Baby boomers have safeguarded and perpetuated a grand myth through which they interpret past and present events, and derive motivations. Myth is one hell of a drug.
Baby boomer conservatism arose during the salad days of American capitalism, the apex of American military might, and the drama of the Cold War. That’s all gone and the young right stands at a crossroads.
‘I don’t think character exists anymore’, Rachel Cusk declared in a 2018 interview. This was not the first time Cusk appeared to be announcing the atrophy of the traditional novel. In a 2014 interview with The Guardian, Cusk stated she was ‘certain autobiography’ was ‘increasingly the only form in all the arts’. Inversely, fiction and its conventional preoccupation with ‘making up John and Jane’, Cusk argued, was only becoming more ‘ridiculous’, ‘fake and embarrassing’. It is precisely this disregard for literary orthodoxy that runs through Cusk’s widely acclaimed trilogy of autofictional novels – Outline (2014), Transit (2016) and Kudos (2018).
My twin brother calls from the hospital. He’s finished his blood draw and wants to know the word in Portuguese for watermelon. I recite the word for him – melancia – though my brother’s mind isn’t likely to keep hold of it. Zach can no longer keep a hold of his house keys or his phone, which he left yesterday in the bathroom sink. Before we hang up, I ask him to please wait for me in the lounge area for outpatient services, not to wander outside the hospital.
Jacqueline Feldman’s Precarious Lease: The Paris Document – out from Fitzcarraldo Editions on 30 January – delivers captivating literary reportage on Parisian squats of the early 2010s. Feldman introduces us to people who transformed abandoned buildings into homes, shelters and hubs for artistic creation. With echoes of Agnès Varda’s work, Feldman’s prose is compassionate and honest, acknowledging her own role as an observer. She answered these questions by email about her fifteen-years-long project, begun in 2009.
THE NEW YORK TIMES MAGAZINE (February 1, 2025): The 2.2.25 Issue features Charles Homans on Trump supporters’ wishes for his return to power; James Forman Jr. on the emptying on America’s youth prisons; C.J. Chivers on invasive crabs in New England; and more.
News of a cheaper AI model exposes vulnerabilities for Nvidia, Amazon.com, Alphabet, and other hot-shot companies. Here’s why Wall Street’s concerns might be overblown.
What made the wildfires devastating was their path through the Palisades, where home values hover around $3.4 million and aging structures were tightly packed in a recognized high-risk fire zone.
Boomers Daily 