Inland Empire
Timeless stories from our 175-year archive handpicked to add context to the news of the day.
Ceasefire, Soon?
[ J A N U A R Y • 2 0 2 4 ]
“The mothers uttered sighs of relief and sent up quick prayers that the war might end soon or that a ceasefire would be reached.”
Read “We Were the News Today” by Maram Humaid
[ D E C E M B E R • 1 9 9 2 ]
“I think I needed the chance metaphorically to bury the dead, and, what with the large number of funerary associations for me, what had been Palestine was indeed a mournful place. But I can feel and sometimes actually see a different future as I couldn’t before.”
Read “Palestine, Then and Now” by Edward Said
[ F E B R U A R Y • 2 0 2 4 ]
“Disquiet derives, correspondingly, from the ways that Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government has recently attacked the judiciary (as well as the academy, the entrepreneurial economy, and the press)—ways calculated, in part, to satisfy his Religious Zionist allies, such as his finance minister Bezalel Smotrich, the minister of national security Itamar Ben-Gvir, and ultra-Orthodox leaders associated with their theocratic vision.”
Read “Israel’s War Within” by Bernard Avishai
Shoving Them Into the Cabinet
[ W E B - O N L Y • J A N U A R Y • 2 0 1 7 ]
A numerical investigation of Donald Trump’s appointees.
Read “Cabinet of Curiosities” by Matthew Sherrill
[ A P R I L • 1 9 7 6 ]
How to become Secretary of State: “Be kind to Kissinger, but not too kind.”
Read “Campaigning for Secretary of State” by David Schneiderman
[ M A R C H • 2 0 0 9 ]
Lewis H. Lapham on Obama’s “Christmas shopping for cabinet officers.”
Read “Achievetrons” by Lewis H. Lapham
Rising from the Ashes
[ A U G U S T • 1 9 9 5 ]
“They come out, blinking, into the bleached, forgetful sunshine, in Dodgers caps and Rodeo Drive T-shirts, with the maps their cousins have drawn for them and the images they’ve brought over from Cops and Terminator 2; they come out, dazed, disoriented, heads still partly in the clouds, bodies still several time zones–or centuries–away, and they step into the Promised Land.”
Read “Where Worlds Collide” by Pico Iyer
[ D E C E M B E R • 1 9 9 2 ]
“There was nothing reticent about L.A. Glamour was instant. The city took its generosity from the movies. You’re beautiful if L.A. says you’re beautiful, goddammit.”
Read “To the City of Angels” by Richard Rodriguez
[ A P R I L • 1 9 2 0 ]
“Good luck to Hollywood. It is indeed the capital of the world.”
Read “The High Kingdom of the Movies” by Harrison Rhodes
In Memoriam: David Lynch
[ J U L Y • 2 0 1 1 ]
“My colleagues were sure the movie had a bad reputation. I said I loved it.”
Read “When Is a Movie Great?” by David Thomson
[ N O V E M B E R • 2 0 1 6 ]
“When television is at its best, as it’s so often been in recent years, it’s not because the suits capitulate. It’s because they’re smart enough, or confident enough, or desperate enough, to bet that creative freedom can itself conduce to profit.”
Read “Ready for Prime Time” by William Deresiewicz
[ M A Y • 2 0 2 4 ]
“The film and TV industry is now controlled by only four major companies, and it is shot through with incentives to devalue the actual production of film and television. What is to be done?”
Read “The Life and Death of Hollywood” by Daniel Bessner