New York seems to be full of people who go to shop openings and social events just to be seen. I don’t much care for these parties because I would rather see my friends privately, and have an actual conversation, than feign interest in something I don’t care about like a handbag with Tinsley Mortimer’s name on it. Being photographed at one of these events in the hope that I might appear in some magazine that will be looked at by people I don’t know isn’t the sort of validation I was brought up wanting. I would prefer instead to be … 
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“Is Stoppard’s play Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead simply glib and superficial?” Some thirty years ago now, it was one of the English essay questions put to me in my final year at high school.  My written answer—‘Yes’—was perhaps itself a little glib and superficial and deserving of its low mark.  But I was eighteen years old and going for the laugh.  I suspect they would not ask such questions these days, for it would be deemed too demanding, too excluding, too elitist, too unfair.  After all, it would require a pupil to read, comprehend, think, and write.  Heaven forbid.  In … 
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In synopsis, The Lost Books of the Odyssey, a lapidary first work of fiction by Silicon Valley computer scientist Zachary Mason, sounds like an overly clever postmodern literary jest. This elegant collection of very short stories consists of 44 purported pre-Homeric variations on the legends of the Trojan War and the pragmatic Odysseus’s homeward wanderings, as recounted in the arch manner of a more recent blind poet, Jorge Luis Borges. Borges (1899-1986), composer of metaphysical conundrums about infinite libraries, has become a Siren for bookish young men of the computer age. I first read Borges several decades ago. Overwhelmed, I immediately … 
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Last night, the world stopped what they were doing and tuned into the red carpet event of the century, the 82nd Academy Awards. Since 1929, regular folk have been dazzled by the likes of George Clooney, James Cameron, and Gabourey Sidibe. We watch spellbound as they strut down the carpet in all the latest fashions and we learn a lot about our world in the process. Why, just four Academy Awards ago, Clooney explained to us how this supposedly “naïve” group of artists are responsible for the civil rights movement. If it wasn’t for Clark Gable for example, Hattie McDaniel wouldn’t … 
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Gstaad. When I spoke with the mayor of Gstaad, as well as some other local stalwarts, they all assured me that they are ready for any invasion by the Libyans, and are confident they will kick the towels back into the Mediterranean where they came from. For any of you who might have missed it due to Gordon Brown’s bullying shenanigans, or John Terry’s, or even that David Cameron is close to blowing it, here is the latest: Col. Muammar Gaddafi, the great leader of Libya, has called for a jihad war against Switzerland over the Swiss minaret ban. This may … 
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Can a blackboard be beautiful? A liquor store car park? What about a sleeping bag? In Tom Ford’s hands the answer is always, “yes, darling”. When Colin Firth’s single man, Professor George Falconer, weaves his way to work through a catwalk throng of pristine students (not one fatso, not one freak), he reaches a lecture room of aesthetic rapture, a Mondrian-like portrait of black, white, and teak. When he later drives to a local store, a dusky sun transforms the parking lot into a glowing Eden. Even the sleeping bag, in which Falconer tries to kill himself, has a certain earthworm … 
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Much of international discourse, international politics, is all about how they should become more like us. Quite how they should become more like us depends upon the speaker: if it’s Hillary then more attention should be given to strong, hefty, and mature women who’ve never had an original idea in their lives and if it’s Bill then more attention will be paid to strong, hefty, and young women who have some very original ideas about cigars. The international aspects of religion are even more exclusive. Not only should they become more like us, they should become exactly like us: share our … 
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Happy news! The government has come up with a 5.9 percent GDP growth rate in the fourth quarter of 2009. The recession is over. Or is it? Statistician John Williams has informed us that 69 percent of this growth, or 4.1 percentage points, is the result of inventory accumulation. That leaves a 1.8 percent growth rate, and the 1.8 percent is likely due to the underestimate of inflation and other statistical problems. The Federal Reserve’s own monetary evidence contradicts the recovery assurances from Fed chairman Ben Bernanke. The Federal Reserve continues to pour massive reserves into the banks. The monetary base, … 
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Most people know Robert Crumb as that esoteric cartoonist from the 60s who did the “Keep on Truckin’” guy. Comic nerds like myself, however, see him as the second coming of Christ. He has completed dozens of graphic novels over the years and the drawings just keep getting better. His writing is another story. Crumb’s fiction almost always falls behind his auto-bio stuff and this latest work, The Book of Genesis, is no exception. It is a fifty-chapter opus that chronicles, er, dozens of people over, um, thousands of years. Here are ten reasons why the pictures surpass his words… 1 … 
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Greece is a country that thrives on rumor. Hearsay has been a part of the Greek DNA since time immemorial. Even Plato remarked on it. Demagogues used rumor and gossip to silence their opponents, demagogism being a Greek word, after all. Greeks also thrive on the spoken word. As was the case of their ancestors, the power of the spoken word sometime drives out reason. As I write, I hear a lot of my fellow Greeks say some very unreasonable things. Such as, the Germans and the French conspired to embarrass us and take over our businesses and natural resources. Or, … 
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