Noam Chomsky has been voted the world’s top public intellectual in a poll. “Chomsky, who was underwhelmed by the honour, beat off challenges from Umberto Eco, Richard Dawkins, Vaclav Havel and Christopher Hitchens to win the Prospect/Foreign Policy poll. More than 20,000 voters from around the world took part in selecting the winners from a list of 100. The most striking aspect of the list is the shortage of the young, the female and the French.”
Blog
Ba Jin, 101
Chinese writer Ba Jin has died in Shanghai. “Ba, a native of Chengdu, southwestern Sichuan Province, was recognized widely as one of China’s greatest literary masters and an outstanding publisher and editor. Ba went to study in France in 1926 and completed his first novel ‘Destruction’ there. He wrote numerous books, including novels, short stories, and essays, totaling some six million words.”
Why Most People Don’t “Get” Conceptual Art
“People who complain about conceptual art always do so on the grounds of craft. Anything that has no painterly or sculptural skill is not art, because anyone could do it. But when people object to individual pieces, it’s almost always because of the subject matter. This has been true since the start of the readymade tradition…”
Checking In With NY City Opera
“The composer-critic Deems Taylor called the City Center Opera ‘democracy in action, a democracy realizing the work of the individual.’ Tickets started at eighty-five cents—nine and a half dollars, in today’s currency—and topped out at $2.20. These days, you have to pay quite a bit more to get through the doors of what LaGuardia dubbed ‘the people’s opera company.’ Tickets go up to a hundred and twenty dollars, which is more than most orchestra seats for ‘Spamalot.’ Don’t blame City Opera for falling short of its populist mission…”
Unions Want In On Video iPod Cash
Five Hollywood unions representing actors, writers and directors have called for negotiations with producers to make sure their members get a cut of revenue generated by the sale of TV shows on Apple’s iTunes software.
PBS Sprouting Ads Over Critics’ Objections
“Some critics have howled that, with Sprout, PBS has crossed a line, giving up any claim to being a safe, noncommercial haven. But PBS supporters say the public TV system has to face reality in a time of uncertain federal funding and unprecedented competition. ‘Unfortunately, PBS has a really hard path to forge. They used to be the only game in town if you were looking for a channel that was safe for your kids. But commercial offerings are now so vast, that in order to have a level playing field, they have to end up doing some of the same things’.”
150 Countries Sign New Culture Agreement (US Refuses)
One hunbdred and fifty countries have signed a new agreement on cultural diversity. “The international agreement — formally the Convention on the Protection and Promotion of the Diversity of Cultural Expressions — reaffirms the right of sovereign states to ‘maintain, adopt and implement’ policies that protect and promote cultural expression, and exempt certain cultural products from free-trade agreements.”
Kennedy Center Swears Off Virtual Orchestra
Washington DC’s Kennedy Center has signed a new contract with its musicians that says the Center will not use a virtual orchestra for any of its shows. “The debate over virtual orchestras was part of a four-day strike in 2003 by Broadway musicians. Theatrical producers had proposed reducing the number of players, to save money, and bring in a virtual orchestra. That attempt failed but has been tried elsewhere.”
New Orleans Museum Fires Staff
The New Orleans Museum of Art, which survived Hurricane Katrina intact, has laid off 70 of its 86 staff. “The city-financed museum, which has been shut since the day before Katrina hit in late August, was instructed by the municipal government to keep only a minimal staff needed to administer the institution in its current closed state.”
Introducing The August Wilson Theatre
Broadway’s Virginia Theatre was renamed the August Wilson Theatre. In a ceremony, Wilson’s daughter read the late playwright’s words on hearing the theatre was to be named for him: “I have a robust imagination and I have imagined for myself many things,” wrote Wilson, author of such plays as “Fences,” “Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom” and “The Piano Lesson.” I have imagined a wife and two beautiful daughters, and I have imagined a sustained career for myself in the theater. But not in my wildest imagination could I have ever imagined this.”