Can anybody explain this? Barbara and I have been members of WGBH for decades now. For the past 36 years GBH has sent their monthly magazine to the correct address: (As you see, I have redacted the street name to… Read More ›
Movies & (occasionally) TV
Who are the Sami?
Hands up if you know who the Sami are without looking it up! Hmm… only three of you. I could have asked whether you can figure out where the stunning movie Sami Blood was filmed, relying on the title alone. Again,… Read More ›
Barton Fink
The Coen brothers, I decided, deserved one more try. They do have a stellar reputation, after all. After disliking Fargo, Raising Arizona, and Blood Simple, I had almost given up on the Coens, but reviews convinced me to check out… Read More ›
The Princess Bride revisited
“Never get involved in a land war in Asia.” That’s the line I’ve remembered for more than three decades. Yes, it has been that long since The Princess Bride was first released! How well has this movie held up? Amazingly well, I… Read More ›
“Why haven’t I ever been to Petra?”
That’s what I kept asking myself as I was watching the PBS Nova episode Petra, Lost City of Stone, which I somehow missed when it first aired six years ago. This amazing archaeological site in Jordan competes in quality with… Read More ›
Science fiction? Greek mythology? Philosophy? All in Jo Walton’s The Philosopher Kings
Three months ago I reviewed Jo Walton’s The Just City. Recently I finished reading the sequel, The Philosopher Kings, which is equally fascinating and equally worth reading. “We don’t know when we are,” as one character remarks. When, not where. The gods live “outside… Read More ›
Darmok and Jalad at Tanagra… and Gavagai… and intertextuality!
Hmmm… how can you communicate with someone when the two of you have no language in common? In linguistics this has been a major conundrum, especially in earlier centuries when there was no worldwide communication; in science fiction it has… Read More ›
The Answer is… “Who is Alex Trebek?”
No, the title of this post is not the title of a book, despite the italics. More specifically, it’s not the title of a book: it’s a portmanteau of the titles of two books: The Answer is… (by Alex Trebek) Who is… Read More ›
Buffy and Star Trek — and the Jews
Until recently I hadn’t thought about any connections between Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Star Trek, nor about any connections between Star Trek and the Jews. So what happened recently to update that pluperfect verb “hadn’t realized”? Well, as I’ve mentioned before, one of my… Read More ›
The Existential Joss Whedon: Evil And Human Freedom in Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Angel, Firefly And Serenity
Don’t go away! OK, a reasonable response to this book title might be “How geeky can you get‽” I mean, the pop-culture-plus-intellectual combo inherent in The Existential Joss Whedon: Evil And Human Freedom in Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Angel, Firefly… Read More ›
