Mah Nishtana Halailah Hazeh? Why is this night different from all other nights? Maybe because I was celebrating the Jewish holiday of Passover on the predominantly Muslim island of Zanzibar. As far as I can tell, I am the only Jew around, at least who’s willing to admit it. I myself have always grappled with [...]

The Pulitzer Prize in Fiction was awarded today to A Visit From the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan, “an inventive investigation of growing up and growing old in the digital age, displaying a big-hearted curiosity about cultural change at warp speed.” For more about A Visit From the Goon Squad on Contrary Blog: Dear LATimes, This [...]

After watching the Tea Party rallies which took place over the weekend in places like Florida and Madison, Wisconsin, held by reality-TV show star Donald Trump and reality-TV show star/former vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin, I began to think that those of us Democrats who believe in fiscal responsibility via raising taxes on the wealthiest Americans [...]

Sherry Turkle asked scientists, humanists, artists, and designers to “trace the power of objects in their lives, objects that connect them to ideas and people.” In Evocative Objects: Things We Think With, published in 2007 by the MIT Press, you’ll find thirty-four essays on objects such as a rolling pin, a yellow raincoat, an axe head, a suitcase, [...]

Cynthia Newberry Martin is most recently famous as the Contrary blogger who set the internet afire when she challenged the LA Times coverage of the National Book Critics Circle awards. But Cynthia excels at many things. She has written some of the most powerful and most popular fiction we’ve published. This story made people cry. [...]

In New York City, where I live, the public school system has long been a logistical quagmire. It’s the largest in the country, attempting to educate 1.1 million kids at 1,700 different schools with an $80 billion budget. (All facts are from the Department of Education’s website.) It also has a pretty high dropout rate: [...]

Do you believe in devils? Spirits? Possessions? Exorcisms? Or are spirits in any society simply the bio-chemical reality of hypnosis, revelation through sound, pitch and tone? An anthropological need for the occasional freak-out, fulfilled? I was skeptical of all things spirits until recently, when I stepped into a Kibuki cult spirit possession ceremony. There, in [...]

Just about every time I have a conversation with anyone about his or her career, I get an earful of doubts, misgivings, annoyances, and, oftentimes, a nagging sense of futility about the entire enterprise. (And bear with me, the photo to your right will make sense soon enough.) Case in point: yesterday I ran into [...]

PREAMBLE: We the people of Denver, Colorado (and the metro-area suburbs, from which our homogenized city is indistinguishable) pledge allegiance to Leisure, to God and to our SUVs. This official document sets forth the tenets by which we shall collectively conduct ourselves to promote a just and peaceful existence in this, our Republic. Herein, “God” [...]

You heard me. No, I’m not married. No, I don’t have a baby. These are the two of the most potent culture-bombs I drop on unsuspecting Zanzibar citizens on a near-daily basis. The reaction hints at devastation for some, others are just confused. You’re thirty-five and you don’t have children? Never been married? In my [...]

Our much loved celebrity poetry editor, Shaindel Beers, gave birth this afternoon to Liam Eliot Pennington. Mother, child and father are well, healthy, and exceedingly happy, according to all reports arriving steadily from Contrary’s Pacific Northwest bureaus. Shaindel was not to be outdone by Fiction Editor Frances Badgett, who gave birth to Cora Cuornoyer in [...]

The dazzling poet Kiki Petrosino, who sent Contrary a series of gorgeous conversations between Dante and God (installments one, two and three), has launched a new journal, Transom, with her friend and fellow poet Dan Rosenberg. Petrosino teaches at the University of Louisville, Rosenberg is a PhD student at the University of Georgia, and some years [...]

“April is the cruelest month,” begins T.S. Eliot’s long poem “The Wasteland.” For me, March was particularly brutal. Between first-book contests, journal submission, post-graduate fellowships, and the academic job market, I was rejected for no less than a dozen things. Some of these rejections were easier to take than others (did I really think I’d [...]