New Books in Performing Arts

Grant H. Kester, "The Sovereign Self: Aesthetic Autonomy from the Enlightenment to the Avant-Garde" (Duke UP, 2023)

21 Oct 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In The Sovereign Self: Aesthetic Autonomy from the Enlightenment to the Avant-Garde (Duke UP, 2023), Grant Kester examines the evolving discourse of...

Shakespeare's "The Tempest" Part 1: The Story

16 Oct 2023

Contributed by Lukas

The Tempest, one of the last plays Shakespeare wrote, draws on themes and stories that fascinated him throughout his career while also taking his art ...

Adam Blum et al., "Here I'm Alive: The Spirit of Music in Psychoanalysis" (Columbia UP, 2023)

15 Oct 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Today we have a  group session (read: an hour and a half) with the authors Adam Blum, Peter Goldberg, and Michal Levin discussing their new book He...

Paraska Tolan-Szkilnik, "Maghreb Noir: The Militant-Artists of North Africa and the Struggle for a Pan-African, Postcolonial Future" (Stanford UP, 2023)

11 Oct 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Upon their independence, Moroccan, Algerian, and Tunisian governments turned to the Global South and offered military and financial aid to Black liber...

Marlena Williams, "Night Mother: A Personal and Cultural History of the Exorcist" (Mad Creek Books, 2023)

10 Oct 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Never watch The Exorcist, Marlena Williams's mother told her, just as she'd been told by her own mother as a Catholic teen in rural Oregon when the h...

Shakespeare's "Romeo and Juliet" Part 3: The Language

09 Oct 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In Part 3, Professor Simon Palfrey offers close-readings of some of the play’s most significant scenes. You’ll hear the play’s dark energies eme...

Geraint D'Arcy, "Mise en scène, Acting, and Space in Comics" (Palgrave Macmillan, 2020)

07 Oct 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Geraint D'Arcy's book Mise en scène, Acting, and Space in Comics (Palgrave Macmillan, 2020) explores some of the less frequently questioned ideas w...

Mara Mills and Rebecca Sanchez, eds., "Crip Authorship: Disability as Method" (NYU Press, 2023)

06 Oct 2023

Contributed by Lukas

A full transcript of the interview is available for accessibility. Mara Mills and Rebecca Sanchez's Crip Authorship: Disability as Method (NYU Pre...

Thomas E. Boomershine, "First-Century Gospel Storytellers and Audiences: The Gospels as Performance Literature" (Cascade Books, 2022)

04 Oct 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Tom Boomershine, one of the pioneers of performance criticism for biblical texts, joined the New Books Network to discuss the publication of First-Ce...

Katrin Nahidi, "The Cultural Politics of Art in Iran: Modernism, Exhibitions, and Art Production" (Cambridge UP, 2023)

04 Oct 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Modernist Iranian art represents a highly diverse field of cultural production deeply involved in discussing questions of modernity and modernization ...

Shakespeare's "Romeo and Juliet" Part 2: Characters and Questions

02 Oct 2023

Contributed by Lukas

With Professor Simon Palfrey, Part 2 looks closely at the play’s characters, and especially at the intelligence and swiftness of Juliet. You’ll se...

Melanie Williams, "A Taste of Honey" (Bloomsbury, 2023)

01 Oct 2023

Contributed by Lukas

What makes a film a classic? In A Taste of Honey (Bloomsbury, 2023), published as part of the BFI Film Classics series, Melanie Williams, a Profes...

Kiana Fitzgerald, "Ode to Hip-Hop: 50 Albums That Define 50 Years of Trailblazing Music" (Running Press Adult, 2023)

30 Sep 2023

Contributed by Lukas

From underground roots to mainstream popularity, hip-hop's influence on music and entertainment around the world has been nothing short of extraordina...

Peter Reed, "Staging Haiti in Nineteenth-Century America: Revolution, Race and Popular Performance" (Cambridge UP, 2022)

28 Sep 2023

Contributed by Lukas

American culture maintained a complicated relationship with Haiti from its revolutionary beginnings onward. In Staging Haiti in Nineteenth-Century Am...

