Criticism

In early October 2007, almost three years to the day after I began my career as a journalist in Russia, a conversation with a former CIA agent brought it to an end. 

In 1827, Thomas de Quincey suggested that murder was becoming a new medium for the artist: “People begin to see,” he wrote, “that something more goes into the composition of a fine murder than two blockheads to kill and be killed, a knife...

Bernardo Atxaga draws a line between theft and homage in his delightful “Obabakoak.”

The year’s best mistakes, Lawerence Weschler’s mysterious power, the merits of literary prizes, and more.

J. Hoberman weighs in Steven Soderbergh’s epic biopic of Che.

Ecce homo: Ernesto, Fuser, The Argentine, The Heroic Guerrilla, The Shadowy Power Behind Fidel Castro, The Great Compañero, The New Socialist Man, The Last Armed Prophet, The Most Complete Human Being of Our Age, The Clearest, Most...

Taking a haircut, misery memoirs, Fitzwilliam Darcy on Facebook and National Buy a Book by a Black Author and Give it to Somebody Not Black Month.

Literary magazines ranked by their Pushcart Prizes winnings.

Writers find a way to challenge and chronicle the consciences of their nations.

The new grammar of Bond.