Arts & Culture

Man of letters Public intellectual Cultural critic Feuilletoniste Whatever he was exactly they don rsquo t make them like that anymore and the more rsquo s the pity Once upon a time writers like Edmund Wilson Mary McCarthy Irving Howe Alfred Kazin or even George Orwell armed only with the

Over 70 years ago in 1934 the prize-winning biographer and historian Matthew Josephson published an eye-opening best seller entitled The Robber Barons Through prodigious research reports of congressional committees and ldquo inquiries rdquo done by state legislatures as key sources and gifted

In Blessed Among All Women Robert Ellsberg publisher of Orbis Books has compiled another unorthodox hagiography The book records the lives of 136 holy women Their stories eloquently told in short entries are grouped according to the virtues of the Beatitudes an arrangement that reflects Ells

With good reason Steven McKenzie worries that many modern men and women misunderstand the Bible There is confusion between biblical and scientific approaches to creation and a misguided recourse to biblical apocalyptic frequently in fundamentalist circles but not limited to them McKenzie prof

In this second collection by Pulitzer Prize and National Book Award winner Mary Oliver containing 42 new poems the contents run in reverse chronological order the most recent ones first just the way a curriculum vitae starts with the latest accomplishments Publishers must fear a flagging of int

If Thomas O rsquo Malley rsquo s first book In the Province of Saints is anything to judge by he has a real future ahead of him as a novelist The story takes place in Ireland more specifically in the southern part between 1976 and 1981 But geography alas does not spare his characters from

Thomas King a professor of theology at Georgetown University has written a fine book deeply rooted in his lifelong meditation on Pierre Teilhard de Chardin his fellow Jesuit whom he approaches above all as a priest and as a scientist with a priestly calling The introduction clearly explains Ki

When a poet writes ldquo I rdquo what does he mean An Irish poet-friend tells me his ldquo I rdquo is always a fiction based on himself but never his real self Literary critics reading an ldquo I rdquo poem discuss the ldquo speaker rdquo or the ldquo voice rdquo but not the ldquo w

In the last months of his long lifehe died at 98 in 2004Cardinal Franz K nig the former Archbishop of Vienna wrote this very personal book In Open to God Open to the World he highlights milestones in his service to the church as the Holy See rsquo s longest serving cardinal and tireless bridge