Berlin: Symphony of a Metropolis, by Walter Ruttmann
Walter Ruttmann’s 1927 film Berlin: Symphony of a Metropolis is strangely suited for these times, when traditional moviegoing is in perilous decline, providing a way to disentangle the art of cinema from that mode of consumption.(...)
Culture from the Slums, by Jeff Hayton
Based on the flurry of academic titles about it over the last decade, punk has become as common to college curriculums as it is to the Top 40. Why this took so long is baffling.(...)
Non-things: Upheaval in the Lifeworld, by Byung Chul-Han
When talk of the “information age” first began in the 1960s, it implied optimism. Information is knowledge, of which more is better than less, generally speaking.(...)
Deutsch Funk Revolte, by ÖPNV
ÖPNV’s debut album Deutsch Funk Revolte is the sort of record that can make you sense the sun even when it is blocked by the relentless grey of winter, which happens most days in their Berlin home. (...)
Germany, Year Zero, Today
It’s hard to watch Roberto Rossellini’s 1948 film Germany, Year Zero to its conclusion. The mood is relentlessly bleak and the landscape bleaker still.(...)
Hyperculture, by Byung Chul-Han
Korean-German philosopher Byung Chul-Han is the quintessential postmodern figure. Having to come to Germany to study metallurgy, he switched fields and mastered the argot of German philosophy.(...)
Labour and the Forde Report
The Forde Report represents a new stage of the malaise afflicting the Labour Party.(...)
Winston Churchill: His Times, His Crimes, by Tariq Ali
Since his student days in the Oxford Union in the 1960s, Tariq Ali has been a blunt teller of truths, not unduly concerned with the feelings of those who think otherwise.(...)
Return to Magic Mountain
Ever since I finished Thomas Mann’s The Magic Mountain, I have been trying to find a way of explaining why it’s worth reading that prioritises the words on the page rather than my idiosyncratic response to them. (...)