“The thought occurs that in each of the Age of Television's three great contests over the Constitution, the rogues' gallery has never really changed. Those are proud and patriotic Republicans sitting over there.”
Originally published January 20, 1987
Portrait of a New York intellectual
Originally published October 10, 1985
“Historical events as vast as the overthrow of world communism can be analyzed on a cosmic scale, the way astronomers study the universe by peering at whole galaxies. Or they can be analyzed in miniature, by focusing on a molecule”
June 9, 2020
“Just as the gospels and Pauline writings were the Bible of Christianity in the past, so 'Leaves of Grass' would be the Bible of Cosmic civilization in the future”
Originally published April 1, 1982
“Village radicalism wasn’t a worker’s movement, not really. It was a bohemian movement with working-class sympathies ... a species of radical bohemianism that ought to be called, after its finest expositor, John Reedism.”
February 1, 1982