Indholdsfortegnelse for March 2023 i Harper's Magazine

Sun and Air Though Hillary Angelo paints a stark picture of solar energy development in the American West [“Boomtown,” Letter from Nevada, January], many studies suggest that solar farms offer an opportunity to unite carbon-free energy production with ecological restoration. While solar farms can have mixed environmental effects, my research has found that amid increasing heat and drought stress in the West, the shade provided by arrays can strengthen native plants, extend flowering time, and support critical pollinator habitats. And agrivoltaics—the coupling of solar energy and agriculture production—shows promise. For example, using sheep grazers to manage solar array landscapes in lieu of gas-powered motors sustainably combines livestock and energy production. The opinions of those living near proposed solar sites must be taken into consideration, and the ways in which private…

Attention ALL Team Members: Our call-offs are occurring at a staggering rate. From now on, if you call off, you might as well go out and look for another job. We are no longer tolerating ANY EXCUSE for calling off. If you’re sick, you need to come prove it to us. If your dog died, you need to bring him in and prove it to us. If it’s a “family emergency” and you can’t say what it is, too bad. Go work somewhere else. If you only want morning shifts, too bad, go work at a bank. From here on out, if anyone calls out more than ONCE in the next thirty days you will not have a job. Do you know in my eleven-and-a-half years at Darden how many…

For three weeks, we sat in a windowless room and listened to people talk about books. Most of the time we didn’t know the titles or authors. Instead we heard about money. We heard about advances, royalties, and option clauses. We heard about foreign rights, world rights, e-book rights, and audio rights. We heard about auctions for manuscripts in all their varieties: round-robins, best bids, better/bests. We heard about preempts and bilateral negotiations. We heard about profit and loss projections, marketing budgets, and distribution. We heard about visibility in bookstores and discoverability via algorithms—all the transactions that make reading possible. We heard that the U.S. market for books had increased by 20 percent in the prior two years: “It was like a hockey stick during COVID. The industry is thriving.”…

Until last summer, we had a dead frog in our freezer. When Bunky died, George and I thought we should wait to bury him till both our grown children were home, so we put him in a Ziploc bag and propped him on his side on a shallow shelf in the freezer door, just above the icemaker. Bunky was flat and compact and, very soon, as rigid as a cell phone. He fit perfectly. I’d always wondered what KitchenAid intended that shelf for—it was too narrow for any food I could think of—but now we knew. It was intended to hold a frog. There are two kinds of pets—the ones you choose and the ones that happen to you. Bunky belonged to the second category. He entered our family in…

Discussed in this essay: On the Marble Cliffs, by Ernst Jünger, translated from the German by Tess Lewis. New York Review Books. 144 pages. $14.95. Ernst Jünger is the intractable land mine of German literature. Demolition squads of scholars have stencil-brushed the casing and every wire of the corpus; warning tape encircles the mother lode of fifty books, which are still capable of sending readers sky-high. Millions of soldiers came home from the First World War missing a body part or a piece of their mind. Jünger, who learned not to flinch at the abyss—who positively courted shrapnel, was wounded seven times, and ended up one of the most decorated soldiers on the German side—came out with a style. Terse, clean, cool: he ran against the grain of the language…

After he finished medical school, my father left India, moved to the United Kingdom, and became a surgeon in the National Health Service. He specialized in orthopedics, which made Christmas a busy time for him. Icy sidewalks and boozy seasonal parties meant a steady stream of broken hips and car accidents. On Christmas morning, he would take the family on a round of the London hospitals where he worked to visit the patients stuck there for the holidays. It was a tradition, a mark of goodwill—most of the doctors we knew did the same thing—but also a recognition that medical care involved more than just the provision of treatment. Many of the patients, particularly the very old ones, had no other visitors. We substituted for the family they didn’t seem…

