“There is a tacit understanding in our culture that one must read a book in order to talk about it with any precision. In my experience, however, it’s totally possible to carry on an engaging conversation about a book you haven’t read – including, and perhaps especially, with someone else who hasn’t read it either.”
Tag: 12.29.07
iTunes’ Most-Downloaded Music In 2007
None of them is exactly a shocker, but who is Colbie Caillat, and why would anyone buy an album from someone named Colbie?
The World’s great Universities – Live & Online
There has never been a more exciting time for the intellectually curious. The world’s top universities have come late to the world of online education, but they’re arriving at last, creating an all-you-can eat online buffet of information. And mostly, they are giving it away.
How True Is That “Based On A True Story”?
“Because the cinema — with its outsize scale, sensory immersion and heightened realism — tends to colonize our imaginations so completely, biographical and historical dramas are graded on a higher curve than any other genres.”
Study: Germans Cut Down On TV Watching
“For the first time in recent memory, Germans spent less time in front of their TVs than they had the year before. And German kids watched significantly less television, boding ill for the future of the medium.”
Beijing’s Building Boom
With the Beijing Olympics looming, China is putting up huge new buildings at dizzying speed. What will the lasting impact be on the rising capital’s architecture? “China is currently the one nation on earth blessed with the mix of overweening ambition, brute strength and deranged self-confidence that might lead a country to build something quite as crazy as the new headquarters of China Central Television (CCTV).”
Detroit Confident In Slatkin Selection
The big orchestral headlines regarding music directors may have been made in New York and LA this year, but the Detroit Symphony feels that it snared a gem of a leader in Leonard Slatkin. “Slatkin is the whole package. His musicianship won over the musicians while his commitment to education, his willingness to fund-raise and think broadly about an orchestra’s role in urban life, make him, as DSO president Anne Parsons put it Monday, ‘the ultimate partner.’ [And] Slatkin gets the Midwest.”
Canadian Art’s Breakout Year?
It was a good year for Canadian art and artists, relatively speaking. “Sotheby’s only provided further proof that the market value for contemporary Canadian art… had gained some traction in the money-drenched international art markets.” Still, there’s a long way yet to go.
Studios: Writers Have Lost More Than $151m
“Hollywood studios said yesterday that striking writers have now lost more in salary and benefits than they had hoped to gain by walking off the job.” Presumably, the writers’ union feels that larger future realities are at stake in the strike, but for the moment, they aren’t commenting on the studios’ announcement.
How Much Is A Museum Worth?
Several small Southern cities have recently committed to build major new museums, and have hired prominent architects to design them. No one believes that a single museum can suddenly transform Bentonville, Arkansas into Chicago or Boston, but many local boosters believe that the right building could help them mimic the cultural rise of smaller cities like Bilbao, Spain.