• Philosophy - Visual Arts

    Maira Kalman’s “The Principles of Uncertainty”: Most Certainly a Gem

    January 21, 2024 - By 

    “If you are ever bored or blue, stand on the street corner for half an hour,” writes the visual artist and spare-time existential philosopher Maira Kalman in “The Principles of Uncertainty,” her wholly original, whimsical, disarmingly profound color-splash-of-a-book that caught my eye on a display table a few years ago in one of those small, impeccably curated bookshops in rural Maine, and which I finally got to reading this week.  What you will see and experience on that corner, she says on a previous page that sets up her suggestion above, is “The People. Everyone looks so exalted, or so…

  • Film/TV - History - Nature

    A Meditation on “Oppenheimer”

    January 13, 2024 - By 

        *** First: the primeval fear and wonder, the fact of existence itself, the gaping at the savannas, the odd and menacing creatures abounding, the vast sprawl of the stars. Noting the deep growl of hunger, the insistent urge to sample tubers, mushrooms, fruit from the trees, the slow and hapless life forms crawling beneath our gaze. The terror of being prey for stronger and faster life forms, with their shrieks and snarls and rumbles through the night. Hearing the helpless wails of our mates being devoured. The seeking for shelter and haven. The cowering. The thinking. The gathering…

  • Film/TV

    Break the Record, Die Trying? Free Diving With Laura McGann’s “The Deepest Breath”

    August 13, 2023 - By 

    In the long summer months—which in the generally sunny climes where I have lived I regard as May through at least September—I have long made a habit of swimming in as many backyard and club pools as their owners will abide. And since none of the pools are Olympic-sized, I’ve developed a ritual of dipping underwater upon entry, descending to just a few inches from the bottom, and breaststroking from one end to the other, holding my breath for the 15 to 30 seconds various pools might require. It always feels invigorating to pop up to the surface with a…

  • Film/TV - Religion

    A Pastor Grapples With Faith and the Future: Paul Schrader’s “First Reformed”

    July 16, 2023 - By 

    A young eco-activist confronts the massive evidence of humankind’s abuse of the earth, and he spirals downward in a doom loop of despair. The new life growing in his wife’s belly offers no solace. Quite the contrary—he’s not at all sure he wants to bear the responsibility of subjecting a child to the hellscape he is convinced life on earth is destined to become. He can’t bear the thought, he confides, that his daughter might look accusingly into his eyes 20 years on and ask, “You knew this all along, didn’t you?” His wife suggests counseling with the minister of…

  • Film/TV - History - Religion

    Freedom, Fanaticism, Retrenchment: John Brown and the Southern Baptist Convention

    July 2, 2023 - By 

    Two events drew my attention and stood in severe contrast last week. One was coming across the 2020 Showtime mini-series, “The Good Lord Bird,” about pre-Civil War abolitionist John Brown and his star-crossed effort in 1859 to spark a slave revolt that he convinced himself would spread from Harpers Ferry, Virginia throughout the Southern states and effectively bring an end to slavery in America. The second was news out of the Southern Baptist Convention’s (SBC) annual meeting last week in New Orleans, at which delegates voted on an amendment to the organization’s constitution that would bring it in line with…