Portside

Ethan Hawke's ferocious portrayal of abolitionist John Brown is the roaring engine of Showtime's rousing James McBride adaptation.

California poet Mary Bailey captures the voice of a Syrian girl from Aleppo who, with assistance from her English-speaking mother, sent messages through Twitter documenting the siege of the city.

Three efforts to right historical wrongs - Nuremberg Trials' prosecution of Nazi war crimes but not crimes against its own people, South Africa's Truth and Reconciliation established the former if not the latter, and today's demand for reparations.

In this new book, Thomas Frank is challenging himself, writes reviewer Rolsky, "to rescue the terms 'populism' and 'populist' from the mouths of those he deems unfit to use them: the anti-populists."

Sacha Baron Cohen and Eddie Redmayne lead a superb ensemble in a dramatization of the infamous circus of a '60s conspiracy trial, which Sorkin makes as charged and relevant today as it was then.

Many cities capped commission fees during the Covid-19 pandemic. As they consider making the emergency rules permanent, Grubhub and Seamless are fighting back.

Toward the end of Netflix’s new documentary-drama The Social Dilemma, former Google employee Tristan Harris describes technology as “simultaneous utopia and dystopia.” This quote encapsulates the focus of the film.

Mississippi poet Philip C. Kolin links the corona virus to its tragic economic consequences.

In Vineland, Thomas Pynchon's dour 1990 novel, the author of Gravity’s Rainbow anticipated a United States where all available definitions of freedom are channeled through security apparatuses understood as the greatest good. Sound familiar?

This new book analyzes the history of the intertwined relationship in the United States between Christianity and white supremacy.