Hieyoon Kim, "Celluloid Democracy: Cinema and Politics in Cold War South Korea" (U California Press, 2023)

27 Sep 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Before South Korea became the democracy and media powerhouse that it is today, it underwent several decades of authoritarian rule during the Cold War ...

Jonathan Mael, "Harlem World: How Hip Hop's Super Showdown Changed Music Forever" (Johns Hopkins UP, 2023)

26 Sep 2023

Contributed by Lukas

July 3, 1981, was a pivotal night for the future of America's newest art form: hip hop. In New York's Harlem World Club, the Fantastic Romantic Five a...

Jessica Lowell Mason and Nicole Crevar, "Madwomen in Social Justice Movements, Literatures, and Art" (Vernon Press, 2023)

26 Sep 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Jessica Lowell Mason and Nicole Crevar's Madwomen in Social Justice Movements, Literatures, and Art (Vernon Press, 2023) boldly reasserts the impor...

Shakespeare's "Romeo and Juliet" Part 1: The Story

25 Sep 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Children of families who are locked in a fatal feud, Romeo and Juliet risk community, identity, and life to pursue an all-consuming love. Today, Romeo...

Tracy Rutler, "Queering the Enlightenment: Kinship and Gender in Eighteenth-Century French Literature" (Oxford UP/Liverpool UP, 2021)

23 Sep 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Tracy Rutler's Queering the Enlightenment: Kinship and Gender in Eighteenth-Century French Literature (Oxford University Studies in the Enlightenmen...

Kimberly Mack, "Living Colour's Time's Up" (Bloomsbury, 2023)

19 Sep 2023

Contributed by Lukas

The iconic Black rock band Living Colour's Time's Up, released in 1990, was recorded in the aftermath of the spectacular critical and commercial succ...

Deanne Williams, "Girl Culture in the Middle Ages and Renaissance: Performance and Pedagogy" (Arden Shakespeare, 2023)

18 Sep 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Deanne Williams's newest book, Girl Culture in the Middle Ages and Renaissance: Performance and Pedagogy (Bloombury, 2023), is a groundbreaking stud...

Hongwei Bao, "Contemporary Chinese Queer Performance" (Routledge, 2022)

18 Sep 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In Contemporary Chinese Queer Performance (Routledge, 2022), Hongwei Bao analyses queer theatre and performance in contemporary China. Boa documents...

Shakespeare's "Twelfth Night" Part 3: The Language

18 Sep 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In Part 3, Professor Emma Smith offers close-readings of some of the play’s most important scenes, which dramatize the wide range of relationships a...

Bryan Rennie, "An Ethology of Religion and Art: Belief as Behavior" (Routledge, 2020)

16 Sep 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Drawing from sources including the ethology of art and the cognitive science of religion, An Ethology of Religion and Art: Belief as Behavior (Routl...

Jonathan Leal, "Dreams in Double Time: On Race, Freedom, and Bebop" (Duke UP, 2023)

14 Sep 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In Dreams in Double Time: On Race, Freedom, and Bebop (Duke UP, 2023), Jonathan Leal examines how the musical revolution of bebop opened up new fut...

Gregory Cahill, "The Golden Voice: The Ballad of Cambodian Rock's Lost Queen" (Life Drawn, 2023)

14 Sep 2023

Contributed by Lukas

The Golden Voice: The Ballad of Cambodian Rock's Lost Queen (Life Drawn, 2023) is very well-reseraech graphic novel based on the life of beloved Camb...

Jo Shaw and Ben Fletcher-Watson, "The Art of Being Dangerous: Exploring Women and Danger through Creative Expression" (Leuven UP, 2021)

13 Sep 2023

Contributed by Lukas

The idea that women are dangerous - individually or collectively - runs throughout history and across cultures. Behind this label lies a significant s...

A Better Way to Buy Books

12 Sep 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Bookshop.org is an online book retailer that donates more than 80% of its profits to independent bookstores. Launched in 2020, Bookshop.org has alre...

