Why? Because it’s unnatural, basically. (Not to mention sleep inertia and social jetlag.)
Looking For Justice In The Book Of Job
Joan Acocella: “God boasts to Satan, Have you seen my servant Job, so pious, so devoted to me? Satan answers, Why shouldn’t he be devoted? You have given him everything he could ever want: ‘But put forth thine hand now, and touch all that he hath, and he will curse thee to thy face.’ Well, God says, let’s see, and he gives Satan permission to ruin Job’s life.”
The Kinda Creepy Mistakes People Are Finding In Google Book Scans
“Scavengers obsessively comb through page after page of Google Books, hoping to stumble upon some glitch that hasn’t yet been unearthed. This phenomenon is most thoroughly documented on a Tumblr called The Art of Google Books, which collects two types of images: analog stains that are emblems of a paper book’s history and digital glitches that result from the scanning.”
What The Ancient Greek Tragedians Knew About Today’s Politics
In an Out Loud podcast, classicist and critic Daniel Mendelsohn talks with Sasha Weiss about how issues ranging from the arguments over where to bury Tamerlan Tsarnaev to Americans’ continuing fascination with JFK’s presidency and murder are reflected in Sophocles and Euripides.
The Great Literary Feuds Of 2013
“Among this year’s conflicts, presented here in rough chronological order, a few themes emerge: clashes over the function of online literary criticism, questions about gender and literature, and struggles over who controls an artist’s legacy and fortune.”
Nadine Gordimer Remembers Nelson Mandela
The Nobel laureate reveals the terrible secret he told her after he was released from prison, recalls the joy of seeing crowds cheering him in Oslo after he won the Nobel Peace Prize, and recounts one telling instance she witnessed of his extraordinary capacity for forgiveness.
Why Your Book Failed?
Do you think the editor’s decision to refrain from intervening in the text was an instance of the dereliction of standards in the publishing industry, or was it an indication of lingering prudence and respect for the practice of literature within what the author would invariably refer to as the “military-industrial publishing complex”?
Hannah Arendt’s Failure Of Imagination
Richard Brody: “Her mechanistic view of Eichmann’s personality, as well as her abstract and unsympathetic consideration of the situation of Jews under Nazi rule, reflect her inability to consider the experiences of others from within.”
Why Are Lists The Crack Cocaine Of Journalism?
“Despite the growing derision of listicles exemplified by the comic, numbered lists–a venerable media format–have become one of the most ubiquitous ways to package content on the Web.”