Essays

1093 results
Page 81
Mengestu: An exile in Washington. (Photo: Linda Nylind.)

Literature's global future

The global future of literature, or: Why can't humanists be more humane?

Here we have a new subgenre of what I call International English: Africans interacting with white and black Americans. The way Mengestu weaves writers as diverse as Emily Dickinson and Tocqueville into his narratives of isolation and conflict is astonishing.
Patrick D. Hazard

Patrick D. Hazard

Essays 5 minute read
Not every nun was blessed with Audrey Hepburn's eyebrows, but a kid can dream, can't he?

Changing habits: What I learned about nuns

Forbidden fruit: My fantasy life among the nuns

As a suburban Catholic grade school student, my meager education in the mysteries of the opposite sex came by watching— and fantasizing about— nuns.
Thom Nickels

Thom Nickels

Essays 6 minute read

Economic lessons from the Far East

I have seen the future, and it's in the Far East

If today's recession is a global crisis, why do the Taiwanese and Japanese seem less traumatized than we Americans? As I've learned from personal experience, they've learned how to adjust their behavior in the face of adversity.
Benjamin B. Olshin

Benjamin B. Olshin

Essays 6 minute read
I promised my mother....

My father's clothes

What remains of my father

I'm sure this gesture has been repeated a million times by a million women in mourning: a father's coats and shirts and ties and hats, handed over to an uncle or a brother.
Amy Small-McKinney

Amy Small-McKinney

Essays 3 minute read
... and he never saw the Dodgers play at Ebbets Field.

My cancer could be prevented

Me, Mike and a certain cancer

Mike Douglas and I are both battling Stage 4 head and neck cancer. We share something else in common as well: An awareness that this particular cancer, at least, could be prevented.
Lynn Hoffman

Lynn Hoffman

Essays 4 minute read

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A picture worth a thousand words.

Mighty Ryan has struck out

The five stages of baseball grief

Depressed because the Phillies failed to win their third consecutive National League pennant? Broad Street Review's sports therapist will see you now.

Jennifer Baldino Bonett

Essays less than a minute read
Not exactly the Art Museum, but....

Sugarhouse Casino: Color me convinced

How I learned to stop worrying and love my casino

Concerned Philadelphians say the new Sugarhouse Casino will ruin its surrounding neighborhood. But if you lived in that decaying neighborhood, as I do, you'd feel differently. You might just perceive it as our best hope for the future.
Thom Nickels

Thom Nickels

Essays 6 minute read
George Clooney, you ruined my life!

Apologies: Ginni Thomas vs. Anita Hill

I'm so very, very sorry, or: What hath Ginni Thomas wrought?

Clarence Thomas's wife recently phoned Anita Hill out of the blue to ask Hill to apologize for accusing Justice Thomas of sexual harassment 19 years ago. Recognizing that Ginni Thomas was on to something, I placed a few calls of my own.
Perry Block

Perry Block

Essays 3 minute read
Vick: A sport with uncomfortably deep roots.

Michael Vick, scapegoat

The dogfighter within us

I hold no brief for dogfighting, a cruel enterprise conducted solely to entertain the bloodthirsty. But before we condemn Michael Vick, we might look in the mirror.
Maria Thompson Corley

Maria Thompson Corley

Essays 2 minute read
Boston Tea Party, 1773: When anger launched a revolution.

The case for anger

A few kind words for anger

Dan Rottenberg to the contrary, righteous anger can indeed be constructive if it is focused on a good cause. Consider, for example, the constructive anger of Jesus, Gandhi and Martin Luther King.
Robert Zaller

Robert Zaller

Essays 2 minute read