March 2020
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In this one, I see two deer (it's not clear whether they're mule or white tail) lolling on the ridge line. They're semi-anthropomorphic — they look like deer, but they're sprawled on the ground as if in a reading position, each supporting his head with one hand (or hoof). I climb to where they are…
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Amnesia movies are not absolutely fettered to reality, nor should they be. Hollywood amnesia, as has been frequently noted, is the most flexible and variable of illnesses. Nevertheless, The Vow (2012) breaks new ground in want of integrity. One reviewer called it a "heartless, soulless jumble," but that's letting it off easy. A young woman,…
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Early in September of 1956, I found my way from Flatbush to Hoboken and there boarded the old Lehigh Valley Railroad (the 'Leaky V') for the eight-hour ride to Ithaca. Surely I was the most naive and callow lad ever to set foot on the grounds of Cornell University. I was ignorant and provincial and…
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"Now for my life," the doctor* boasted, "it is a miracle of [eighty] years, which to relate, were not a history but a piece of poetry." Sir Thomas didn't know the half of it; if his life was a miracle, then mine is a hundred times more so. Yesterday the miracles started first thing in…