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Articles by Elizabeth Eck
New to The New Criterion ?
Ricard Urgell, Opera, 1922. Oil on canvas, National Art Museum of Catalonia. Week in review Purchase this and other timeless New Criterion essays in our hard-copy reprint series. Recent stories of note: “The Tickets Are Crazy Expensive. So Why Are Opera Houses Losing Money?” Elias Leight, The Wall Street Journal Opera houses are struggling to promote themselves, courting a populace that is increasingly drawn towards other forms of luxury entertainment, such as sports games or pop concerts.
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The cast of The Cherry Orchard at Harold Pinter Theatre, London. Photo: Johan Persson. Trigger happy Purchase this and other timeless New Criterion essays in our hard-copy reprint series. When The Cherry Orchard premiered in Moscow in 1904, Chekhov called it a comedy with elements of farce. The first director, Konstantin Stanislavski, staged it as a tragedy.
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Anonymous, View of the Parthenon, Nineteenth century, Brush and brown wash, Metropolitan Museum of Art. Ancient Greek architecture is the subject of an event with Sam Holzman at the National Arts Club. The Critic’s Notebook Purchase this and other timeless New Criterion essays in our hard-copy reprint series. Art: Photo of the design room of Tiffany Studios from an advertising pamphlet. Image: Metropolitan Museum of Art. “Designing the Gilded Age: Drawings from the Studios of Louis C.
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The orchestra of the Greek National Opera performing at Carnegie Hall. Photo: Giannis Antonoglou. Kazantzakis at Carnegie Hall Purchase this and other timeless New Criterion essays in our hard-copy reprint series. On a recent trip through Crete, I stopped at Arkadi Monastery, a sixteenth-century walled complex in the hills southeast of the city of Rethymno.
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Sonya Yoncheva in the title role of Cherubini’s Medea. Photo: Marty Sohl / Met Opera. Sonya’s sorceress Purchase this and other timeless New Criterion essays in our hard-copy reprint series. In a Medea, you need a Medea, for sure. Few title roles are as crucial. Still, there is no one more important in this opera than the conductor. He (or she) determines the character of a performance: its liveliness or dullness; its intensity or limpness.
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Smoke rising from fires in the London docks, following a bombing on September 7, 1940. Photo: Wikimedia Commons. A visit to Greeneland Purchase this and other timeless New Criterion essays in our hard-copy reprint series. Graham Greene, who along with Evelyn Waugh was one of England’s greatest Catholic novelists, is best known for his serious studies of men and women haunted by sin, represented by such works as The End of the Affair (1951) and The Heart of the Matter (1948).
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Nathaniel Grogan, Lady Blanche Crosses the Ravine Guided by the Count and Saint Foix (a Scene from The Mysteries of Udolpho), ca. 1796–98, Oil on canvas, National Gallery of Ireland, Dublin. Week in review Purchase this and other timeless New Criterion essays in our hard-copy reprint series.
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Stanislas de Barbeyrac as Parsifal. Photo: Marc Brenner. A fool’s errand Purchase this and other timeless New Criterion essays in our hard-copy reprint series. “Du siehst, mein Sohn, zum Raum wird hier die Zeit”—“You see, my son, here time becomes space,” sings Gurnemanz, a wizened old knight of the Holy Grail, to the naive title character of Richard Wagner’s Parsifal. Wagner’s final opera premiered in 1882, only a quarter century before quantum physics combined the concepts of space and time.
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Prince Leopold of Bavaria signing the armistice between Russia and Germany on December 15, 1917. Photo: Wikimedia Commons. Political maneuvers Purchase this and other timeless New Criterion essays in our hard-copy reprint series. When did World War I begin?
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Rembrandt Harmenszoon van Rijn, The Large Lion Hunt, 1641, Etching and drypoint on paper, Morgan Library & Museum. On view in “Rembrandt’s Lions: Art and Exile in the Dutch Republic,” at the Morgan Library & Museum. The Critic’s Notebook Purchase this and other timeless New Criterion essays in our hard-copy reprint series.
