Essays Archive | Los Angeles Review of Books

All Essays

“Home Guards”: A Film About Modern-Day Hungary or an Ode to Neo-Nazis?
“Home Guards” is, whatever its director says, a film for the far right.
Nanda DyssouDec 9, 2016
- Around the World
- Film
Of Levant and Leviathan: Cautionary Tales from a Turbulent World
A specter is haunting the Levant — the specter of Hobbes’s Leviathan.
Muhammad Idrees AhmadDec 6, 2016
- Around the World
- Politics
Westworld is Getting Old
All of Westworld’s tricks are about age.
Phillip MaciakDec 5, 2016
- Dear Television
Why Moviegoing Matters
Moviegoing, like roller-skating and rotary telephone use, is in decline.
Graham DaselerDec 5, 2016
- Film
Idra Novey, Hannah Sanghee Park, Gregory Pardlo, and Mark Richard Talk to Olivia Clare About Multiple Genres
What does it mean to move among multiple genres as a writer?
Olivia ClareDec 4, 2016
Gilmore Girls: A Year in the Life
Aaron BadyDec 3, 2016
- Dear Television
“The Handmaiden”’s Ars Erotica
Marta Figlerowicz considers the contradictions of Park Chan-wook's "The Handmaiden."
Marta FiglerowiczDec 2, 2016
- Film
The Obama Years
Stephen Marche reflects on the Obama years.
Stephen MarcheNov 30, 2016
- Cultural Studies
- Politics
Life (Narrative) in the End Times
Time and narrative, once again, turn out to have histories.
Tanya AgathocleousNov 29, 2016
- Fiction
- Memoir & Essay
A Train, an Old Guy with a Banjo, a Chained Dog: On Jeff Silva and Vic Rawlings’s “Linefork”
Peter Trachtenberg reflects on the work of music and the music of work in “Linefork.”
Peter TrachtenbergNov 28, 2016
- Film
- Music
Beyond the Pineapple Tract: Mapping Utopian Los Angeles
Bonnie Johnson explores LA’s utopian past and argues for a utopian future.
Bonnie JohnsonNov 28, 2016
The Philosopher of Failure: Emil Cioran’s Heights of Despair
Failure runs through it all, from Cioran’s “On the Heights of Despair” to “The Trouble with Being Born.”
Costica BradatanNov 28, 2016
- Philosophy & Religion
Only Power Rules: Turkey After the Failed Coup
Nick Ashdown looks back on the failed Turkish coup of July 15 and its aftermath.
Nick AshdownNov 27, 2016
- Around the World
- Politics
Black Night Falling: David Goodis on Central Avenue
Woody Haut shadows David Goodis down Central Avenue.
Woody HautNov 26, 2016
A Longer Reach: Thanksgiving 2016
Dinah LenneyNov 26, 2016
How It Happens Here: Race and American Anti-Fascist Literature
Brooks E. Hefner on "The Black Stockings," William Thomas Smith's 1937 serial aimed at working- and middle-class African-American readers.
Brooks E. HefnerNov 26, 2016
- Fiction