Pierre Boulez Curates Art Exhibition At Louvre

“[T]he art show titled ‘Work:Fragment’ gathers 70 works by artists such as Ingres, Cézanne, Degas, Delacroix, Kandinsky, Klee, Giacometti and Picasso alongside scores from Wagner, Bartók and Varèse and works by writers from the 19th and 20th centuries.” The program, the first at the Louvre ever to be curated by a musician, also includes 11 live and six filmed concerts.

Researchers: Novelists Best Academics In Explaining World

“Fiction – including poetry – should be taken just as seriously as facts-based research, according to the team from Manchester University and the London School of Economics (LSE). Novels should be required reading because fiction ‘does not compromise on complexity, politics or readability in the way that academic literature sometimes does,’ said Dr Dennis Rodgers from Manchester University’s Brooks World Poverty Institute.”

Critic Extraordinaire John Leonard, 69

The writer whom Kurt Vonnegut called “the smartest man who ever lived” died Wednesday night of lung cancer. He began his career monitoring the left-wing press for National Review; he gave Pauline Kael her start at Pacifica Radio; from 1971-75 he served as editor of The New York Times Book Review, where he was an early champion of Toni Morrison, Maxine Hong Kingston and Gabriel García Marquez; he wrote about books for The New Republic, The Nation, The Atlantic Monthly and Salon.com, among “countless other publications”; he was even a television critic for CBS and New York magazine.

Fort Worth Opera to Premiere Before Night Falls

“The Fort Worth Opera has announced it will stage the world premiere of Before Night Falls, a new opera by Cuban American composer Jorge Martin, as the centerpiece of its 2010 Opera Festival. Before Night Falls is based on the autobiography of Cuban dissident poet Reinaldo Arenas, whose memoir by the same name was made into a 2000 film starring Javier Bardem.”