Making Shakespeare Sing
Giuseppe Verdi’s last two operas, the Shakespearean diptych of Otello and Falstaff, together constitute my favorite case study in what happens when a play is made...
The Gun Violence Epidemic Plaguing Arab-Israeli Society
The problem of gun violence in Israel’s Arab communities has become a national emergency. Even before the recent general election, a poll conducted among Arab Israelis...
The Framers’ Answers to Three Myths About Impeachment
Congress is not a “co-equal” branch of government with the presidency. It is by far the superior branch. James Madison made that clear for all time...
The Lebanese Street Asks: ‘Which Is Stronger, Sect or Hunger?’
“Sectarian leaders have been keeping voters captive,” Karim Emile Bitar, a political scientist and professor at Lebanon’s renowned Saint Joseph University, told me, when we met...
No Second Thoughts
To the Editors: I am very grateful to Nick Laird for his generous review of my anthology, The Penguin Book of the Prose Poem. There is,...
Who Are Turkey’s Proxy Fighters in Syria?
When US President Donald Trump announced the withdrawal from Syria of the US forces that had been working with the Kurdish-led SDF, Turkey sought to capitalize...
How China’s Rise Has Forced Hong Kong’s Decline
Journalists expecting to cover Tiananmen II flew in for the most promising global story of the year, its allure bolstered by the protesters’ ability to speak...
What the ‘Danish Lawrence’ Learned in Libya
Holmboe has long weighed on my mind in my own travels across Libya over the past decade, at times even retracing his journey. It was only...
A Year in Reading: Ed Simon
My reading year was interrupted by the caesura of an interstate move, as we traded in lobster rolls for Maryland blue crabs, Legal Seafood for Ben’s...
A Year in Reading: Zoë Ruiz
I spent most of the year living in a small town in Oregon where I read a lot of student work and finished my MFA thesis....
