Tuesday, January 4, 2011

A math professor prefers lager to hoppy suds.

A Beer Manifesto

by Rick Ball, as told to his daughter, Molly Ball, January 2011
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Nathan Englander begins his conversation with Zadie Smith by recalling the two novelists’ first encounter, at the Capri Festival “ten thousand years ago,” and the visible reverence Smith showed for David Foster Wallace, who, along with Jonathan Franzen and Jeffrey Eugenides, was also in attendance. In the conversation that follows, the two discuss the heralded Infinite Jest author (as well as Saul Bellow, George Eliot, and James Baldwin) and topics ranging from seeing yourself as other to morality in writing. The conversation took place at the School of Visual Arts’ intimate Silas Theatre in Manhattan. Hosted by Matawi, proceeds from the event went to benefiting the organization’s Dadaab Young Women’s Scholarship Initiative, which increases access to educational opportunity for refugee women and girls on the Kenyan/Somalian border. (Runs about 45 minutes, with audience questions beginning at 30.)

2 year anniversary show!



feat. Nelly Reifler, A.M. Homes, Michael Cunningham w/ musical guests Sam Amidon & Doveman
7:00 pm; $15
New York's "most vital authors' series" (Time Out NY) celebrates it's second anniversary!
click here for tickets


Here's what Malcolm Gladwell had to say about Lauren Redniss' book Radioactive: Marie & Pierre Curie, A Tale of Love and Fallout: "Radioactive is quite unlike any book I have ever read—part history, part love story, part art work and all parts sheer imaginative genius." There's an accompanying exhibition at the NYPL opening January 14th.
J Henry Fairs' extraordinary, consumptively beautiful, sickening photos of our ailing planet are gathered in a new book The Day After Tomorrow: Images of Our Earth in Crisis, released later this month. An exhibition of the photos, Landscapes of Extraction: The Collateral Damage of the Fossil Fuels Industries, will be at Cooper Union's Arthur A. Houghton Jr. Gallery starting January 20th.

For any number of understandable reasons, you may not be interested in reading a book about the history of cancer. But there's a reason Siddhartha Mukherjee's book The Emperor of All Maladies has earned virutally universal acclaim: somehow, it's endless fascinating and a great read.
Architecture critic and author Witold Rybczynski looks at the history—and future—of cities in his new book, Makeshift Metropolis, which he'll discuss at the Tenement Museum on January 13th, 6:30pm.
Get your head around the idea of parallel universes and then, please, come explain it to us. Or better yet, we'll consult theoretical physicist Brian Greene, whose new book The Hidden Reality: Parallel Universes and the Deep Laws of the Cosmos, is out on January 25th. Mr. Greene discusses the mindblowing theory at the Museum of Natural History on February 7th, 7:30pm, $15.

Daily Dose Pick: James Hamilton

2:00 pm Monday Jan 3, 2011 by Shana Nys Dambrot
Collecting four decades of work, James Hamilton’s You Should Have Heard Just What I Seencombines the dedication of a photojournalist with the passion of a true music fan and the eye of a fine-art photographer.
The new book, edited by longtime friend and frequent subject Thurston Moore, chronicles Hamilton’s 40 years immersed in the downtown NYC music and art scene. Lovingly culled from the artist’s vast private archive, the volume also features never-before published candid photographs of icons from Joni Mitchell to the Ramones.
Visit James Hamilton’s official website, read an excerpt of Thurston Moore’s essay via Vanity Fair, watch a video from Hamilton’s recent gallery opening in Tribeca, and buy a copy of the book.