Criticism and interpretation Archives

Criticism and interpretation

National Treasure

The ecstatic cult of Nicolas Cage

Southern Fan

by John Cornyn,

From descriptions, published in a music review by Texas senator John Cornyn, of Neil Young’s 1972 album Harvest. The article was printed in February of that year in the Trinitonian,…

Hostile Work Environments

by Elaine Blair,

A sexual harassment reading list

The Minds of Others

by David Bromwich, Garth Greenwell, Hanif Abdurraqib, Kelly Clancy, Laila Lalami, Mychal Denzel Smith, T. M. Luhrmann,

The art of persuasion in the age of Trump

American Expansion

by Helen Vendler,

The innovations of A.R. Ammons

The Notes of Patrick Modiano

by Peter De Jonge,

A young writer finds his voice on the radio

Four in Verse

by John Ashbery, Ben Lerner,

Many of John Ashbery’s recent poems are full of sayings and parables and clichés — but from what culture, what country? The world of these poems resembles ours: there are…

Cut With the Kitchen Knife

by Rosmarie Waldrop, Ben Lerner,

We conventionally use the period to punctuate a finished thought. But Rosmarie Waldrop, one of the most innovative poets in English, deploys the period as a rest, often musical, in…

The Drums of Marrakesh

by Mark McMorris,

A Jamaican-born poet chain-smokes as he listens to a circle of drummers in the old market of Marrakesh, circa 2015. The drums sound in the present, but they also sound…

New Art

by Terry Castle,

Dear Miss Maier (for who would dare address you as Vivian, let alone Viv?), Inevitable that I should get crushed out on you, I guess. You seem to be…

New Books

by Christine Smallwood,

There were dozens of hippie acts in Haight-Ashbury in the late 1960s, but most people have only heard of a few: Jefferson Airplane, Santana, Janis Joplin, and the Grateful Dead.…