Over the weekend the New York Times magazine published a lengthy article on why, when evidence showed Wall Street to be riding atop a sea of criminality, only one top banker went to jail after the financial crisis.  And no, they conclude, it’s not the reason you think it is. Here’s your take-away: Many assume that the […]

I probably won’t be very visible here for the next few days, as I’ll be in San Antonio teaching at Paradise Lost, which— come to think of it— might well be the most exclusive writers’ workshop in the world. Why?  Because it only accepts people who have already graduated from either Viable Paradise or Taos Toolbox, […]

I’ve been splayed in front of the pay-per-view watching films about decadence, and the first thing I noticed was that European and American filmmakers handle these things in completely different ways. First up was The Wolf of Wall Street, Martin Scorsese’s biopic of financial sleazeball (“and motivational speaker”)  Jordan Belfort.   Belfort lost his job on […]

Today is the day we traditionally celebrate the birth of “Gulielmus filius Johannes Shakspere,” as he was referred to in his baptismal records.  It may not be his actual birthday, but what the hell: Let’s celebrate anyway! There’s a kind of bad literary scholarship that we might refer to as “spot-the-influence,” in which the critic observes […]