Comment by James Lardner. Mikhail Gorbachev's fall from power inspired many commentators to take his historical measure, and the nature of the occasion seemed to encourage a focus on his missteps and shortcomings. How easy it is to forget, for example, that in 1985, when Gorbachev was named General Secretary of the Soviet Communist...

The Talk of the Town Flourishing by Adam Gopnik. Talk story about William Christie and his French Baroque group, Les Arts Florissants. He is probably the most revered master of old French music in France. Les Arts Florissants has improbably managed to take a musical repertoire--the sacred and profane music of the French Baroque--that had been effectively...

The Talk of the Town Sic Transit by Harold Brodkey. Talk story about shopping for movies on videocassette. Those damn cassettes in the video store and the damn VCR and the hungry 32" TV and the 4 speakers I bought to give me movie-theatre sound in my own not very large apartment --the sheer bulk of my own home...

Fiction The Wedding of Henry Markowitz by Allegra Goodman. Henry Markowitz's relatives are surprised when he becomes engaged to Susan McPhearson. Henry works for Laura Ashley in Oxford, England; Susan is assistant registrar at Merton College. Henry has been a professor at Queens College and N.Y.U.; horrified by the vulgarity he encountered there, he moved to Oxford in pursuit...

A Reporter at Large A NATION OF CONTRADICTIONS by Stan Sesser. REPORTER AT LARGE about Singapore where an economic miracle has been achieved. In not much more than a decade, Singaporeans passed from poverty to affluence, & the nation's economy from a basket case to the powerhouse of southern Asia. The explanation for this transformation, as for nearly everything else in...

Musical Events by Andrew Porter.

The Current Cinema Smoke and Mirrors by Terrence Rafferty.

Books by Adam Gopnik.

Poetry The Nearsighted by Elizabeth Macklin. who misreads the serious joke, the speech...

Poetry Simone Weil: The Year of Factory Work (1934-35) by Edward Hirsch. A glass of red wine trembles on the table...