Category Archive For "Responses"
in Responses
Chernow’s Alexander Hamilton
In a radio interview, Tracy Kidder, who’s written quite a few good books and at least one important one, advocated for a sort of Maxwell’s demon approach to book reading. He divides books into two main categories: books in which he has interest and books in which he does not. He went on to say …
in Responses
Already There
One of the difficulties of diagnosing contemporary US culture is that we lack perspective. Here’s a helpful ichthyological fable I heard somewhere: Two young little fish are swimming around and they come across a big older fish who asks, “How’s the water, boys?” The little guys are unsure of how to respond and they swim …
in Responses
Why Cormac McCarthy’s Novels Shouldn’t be Made into Films (or, at least, why the books are better)
While reading prose fiction, occasionally you encounter depictions of physical actions, performed by outsized characters, that come across as so richly visual that it’s natural to wonder whether this piece of prose fiction should in fact be a film or would be better as a film, seen on a giant screen instead of the printed …
in Responses
Fighting Fire With Arson: A Response to Yale Professor Robert J. Schiller’s misguided but not unexpected piece on the housing bubble, titled “Infectious Exuberance” and appearing in the July/August 2008 Atlantic.
Shiller believes our two recent “epidemics of financial optimism” (the dot-com and real estate bubbles) could be followed by a more disastrous financial epidemic if “irrational pessimism and mistrust” manage to spread from the lips and fingertips of sourpuss chicken-little financial pundits to the wider population. According to the author this third epidemic is easily …
in Responses
What does it take to cause agony in another human being?
Last night, I turned away from the HBO miniseries Elizabeth. A man had attempted to kill the queen and he was being stretched on the rack in a creepy, dark, moist, windowless and hell-like torturing dungeon. The putative and apparent goal of the torture was to extract “information” from the man, who had been acting, …
Treating Classes Like Gatherings, Part Three: Ending Well(If you haven’t read part one, on establishing purpose, or part two, on facilitating well, I’d [keep reading...]
Treating Classes Like Gatherings, Part Two: Teaching With Generous Authority(If you haven’t read part one, about establishing purpose, consider starting there.) After [keep reading...]
Why Teachers Should Consider Their Classes “Gatherings”Priya Parker’s The Art of Gathering, a book that, as the subtitle suggests, takes up the subject of [keep reading...]