Shakespeare's "Twelfth Night" Part 2: Characters and Questions

11 Sep 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Part 2 looks at the many instances of inversion and transgression, looking at how characters cross boundaries of gender, status, and social role, and ...

Josephine Lee, "Oriental, Black, and White: The Formation of Racial Habits in American Theater" (UNC Press, 2022)

11 Sep 2023

Contributed by Lukas

The history of race in American theater is more complicated than you might think, writes Dr. Josephine Lee in Oriental, Black, and White: The Format...

Tingting Hu, "Victims, Perpetrators and Professionals: The Representation of Women in Chinese Crime Films" (Liverpool UP, 2021)

09 Sep 2023

Contributed by Lukas

How are women represented in Chinese crime films? In what ways do the representation reflect traditional Chinese values and contemporary Chinese socia...

Chris Yogerst, "The Warner Brothers" (UP of Kentucky, 2023)

08 Sep 2023

Contributed by Lukas

One of the oldest and most recognizable studios in Hollywood, Warner Bros. is considered a juggernaut of the entertainment industry. Since its formati...

Caveh Zahedi, "Digging My Own Grave: The Films of Caveh Zahedi" (Factory 25, 2015)

06 Sep 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Digging My Own Grave: The Films of Caveh Zahedi (Factory 25, 2015) is the most comprehensive collection of filmmaker Caveh Zahedi possible with 36 fi...

James Newlin and James W. Stone, "New Psychoanalytic Readings of Shakespeare: Cool Reason and Seething Brains" (Routledge, 2023)

06 Sep 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Dr. Richard Waugaman is an emeritus supervising and training analyst at the Washington Baltimore Center for Psychoanalysis. He is also a well-respect...

Shakespeare's "Twelfth Night" Part 1: The Story

04 Sep 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Twelfth Night, named for the celebration that is both the culmination and the close of the Christmas festivities, is a bittersweet romantic comedy at ...

John Szwed, "Cosmic Scholar: The Life and Times of Harry Smith" (FSG, 2023)

03 Sep 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Who was Harry Smith? Was he an anthropologist, a filmmaker, a painter? Was he a charlatan? A genius? Was he a moocher, a schmuck, a bum? As John Szwed...

Elise Herrala, "Art of Transition: The Field of Art in Post-Soviet Russia" (Routledge, 2021)

03 Sep 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Art of Transition: The Field of Art in Post-Soviet Russia (Routledge, 2022) investigates contemporary art in Russia since the end of the Soviet Unio...

Diana W. Anselmo, "A Queer Way of Feeling: Girl Fans and Personal Archives of Early Hollywood" (U California Press, 2023)

02 Sep 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In A Queer Way of Feeling: Girl Fans and Personal Archives of Early Hollywood (University of California Press, 2023), Diana W. Anselmo queers the ea...

Anna Kathryn Grau and Lisa Colton, "Female-Voice Song and Women's Musical Agency in the Middle Ages" (Brill, 2022)

01 Sep 2023

Contributed by Lukas

While there is little doubt that women were active participants in medieval musical culture, their role has nevertheless been variously obfuscated, un...

Una McIlvenna, "Singing the News of Death: Execution Ballads in Europe 1500-1900" (Oxford UP, 2022)

31 Aug 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Across Europe, from the dawn of print until the early twentieth century, the news of crime and criminals' public executions was printed in song form o...

Bonnie Gordon, "Voice Machines: The Castrato, the Cat Piano, and Other Strange Sounds" (U Chicago Press, 2023)

31 Aug 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Italian courts and churches began employing castrato singers in the late sixteenth century. By the eighteenth century, the singers occupied a celebrit...

John Brackett, "Live Dead: The Grateful Dead, Live Recordings, and the Ideology of Liveness" (Duke UP, 2023)

30 Aug 2023

Contributed by Lukas

The Grateful Dead were one of the most successful live acts of the rock era. Performing over 2300 shows between 1965 and 1995, the Grateful Dead’s r...

