A roundup of the most read stories from the Pittsburgh Review of Books’ first four months.
10. “A New Magazine of Pittsburgh” by Ed Simon
“More than in the subject matter we publish, or literally where we’re headquartered, the “Pittsburgh” in The Pittsburgh Review of Books is a matter of mentality, of perspective.”
9. “The EPA’s Docudrama Series is Beautiful and Still Urgent” by Gideon Leek
“That’s a key story at the heart of Documerica, a country of people made rich at the expense of the environment, but seeing the richness spoiled by a world they’ve destroyed.”
8. “Things Have Changed” by Ron Rosenbaum
“I was the one who, in that epic interview, got Bob to describe the sound he’d been seeking, which he memorably described to me as ‘That thin, that wild mercury sound.'”
A neurasthenic summer leads to an encounter with German painter Gotthard Graubner’s ethereal pillow paintings, sparking an unlikely meditation on medieval mysticism, Romantic poetry, and the revelatory power of abstraction.
6. “Now is the Time of Monsters” by Lori Jakiela
Writing With Humor and Empathy in a Depraved New World
5. “Being a Politician” by Bruce Schneier and Nathan E. Sanders
“Modern politicians are already collective and cyborg-ish. A politician today is really a complex socio-technical system with a single person as the public face.”
4. “Talking about the Constitution with Jill Lepore” by Ed Simon
“The framers never intended for the Constitution to be preserved, like a butterfly, under glass.”
3. “Totality Without Signification” by Ignacio M. Sánchez Prado
Ignacio M. Sánchez Prado on how Michael Lentz’s novel transforms language and image into a totality that resists interpretation.
2. “What Mamdani Learned from His Mother’s Films” by Amardeep Singh
How the ethics of the acclaimed filmmaker Mira Nair echo in her son’s politics.
1. “Hope External: Phil Christman’s Prophetic Ambivalence” by Todd Shy
Todd Shy examines the tension between Phil Christman’s wise embrace of ambiguity in his earlier work and his prophetic certainty about capitalism in his new case for Christian socialism.