A mind trained from birth to calculate Bred for the role of CEO Breezed through an elite prep school As good at explaining macroeconomics as anyone out there in the world today Unbelievably fantastic Obviously a genius More like a super-advanced AI than flesh and blood Working when people arrive, working when people leave Devoting every waking moment of his life to work His parents queued for a moment of his time, only to give up because the wait was too long Has a real chance at being the world’s first trillionaire Like no other billionaire I’ve ever met Instantly lovable The guilelessness, kindness, and openness of a Muppet Ninety-nine times out of a hundred, the terms of the deals he makes favor the other side An ethical maximalist in…

Engine 19 of the Denver Fire Department responded to support Denver Police Department officers on a welfare check. One of the police officers entered the residence, came out, and stated that the individual smelled of decomposition, saying, “You do not need to go inside. She is obviously dead.” To obtain a pronouncement of death from the hospital, Firefighter Marshall Henry described the patient’s condition as being in an advanced state of death, despite knowing that he had not personally performed a primary assessment on the patient. The doctor asked clarifying questions, and Firefighter Henry deliberately misrepresented himself as having performed a patient assessment. Firefighter Henry stated that when the doctor asked those questions, he realized he messed up. The police officer later re-entered the residence and shone his flashlight on…

I heard about a rejection letter recently that deserves preservation in these days of big-time word merchandising. “I cannot recall reading,” it said without irony, “a novel as learned, as intelligent, as witty as this, and one with so exact a sense of its place and time. However it is not right for us.” Think long on all that tells you about “us.” A fistful of such letters may reinforce a novelist’s suspicion that most publishers’ first readers are chimpanzees. In less paranoid moments, he may recognize the voices assumed by human beings trying to pretend they aren’t serving a venture in mass production, a theme concerning which it behooves us to be less naïve than they’d like. Mankind’s first mass-produced item was surely the brick, the second probably…

In an effort to replenish its anemic membership with younger blood, the New Amsterdam Club has, among other measures, relaxed its dress code, allowed the use of cell phones, and added a mezcal cocktail to the menu. Yet one unspoken rule remains unchallenged: no business talk on the premises. Unless, maybe, in what’s known as “the little bar.” No one would dream of discussing work in the big bar or the dining room, but the little bar is a territory with a diplomatic status and a legislation of its own. Conversations are kept brief and drinks left unfinished out of consideration for those who pretend not to be waiting outside: according to yet another tacit law, each party is given total privacy in the narrow, seatless bar. Perhaps because its…

Brian T. Watson is an architect and cultural critic. For twenty-three years, he has been a columnist with the Salem News in Salem, Massachusetts, focused primarily on current affairs and the forces that were and are shaping societies both here and abroad. btwatson20@gmail.com (781) 367-2008 Paper, $13.00 e-Book, $9.99 Available on Amazon Independent of the pandemic and war, we are beset by a range of unprecedented developments that together, in this century, threaten the very existence of civilization. The current states of just ten forces — capitalism, technology, the internet, politics, media, education, human nature, the environment, population, and transportation — are driving society in predominantly negative ways. These forces are powerful and interconnected and their combined dynamics will carry us into any number of disasters well before 2100. We…

People think actor Mickey Rourke bears a resemblance to Val Kilmer Lady Gaga becomes the latest celebrity to fall into a meme trend of someone posting a picture of a celebrity for humorous effect Many respond to a tweet receiving criticism for suggesting the kinds of photos women should not share online The usual quips about Green Day and their hit song are made as September ends, but some remember its true meaning Author and psychologist Dr. Umar Johnson confirms a viral video shows him shopping at a mall in New Jersey Spokane-style pizza sparks discussion People see similarities between Popeyes food and a plate of food in a tweet A video of a drive-thru worker’s interaction with a customer circulates online Some debate the fizzy properties of Sprite at…

Thinking of peoplemakes us avoid them.I think we should even avoid we. Straw spews out when we speakand becomes a straw doll. “You left this behind,”she said. The girl picked up a mirrorthat I’d thrown away.I thanked herand tried to look glad. When I come homeI find my room crammed fullof the things I was going to leave on the curb andthe straw we spit up. I pick off molted cicada skinjust barely hanging on to the ends of the straw.The song shed us and ran off.I had to survive. I crush the emptied bodywith my fingers.Gazing down at the scene,the song does what songs do.…