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Raymond Asquith and his wife Katharine in 1913. Photo: Wikimedia Commons. A shooting star of England Purchase this and other timeless New Criterion essays in our hard-copy reprint series. Raymond Asquith (1878–1916)—the son of the British prime minister H. H. Asquith, a wit, scholar, barrister, and, at the end of his life, soldier—was the stuff of legend.
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Dmitri Shostakovich in 1925, when he was eighteen or nineteen. Photo: Wikimedia Commons. The “cardinal sin of performance” Purchase this and other timeless New Criterion essays in our hard-copy reprint series. The concert at David Geffen Hall on Saturday night was a promising one—more than promising, a lock-cinch guarantee. Three top-flight musicians gathered to play a program of piano trios.
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John Singer Sargent, Scotland, 1897, Watercolor on white wove paper, Metropolitan Museum of Art. Week in review Purchase this and other timeless New Criterion essays in our hard-copy reprint series. Recent stories of note: “Homer’s majestic vessels” David Butterfield, The Critic In The Critic, David Butterfield explores the influence and mystery of the world’s greatest poet: Homer.
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Good bankers do not make the best subjects for biographies. They are cautious, prudent, discreet, and devoted to their balance sheets. Proverbially, they are the sort of people who take away the punch bowl just when the party gets going. The Philadelphian Thomas Willing (1731–1821) was the consummate banker.
Thumotic thoughts
Leon von Klenze, The Acropolis at Athens, 1846, Oil on canvas, Neue Pinakothek, Munich. Thumotic thoughts Purchase this and other timeless New Criterion essays in our hard-copy reprint series. [I]n Athens, we found the first full realization of all the essential traits that would come to define the West: fierce individuality and relentless ambition; daring exploration and invention; a yearning for discovery, for adventure, risk and glory.
“Ignoble Nobels.”
The committee room of the Norwegian Nobel Committee. Photo: Wikimedia Commons. Ignoble Nobels Purchase this and other timeless New Criterion essays in our hard-copy reprint series. This year, the Swedish Academy awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature to the Canadian poet and classicist Anne Carson.
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Editors’ note: The following is an edited version of remarks delivered for The New Criterion’s eighth annual Circle Lecture on September 24, 2026. I’m afraid there’s a price to pay for asking a fiction writer to deliver a formal lecture. I plan to trade in freewheeling overgeneralization, unsupported inference, and sheer speculation. I’m a novelist. I make stuff up. The question before us is this: what do progressives really want?
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Frederic Edwin Church, The Aegean Sea, ca. 1877, Oil on canvas, Metropolitan Museum of Art. The art of Frederic Edwin Church is the subject of an afternoon of presentations and conversations at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. The Critic’s Notebook Purchase this and other timeless New Criterion essays in our hard-copy reprint series.
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True Williams, Frontispiece from The Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain, 1876. Photo: Wikimedia Commons. Week in review Purchase this and other timeless New Criterion essays in our hard-copy reprint series.
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Samuel Finley Breese Morse, Gallery of the Louvre, between 1831 and 1833, Oil on canvas, Terra Foundation for American Art. Week in review Purchase this and other timeless New Criterion essays in our hard-copy reprint series.
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Unity Phelan with the Company in Alysa Pires’s Auspicy. Photo: Erin Baiano. Light as a feather Purchase this and other timeless New Criterion essays in our hard-copy reprint series. Birds are never far from the ballet. Last year alone, New York saw three versions of Firebird performed, and at least two Swan Lakes.
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Georgia O’Keeffe, Radiator Building – Night, New York, 1927, Oil on canvas, Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, Bentonville, Arkansas. O’Keeffe’s paintings of buildings are the subject of Georgia O’Keeffe: Architecture, edited by Benjamin W. Colman. The Critic’s Notebook Purchase this and other timeless New Criterion essays in our hard-copy reprint series. Art: Georgia O’Keeffe: Architecture, edited by Benjamin W.
