Category Archives: Commentary

Opinion or analysis concerning whatever’s on my mind.

Two Takes

Posted on May 29, 2019 by JMN

If there were a muse named Ironia, it strikes me that she would be an inspiration for Rutene Merk and Lynn Hershman Leeson. The two images below have little in common other than depicting females. They both incite interest, however, … Continue reading →

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“Strangeness”

Posted on May 28, 2019 by JMN

Science, art and language collide a lot in the field of theoretical physics, it seems. There are appealing language touches in the work of Nobel laureate Murray Gell-Mann profiled in this article. He “mischievously” named his theory of elementary particles … Continue reading →

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A Lower Power

Posted on May 26, 2019 by JMN

“My inside sources at the Louvre, various sources, tell me that not many curators think [the ‘Salvator Mundi] is an autograph Leonardo da Vinci. “If they did exhibit it … they would want to exhibit it as ‘workshop’. “If that’s … Continue reading →

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Three Tiers!

Posted on May 26, 2019 by JMN

The NYTimes chronicles the romance and nuptials of this couple in its “Vows” section. I never read this section, but a crafty flourish in the subheading of this particular installment trapped me. It illustrates an astute whoring for eyeballs: Brian … Continue reading →

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“Rived”!

Posted on May 22, 2019 by JMN

Rived by years of infighting…. (Editorial Board, “An Electoral Brush Fire in Australia,” NYTimes, 5-20-19) Past participles in this opinion piece flutter the heart of a nerdy grammaticist. I rarely read or use the verb “(to) rive,” which I think … Continue reading →

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Furiouser Than Thou

Posted on May 20, 2019 by JMN

Margaret Renkl writes from Tennessee. Her anguish over what she calls the racist and misogynistic travesty that is endemic and persisting in southern society is palpable in the column cited here. Renkl cites recent instances of atrocities committed by southern … Continue reading →

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“Lay, Lady, Lay.”

Posted on May 19, 2019 by JMN

“Lay across my big brass bed.” The Bob Dylan song encapsulates the entrenched American muddle around “lie” and “lay.” The victory of “lay” is all but complete. It’s obvious the song invites the lady to sexual congress, not to a … Continue reading →

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Quote This?

Posted on May 16, 2019 by JMN

A kind observer from somewhere remarked that I had a fair amount of original content on my blog, and asked if I coped with plagiarism or copyright violation, saying he or she was seeing his or her own content cropping … Continue reading →

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Hard to Live With

Posted on May 15, 2019 by JMN

Claude Monet’s series paintings are among the few true trophies that can generate real excitement at auctions… “They’re so evocative, so romantic and so easy to live with,” Offer Waterman, a London-based dealer, said. “That was the best of the … Continue reading →

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Rust in Peace

Posted on May 12, 2019 by JMN

There’s this sense of wonder you get when looking at abandoned buildings. You try to imagine what these spaces were like when they were filled with busy workers trying to meet production targets. And why did they close? (Brett Patman, … Continue reading →

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