William Dalrymple is a talented writer who can very often turn out gorgeous descriptions of lands, peoples and the built environment. As might be expected, when I encounter writings about places and times with which I consider myself to be intimately familiar, I experience an acute ambivalence. Such is the case with Dalrymple’s work. Continue reading “William Dalrymple’s Uneven Vision of Modern India”
Category Archives: Writing
RIP Norman Geras
Norman Geras, prolific blogger and professor emeritus of politics at the University of Manchester has passed away at the age of 70. He had been suffering from prostate cancer. Norm was best known as a political theorist whose oeuvre included books on Karl Marx, Rosa Luxemburg and Richard Rorty. (He also served on the editorial boards ofContinue reading “RIP Norman Geras”
The Seductive Appeal of ‘Education’
In reviewing Jill Lepore‘s Book of Ages: The Life and Opinion’s of Jane Franklin, a ‘biography’ of Benjamin Franklin‘s considerably less distinguished sibling, Susan Dunn writes: The words “seduction” and “education” in fact share the same Latin root: ducere, to lead. Seduction leads astray (“se-”), while education leads out (“e”)—out of our unformed, primitive selves.Continue reading “The Seductive Appeal of ‘Education’”
The Burdens of Proofreading and Copy-Editing
There must be some sort of writer’s law out there that captures the sensation I am about to describe: as your book approaches the finish line, and as the final proofreadings, corrections, indexing queries, and debates about jacket and cover compositions pile up, the author’s nausea at the sight of his former ‘dearly beloved’ increasesContinue reading “The Burdens of Proofreading and Copy-Editing”
Social Networks and Loneliness
As a graduate student in the late 1980s, I discovered, in quick succession, email, computerized conferencing, and Usenet newsgroups. My usage of the last two especially–and later, the Internet Relay Chat–would often prompt me to say, facetiously, that I would have finished my graduate studies quicker had I stayed off the ‘Net more. That lameContinue reading “Social Networks and Loneliness”
The Never-Ending Angst Over the Nobel Prize In Literature
Ian Crouch asks why more Americans don’t win the Nobel Prize for Literature. (The last one to do so was Toni Morrison in 1993, an award I remember especially clearly because a) I had only recently started reading her and b) I was struck by the fact of an African-American woman writer being so recognized.)Continue reading “The Never-Ending Angst Over the Nobel Prize In Literature”
Dawn Powell on ‘Writers of Consequence’
Dawn Powell‘s A Time To Be Born is chock-a-block with wonderfully acerbic observations: on life, love, politics–you know, the usual stuff–but for my money, most memorably, in these brief passages, on journalism, writers, and writing itself: Every morning Miss Bemel turned in a complete digest of the dinner conversations or chance comments of important officialsContinue reading “Dawn Powell on ‘Writers of Consequence’”
The Peculiar Allure of Blog Search Terms
Like most blogging platforms WordPress provides statistics on blog views: unique visitors, referring pages, and most interestingly search terms that bring viewers here. The following, for instance, are yesterday’s entries for this blog: a municipal report what is the narrator’s attitude toward the south failure of kindness www american horror story season 3 walking deadContinue reading “The Peculiar Allure of Blog Search Terms”
A Small, Yet Beautiful Book Collection (And Its Scholarly Owner)
As an academic, I’m used to seeing large personal book collections in homes and offices. Many of my colleagues and friends–some very accomplished and smart folks–have, rather effortlessly, put mine to shame. This is the story of, in contrast, a small book collection. But a very impressive one, one that revealed its owner to beContinue reading “A Small, Yet Beautiful Book Collection (And Its Scholarly Owner)”
Alina Simone Doesn’t Like The Internet, Her Best Friend
The New York Times periodically publishes blog posts and Op-Eds by defenders of the intellectual property regimes that are a blot on our cultural landscape today; these defenders include what I describe as–for lack of a better term–‘the whining artist.’ This category includes all those who, seemingly stunned by the fact that the political economyContinue reading “Alina Simone Doesn’t Like The Internet, Her Best Friend”
Samir Chopra 