Newsletter 893

Best of the Moment

In The Neighborhood: Tom Waits

Alex Harvey | LA Review Of Books | 29 December 2012

On the life and music of Tom Waits, steeped in the sleaze of Los Angeles. A friend looking for beer in Waits's motel fridge found "a claw hammer, a small jar of artichoke hearts, an old parking ticket and a can of roof cement" Comments (https://thebrowser.com/articles/neighborhood-tom-waits)

Shooting Dead People

Mark Liberman | Language Log | 3 January 2013

"My intuition, for what it's worth, says that you can shoot someone dead, and you can shoot someone in the head, but you can't shoot them dead in the head, no matter how much noun-phrase-shifting you do" Comments (https://thebrowser.com/articles/shooting-dead-people)

The Mystery Of Faith

Morgan Meis | Smart Set | 2 January 2013

On Caravaggio: "The transformation on the face of the servant girl is something akin to the transformation that Caravaggio brought to the history of painting. He turned painting in a different direction. He converted it" Comments (https://thebrowser.com/articles/mystery-faith)

China: The Disappeared

Frank Dikötter | Foreign Policy | 1 January 2013

Mao's Great Leap Forward produced a famine that killed millions. Historians have pieced together most of the story. But where are the photographs? Locked up in Communist Party archives. The government still fears the truth Comments (https://thebrowser.com/articles/china-disappeared)

Dean Acheson And The Myth Of Anglo-American Unity

Geoffrey Wheatcroft | Spectator | 2 January 2013

Portrait of the American politician who, just over fifty years ago, declared that "Great Britain has lost an empire and has not yet found a role" — and, with that single phrase, damaged US-UK relations for decades to come Comments (https://thebrowser.com/articles/dean-acheson-and-myth-anglo-american-unity)

Shopping In Ancient Rome

Mary Beard | London Review Of Books | 2 January 2013

"Walk down the main streets in Pompeii or Herculaneum and you feel comfortably at home in what seems recognisably close to a modern cityscape: bars and cafés and shops." But what exactly did they sell, and to whom? Comments (https://thebrowser.com/articles/banter-about-dildoes-shopping-ancient-rome)