It was from a dark old depot, long since forgotten, underneath the terminal that hundreds of Jews were stuffed into cattle cars and shipped to Auschwitz in 1944. After a long and slow start, Milan is now converting the depot into a memorial and library, complete with wooden train cars.
Author: Matthew Westphal
The Roar Of The Crowds: Urbanites Process Stress Differently
“Researchers have known for decades that residents of densely populated areas have higher rates of mental illnesses, including anxiety disorders and schizophrenia. But do the brains of city dwellers function any differently from those of rural folk? Studies are showing that they do.”
Mikko Nissinen’s Ten Years At Boston Ballet
“In the past decade, Nissinen has transformed Boston Ballet from a largely conservative classical company” – one saddled with years of debt – “to one known for a distinctive mix of classical story ballets, neoclassical gems by the likes of Balanchine and Robbins, and contemporary fare.”
The Long-Lost Book That Launched The Renaissance
Thanks to a Florentine bookseller in 1417, the seminal ancient Latin text on Epicureanism – a philosophy that surprisingly resembles modern secular humanism – was rediscovered and circulated among the Italian intelligentsia. This text’s ideas arguably made the entire scientific revolution conceivable.
British Government To Cut Entertainment License Red Tape
“The government has published proposals to scrap many of the licensing regulations that campaigners claim are stifling live entertainment in the UK. … Plans involve cutting regulation on sectors including travelling circuses, small-scale live music performances and even licensing for theatre performance with audiences of less than 5,000.”
Nederlands Dans Theater Names New Director
“Paul Lightfoot, who has spent nearly his entire career with the Nederlands Dans Theater as a dancer and choreographer, has been elevated to artistic director, replacing Jim Vincent.”
What Vaclav Havel Didn’t Bargain For: Central Europe’s Loss Of Interest In Ideas
“The artistic and literary scene that flourished paradoxically under censorship and repression has died off. … The people of Central Europe traded in ideas for groceries and for not being beaten to death by the police. No one could possibly blame them, but at the same time, Havel and the other leaders had no sense of the true cost of democracy.”
Richard Hamilton, 89, ‘The Father Of Pop Art’
“[C]elebrating lowbrow culture was never his aim. He did not share pop art’s idolisation of advertisements and comic strips, nor the teenage dreams much of it referred to. His analysis of the methods of commercial and technical image-making was matched by his study of high art.”
After The Revolution – What Do Egypt’s Writers Do Now?
“Under Mubarak, the Egyptian literary scene, long the center of the Arab cultural universe, floundered.” Now Cairo’s literary éminences grises find themselves in a new world, pleasantly shocked by the younger generations’ courage and creativity.
Fraud Convictions Of Livent Founders Upheld
The former business partners Garth Drabinsky and Myron Gottlieb, whose Livent Inc. “produced major musicals throughout North America in the 1990s”, were ordered to begin serving their prison terms after losing their case before the Ontario Court of Appeal.