New to The New Criterion ?
Philippe Rousseau, Still Life with Ham, 1870s, Oil on canvas, Metropolitan Museum of Art. Week in review Purchase this and other timeless New Criterion essays in our hard-copy reprint series. Recent stories of note: “At Andrew Edmunds, Artistic Gossip Is Always on the Menu” Michael Delgado, Apollo In Apollo, Michael Delgado lauds the old-school charm of the London restaurant Andrew Edmunds.
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Gordon Bintner & Aigul Akmetshina as Don Giovanni & Donna Elvira. Photo: Alastair Muir. A libertine in London Purchase this and other timeless New Criterion essays in our hard-copy reprint series. “Più del pan che mangio, più dell’aria che spiro”—“More than the bread I eat, more than the air I breathe,” says the titular character of Mozart’s Don Giovanni, describing his need for women.
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Tintoretto, Susanna and the Elders, ca. 1555–56, Oil on canvas, Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna. A Venetian master Purchase this and other timeless New Criterion essays in our hard-copy reprint series. Jacopo Robusti (1518–94), better known as Tintoretto or “the dyer’s son,” is one of the greatest masters of Venice’s sixteenth century. It is appropriate for Paris’s Jacquemart-André, noted for its exhibitions of Italian art, to present a panoramic look at Tintoretto’s art.
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Gustavo Dudamel with the New York Philharmonic in May 2025. Photo: Brandon Patoc. An inaugural ball Purchase this and other timeless New Criterion essays in our hard-copy reprint series. In Lincoln Center Plaza last night, there was a banner reading, “Our New Era Starts Now.” For good measure, there was another banner giving that same message in Spanish: “Nuestra Nueva Era Comienza Ya.” The banners were heralding the arrival of Gustavo Dudamel as the music director of the New York Philharmonic.
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A scene from Mozart’s Così fan tutte. Credit: Marty Sohl / Met Opera. September 29, 2026 Six for six Purchase this and other timeless New Criterion essays in our hard-copy reprint series. The opera had a bad start, with the orchestra nowhere near together. But as the overture proceeded, things got straightened out. Regardless, was the audience really listening? There was a lot of action onstage, provoking laughter in the audience. This is good—but so is Mozart’s overture.
New to The New Criterion ?
A scene from the Bayeux Tapestry. Credit: Wikimedia Commons. The Bayeux Tapestry is the subject of The Story of the Bayeux Tapestry: Unravelling the Norman Conquest, by David Musgrove and Michael Lewis. September 29, 2026 The Critic’s Notebook Purchase this and other timeless New Criterion essays in our hard-copy reprint series.
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Charles Nicolas Cochin II, The Coming of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost, ca. 1700s, Red chalk over traces of black chalk, Metropolitan Museum of Art. September 28, 2026 From fire by fire Purchase this and other timeless New Criterion essays in our hard-copy reprint series. Dana Gioia met the sublime as a young child in his parish church in Hawthorne, California, singing to a hidden Lord in an inscrutable language.
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Rosa Feola as Musetta during Act II of La bohème. Credit: Jennifer Taylor / Met Opera. September 28, 2026 B is for “Bohème” Purchase this and other timeless New Criterion essays in our hard-copy reprint series. The Metropolitan Opera is not an “ABC company”—but it does not ignore A, B, or C. In fact, the Met is staging both A and B this season. B opened on Friday night. An “ABC company” is one that serves up favorites, to the exclusion of almost everything else.
Morgan Vannell - The New Criterion
Show AllShow ArticlesShow DispatchShow TNC+ MultimediaAll AuthorsAbel, LionelAbowitz, RichardAdams, HarryAdams, J.
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Richard Dadd, The Fairy-Feller’s Master-Stroke, 1855–1864, Oil on canvas, Tate Gallery, London. September 25, 2026 Week in review Purchase this and other timeless New Criterion essays in our hard-copy reprint series. Recent stories of note: “Euripides had the last laugh” David Butterfield, The Critic Some people are simply born in the wrong generation. In a darkly comic essay for The Critic, David Butterfield details the life and work of the ancient Greek playwright Euripides.
