Charged up, partisan political books are all over the best-seller lists these days. “There’s never been a time before when partisan books not only dominated the best-seller lists but also showed this kind of staying power.”
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Austin Musical Theatre Files Bankruptcy
“In the biggest smashup of the two-year Austin arts bust, Broadway Texas, formerly known as Austin Musical Theatre, filed for bankruptcy Monday.”
Ancient Chariot Under Road
Highway builders have discovered an ancient chariot buried in their path in West Yorkshire. “Buried for 2,500 years, the find is a complete chariot containing the skeleton of a tribal leader, with the remains of at least 250 cattle, probably slaughtered for the funeral feast.”
Poetry: How $100 Million Changes You
It’s been a year since Poetry Magazine was given $100 million. “Over the last 12 months, the euphoria within the organization over what is believed to be the largest gift to a literary group — and which effectively guarantees in perpetuity the survival of the monthly founded 91 years ago in Chicago — has been undercut by the prosaic details of managing new wealth and responsibly employing it in the service of poetry. For some staffers, the excitement over a submission by a promising new poet has competed with the tedium of long meetings on legal, accounting and investment issues.”
Out Of Italy (There Was More Going On)
Art historians used to believe that Italy was the only game in town during the Renaissance. But new understanding has come: “The picture that has emerged is of a Europe in which the courts of the Burgundian, French and German princes were at least the equal of those of northern Italy in their magnificence and political ambition, and of course the patronage and ostentation by which they were expressed. Europe was open, international travel common, and the traffic and exchange between north and south, as much cultural as commercial, flowed in a constant stream.”
Is PR Ruining Classical Music?
In pop music “stars are manufactured by TV companies in programmes such as Pop Idol and Fame Academy. But, increasingly, there’s an element of it too in classical music. Not so much from the “talent show” angle – the epitome of which, at least where raw young talent is concerned, is probably the BBC’s serious-minded and professionally engineered Young Musician of the Year competition – as the scurrying efforts by struggling record companies to mould and flog the latest classical superstar.”
Review In Review – The NYTBR’s Golden Age
The New York Times Book Review is looking for a new editor. “In looking forward, the Times might want to look back—to what was widely agreed to be the Book Review’s golden age, from 1971 to 1975, under the editorship of John Leonard. Nostalgia is obviously a perilous emotion, but in this case, the golden years prove to be more than just the gilt of yesteryear. They provide a useful model for what tomorrow’s Book Review could look like—should it choose to.”
My Kidney For A Sax
A Moldovan musician has sold his kidney to buy a saxophone. “Sergiu, 23 – who as a professional musician has toured parts of Europe – sold the kidney to a Turkish hospital for $10,000 (£5,800). He has since been able to afford the instruments to further his career in the poverty-stricken eastern European country.”
In My Humble Opinion…
“There are perhaps three types of opinion. The first is the educated man’s opinion that certain popular beliefs are stupid. The second is the sort that drove Flaubert to near madness, the opinion that certain original thoughts are stupid. Third, there is the conventional “wisdom” about what is correct. Opinions flourish only in periods or cultures without a dominant religion.”
Art – I Can’t Conceptulaize It
Is conceptual art really art at all? The debate never seems to end. “Conceptual art refuses to be judged in conventional artistic terms, in terms of the material art object. But nor can it be judged as a pure idea, either. The result is that it occupies a kind of no-man’s land, where it is difficult to judge or hold it to account.”