Hamid Keshmirshekan, "The Art of Iran in the Twentieth and Twenty-First Centuries: Tracing the Modern and the Contemporary" (Edinburgh UP, 2023)

30 Aug 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Hamid Keshmirshekan's book The Art of Iran in the Twentieth and Twenty-First Centuries: Tracing the Modern and the Contemporary (Edinburgh UP, 2023)...

Chuyun Oh, "K-pop Dance: Fandoming Yourself on Social Media" (Routledge, 2022)

28 Aug 2023

Contributed by Lukas

K-pop Dance: Fandoming Yourself on Social Media (Routledge, 2022) is about K-pop dance and the evolution and presence of its dance fandom on social m...

Shakespeare's "The Merchant of Venice" Part 3: The Language

28 Aug 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In Part 3, Professor Stephen Greenblatt offers close-readings of some of the play’s most significant scenes. You’ll get an in-depth look at the po...

Vanessa I. Corredera, "Reanimating Shakespeare's Othello in Post-Racial America" (Edinburgh UP, 2022)

27 Aug 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Vanessa I. Corredera’s book Reanimating Shakespeare's Othello in Post-Racial America (Edinburgh Univeristy Press, 2022) looks at how that seventee...

Polyphony

24 Aug 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In this episode of High Theory, Brian Fairley tells us about Polyphony, a concept from music that describes multiple melodic lines sounding at once. T...

PostScript: The Barbie Movie: A Conversation about a Cinematic and Cultural Event

23 Aug 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Today’s episode of POSTSCRIPT explores and examines director Greta Gerwig’s film, Barbie. This Warner Brothers’ movie has been in theaters for ...

Shakespeare's "The Merchant of Venice" Part 2: Characters and Questions

21 Aug 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Part 2 discusses the play’s central characters, their profound bonds of intimacy and animosity, and the effect of money on those bonds. Professor St...

Kevin Landis, "One Public: New York’s Public Theater in the Era of Oskar Eustis" (Methuen Drama, 2022)

19 Aug 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Kevin Landis's One Public: New York’s Public Theater in the Era of Oskar Eustis (Methuen Drama, 2022) tells the story of the remarkable first 17...

Jamila Rodrigues, "Sufi Women, Embodiment and the 'Self': Gender in Islamic Ritual" (Routledge, 2023)

18 Aug 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Jamila Rodrigues's new book Sufi Women, Embodiment and the “Self”: Gender in Islamic Ritual (Routledge 2023) uses her dance and performance stud...

David Humphrey, "The Time of Laughter: Comedy and the Media Cultures of Japan" (U Michigan Press, 2023)

15 Aug 2023

Contributed by Lukas

David Humphrey’s The Time of Laughter: Comedy and the Media Cultures of Japan (U Michigan Press, 2023) examines the roles of mediated laughter in ...

Al Coppola, "The Theater of Experiment: Staging Natural Philosophy in Eighteenth-Century Britain" (Oxford UP, 2016)

15 Aug 2023

Contributed by Lukas

The first book-length study of the relationship between science and theater during the long eighteenth century in Britain, The Theater of Experiment:...

Shakespeare's "The Merchant of Venice" Part 1: The Story

14 Aug 2023

Contributed by Lukas

The Merchant of Venice is one of Shakespeare’s most gripping and challenging plays. Labeled as a comedy in Shakespeare’s First Folio, today it res...

Nicholas Tochka, "Rocking in the Free World: Popular Music and the Politics of Freedom in Postwar America" (Oxford UP, 2023)

14 Aug 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Progressive and libertarian, anti-Communist and revolutionary, Democratic and Republican, quintessentially American but simultaneously universal. By t...

William J. Mann, "Bogie and Bacall: The Surprising True Story of Hollywood's Greatest Love Affair" (Harper, 2023)

09 Aug 2023

Contributed by Lukas

From the noted Hollywood biographer comes this celebration of the great American love story—the romance between Lauren Bacall and Humphrey Bogart—...

