The Other Damnificados: “Evicted: Poverty and Profit in the American City” – by Matthew Desmond

One hundred years from now, historians will want to describe African American life in the 21st century. They may well use Matthew Desmond’s formulation: “Poor black men were locked up. Poor black women were locked out.” Desmond is a Harvard sociologist and recent winner of a MacArthur “genius” grant. His graduate studies consisted of living…

Shakespeare 400 years on

Shakespeare lives. That’s his genius. According to David Crystal, Shakespeare gave us about 700 new words that have remained part of the language, and numerous idioms and turns of phrase: a foregone conclusion, a sorry sight, fight fire with fire, be in a pickle, lie low, more fool you, send him packing, vanish into thin…

L.A. Times Festival of Books – brilliant and illuminating

The L.A. Times Festival of Books on April 9-10 was outstanding. A huge thank you to the organizers for inviting me and for the superb organization. The awards ceremony was a highlight. Although it went on nearly as long as the Oscars, it was great to see Juan Felipe Herrera, the first Chicano Poet Laureate…

From #BlackLivesMatter to Black Liberation – by Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor

“Mike Brown was … walking down the street. Eric Garner was standing on the corner. Rekia Boyd was in a park with friends. Trayvon Martin was walking with a bag of Skittles and a can of iced tea. Sean Bell was leaving a bachelor party, anticipating his marriage the following day. Amadou Diallo was getting…

Sci-fi – a new frontier (for me, anyway)

I recently read two sci-fi novels. This is not a sentence I’ve ever used before. In my entire life I’ve probably read about five. In both recent cases I was reading friends’ work, one in order to write an endorsement and the other to make editorial comments.                …