Culture, High & Low

Trump: America’s First Black Friday President

Like many Americans I’ve struggled to put the election of 2016 in proper perspective the last few weeks, only to arrive at an unexpected...

Some Thoughts on Leonard Cohen – Going Home

Grand Rapids, MI Leonard Cohen has done his last show, composed his last song, and breathed his last breath. When the news popped up on...

Sources of Order: Rooted Cosmopolitanism and the Origins of City Life,...

What follows is an expanded version of a talk originally given at the 2016 Front Porch Republic Conference at Notre Dame, where Susannah Black...

Sources of Order: Rooted Cosmopolitanism and the Origins of City Life

What follows is an expanded version of a talk originally given at the 2016 Front Porch Republic Conference at Notre Dame, where Susannah Black...

Patmore: Prophetic Political Pessimist (and Localist?)

“Nations die of softening of the brain, which, for a long time, passes for softening of the heart.” “Democracy is only a continually shifting aristocracy...

The Alpine Heart

Liechtenstein is the 6th smallest country in the world, larger than San Marino but smaller than the Marshall Islands, and is roughly twice the...

Going Down to Vanity Fair

Over a long and colorful career, the phrase “Vanity Fair” has called up wildly divergent associations, while often seeming to mean nothing at all....

Would Rabbit Angstrom Vote For Trump?

Harry “Rabbit” Angstrom, a former high school basketball star with a spiritual yearning and an outsized libido, may be both John Updike’s most famous...

The Web, Our Brains, and You

Like most avid readers I have a queue of books I'm reading and plan to read. When a new book gets added to the...

Palio

On an intercontinental flight these days one has dozens of options. Not only do they have the most recent movies available for your enjoyment,...