Tag: myth
-
A Generation of Hackers
Hackers are fascinating—the good ones, the bad ones, the ones in between. From corporate elites like Bill Gates to fugitives like Edward Snowden, we look to hackers to provide for us, to excite us, to liberate us. But why? This is the question that took hold of me in the midst of my summer’s journey…
-
The God of This World
Isn’t it obvious that God, or at least our idea of God, needs saving as much as we do? He—forgive me if necessary for saying “He”—has been run through the mud by terrorists, televangelists, New Atheists, and grandmothers’ guilt. The rest of us are supposed to have a relationship with this guy? Or even just…
-
Martyr City
If you don’t know the name Hypatia, you should. In the grand mythology of the Enlightenment (to which, on optimistic days, I subscribe), her murder at the hands of a Christian mob marks more or less the end of Greek philosophy and the beginning of the Dark Ages. Now, for those of you who don’t…
-
The Diaries of the Late God
Last week a dear friend blessed me with a 1968 first edition paperback copy of a sleeping classic: Excerpts from the Diaries of the Late God by Anthony Towne. I love this. The dedication page sends a tingle down my spine. The poet Anthony Towne was, if you didn’t know, the extraordinary partner of the…
-
Who Are These Women?
Along the ramparts of the Brooklyn Museum’s Sackler Center for Feminist Art, there is a small exhibition of ancient female figurines, among them the oldest sculpture in the museum’s collection. What strange forms! Where are the supermodels, where are the Barbie dolls? At the confluence of second-wave feminism and post-Freudian psychohistory, the mid-twentieth century saw…