elections.
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The Economist finds Ayaan Hirsi Ali's autobiography charming but a tad problematic. Tygodnik Powszechny comments on the race of conservative Poland to vilify Adam Michnik. Nepszabadsag no longer wants to look the indifferent Western Europeans in the eye. And in Nouvel Obs, Tariq Ali has abandoned all hope of Iraqi independence.
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NRC Handelsblad has read the Christian school version of the Dutch dictionary and calls for a "Halal" version as well. Al Ahram accuses a UN report on the Arab World of feminist propaganda. Ian Buruma explains Tariq Ramadan's media-friendly brand of Islamic socialism in The New York Times, and Ayaan Hirsi Ali tells The Observer who Ramadan really is. In Folio, Tehran artist Jinoos Taghizadeh extols the virtues of Iranian private space. HVG describes how Romanian newspapers make money by not publishing articles. And DU travels to sin city Asakusa.
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In Prospect, Francis Fukuyama asks post-modern European elites what they have to offer Muslim immigrants in the way of identity. In Al Hayat, Yassin Al-Haj Salih asks why the USA supported dissidents in Eastern Europe and despots in the Arab World. In Le Monde, a gynecologist describes his experiences helping Muslim women give birth. Tygodnik Powszechny sees Byzantium sliding closer to Brussels. And in Figaro, Paul Bocuse reminisces about the real Nouvelle Cuisine.
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In Le Figaro, philosopher Remi Brague explains the sense and nonsense of the Heidegger debate, which reappears regularly every 20 years. Amir Taheri asks in Asharq Al-Awsat what Pope Benedict XVI means when he calls freedom a "mythical value." In The Guardian, Nick Cohen asks why the Left only supports fascist regimes. Outlook India murmers "poor Brits" after a Big Brother scandal. Joseph Stiglitz defends Hugo Chavez' economic recipe in Gazeta Wyborcza. And composer Ivan Madarasz talks about music and higher world orders in Nepszabadsag.
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Burn the burqa! Taslima Nasrin demands in Outlook India. Hungarian bishops should follow the example set by their Polish colleagues, Nepszabadsag writes wishfully. Vanity Fair looks at the rich white knights who are riding to the rescue of the newspapers. In Folio, anthropologist Nigel Barley recounts how he narrowly escaped having his penis peeled. The New Yorker portrays the only Al Qaida operative to use Monopoly metaphors. In Reportajes, arms dealer Carlos Cardoes describes Saddam Hussein's well-balanced personality. Il Foglio tells of the war of succession between the two octogenarian casino moguls of Macau. And in Al Hayat, the writer Ghalia Qabban is angered by the Tehran Holocaust conference.
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Lebanese, Iraqi and Syrian authors explain in Al Hayat why Saddam Hussein's execution was a mistake. In Espresso, Tahar Ben Jalloun fumes that the Americans failed to hang Augusto Pinochet as well. The Gazeta Wyborcza asks the Catholic Church to do a little cleaning up. In Die Weltwoche, Hans-Ulrich Wehler requests a little more bite from his students. And in the New York Times, the writer Richard Powers explains how he speaks his books.
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