Welcome to the weekend,
Here are five things I thought worth sharing.
A gem from a decade ago, on Albert Camus, his fiction, social criticism, and the release of his First Man, an unfinished novel he was working on at the time of his death at just age 46. An unintended consequence of this essay is the striking parallels between the global politics of the 1950s and today.
The U.S.’s largest newspaper chain has hired a full-time Taylor Swift reporter.
As you may have noticed, lately, much of my reading has been centered around the topic of … reading. Perhaps unsurprisingly, studying readers over the past seven hundred years or so yields a cornucopia of wise, witty, and remarkably different characters. In this piece, Clayton Davis introduces us to an Italian peasant from the 1600s who closely studied the handful of books he had access to, and wrote down his remarkable conclusions.
A charming teaser for an upcoming interview with writer, filmmaker, and all-around interesting man, Werner Herzog.
Finally, an incredibly timely reminder from Dietrich Bonhoeffer on why stupidity is more dangerous than evil. “Upon closer observation, it becomes apparent that every strong upsurge of power in the public sphere, be it of a political or of a religious nature, infects a large part of humankind with stupidity.” It was true during Bonhoeffer’s time – the madness of World War II – and it remains true today.
Currently reading: A Personal Anthology by Jorge Luis Borges
Have a creative (long) weekend.
Image: A November Morning. Onderdonk, Julian. 1909.
