From LRB, a review of The Poems of John Dryden: Vol. V 1697-1700 and Dryden: Selected Poems; Through the Trapdoor: A review of The Narrow Foothold by Carina Birman; and Marlon Brando didn’t believe in acting, except in real life, and he took every opportunity, in interviews and his autobiography, to trash the profession. It’s tempting to say this is why he was a great movie actor, but the story is more complicated.
From TLS, Orientalist art and photography: A review of Odalisques and Arabesques: Orientalist photography 1839–1925 by Robert Irwin and Ken Jacobson; Images of the Ottoman Empire by Charles Newton; and The Art of Omar Khayyam by William H. Martin and Sandra Mason; a review of Henry James Goes to Paris by Peter Brooks; and a review of A Tranquil Star: Unpublished stories by Primo Levi.
From Mute, in her recent anthology Participation, Claire Bishop targets the suspect utopianism of relational aesthetics – a new model public art for the age of consensus. But, writes Paul Helliwell, her alternative reading of participation, made across a set of historical texts and concerned to preserve the autonomy of art, may have blocked itself with her deployment of the fashionable Jacques Rancière. Tales of Titans and Hobbits: Both Ayn Rand and J.R.R. Tolkien passionately tell their tales about freedom, but they resort to completely different aesthetics, and, in consequence, paint two entirely different pictures of the world, with different heroes and different challenges. Are those differences important?
He coined the term "cyberspace" in his novel Neuromancer. So it's fitting that William Gibson's latest book, Spook Country, will be promoted in cyberspace — in Second Life, to be exact. On the centennial of Robert Heinlein's birth, Scott Van Wynsberghe examines the legacy of one of science fiction's most renowned pioneers. “We must ride the lightning”: An article on Robert Heinlein and American spaceflight. From American Heritage, Star Wizards: How a handful of desperate innovators took special effects to new heights in two 1977 movies—Star Wars and Close Encounters. Lucasfilm's Phantom Menace: Lawrence Lessig on how the Lucasfilm's empire is pulling a Jedi mind trick on collaborative recreators. Is Tinseltown really about to disappear from our cultural radar screens? A review of The Decline of the Hollywood Empire by Hervé Fischer.
From 3:AM, an interview with Bookslam impresario Patrick Neate, author of Culture is Our Weapon. A review of Total Chaos: The Art and Aesthetics of Hip-Hop. How Rap Cat Made It Into This Headline: As old ad agencies try to get a grip on their future, the new guerrilla ad guys think they’ve got it all figured out.
