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Straight Up | Jan Herman

Arts, Media & Culture News with 'tude

Archives for November 2003

REGARDING POLANSKI AND ‘THE PIANIST’

November 12, 2003 by cmackie

It turns out I’m not the only person to have noticed Polanski’s unforgivable omission in “The Pianist.” Many readers messaged that they also noticed it. First, here’s the reply from my friend Alan M. Edelson, whose admiration for “The Pianist” got me started: I found your take on the film very interesting. Still, it does not […]

Polanski’s Unforgivable Omission

November 11, 2003 by cmackie

By Jan Herman The author Thane Rosenbaum wrote an article a few days ago outlining “the dilemma facing the builders of a Holocaust memorial in Berlin,” as it was described this morning by one of its readers. Read his complete article, “The Price of Forgiveness,” and then this morning’s reactions, “The Long Shadow of the Holocaust.” […]

VERGING ON CUBA

November 10, 2003 by cmackie

Winter seems finally to have arrived this weekend, and the trees have pretty much gone bare. But I was buoyed the other evening by a panel discussion: “Cuba on the Verge” (the name taken from a recent book with that title, edited by Terry McCoy, who organized the event in midtown Manhattan). What Cuba is […]

WAR AND THE GLORY OF AN OLD LIE

November 9, 2003 by cmackie

Adam Cohen reminds us today that Wilfred Owen, the great British poet, died in battle 85 years ago this week. You can disagree with his claim that Owen is wrongly portrayed as antiwar — “[H]e was not,” Cohen writes. “What he stood for was seeing war clearly” — but Cohen’s larger point that George W. Bush […]

TEAHOUSE OF THE MIDDLE EAST

November 8, 2003 by cmackie

There’s hope yet for a brighter weekend. I got a small grin out of Bush’s call for democracy in the Middle East. It made me think of what put-upon Col. Wainwright Purdy III said in the 1956 movie “The Teahouse of the August Moon”: “My job is to teach these natives the meaning of democracy. […]

CONNECT THE DOTS

November 7, 2003 by cmackie

Looking for an upbeat way to begin the weekend ain’t easy … Not when another helicopter has gone down in Iraq, this time killing six American soldiers … Not when the death toll has risen from 15 to 16 in Sunday’s helicopter shoot-down … Not when Shrub’s rush to war in Iraq looks increasingly like […]

FOOT-IN-MOUTH DISEASE

November 6, 2003 by cmackie

Maybe my ears failed me. It’s possible. Too many rock concerts? Too much time in the New York subway? A hearing test the other day revealed slight, high-frequency hearing loss due to nerve damage. The doc wasn’t sure why. But I heard what I heard, and the only reason I wonder about it now is […]

THIS SAYS IT ALL

November 6, 2003 by cmackie

In his presidential memoir, “A World Transformed,” written with his national security adviser, Brent Scowcroft, and published five years ago, George Bush the Elder explained why U.S. forces didn’t go after Saddam Hussein at the end of Gulf War I: Trying to eliminate Saddam … would have incurred incalculable human and political costs. Apprehending him […]

WAL-MART 101

November 5, 2003 by cmackie

The last time I looked, way back in May in another life, the question about Wal-Mart was: Small-town savior or company gulag? At least that’s the way I put it. Even the increasingly irritating David Brooks got off a funny satire about Wal-Mart’s lad-magazine ban, “No Sex Magazines, Please, We’re Wal-Mart Shoppers,” although it was, […]

ONWARD, CHRISTIAN SOLDIERS

November 4, 2003 by cmackie

Did I say the other day that David Brooks is still trying to find his rhythm as a New York Times op-ed columnist? I was too kind. Judging by his effort this morning, “A Burden Too Heavy to Put Down” (wisely positioned by the editors below the fold), the guy’s melody has become all too […]

TALKING BACK TO THE TUBE

November 3, 2003 by cmackie

A friend messages: “Aren’t you bothered by the fact that at a time when too many children in this country go to bed hungry, when senior citizens cannot afford medical care, when soldiers are being sent home from Iraq in boxes, the U.S. Senate held public hearings on college football’s Bowl Championship Series? And you […]

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Jan Herman

When not listening to Bach or Cuban jazz pianist Chucho Valdes, or dancing to salsa, I like to play jazz piano -- but only in the privacy of my own mind.
Another strange fact... Read More…

About

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Several books of poems have been published in recent years by Moloko Print, Statdlichter Presse, Phantom Outlaw Editions, and Cold Turkey … [Read More...]

Straight Up

The agenda is just what it says: news of arts, media & culture delivered with attitude. Or as Rock Hudson once said in a movie: "Man is the only … [Read More...]

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