The Bank of England has announced that a visual artist will grace the new £20 bill.
Author Archives: Becca Rothfeld
Becca Rothfeld is assistant literary editor of The New Republic and a contributor to The Los Angeles Review of Books, The New York Daily News’ literary blog, The Baffler, and Slate, among other publications. She and her inconveniently heavy book collection are currently based in Washington, D.C.
Posted inOpinion
Sunday Night’s ‘Game of Thrones’ Episode Doesn’t Endorse Rape
I think that there is ample justification for the disturbing scene in “Unbowed, Unbent, Unbroken.”
Posted inOpinion
Do Academic Articles Need Wide Audiences?
The cultural push towards artifacts with obvious, immediate utility is symptomatic of a culture that fails to place sufficient value on humanistic or artistic pursuits, many of which don’t have tangible or quantifiable benefits.
Posted inIn Brief
A Website Translates Words into Drum Beats
Have you ever wondered what your name, or the words “Anna Karenina,” would sound like as a sequence of beats?
Posted inArt
What Was Art of the 1990s All About?
MONTCLAIR, NEW JERSEY — To devote a show to an era is to delimit the era in question, carving it off from surrounding epochs and ascribing some measure of thematic or aesthetic continuity to it.
Posted inIn Brief
Study Reveals Electrically Stimulating the Brain Can Enhance Creativity
A recent study conducted by scientists at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill reveals that it is possible to enhance creativity by zapping certain regions of the brain with electrical currents.
Posted inIn Brief
Apple Watches Won’t Work on Tattooed Wrists
The new Apple Watch is the pinnacle of technological achievement.
Posted inArt
‘Black Mirror’ Punishes and Rewards Passive Viewing
The show is a patchwork of guilt and fascination: even as it prompts us to renounce the passivity of watching, its success as a television series requires our complicity.
Posted inIn Brief
Before Tinder, There Were Escort Cards
In the 1800s, long before swiping right, there were escort cards: paper cards that men presented to women as an indication of their interest.
Posted inArt
Are Emojis a Language?
Do emoji, which comprise so much of our textual communication, really constitute a language?
Posted inOpinion
What the Cult of Knausgaard Tells Us About Critical Bias
The privilege of writing about oneself — of passing one’s vanity off as profundity — is reserved almost exclusively for male authors.
Posted inOpinion
Six Authors Withdraw from PEN Gala in Protest of ‘Charlie Hebdo’ Honor
Celebrated writers Teju Cole, Rachel Kushner, Taiye Selasi, Peter Carey, Michael Ondaatje, and Francine Prose have withdrawn from this year’s annual PEN American Center gala, citing discomfort with the organization’s plan to honor French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo.