Winter 2010

Articles

My Brain on My Mind

The ABCs of the thrumming, plastic mystery that allows us to think, feel, and remember

by Priscilla Long

The Stolen Election

An expatriate Iranian writer travels her troubled homeland in the weeks after a disputed presidential vote

by Gelareh Asayesh

Seventy Years Later

The Second World War destroyed Adolf Hitler, but his legacy is showing disturbing signs of life

by John Lukacs

Strange Matter

The physics and poetics of the search for the God particle

by John Olson

Wrestling with Two Behemoths

A longtime New Yorker, and New Yorker writer, gets the cold shoulder from powerful New York cultural institutions

by Ved Mehta

Departments

Book Essay

Shylock, My Students, and Me

Shylock, My Students, and Me

What I’ve learned from 30 years of teaching The Merchant of Venice

Paula Marantz Cohen

Book Reviews

Science Doubters

When healthy skepticism turns into unhealthy antagonism

Natalie Angier

Laissez-Faire Run Amok

The extremist, and enduring, philosophy of Ayn Rand

Ethan Fishman

Riffs and Raptures

Zadie Smith’s essays offer crisp prose and hard-won insights

Sarah L. Courteau

Wrestling the Moose

Jefferson debunked a French theory of natural history, launching American exceptionalism

Miranda Weiss

The Tales Buildings Tell

Architects can overwhelm their creations; time can make a hash of great visions

Stanley Abercrombie

Through Fire and Flood

Faulkner’s best fiction emerged from his willingness to face crises

Jay Parini