Eric Z.

On the origins of Bookworm (RIP Michael Silverblatt): pubs.lib.uiowa.edu/iowareview/a...

Duvall, Silverblatt, now Wiseman...

“Readers should be able to assume that every word between quotation marks is what the speaker or writer said… The writer should, of course, omit extraneous syllables like ‘um’ and may judiciously delete false starts.”
-NYT ethical guidelines

Before ‘The Godfather,’ a Coppola film shot in western Nebraska played a pivotal role in Hollywood’s evolution Three films, plus a TV miniseries, emerged from this Hollywood-Nebraska intersection, including a documentary Robert Duvall made about a rambunctious trick-riding rodeo family, the Petersons.

Was just reading this about The Rain People (and maybe I'm the last to know): Duvall was a last-minute replacement for Rip Torn, which led to him working with Coppola, which etc etc. nebraskapublicmedia.org/en/news/news...

!!!

Just a hot plate, a shelf of various poets' collected poems, and this scotch-taped to a wall:

Always love a play promo photo that has the subjectivity of an audience member's eye and especially depth of field:

Curious about this one:

pretty stunning chart

Decades of amazing conversations with writers, mostly novelists. Your favorite is likely in the archives: www.kcrw.com/shows/bookworm

Magic - That's How Strong My Love Is [US, Garage, Rock] (1968) Really killer Otis cover.

Magic - That's How Strong My Love Is [US, Garage, Rock] (1968) Really killer Otis cover.
https://redd.it/g7pu6q
https://youtu.be/9hIvzQktj-g

Jolie Holland was fantastic tonight, accompanied by Max Knouse. No shade to drummers, but it always feels special and close-up hearing someone (especially with riveting voice/lyrics) play without one. (Drums in pic just happened to be there!)

Outta my deep love for the titles of Saul Bass I finally watched Phase IV, the only film he directed. Killer ants battle humans but it's neither campy or scary enough to be worth the watch sadly.

‘Hate Radio’ and Other Transmissions From the Theater of the Real

This show, based on radio broadcasts leading up to Rwanda’s genocide, sounds especially compelling: www.nytimes.com/2026/02/14/t...

No, ICE isn’t ‘retreating.’ It’s loading up to invade your town. | Will Bunch A much-hyped ICE pullback from Minneapolis is a blip in a looming nationwide surge of arrests, concentration camps.

While MLPS was a victory, moral and tangibly, for ICE resisters, don't call it 'a retreat.' The dystopia is just getting started

Thousands of new agents. 150 new offices in every state. And the nationwide gulag archipelago. The fight has just begun

My new column www.inquirer.com/opinion/ice-...

Wondering if more museums will start to have dedicated listening rooms: www.cooperhewitt.org/channel/devo...

They already had one

i’ll end this little brainstorm by just asking what it is, exactly, that the MAGA right likes about the United States, since it explicitly rejects those things that make this nation distinctive — its pluralism, its revolutionary heritage and egalitarian aspirations, and its republican institutions

Exactly! lol

Three cartoon cats painted on a concrete wall in a viaduct

Unexpected viaduct art on Kimball Avenue

More, "ok this is goofy fun" than "*did you know* that Hallmark invented etc etc"

Feels like an ironic but non-snarky Valentine's Day out there?

It’s a little discouraging that the harshest punishment administered in the whole Epstein sex trafficking scandal is a spaghetti sauce getting the death penalty.

Stephanie Ruhle: This bridge will take toll money away from another bridge that connects Michigan and Canada, and that bridge is owned by a big Trump donor who, on Monday, had a meeting with Howard. Lutnick. Immediately following that meeting, poof, we no longer want this new bridge.

A review of The Designated Mourner (1997) Have rarely seen an actor so off-book as Mike Nichols is here. Charlie Parker and Freddie Hubbard come to mind: fast, bleating, feels spontaneous, and remarkably different than Wallace Shawn’s own cad...

Had seen it onstage and heard it in podcast form, but hadn't seen the film version of The Designated Mourner until tonight: letterboxd.com/ericzieg/fil...

amazing

Has a single ICE agent or his family been targeted or harmed as a result of such tactics? You really want to compare neighborhood watch folks with cameras to drug cartels?

Maggie Queeney reflects on a decade building the Poetry Foundation’s adult education programs - Chicago Reader As the Poetry Foundation sunsets its adult education programming, the poet and educator remains committed to facilitating communal poetry spaces.

In November 2025, the Poetry Foundation announced it would discontinue the library’s adult education programming at the end of 2025 and sunset its overall public programming in 2026 to refocus on literary arts grantmaking. https://bit.ly/3NKFp4v

Rhetorial question but how is it ice's job to go after agitators

Throwback to Pam Bondi’s campaign ad for Florida AG:

“I’ll fight to put human trafficking monsters where they belong. Behind bars.”

The ad aged. The internet remembers.