Micah Mattix

It turns out that the more scientifically knowledgeable one is,  the more likely one is to doubt the risks of climate change . To find out what some scientists find of little concern, read William Happer’s  “The Truth about Greenhouse Gases”  in last year’s . . . . Continue Reading »

Alexandra Peers  has a wonderful review  of Michael Findlay’s new book,  The Value of Art , in the  Wall Street Journal : A decade into the 21st century, no clear movement or style has emerged to mark contemporary art. No Impressionism, Modernism, Minimalism—no single . . . . Continue Reading »

What has happened to literary journalism that  something like this  gets published in a national paper? John Donne’s Holy Sonnet 14—a poem on Christ’s violent attack on the self’s evil heart that brings about salvation—tells us, Roz Kaveney writes, . . . . Continue Reading »

Over at  Books & Culture ,  Halee Scott reviews Craig G. Bartholomew’s  Where Mortals Dwell —a book on the importance of place in Christian theology. I won’t rehash all of her points, but this struck me: Bartholomew notes that place has a formative influence on . . . . Continue Reading »

At  Public Discourse , Mark Bauerlein argues that  liberalism’s relativistic individualism has ruined the novel : Apart from the truth or politics of that statement, its consequences for the novel are certain. A good plot needs conflict, an unsettled situation whose outcome we care . . . . Continue Reading »

Rod Dreher  linked  to  my piece on Gogol  yesterday, and we got to discussing the difference between people who like Austen and those who like Russian novels. In an email, I suggested: In my experience, Austen fans love her because of the detailed character portraits, the . . . . Continue Reading »

Over at  Books & Culture , John Wilson offers his books of the year . I love John’s methodology: the best books are those that first come to mind after a year of reading. Here are a couple of the more interesting titles: Apricot Jam: And Other Stories . Aleksandr . . . . Continue Reading »

All Russian writers, it has often seemed to me, are at once wonderfully and disturbingly foreign. The dark, snow-encrusted landscapes of Pasternak somehow both reflect and drown the human heart. The nearly inscrutable evil of Dostoevsky’s Raskolnikov in Crime and Punishment finds its counterpart in the absurd innocence of the Prince in The Idiot. Chekhov’s uncanniness captures modern man’s bewilderment, and Tolstoy’s complex realism, life’s uncanny and often tragic consistencies… . Continue Reading »

New Criterion art critic James Panero has curated what looks to be an interesting exhibition of portraits of injured U.S. service personnel. Too often artists use military injuries or deaths as mere fodder for the next piece of political art. That’s not the case here . The exhibit will run . . . . Continue Reading »

We will be screening Walker Percy: A Documentary Film at Houston Baptist University tomorrow night. I’ll be giving a brief introduction to Percy before the film and would love to meet any fellow readers of First Things . The screening is free and open to the public. It begins at 8:30 p.m. in . . . . Continue Reading »