Here is Writing New York

by | Jan 26, 2009 | Books, Politics, Teaching

Today’s lecture in our Writing New York class is devoted to E. B. White’s Here is New York, which will function as a kind of overture to the course. We’ll introduce it whimsically, first with a clip of Speed Levitch’s homage to White from the...

The Do-Over

by | Jan 22, 2009 | Politics | 4 comments

So President Obama had to retake the oath of office yesterday, because he and Chief Justice John Roberts flubbed it the first time. There’s a New York angle to this story. Obama joins Chester A. Arthur and Calvin Coolidge as the only presidents who have had an...

Obama is One of Us

by | Dec 16, 2008 | Politics

The President-elect during his salad days in NYC.The cover story of this week’s New York magazine, the year-end double issue, is “Reasons to Love New York (Especially Right Now).” It’s the fourth time that the magazine has run the feature, but...

Ahab by MC Lars

by | Dec 10, 2008 | Books, Music, People, Politics

Later this morning I’ll be giving the last lecture of my Conversations of the West class, wrapping up the course’s treatment of how Moby-Dick engages with its cultural inheritances from the ancient Greek, Biblical, and early modern English traditions....

My Fellow New Yorkers

by | Dec 3, 2008 | Politics

It was nice to see Secretary of State-designee Hillary Clinton acknowledge the citizens of her adopted state at President-Elect Obama’s press conference on Monday. Obama had described Clinton’s appointment as “a sign to friend and foe of the...