An Introduction to an Idea — Is Religion another aspect of human creativity — albeit on the collective level? This writer thinks so. The same collective mind that fashioned language, music, poetry, painting — all the major art forms in fact — fashioned religion which shares — and exceeds — their capacity for emotional, sensual, and…

The photographs of Jean-Charles Blanc — From Brassai to Jane Evelyn Atwood and now Jean Charles Blanc, the prostitutes of Paris have fascinated photographers. Frequently associated with specific neighborhoods, such as Porte St Denis, prostitution thrives in Paris as it does in every major city. These women with their raw and rough lives, their embattled bodies…

I was barely 16 when I started. Keen to earn my own money, I was thrilled when Miss Mary McGowan, head filing clerk of Eastman Dillon, hired me to be one of her bevy of girls — all Irish Catholics — except for me, the supposed Italian. Well, I didn’t…

In the Shadow of the Klan — Eileen Manion We’ve been here before. Hatred and fear of immigrants. Hyper-patriotism. Nativism. Christian evangelism. White supremacy. Book banning. Struggles to control school curricula. Hostility to science and intellectuals. Tolerance of bigotry and violent rhetoric. Linda Gordon in her book, The Second Coming of the Ku Klux Klan, warns us…

The Ties that Bind — Daughters often adore their fathers. And frequently, when they are small, fathers are the indulgent ones. But in the end fathers represent patriarchal authority and wish to uphold that patriarchy. They may spoil girls when they are little, but when the time comes, they want their daughters to gracefully take…

I am at Bachkovo, the 11th century Bulgarian monastery on the outskirts of Plovdiv. A friend has taken me there, someone I met by chance as I meet most people when I travel. Struck by the drama: the pools of light, the gestures, the icons, the incense, the bearded priest…

Eileen Manion and Barbara Confino talk about the state of justice in America — Eileen: Was Martin Luther King right when he said the arc is tending toward justice? He was correct in saying it’s long. Longer than my lifetime, for sure. Reading Just Mercy, I’m happy that there are people like Bryan Stevenson in the United States. But I fear that he and people…

A Neighborhood WalkAbout — with thanks to Justin Brannan and Bay Ridge Cares Like a fallen woman in an old time movie, Bay Ridge has a Past. In fact, it has several, each one superimposed over the last. Norwegians followed by Greeks, then Italians, now Arabs, each group passing through leaves tangible traces, their…

A short meditation on Pieter de Hooch’s The Card Players — Of all painting styles that of the Dutch Golden Age can legitimately be said to luxuriate in the celebration of ‘stuff’. More detailed, loving descriptions of worldly goods can hardly be found anywhere. And yet…parallel with this earthbound, tactile embrace of things lies the Dream of Reason, as it is…