On Book

August Wilson’s play just hit the big screen, but even greater rewards await on the page

The Baritone as Democrat

How Lawrence Tibbett prophesied the Metropolitan Opera crisis of today

My Cousin Manya

One survivor’s story

Writer on Board

The cruise story from Twain to Shteyngart

Nights at the Opera

Long before he wrote his masterly novels, Stendhal was transformed by the power of music

A Terrifying Delight

Following Robert Frost into the depths

Consummated in Exile

A new recording of Rachmaninoff’s Symphonic Dances conveys the breadth of the 20th-century composer’s life’s journey

The Importance of Being Different

A travel writer’s education

Stereotypes and the City

 What to make of HBO’s attempts to diversify an iconic show?

Ripeness Is All

What may be the fate of classical music’s new superstars?

By the Content of Its Characters

On rereading “War and Peace” in the age of radical sensitivity

Superlatalk

The history of the most awesome language ever

Injurious Entanglements

Remembering William Trevor’s Anglo-Irish Stories

Low Definition in Higher Education

When college students are told what to think and what not to say, who suffers in the end?

Sex, Lies, and Literature

Learning from Mr. Hyde

Garden State Sorcerer

In his new memoir, Springsteen reveals his inner life but is strangely silent on his music

Pawns for Fascism

This piece from 1937 envisions the forces that make a demagogue like Trump possible

The Hidden Music of Words

Academics shouldn’t scoff at literary prose—they have much to learn from it

The Aspirational Golf of Arnold Palmer

Ode to the man who brought out the goodness in the game

Late Night Thoughts on Nuclear Weapons

The game of nuclear deterrence contains a fatal trap

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