Category: Arts
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On the arts as blunt instruments
Alan Jacobs, considering a John Adams letter on the usefulness of the arts: Everyone in power, or aspiring to power, in this country seems to be studying Politics and War, though they will sometimes cover that study with a flimsy disguise. On the so-called Left we see surveillance moralism (and often enough the sexualization of […]
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The Actor’s Vow
“The Actor’s Vow” by Elia Kazan (via The Last Movie Stars on HBO Max): I will take my rightful place on stageand I will be myself.I am not a cosmic orphan.I have no reason to be timid.I will respond as I feel;awkwardly, vulgarly,but respond. I will have my throat open,I will have my heart open,I […]
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Ideas as kin
In a recent newsletter about the movement to dismantle the classics, Andrew Sullivan wrote about Martin Luther King Jr.’s syllabus for a seminar he was teaching at Morehouse College in 1962, which included Plato’s Republic, Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics, Augustine’s City of God—a glimpse of what King believed an educated black man at that time should […]
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When we make our art
“When we make our art, we are also making our lives. And I’m sure that the reverse is equally true.” — Wendell Berry, in the beautiful documentary Look & See. Might have found my new life motto.
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Circle of lives
Somewhere on the Internet I stumbled upon this print from the artist Nina Montenegro’s series Against Forgetting: It struck a chord in me not only because I’ve been reading the tree-centric novel The Overstory, but also because six days ago I became a father. And I’ll tell ya, I know I’m barely a week into […]
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Denver Crush Walls
Got to visit Denver for the second time this year for a friend’s wedding. While there another Denver friend brought me on a walking tour of the Crush Walls urban art festival in the RiNo neighborhood, where we saw some really cool graffiti:
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Why pause? Life’s magical moments right in front of you
Magazine mashups from Money, June 2017. More here.
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Florida Man Busy Book Learning
Going old school with magazine mashups this time, from Better Homes and Gardens, December 1962:
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Hamilton and what makes a healthy republic
The Show Ready for a hot take? Hamilton: An American Musical was really good. I assumed I wouldn’t see it for years, as tickets are prohibitively expensive in Chicago. But it was a surprise anniversary gift from my wife (musical theater tickets are the traditional Year 3 gift, right?) along with a special ticket she […]