Comment A Very Big Delusion by David Remnick. Comment about the end of the Cold War and claims by George Bush that he was the one who ended it. Mikhail Gorbachev said, "Bush warned me privately not to pay any attention to what he would say during the Presidential campaign... I suppose these are necessary things in a...

The Talk of the Town Front Page by Helen Thorpe. Talk story about Mike Pearl, the retiring "Post" criminal courtroom reporter who worked with Morgenthau. Morgenthau is the Manhatten District Attorney who says that Pearl was a real "pro" at what he did...

The Talk of the Town Red Stars by Sidney Blumenthal. Talk story about Sergei Plekhanov & the filming of the HBO movie "Stalin," for which he wrote the Russian subtitles. It premieres in Moscow Nov. 7, with Pres. Boris Yeltsin in attendance, and will be broadcast here Nov. 21. "I grew up in a country where Stalin was like God...

The Talk of the Town Brief Encounter by Susan Orlean. Talk story about the singer/rapper Marky Mark and his recent noteriety inCalvin Klein's underwear campaign. Mark heightened his celebrity status when during one of his concerts, his brother Donnie Wahlberg (one of the New Kids On The Block) pulled down his pants on stage. It drove the fans wild...

The Talk of the Town Foreign Affairs by Laura Winters. Talk story about Jean-Jacques Annaud and his new film "The Lover" based on the Marguerite Duras novel and starring nineteen-year old British actress Jane March and Tony Leung. The movie, which was filmed in Vietnam, will be released in the U.S. on October 30, 1992. It has already...

The Talk of the Town A Lost Art by Stephen Harrigan. Talk story about James Marshall, the children's book writer & illustrator who died a few weeks ago in N.Y., at age 50. He wrote & illustrated the George & Martha series, about the friendship of two hippopotamuses. He collaborated with writer Harry Allard on "Miss Nelson Is Missing," his best...

Dept. of Dire Straits JOHN MAJOR'S LAMENT by John Mortimer. DEPARTMENT OF DIRE STRAITS about British Prime Minister John Major. It has been said that Pres. Bush has sought to follow the example of Major in his re-election efforts. But Major's fate, brought about by his unexpected success, has been awful. His success is a result of the changing...

Around City Hall SLOUCHING TOWARDS THE SENATE AROUND CITY HALL by Andy Logan. On September 16, tenthousand local off-duty policemen, marshalled by their union, the Patrolemn's Benevolent Association, demonstrated at City Hall, exercising their lawful right to protest against a proposed revision of the Civilian Complaint Review Board, with which citizens file complaints of insulting or brutal behavior by members of the...

The Sky Line by Brendan Gill.

Letter from Washington Endgame by Elizabeth Drew. Despite George Bush's problems, as Bill Clinton headed into the final 2 1/2 weeks with a fairly comfortable lead, his advisors were "scared to death." The debates preoccupied Washington. The spectacle of the Vice-Pres. debate, in Atlanta, was disheartening, with Dan Quayle's manic mad-dog attack & Al Gore's...

Dept. of Amplification FROM KAFKA TO DREYFUS by Lawrence Weschler. DEPARTMENT OF AMPLIFICATION about the lustration or purging of Czech dissident Jan Kavan. Tells about an October 16th hearing at which his lustration committee was to hear his evidence of innocence. They had already reached a verdict however: guilty. (An appalling lack of due process has characterized many of the...

Annals of Government IN THE LOOP: BUSH'S SECRET MISSION by Murray S. Waas. ANNALS OF GOVERNMENT about Iraqgate and the Iran-Contra scandal. Describes an assignment Vice-President George Bush received in 1986 from William Casey: To convey a message through intermediaries to Saddam Hussein: He was to deliver an incendiary message from Washington to Baghdad--escalate the air war and escalate the...

Fiction Barn Burning by Haruki Murakami. The narrator, a married Japanese writer, meets a woman at a friends wedding in Tokyo, and proceeds to tell the story of their bizarre relationship. Studying with a famous mime and working as a model for an ad agency, she gets anything she wants from men (clothes, food, money). She...

The Current Cinema MARRIAGES FROM HELL by Terrence Rafferty.

The Theatre CHEZ ROSENSWEIG by Edith Oliver.

Books by Katha Pollitt.

Books by Deborah Garrison.

Shouts & Murmurs HOSTILE HAIRCUTS by John Updike. SHOUTS AND MURMURS about hostility expressed through haircuts. Quotes this magazine's praise of Day-Lewis's hair in the movie "The Last of the Mohicans...

Poetry Our Masterpiece Is The Private Life by Mark Strand. Is there something down by the water, keeping itself from...

Poetry The Last Day by Daniel Halpern. It is on the last day...

Poetry What Happened To Auden by Clive James. His stunning first lines burst out of the page...

Poetry A Monument in Utopia (Osip Mandelstam) by Gertrude Schnackenberg. Five thousand miles east of childless Petrograd...