BURMA-SHAVE
ARE YOU old enough to remember Burma-Shave signs? I feared as much. However, these sequential roadside messages, typically in verse, tell a lot about advertising during the middle decades of … Continue reading
VINTAGE MAGAZINE
MAYBE YOU’RE already reading Vintage Racecer/Vintage Roadcar. If not, and if, like me, you enjoy vintage automobiles, I highly recommend this monthly magazine (www.vintageracecar.com). Publisher/Editor Casey Annis has gathered a … Continue reading
PAPAL HIGHJINKS
THE ACCESSION of Pope Francis I has been taking place with high ceremony and, given His Holiness’s nature, a sense of humility. But it wasn’t always that way. In the … Continue reading
THE ROYALS—OLD AND NEW
HILARY MANTEL is a marvelous writer, whether she’s documenting the Tudor goings-on of Henry VIII et al or delivering a lecture as part of the London Review of Books Winter … Continue reading
U OR NON-U, REDUX
IT USED be so simple. Beginning with October 14, 1066, one was either Norman or non-Norman. Up until recently (two days ago), it was U or non-U, the “U” standing … Continue reading
SHAKESPEARE, INC.
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE a loan shark? A tax dodger? Worse yet, a hedge trader? Or was he merely a man of his Elizabethan times? And the greatest dramaturgist of all time? … Continue reading
EASTER FLICKS
IT’S MID-afternoon. Maybe a holiday meal with the family is either in preparation or has been concluded. Maybe the familial/liturgical/political chatter has temporarily subsided. What to do? See if there’s … Continue reading
“GOOGLING,” SO TO SPEAK
LANGUAGES ARE living things—and occasionally combative ones. So it was recently when the Språkrådet, the Swedish Language Council, had it out with no less than Google Inc., all over the … Continue reading
TIME TRAVEL
THE IDEA of time travel, especially backward in time, is an appealing one for me. I’ve enjoyed several novels with this as their theme. Here are mini-reviews of my favorites. … Continue reading
VAUDEVILLE AND MUSICALS
VAUDEVILLE COULD well be a metaphor for my career in magazines and academe, and maybe for yours too. There are two entertaining books that are fun to share. The first is No Applause—Just … Continue reading
Simanaitis Says 