The New York Review of Books (September 21, 2023) – The Fall Books issue features Michael Gorra on Zadie Smith, Anahid Nersessian on Joyce Mansour’s Surrealist poetry, Osita Nwanevu on the Democrats, Colin Grant on Margo Jefferson, Fintan O’Toole on fascists in the family tree, Karan Mahajan on Williamsburg rock, Ben Tarnoff on the depredations of Silicon Valley, and more…

Playing with the Past

The Fraud, Zadie Smith’s first historical novel, asks if we might all be frauds of some sort, wearing masks and performing as people who are not quite ourselves.

By Michael Gorra

The Fraud by Zadie Smith; Penguin Press, 454 pp

Vibrant, Cacophonous Buddhism

A groundbreaking show at the Metropolitan Museum displays, among other treasures from India, works of Buddhist art that bear the mark of ancient animist cults that long preceded the teachings of Siddhartha Gautama.

By William Dalrymple

Tree and Serpent: Early Buddhist Art in India, 200 BCE–400 CE, an exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City, July 21–November 13, 2023; and the National Museum of Korea, Seoul, December 22, 2023–April 14, 2024

Catalog of the exhibition by John Guy; Metropolitan Museum of Art, 343 pp.

In 2003 Indian archaeologists working on a remote hilltop in the southern state of Telangana uncovered a remarkable early Buddhist monastic complex. Phanigiri, “the snake-hooded hill,” had clearly been one of the most important Buddhist monasteries in India. All around were found spectacular fragments of sculpture, including substantial sections of elaborately carved ceremonial gateways and a torso now judged to be one of the masterworks of Buddhist art. Many of the statues had been dismantled and carefully buried in soft earth for their protection after the monastery was abandoned in the fifth century CE, and they were found in almost mint condition.

The Metropolitan Museum of Art (August 3, 2023) – A virtual tour of Tree & Serpent: Early Buddhist Art in India, 200 BCE–400 CE. Featuring more than 140 objects dating from 200 BCE to 400 CE, the exhibition presents a series of evocative and interlocking themes to reveal both the pre-Buddhist origins of figurative sculpture in India and the early narrative traditions that were central to this formative moment in early Indian art.

Tree & Serpent: Early Buddhist Art in India, 200 BCE–400 CE

July 21st–November 13th, 2023

With major loans from a dozen lenders across India, as well as from the United Kingdom, Europe, and the United States, it transports visitors into the world of early Buddhist imagery that gave expression to this new religion as it grew from a core set of ethical teachings into one of the world’s great religions. Objects associated with Indo-Roman exchange reveal India’s place in early global trade.

The exhibition showcases objects in various media, including limestone sculptures, gold, silver, bronze, rock crystal, and ivory. Highlights include spectacular sculptures from southern India—newly discovered and never before publicly exhibited masterpieces—that add to the world canon of early Buddhist art. On view: July 21st–November 13th, 2023