Category Archives: Reviews

Arts/Books: Times Literary Supplement – April 26, 2024

Times Literary Supplement (April 24, 2024): The latest issue features ‘The Mormon Conquest’ – Seth Perry on a people of the book; Is ‘green growth’ a mirage; Virginia Woolf’s rural retreat; China’s Shakespeare…

Politics: Foreign Affairs Magazine – May/June 2024

May/June 2024

Foreign Affairs (April 23, 2024): The latest issue features Can China Remake the World?; Russia’s Divergent Futures; Iran’s Winning Strategy…

China’s Alternative Order

And What America Should Learn From It

By Elizabeth Economy

By now, Chinese President Xi Jinping’s ambition to remake the world is undeniable. He wants to dissolve Washington’s network of alliances and purge what he dismisses as “Western” values from international bodies. He wants to knock the U.S. dollar off its pedestal and eliminate Washington’s chokehold over critical technology. In his new multipolar order, global institutions and norms will be underpinned by Chinese notions of common security and economic development, Chinese values of state-determined political rights, and Chinese technology. China will no longer have to fight for leadership. Its centrality will be guaranteed.

No Substitute for Victory

America’s Competition With China Must Be Won, Not Managed

By Matt Pottinger and Mike Gallagher

Special Report: “India’s Economy” – April 27, 2024

Special reports: The India express

The Economist SPECIAL REPORTS (April 22, 2024): The latest issue features The India express – With the right changes, it can continue as an engine of global growth, say Arjun Ramani and Thomas Easton….

For its next phase of growth, India needs a new reform agenda

An illustration showing a modern train pulling old carriages.

With the right changes, it can continue as an engine of global growth, say Arjun Ramani and Thomas Easton

The consecration of the Ram temple in Ayodhya, a city in Uttar Pradesh, in January was a matter of supreme importance to Narendra Modi, India’s prime minister; attendance was thus de rigueur for those seeking his approval. The attendant courtiers included not just politicians, officials and foreign dignitaries but also India’s biggest corporate bosses. Uttar Pradesh is not their normal stamping ground, and Ayodhya has not until recently been much of a destination for tycoons. Now it has 115 hotels under construction, and some of those January visitors may soon be finding reasons to return.

India’s financial system has improved dramatically in the past decade

India’s difficult business environment is improving

India’s leaders must deal with three economic weaknesses

Going green could bring huge benefits for India’s economy

Cover: The New Statesman Magazine – April 21, 2024

The New Statesman – April 21, 2024:

Israel and Iran’s deadly game

Israel and Iran’s deadly game

They bet that direct attacks would not lead to a disastrous escalation. The Middle East is now on the…By Jeremy Bowen

Why Iran’s attack on Israel failed

Why Iran’s attack on Israel failed

The drone and missile strike conveyed as much weakness as it did strength.By Lawrence Freedman

The Cass review into children’s gender care should shame us all

The Cass review into children’s gender care should shame us all

Why was the prescription of puberty blockers to distressed children allowed to continue for so long?By Hannah Barnes

The New York Times Book Review – April 21, 2024

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THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW (April 20, 2024): The latest issue features….

Coddling Plus Devices? Unequivocal Disaster for Our Kids.

In “The Anxious Generation,” Jonathan Haidt says we’re failing children — and takes a firm stand against tech.

In this photo-illustration, a child sits on a seesaw set in a field of emerald green grass. On the other side of the seesaw is a giant smartphone.

By Tracy Dennis-Tiwary

THE ANXIOUS GENERATION: How the Great Rewiring of Childhood Is Causing an Epidemic of Mental Illness, by Jonathan Haidt

Quick! Someone Get This Book a Doctor.

Inside the book conservation lab at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

By Molly Young

Not every workplace features a guillotine. At a book conservation lab tucked beneath the first floor of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the office guillotine might as well be a water cooler or a file cabinet for all that it fazes the staff. “We have a lot of violent equipment,” said Mindell Dubansky, who heads the Sherman Fairchild Center for Book Conservation.

How the Rich and Poor Once Saw War

In “Muse of Fire,” Michael Korda depicts the lives and passions of the soldier poets whose verse provided a view into the carnage of World War I.

Finance Preview: Barron’s Magazine – April 22, 2024

Magazine - Latest Issue - Barron's

BARRON’S MAGAZINE – APRIL 22, 2024 ISSUE:

Nvidia Won AI’s First Round. Now the Competition Is Heating Up.

Nvidia Won AI’s First Round. Now the Competition Is Heating Up.

Nvidia’s AI dominance won’t last forever. Big Tech and the rest of Silicon Valley are racing to catch up.

