Director Atom Egoyan, playwright Tom Stoppard, and novelist Amos Oz have been named as the recipients of Israel’s $1m Dan David Prize, which recognizes humanitarian achievement in the cultural sphere. “The award to Egoyan is in recognition of his controversial 2002 near-epic Ararat, which concerned the 1915 Armenian genocide in Turkey and the attempt to deny it ever happened.”
Category: people
William F. Buckley Dead At 82
American conservatism may never have a better or more eloquent than Buckley, but the author and commentator was so much more than a political crusader. “Such a vortex of contradictions: the Roman Catholic prep-school Skull and Bones Yalie heir to an Irish family’s Mexican oil fortune… Foe of anti-Semites, advocate of tattooing AIDS carriers on the buttocks, champion of McCarthyist Communist-hunting, and of the legalization of marijuana. His outrageousness immunized him against effective condemnation.”
The CS Lewis You Don’t Know In His Writing
A handwriting expert analyzes Lewis’ handwriting. “At first glance this small, neat script appears to trot unprepossessingly across the page. His exceedingly small personal pronoun does indeed suggest that this man is a modest individual; but being modest does not mean ineffectual.”
Juno Screenwriter Cody Diablo Finds Celebrity Challenging
“The very things that make her star unique are suddenly being panned and scrutinized. From tabloid newspapers to well-trafficked celeb- and media-sniping blogs, Cody’s meteoric rise has made her something of a target.”
Reza Vs. The French Intellectuals
Playwright Yasmina Reza believes her refusal to adopt intellectual positions has alienated her from many French critics, who have never praised her in quite the same way as their American, British and German counterparts…
The Pop Star, The President, And The War Over Free Speech
“The heated ideological showdown between Spanish superstar Alejandro Sanz and the combative president of Venezuela, Hugo Chavez, escalated into a full-fledged battle over free speech.”
William Bolcom At 70
For decades, Mr. Bolcom has been a full-service composer, turning out some 300 symphonic works, chamber pieces and songs.
Remmebering Alain Robbe-Grillet
“Robbe-Grillet was the very model of a postwar avant-gardist. His attempts to wrest fiction free from 19th-century constraints like plot and character, and to wrest objects free from imposed meaning, were never entirely popular with readers but had a decisive influence on critical theory and on the art of the novel, as well as on film, art and even psychology.”
Modigliani Scholar Accused Of Fraud
“Art historian and Modigliani specialist Christian Parisot is facing trial in Paris, accused of faking 77 drawings by Jeanne Hébuterne, the artist’s mistress and mother of his daughter, also called Jeanne. She committed suicide, pregnant and aged just 21, the day after Modigliani died in 1920.”
The Critic Who Now Runs The Barbican
Nicholas Kenyon has taken over one of Britain’s main cultural centers. “When I ran Radio 3, I think I sometimes moved too fast without securing an internal consensus, so I’m not in any hurry here, and I don’t need to be – the centre is clearly extremely well run and thriving artistically.”