Category Archives: Commentary

Opinion or analysis concerning whatever’s on my mind.

Pub Apocalypse?

Posted on January 4, 2021 by JMN

A good pub feels a bit like a living room: a familiar, informal space where you can have a pint with friends and strangers… Enjoying a drink in a room that has been used for the same purpose for hundreds … Continue reading →

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‘The Flag Is Also Waving You’

Posted on January 3, 2021 by JMN

Someone who studies flags is a “vexillologist.” There’s a North American Vexillological Association for persons devoted to this study. In the 18th and 19th centuries, a flag was not so much a symbol as a practical way to tell from … Continue reading →

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Alice Trumbull Mason: ‘Adamantine’

Posted on January 2, 2021 by JMN

In the matter of electing to be born of illustrious forebears Alice Trumbull Mason, of Litchfield, Connecticut, chose well. Her rumbling name preserves affiliation with a “well-off family of old New England stock.” (All stock isn’t equal even where egalitarian … Continue reading →

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Cardin Made His Bed and Lay in It

Posted on January 1, 2021 by JMN

“I wash with my own soap… I wear my own perfume, go to bed with my own sheets, have my own food products. I live on me.” The proudest garment in my closet was once a blazer with the Pierre … Continue reading →

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‘A Different Philosophy’

Posted on December 31, 2020 by JMN

“What everybody is talking about right now is, what happened to pneumonia?” he said. “What happened to a lot of deals, a lot of common flu deaths, why is everything being reported Covid now?… We’ve heard that hospitals are getting … Continue reading →

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‘I Belong to Brazil’

Posted on December 30, 2020 by JMN

The 1940s debut novel of Brazilian writer Clarice Lispector (1920 – 1977), “Perto do Coração Selvagem” (“Near to the Wild Heart”), is described as the “reflections of a young female protagonist determined to live freely in a world ordered by … Continue reading →

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Alternatives to Fact

Posted on December 28, 2020 by JMN

“I think that perception and comprehensible information based in truthful reality is what has been burned to the ground,” he says. “Answers are lit on fire like burning leaves in the wind. Nobody really has any facts.” Never at a … Continue reading →

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Salman Toor

Posted on December 27, 2020 by JMN

Ligaya Mishan’s early-December essay on cancel culture is well worth reading (“The Long and Tortured History of Cancel Culture,” NYTimes, 12-3-20). Initially, however, I was distracted from the essay itself by the paintings of Salman Toor which figure among the … Continue reading →

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Missionary Phallacy

Posted on December 26, 2020 by JMN

Shere Hite (1942-2020) published “The Hite Report” in 1976. It gathered candid feedback from women suggesting canonical sexual congress was not the be-all and end-all prescribed by male-centric orthodoxy. Two more best-selling studies followed in 1981 and 1987. Hite’s work … Continue reading →

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Language and Music

Posted on December 25, 2020 by JMN

“It takes a lifetime to learn shakuhachi. The earlier you start, the longer it takes.”(Japanese saying quoted by Zac Zinger on Adam Neely’s podcast. The shakuhachi is a bamboo flute.) I learned Spanish because I had to. From puberty forward … Continue reading →

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