“Stories about the future always have a what if premise, and The Handmaid’s Tale has several. For instance: if you wanted to seize power in the United States, abolish liberal democracy, and set up a dictatorship, how would you go about it? What would be your cover story? It would not resemble any form of communism or socialism: those would be too unpopular. It might use the name of democracy as an excuse for abolishing liberal democracy: that’s not out of the question, though I didn’t consider it possible in 1985.”
Blog
‘Mime Is Probably Now At Its Lowest Point In Its Modern History’ (But It’s Slowly Coming Back)
Marko Stojanovic, co-founder and president of the World Mime Organization, writes about what made mime popular in the periods it was and the state of the art around the world today.
What Makes A Great Translation? 10 Translators Weigh In
It’s easy to say what a bad translation is. The ones that are accidentally jagged like the person wielding the scissors was drunk. The ones where someone has misunderstood the original, or perhaps misinterpreted it. The ones where all individuality has been smoothed out. But how do we identify a successful translation? When have we done our job well? What is it we want to achieve, beyond mere fluidity?
Happiness As A Medical Condition (Is This Really Desirable?)
The absence of joy and pleasure—anhedonia—has, in its way, become a popular issue in the wake of the disease depression. A quarter of us are affected by it over the course of a lifetime, various studies suggest, and its frequency is increasing in the industrialized world. The treatment of depression has become both a window display and a battleground for deep brain stimulation.
New Thinking About The Context Of Classical Music
Why does the classical music industry only look to its own professionals to solve its problems? I know musical enthusiasts whose opinions are no less informed or apposite than my own and work in professions where thinking laterally and finding creative solutions is a daily requirement. Surely these people are better able to understand conundrums and see resolutions than I am.
In Children’s Lit, Family Dramas Are Crowding Out Adventures, Warns Awards Judge
“The fictional children of the past frolicked on the heather-clad slopes of Kirrin Island or battled the armies of evil at Hogwarts, free from the restrictions of their parents. Today, according to [Philip Womack], novelists are eschewing adventure stories for ‘claustrophobic’ domestic dramas and creating ‘a depressing children’s literary landscape’ in the process.”
The New York Times’ Chief Movie Critics Send Memos To Hollywood
“Every so often, … Manohla Dargis and A.O. Scott, fire off a number of thoughtful memos to the movie industry and the industry-adjacent. These messages are largely ignored, which does not stop Ms. Dargis and Mr. Scott from continuing this semi-serious tradition. Given the new summer season and how deeply fraught the past year has been – Harvey Weinstein, Netflix, #MeToo, #oscarsalittlelesswhitebutnotmuch – it was time for our critics to weigh in again with their thoughts (and complaints).”
When The U.S. Sent Its Jazz Greats Abroad As Weapons In The Cultural Cold War
“By the mid-1950s, the civil rights movement in the US had become a major international news story. People were horrified by the brutality of Emmett Till’s lynching in 1955, and by the mob violence directed at young black students in Little Rock, Arkansas, in 1957. It undercut America’s claims about freedom and equality. US foreign policy officials decided that America needed to create a new international narrative about its domestic racial struggle.” Enter Louis Armstrong, Dizzy Gillespie, and their colleagues.
The Original Laugh-Track Machine, And The Man Who Became Its Virtuoso
It was know as the Laff Box, and it was mocked up – jerry-rigged, almost – by mechancial engineer Charlie Douglass. You’ve heard it on everything from The Munsters and Gilligan’s Island to Cheers and MAS*H, and “[it] could chuckle. It could guffaw. It could laugh with sighed relief. It even had a reel, controlled by the foot pedal, that was only titters, one person lightly laughing at a time. At its most sophisticated, the box had 320 laughs” – and Douglass deployed them with surprising cleverness and subtlety.
France Begins Multi-Billion-Euro Program To Revive Downtowns Of Smaller Cities
“France’s city centers are about to get one of the biggest makeovers in their history. Following an announcement last month, the country is launching a vast €5 billion ($6.1 billion) plan called Action Coeur de Ville (Action: Heart of the City) intended to revamp 222 city cores … in what the French call Villes Moyennes, ‘average cities’ with populations between 15,000 and 100,000 … over the next five years with new stores, offices, co-working spaces, and renovated housing.”