Four years ago, Kate Millett published Sexual Politics, an analysis of the “sexism” of American culture and its literary figures. Despite the bitter denunciations which the book soon met, its central achievement is still clear. Millett was the first person to take on the he-man attitudes expressed by writers like Norman Mailer and to connect […]
James Fallows
James Fallows, who began his career at the Washington Monthly, is the author of 12 books and writes the “Breaking the News” blog on Substack.
Posted inMagazine
Mary McCarthy—The Blinders She Wears
Last March the New York Review of Books published two articles about the Americans who had been held as prisoners of war in North Vietnam and who are now telling their stories in print. One of the articles was by Anthony Lewis, and it reached a conclusion not easily swallowed by those who regarded our […]
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Doing a Little for Others and a Lot for Ourselves
A Tale of Two Projects: • The Southern headquarters of the American Friends Service Committee is a small suite of rooms in one of Atlanta’s more notorious office buildings, an ugly old brown monster that Lester Maddox once denounced as a nest of Commies because it housed (and still does) such groups as the American […]
Posted inMagazine, March 1974
Will Editors Ever Love Flaubert?
He could help them better understand the complexity and motivation of human beings in political situations.
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A Primer on the Economy: How We Can Survive the Seventies
A chaos reigns over the economic scene, a chaos we all have been forced to notice. The monetary “crises” of years past we could leave to the speculators in Zurich; but now the intricacies of financial life are making themselves known in unexpected quarters. The economy has become the modern equivalent of a mystical force, […]
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Chapter Two of Moral Myopia: The Watergate Committee and its Staff
During the televised Watergate hearings senators kept reminding witnesses that they were all part of a “great civics lesson,” that the revelations and expiations were necessary steps in a painful process of education that could prevent the country from making the same mistakes again. After six months of presenting their celebrated hearings, members of the […]
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Death on the Road: Going Beyond Nader and the Reader’s Digest
“Daddy had to go up to see Grandfather Follet,” their mother explained. “He says to kiss both of you for him and he’ll probably see you before you’re asleep tonight.”“When?” Rufus asked.“Way, early this morning, before it was light.”“Why?”“Grampa Follet is very sick. Uncle Ralph phoned up very late last night. . . . He […]
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The Great Stagflation Machine
In its treatment of economists is this nation’s true compassion revealed. Five centuries ago physicians were put to death when pestilence persisted. Today we coddle our economists, call them forth in swollen ranks to confront our economic plagues. Only strangers to the laws of supply and demand can be surprised to learn that the experts […]
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“Making It” Revisited: Nader, Podhoretz, and Morris
Last May The Washington Post sponsored a luncheon at which the authors of four recently published books discussed their works. One of the four was Willie Morris, whose first novel, The Last of the Southern Girls, had just come out. Even those who admire Morris, as I do, must acknowledge that the book is no […]
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Putting the Wisdom Back into Intelligence
In recent years the “police brutality” style of thinking has become an increasingly prominent feature of liberal opinion in America. Several years back, when urban crime became big news, liberal politicians and intellectuals often found that their only palatable response was to point out that the police were doing wrong, and denounce them for it. […]