CEO Compensation Rose to Another Record in 2023

CEO Compensation Rose to Another Record in 2023

The 11.4% median increase for 100 top CEOs was well ahead of the 4.3% gain for the average worker.

This Retirement Tax Move Is ‘On Sale’ Now. How to Play It.

This Retirement Tax Move Is 'On Sale' Now. How to Play It.

Switching to a Roth IRA from a traditional IRA could save you money in retirement. Here’s what to know.

Buy U.S. Steel Stock. It Won’t Be Stuck in Deal Limbo Forever.

Buy U.S. Steel Stock. It Won’t Be Stuck in Deal Limbo Forever.

Its merger with Japan’s Nippon is in doubt, but shares still look attractive.

Bonds Are a Minefield. Where to Find 5% to 8% Yields Now.

Bonds Are a Minefield. Where to Find 5% to 8% Yields Now.

After a tough start to the year, bonds should start to perk up. Where to invest for income now.

The New York Times Magazine – April 21, 2024

THE NEW YORK TIMES MAGAZINE (April 19, 2024):The Modern Love issue features…

Online Dating After 50 Can Be Miserable. But It’s Also Liberating.

You know so much more about yourself and your desires when you’re older that dating apps — even with all their frustrations — can bring unanticipated pleasure.

Can a Sexless Marriage Be a Happy One?

A photograph of a miniature model with two beds separated by a door.

Experts and couples are challenging the conventional wisdom that sex is essential to relationships.

The Poems That Taught Me How to Love

Lessons from Pablo Neruda’s mind-bending verse.

By NICHOLAS CASEY

Reviews: ‘The Week In Art’

The Week In Art Podcast (April 19, 2024): We are back in Venice for the latest edition of the biggest biennial in the world of art. The 60th Venice Biennale comprises an international exhibition featuring more than 300 artists, dozens of national pavilions in the Giardini—the gardens at the eastern end of the city—and the Arsenale—the historic shipyards of the Venetian Republic—and host of official collateral exhibitions and other shows and interventions across Venice.

The Art Newspaper’s contemporary art correspondent, Louisa Buck, editor-at-large Jane Morris and host Ben Luke review the international exhibition, Foreigners Everywhere/Stranieri Ovunque, curated by the Brazilian artistic director, Adriano Pedrosa. We talk to artists and curators behind five national pavilions—Jeffrey Gibson in the US pavilion, John Akomfrah in the British pavilion, Romuald Hazoumè in the Benin pavilion, Gustavo Caboco Wapichana, the curator of the Hãhãwpuá or Brazilian pavilion, and Valeria Montii Colque in the Chilean pavilion—about their presentations.

And we like to end our Venice specials by responding to an example of the historic work that made la Serenissima one of the world’s great centres for art. So for this episode’s Work of the Week, Ben Luke gained exclusive access to one of the most significant paintings in Venetian history: the Assunta or Assumption of the Virgin made between 1516 and 1518 by Titian. Since the last Biennale in 2022, the Assunta has been unveiled after a four-year conservation project, funded by the charity Save Venice. We spoke to the man who restored this incomparable masterpiece, Giulio Bono, right beneath Titian’s painting.

Arts & Literature: Kenyon Review – Spring 2024

Richie Hofmann (@RichieHof) / X

Kenyon Review – April 19, 2024: The 2024 Spring issue features Beth Bachmann’s 2023 Short Fiction Contest-winning story, chosen by judge Danielle Evans; fiction by Nick Almeida and Lauren Cassani Davis; poetry by Fatima Jafar and Marcus Wicker; and a folio of Literary Curiosities, which features work by Jennifer ChangJ. D. DebrisSummer FarahEliza GilbertChristine ImperialPhoebe Peter OathoutTega OghenechovwenMaya C. Popa, and more. The cover art is a detail of Chitra Ganesh’s City Inside Her, from the artist’s Architects of the Future portfolio.

Research Preview: Science Magazine – April 19, 2024

Current Issue Cover

Science Magazine – April 18, 2024: The new issue features ‘Designed To Bind’ – Deep learning for protein and ligand modeling…

Brightest gamma ray burst ever emerged from collapsing star

NASA’s JWST telescope traces burst to a supernova but finds a puzzling lack of heavy elements

Native lizards taught to avoid toxic toads by released toadlets

Exposing monitor lizards to thousands of young cane toads helped them survive once the adult toads invaded

Hiring ban disrupts research at Florida universities

Suit seeks to overturn state law targeting graduate and postdocs from China and other “countries of concern”

Giant planets ran amok soon after Solar System’s birth

Meteorites suggest tumult occurred around the time of the Moon’s formation