David Lehman

David Lehman, a contributing editor of the Scholar, is a poet, critic, and the general editor of The Best American Poetry annual anthology and author of the book One Hundred Autobiographies. He currently writes our Talking Pictures column.

An Exchange of Bullets in Belfast

Revisiting Carol Reed’s 1947 masterpiece Odd Man Out

By David Lehman | Thursday July 9, 2020

Strangers and Mirrors

Orson Welles’s The Stranger (1946) and The Lady from Shanghai (1947)

By David Lehman | Tuesday May 26, 2020
Black-and-white photo of the "Running Wild" scene from Some Like it Hot. Cast members, including Jack Lemmon, Tony Curtis, and Marilyn Monroe, play various instruments in the photo.

Great Movie Music

Fifteen examples that avoid the usual suspects

By David Lehman | Tuesday April 28, 2020

Epitaph for a Genre

Crime Doesn’t Pay in The Killing

By David Lehman | Wednesday April 1, 2020
Still from The Time of Our Lives

Souvenirs of War

Remembering The Best Years of Our Lives

By David Lehman | Thursday March 5, 2020
Gregory Peck in "Gentleman's Agreement"

A Matter of Pride

The enduring legacy of Gentleman’s Agreement

By David Lehman | Monday February 10, 2020
Don Taylor and William Holden in Stalag 17

William Holden, Model Prisoner

How the actor defined the ideal, postwar man

By David Lehman | Tuesday January 14, 2020
Still from Cape Fear

The Shadow of Evil

By David Lehman | Tuesday December 3, 2019
Harold Bloom

A Prophet of the Truly Great

Harold Bloom’s lasting influence

By David Lehman | Monday October 21, 2019
Pencil

A Valediction, Forbidding Mourning

By David Lehman | Tuesday September 17, 2019

Resolutions or Regrets

By David Lehman | Monday February 9, 2026

A Leap Without a Safety Net

By David Lehman | Monday November 10, 2025

Let’s Write a Villanelle

By David Lehman | Monday October 6, 2025

The Stolen Lines

By David Lehman | Monday September 1, 2025

“Dead Man’s Hand”

By David Lehman | Monday August 4, 2025

Why Go On?

By David Lehman | Monday July 7, 2025

Reasons for Living

By David Lehman | Tuesday June 10, 2025

“The Jester’s Magma”

By David Lehman | Monday May 19, 2025

“The Overture”

By David Lehman | Friday April 18, 2025

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