Hampton Sides is an acclaimed bestselling author and a National Magazine Award nominated journalist. He won the PEN USA Award for nonfiction and the 2002 Discover Award from Barnes and Noble for Ghost Soldiers, a historical narrative following the rescue of WWII Bataan Death March survivors that was later adapted into the Miramax feature film The Great Raid. His next book, Blood and Thunder, was adapted into an episode of the Public Broadcasting Service’s American Experience series. Hellhound On His Trail, is a taut and thrilling account of the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr., and the 65-day manhunt for […]
MUST SEE TV: Sarah Silverman Touched By A Unicorn
For your consideration.
THIS IS HOW MARXISTS GET MADE: A Unified Theory Of Everything That Is Wrong With America
JOSEPH STIGLITZ: It’s no use pretending that what has obviously happened has not in fact happened. The upper 1 percent of Americans are now taking in nearly a quarter of the nation’s income every year. In terms of wealth rather than income, the top 1 percent control 40 percent. Their lot in life has improved considerably. Twenty-five years ago, the corresponding figures were 12 percent and 33 percent. One response might be to celebrate the ingenuity and drive that brought good fortune to these people, and to contend that a rising tide lifts all boats. That response would be misguided. […]
BOOKS: Fey Accompli
NEW YORK TIMES: “Bossypants” isn’t a memoir. It’s a spiky blend of humor, introspection, critical thinking and Nora Ephron-isms for a new generation. But it chronologically follows Ms. Fey through an awkward girlhood spent in Upper Darby, Pa., teenage years with a coterie of gay friends and a fish-out-of-water stint at the University of Virginia. “What 19-year-old Virginia boy doesn’t want a wide-hipped, sarcastic Greek girl with short hair that’s permed on top?” asks Ms. Fey, who calls herself Greek when she isn’t calling herself German. “What’s that you say? None of them want that? You are correct. So I […]
WORTH REPEATING: O Death
INQUIRER: My husband did well for most of his illness. A writer, Jeff finished two books after his first surgery and he retained his patient, amiable nature as he struggled to adjust to increasing disability. He was able to take care of himself until almost the last month, though the first major sign of impending death appeared well before that. He started sleeping more than the cats, and I grieved for the precious moments he was squandering. The other changes in this once quick-witted man – the guy who always won at Scrabble – began with glacial slowness. Then they […]
Sheen’s ‘Violent Torpedo Of Truth’ Misfires In Detroit
A.O. SCOTT: As it happened, Mr. Sheen and Detroit proved to be a disastrous match. The Fox, a lavishly ornamented, carefully restored 5,000-seat show palace evoking a lost golden age of spectacle, is beautiful, but the scene there was ugly, as a boisterous, liquored-up capacity crowd greeted Mr. Sheen with cheers that quickly turned to boos. The show — a ragged mix of video clips, ear-splitting music, profanity-laced monologues and clumsy attempts to encourage audience participation — did not so much end as collapse. After a little more than an hour Mr. Sheen turned the stage over to a rapper […]
Q&A With Fresh Air Jazz Critic Kevin Whitehead
Kevin Whitehead has been writing professionally about jazz and its discontents since 1979. His work has appeared in the pages of the Chicago Sun-Times, Downbeat and the Village Voice. He is the author of 1996’s New Dutch Swing and his essays have been anthologized in the Da Capo Best Music Writing 2006, Jazz: The First Century and The Cartoon Music Book. He currently serves as jazz critic for Fresh Air, where he habitually champions way-off-the-beaten-path but worthy fare while dispensing deadpan insights delivered with the bone-dry elegance of an Eric Dolphy solo. He’s just published his second book, Why Jazz? […]
TONITE: Gimme Fiction
Summer Fiction is the new nom-de-rock for South Philly bedroom pop autuer Bill Ricchini who has recently returned from a five year hermitage of domesticity, home-improvement and crock pottery with a self-titled debut full of rumors and sighs and fallen lovers outlined in lipstick traces. Breezy, bright and eminently tuneful, Summer Fiction picks up where Ricchini’s previous releases — 2002’s Ordinary Time and 2005’s Tonight I Burn Brightly — left off. Lush with deftly-turned nods to Burt Bachrach, Brian Wilson and Ray Davies, Summer Fiction is pure pop for the kind of now people who sleep with copies of Village […]
STYLE COUNCIL: What’s A Ball Girl To Wear?
Glitter, catwalk runways and celebrity judges — sounds like your average Phillies promotional event right? Erm, maybe not. But Thursday evening local apparel designers and Phillies’ Ballgirls teamed up in a fashion show to mark the finale of the week long “Painting the Town Red” build up to yesterday’s opening game. Although, apparent to anyone that has ever been to a Philadelphia sports event, these are fans that need no pumping to get Phanatical about the home team, the Phillies’ promotional team ran events all week to get fans hyped for the home opener against the Houston Astros — and […]
Goober Preacher Burns Koran, Afghans Go Ballistic Storm U.N. Compound And Kill 12 Relief Workers
NEW YORK TIMES: Thousands of protesters, enraged by the burning of a Koran at a Florida church, overran a United Nations compound in the Afghan city of Mazar-i-Sharif on Friday, killing at least 12 people. The incident that so enraged Afghans, the burning of a Koran after a mock trial in a small Florida church on March 20, was barely noticed in the United States but widely reported in Afghanistan and Pakistan. The presidents of both countries have called on the United States to arrest Terry Jones, the pastor of the church. Mr. Jones presided over the “International Judge the […]
Phawker Presents The 10th Installment Of BLOTTO
BY LANCE DOILY Since the main office we work out of is located right in the middle of a gritty industrial area on the outskirts of Paterson, most of the guys spend their down time meandering through the lawless concrete ruins behind the Tropicana warehouse up the block. So we took it upon ourselves to meet with a few of their Tropicana workers and started a baseball league. The warm-up games alone separated the men from the boys as they were played entirely on a hard slab of concrete, but from the beginning a decision was made to take a […]
OP-ED: Time For Queen Arlene To Vacate The Throne
AP Ticker reads this week’s Phawker Op-Ed TIME FOR QUEEN ARLENE TO VACATE THE THRONE, written in response to the Inquirer’s must-read seven-part series on out of control violence in the Philadelphia schools system entitled ASSAULT ON LEARNING. PREVIOUSLY: TIME FOR QUEEN ARLENE TO VACATE THE THRONE
NPR FOR THE DEAF: We Hear It Even When You Can’t
FRESH AIR This season of Mad Men has been a transformative one, to say the least, for lead character Don Draper, the star partner at ad firm Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce. His wife, Betty, has left him, having learned that he stole a fellow soldier’s identity during the Korean War. He’s been striking out at pitch meetings. He’s become what Jon Hamm, the actor who created the previously bulletproof character, calls a “less-functioning alcoholic,” living a bachelor life in Greenwich Village but grappling with both profound loneliness and a shattering personal loss. “Don is losing touch with not only his […]