Shakespeare's "King Lear" Part 3: The Language

07 Aug 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In Part 3, Professor Palfrey offers close-readings of some of the play’s most significant scenes. You’ll witness the king and the beggar in the he...

Tony McCaffrey, "Giving and Taking Voice in Learning Disabled Theatre" (Routledge, 2023)

05 Aug 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Giving and Taking Voice in Learning Disabled Theatre (Routledge, 2023) offers unique insight into the question of 'voice' in learning disabled theatr...

What Was Contemporary Art?

04 Aug 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Contemporary art in the early twenty-first century is often discussed as if the very idea of art that is contemporary is new. Yet all works of art wer...

Michael Baltutis, "The Festival of Indra: Innovation, Archaism, and Revival in a South Asian Performance" (SUNY Press, 2023)

03 Aug 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Michael Baltutis' book The Festival of Indra: Innovation, Archaism, and Revival in a South Asian Performance (SUNY Press, 2023) details the textual...

Alix Beeston and Stefan Solomon, "Incomplete: The Feminist Possibilities of the Unfinished Film" (U California Press, 2023)

02 Aug 2023

Contributed by Lukas

This field-defining collection establishes unfinished film projects--abandoned, interrupted, lost, or open-ended--as rich and under-appreciated resour...

Shakespeare's "King Lear" Part 2: Characters and Questions

31 Jul 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Part 2 explores the way that Shakespeare revised the original Lear story and the way he revised his own play to create a uniquely wrenching form of tr...

Shakespeare's "King Lear" Part 1: The Story

24 Jul 2023

Contributed by Lukas

King Lear has perhaps the most expansive cosmic scope of any of Shakespeare’s tragedies. In this play, Shakespeare retells the story of an aging kin...

Kyle A. Thomas and Carol Symes, "The Play about the Antichrist (Ludus de Antichristo): A New Verse Translation, Edition, and Commentary" (Medieval Institute Publications, 2023)

24 Jul 2023

Contributed by Lukas

The Play about the Antichrist (Ludus de Antichristo) was composed around 1160 at the imperial Bavarian abbey of Tegernsee, at a critical point in t...

Rich Deakin, "Grebo!: The Loud & Lousy Story of Gaye Bykers on Acid and Crazyhead" (Headpress, 2021)

23 Jul 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In Grebo! The Loud & Lousy Story of Gaye Bikers on Acid and Crazyhead (Headpress, 2021) Rich Deakin explores West Midlands 1980s, home to heavy met...

Howard Fishman, "To Anyone Who Ever Asks: The Life, Music, and Mystery of Connie Converse" (Dutton, 2023)

22 Jul 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Howard Fishman's To Anyone Who Ever Asks: The Life, Music, and Mystery of Connie Converse (Dutton, 2023) is a fascinating hybrid biography that weav...

Wirsching: Bombay Talkies B-Side

20 Jul 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In this episode of High Theory, we continue our conversation with Debashree Mukherjee about the pioneering film studio Bombay Talkies, founded in 1934...

Bombay Talkies

20 Jul 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Debashree Mukherjee talks about the pioneering film studio founded in 1934 in the city of Bombay (now Mumbai) by Himansu Rai and Devika Rani. Its c...

Mani Sharpe, "Late-Colonial French Cinema: Filming the Algerian War of Independence" (Edinburgh UP, 2023)

19 Jul 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In Late-Colonial French Cinema: Filming the Algerian War of Independence, Mani Sharpe peploys the term “late-colonial” to describe (mostly) Frenc...

Michele Meek, "Consent Culture and Teen Films: Adolescent Sexuality in US Movies" (Indiana UP, 2023)

17 Jul 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Teen films of the 1980s were notorious for treating consent as irrelevant, with scenes of boys spying in girls' locker rooms and tricking girls into s...

Shakespeare's "Henry V" Part 3: The Language

17 Jul 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Part 3 features close-readings of some of the play’s most significant speeches, with Professor Stephen Foley. Through Henry’s private soliloquy, w...

