Miscellaneous: From The New Yorker, Inside Shelley’s Manichaean mind: A review of Being Shelley by Ann Wroe (and more). The genre that just won't die: Comics are to be Hercule Poirot's latest incarnation. It's the latest twist to crime fiction, a genre constantly reinvented in its 170-year history. A look at how Britain's novelists are bad at business. Too Many Mirrors: Style is often described paradoxically as an indescribable quality, as something timeless, which is precisely what makes it so useful to the fashion industry. A review of Leviathan: The History of Whaling in America by Eric Jay Dolin. Bratz Dolls worse than Barbie? How a saucer-eyed, saucy-dressing line of dolls made Barbie the far lesser of two feminist evils.
A review of Service Included: Four-Star Secrets of an Eavesdropping Waiter by Phoebe Damrosch. A review of Das Kapital: A Novel of Love and Money Markets by Viken Berberian. From Chronicles, Fr. Hugh Barbour on liberality as the basis of culture. Hallyu, the Korean Wave: Is this how it feels to be French or Italian? To be chic just because of your nationality? Dare I feel that just being Korean may hold some cultural currency, these days? There are not as many movie icons out there as we think. What makes one? Well it's not talent — they can just look pretty and our imagination does the rest.
From California Literary Review, accept that humanity is alone in this vast part of the universe, our galaxy. Turn to the front page of the newspaper opened before you. Now, read. A review of Aristophanes and the Carnival of Genres by Charles Platter. A review of Deluxe: How Luxury Lost Its Luster by Dana Thomas. Perfume Nose: An interview with third-generation fragrance expert Celine Ellena on how to smell a winner. Mr. Manchester: How Tony Wilson changed the face of pop culture. A look at how the Chinese novel finds new life online.