Emily Katz Anhalt, "Embattled: How Ancient Greek Myths Empower Us to Resist Tyranny" (Redwood Press, 2021)

11 Jul 2023

Contributed by Lukas

As tyrannical passions increasingly plague twenty-first-century politics, tales told in ancient Greek epics and tragedies provide a vital antidote. De...

Shakespeare's "Henry V" Part 2: Characters and Questions

10 Jul 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Part 2 opens with a discussion of the history play genre and of how history shapes and constrains the plays’ protagonists. With Professor Stephen Fo...

Katherine Giuffre, "Outrage: The Arts and the Creation of Modernity" (Stanford UP, 2023)

10 Jul 2023

Contributed by Lukas

A cultural revolution in England, France, and the United States beginning during the time of the industrial and political revolutions helped usher in ...

William Perrine, "Alien Territory: Radical, Experimental, & Irrelevant Music in 1970s San Diego" (Billingsgate Media, 2023)

09 Jul 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Alien Territory: Radical, Experimental, & Irrelevant Music in 1970s San Diego (Billingsgate Media, 2023) is the untold story of a sleepy Navy town th...

Mathias F. Clasen, "Why Horror Seduces" (Oxford UP, 2017)

08 Jul 2023

Contributed by Lukas

From vampire apocalypses, shark attacks, witches, and ghosts, to murderous dolls bent on revenge, horror has been part of the American cinematic imagi...

Robin Steedman, "Creative Hustling: Women Making and Distributing Films from Nairobi" (MIT Press, 2023)

06 Jul 2023

Contributed by Lukas

What is the future of the global creative economy? In Creative Hustling: Women Making and Distributing Films from Nairobi (MIT Press, 2023), Robin ...

Suk-Young Kim, "Surviving Squid Game: A Guide to K-Drama, Netflix, and Global Streaming Wars" (Applause Books, 2023)

04 Jul 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In Surviving Squid Game: A Guide to K-Drama, Netflix, and Global Streaming Wars (Applause Books, 2023), scholar Suk-Young Kim reflects on Netflix's ...

Tilly Bridges, "Begin Transmission: The Trans Allegories of The Matrix" (BearManor Media, 2023)

04 Jul 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In Begin Transmission: The Trans Allegories of The Matrix (BearManor Media, 2023), trans woman and screenwriter Tilly Bridges takes you through t...

Shakespeare's "Henry V" Part 1: The Story

03 Jul 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Henry V is one of the most celebrated of Shakespeare’s history plays. In the 1590s, Shakespeare wrote a series of eight plays based on English chron...

Adrian Rifkin, "Future Imperfect: The Past Between My Fingers..." (2021)

02 Jul 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Then let the story really begin in 1968, though it has little to do with May. By chance it opens in January of that year, and it really concerns me ra...

The Marketplace of Attention: How Audiences Take Shape in a Digital Age

01 Jul 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Feature films, television shows, homemade videos, tweets, blogs, and breaking news: digital media offer an always-accessible, apparently inexhaustible...

Marie Arleth Skov, "Punk Art History: Artworks from the European No Future Generation" (Intellect, 2023)

30 Jun 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In her book, Punk Art History: Artworks from the European No Future Generation (Intellect Books, 2023), Marie Arleth Skov examines the punk movement...

TaTa Dada: The Real Life and Celestial Adventures of Tristan Tzara

29 Jun 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Tristan Tzara, one of the most important figures in the twentieth century's most famous avant-garde movements, was born Samuel Rosenstock (or Samueli ...

Shakespeare's "A Midsummer Night's Dream" Part 3: The Language

26 Jun 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In Part 3, Professor Tiffany Stern offers close-readings of some of the play’s most significant speeches. You’ll discover the surprising biblical ...

Michael Gray, "Song & Dance Man: The Art of Bob Dylan-Vol. 1 Language & Tradition" (FM Press, 2023)

22 Jun 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Song & Dance Man is an established classic, available again for Dylan fans and scholars alike on the 50th Anniversary of the original edition. The wo...

Shakespeare's "A Midsummer Night's Dream" Part 2: Context and Questions

19 Jun 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Part 2 addresses the play's central questions about comedy, tragedy, and passion by examining its language and plot motifs. Professor Tiffany Stern wi...

Roy Christopher, "Boogie Down Predictions: Hip-Hop, Time, and Afrofuturism" (MIT Press, 2022)

12 Jun 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Boogie Down Predictions: Hip-Hop, Time, and Afrofuturism (MIT Press, 2022), edited by Roy Christopher, is a moment. It is the deconstructed sample, t...

Shakespeare's "A Midsummer Night's Dream" Part 1: The Story

12 Jun 2023

Contributed by Lukas

A Midsummer Night’s Dream is one of Shakespeare’s most popular romantic comedies. At the same time, it’s a play that explores the darker and mor...

Paul Metsa and Rick Shefchik, "Blood in the Tracks: The Minnesota Musicians Behind Dylan's Masterpiece" (U Minnesota Press, 2023)

11 Jun 2023

Contributed by Lukas

The story of the Minneapolis musicians who were unexpectedly summoned to re-record half of the songs on Bob Dylan's most acclaimed album. When Bob Dyl...

Arturo Rodríguez Morató and Alvaro Santana-Acuña, "Sociology of the Arts in Action: New Perspectives on Creation, Production, and Reception" (Palgrave MacMillan, 2023)

11 Jun 2023

Contributed by Lukas

What are the latest developments in the sociology of the arts? In Sociology of the Arts in Action: New Perspectives on Creation, Production, and Rece...

Rumi, "Gold" (New York Review of Books, 2022)

10 Jun 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In this conversation, we discuss Haleh Liza Gafori's masterful new translations of poetry by Rumi, the 13th-century Persian mystic and poet. Rumi's wo...

Robin James, "The Future of Rock and Roll: 97X WOXY and the Fight for True Independence" (UNC Press, 2023)

07 Jun 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In 1983, an Ohio radio station called WOXY launched a sonic disruption to both corporate rock and to its conservative home region, programming an omni...

Shakespeare's "Julius Caesar" Part 3: The Language

05 Jun 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In Part 3, Professor Michael Dobson offers close-readings of some of the play’s most important speeches, including Brutus’s deliberation over Caes...

Xiaomei Chen, "Performing the Socialist State: Modern Chinese Theater and Film Culture" (Columbia UP, 2023)

05 Jun 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Xiaomei Chen's book Performing the Socialist State: Modern Chinese Theater and Film Culture (Columbia UP, 2023) looks at three "founding fathers" of...

Lance Esplund, "The Art of Looking: How to Read Modern and Contemporary Art" (Basic, 2018)

04 Jun 2023

Contributed by Lukas

What is art, and who gets to define it? Museums have long staked a claim on knowing what to show, but there has always been a wide range of how viewer...

Monika Raesch, "Abbas Kiarostami: Interviews" (UP of Mississippi, 2023)

04 Jun 2023

Contributed by Lukas

The cinephile community knows Abbas Kiarostami (1940–2016) as one of the most important filmmakers of the previous decades. This volume illustrates ...

A Slow Burning Fire: The Rise of the New Art Practice in Yugoslavia

29 May 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Writer and academic Anthony Gardner (NSK from Kapital to Capital, Politically Unbecoming) interviews Marko Ilić about his new book A Slow Burning F...

Shakespeare's "Julius Caesar" Part 2: Characters and Questions

29 May 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Part 2 focuses on the play’s key interpretive questions: how we are invited to judge the central characters. Is Caesar, in Shakespeare’s story, re...

Lisa McCormick, "The Cultural Sociology of Art and Music: New Directions and New Discoveries" (Palgrave MacMillan, 2022)

28 May 2023

Contributed by Lukas

How can sociology help us understand art and music? In The Cultural Sociology of Art and Music: New Directions and New Discoveries (Palgrave MacMill...