New to The New Criterion ?
Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Young Woman at the Well, 1886, Oil on panel, Renoir Museum, Cagnes-sur-Mer. September 18, 2026 Week in review Purchase this and other timeless New Criterion essays in our hard-copy reprint series. Recent stories of note: “Privatize the Smithsonian” Eric Gibson, The Wall Street Journal How should the Smithsonian Institution deal with the recent exit of its secretary Lonnie Bunch III and President Trump’s criticisms?
Will Wells - The New Criterion
Sign into your account Become a subscriber Current subscribers may register for online access. Already subscribed? Will Wells’s latest full-length poetry collections include Unsettled Accounts (Ohio University Press) and Odd Lots, Scraps & Second-hand, Like New (Grayson Books). Displaced
Daniel Janeiro - The New Criterion
Show AllShow ArticlesShow DispatchShow TNC+ MultimediaAll AuthorsAbel, LionelAbowitz, RichardAdams, HarryAdams, J.
Nicholas W. Zamiska - The New Criterion
Sign into your account Become a subscriber Current subscribers may register for online access. Already subscribed? Nicholas W. Zamiska is the head of corporate affairs and legal counsel to the office of the chief executive officer at Palantir Technologies, Inc. He is also the coauthor of The Technological Republic (Crown Currency), published last year. The long peace
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Albrecht Dürer, Great Piece of Turf, 1503, Watercolor, gouache & highlights, The Albertina, Vienna. September 17, 2026 Nonsense with a side of greens Purchase this and other timeless New Criterion essays in our hard-copy reprint series.
“America inside out,” by James Panero.
The Tang Wing for American Democracy at the New-York Historical Society, view from Seventy-sixth street toward Central Park West. Photo: Bridgit Beyer. America inside out Purchase this and other timeless New Criterion essays in our hard-copy reprint series. Few buildings differ so much in effect between exterior and interior as the new Tang Wing for American Democracy. From the outside, this extension to the New-York Historical Society that opened last summer is a triumph.
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“Ruud Kuijer” in the Rietveld Pavilion at the Kröller-Müller Museum. Photo: Rob Versluys. Kuijer’s components Purchase this and other timeless New Criterion essays in our hard-copy reprint series. The Gerrit Rietveld Pavilion on the extensive grounds of the Kröller-Müller Museum, in Otterlo, the Netherlands, is a modernist icon, a triumph of twentieth-century materials and economical form.
“The aqueduct: Pont du Gard,” by Daniel Janeiro.
The aqueduct: Pont du Gard Purchase this and other timeless New Criterion essays in our hard-copy reprint series. A stray arcade of stone astride a stream, Its footed piers planted on bank and boulder, Stands like a team Of acrobats stacked up, shoulder on shoulder. A skillful tension keeps them still and straight: The topmost arches staid, the lower, humble, Supporting their weight, Please with their joint efforts not to tumble.
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Schmigadoon! (at the Nederlander Theatre through January 3), which in June captured the Tony for Best Musical, took an unusual route to the stage: through the television. Viewers of the Apple TV show of the same name (which premiered in 2021 and concluded with its second season in 2023) have already seen it: same story, same characters, same songs, same look. It worked fine then, and it’s still a delightful tribute now.
Rave in the nave
Canaletto, St. Paul’s Cathedral, ca. 1754, Oil on canvas, Yale Center for British Art, New Haven. Rave in the nave Purchase this and other timeless New Criterion essays in our hard-copy reprint series. We do not propose to spin that tale now. We mention it only because some news out of England reminds us both of how far secularization has proceeded and, at the same time, how lively the reaction against it can be.
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Matthäus Merian the Elder after Antonio Tempesta, Plate 1: Emperor Julius Caesar on Horseback, from “The First Twelve Roman Caesars,” 1610–50, Etching, Metropolitan Museum of Art. Decline & rise Purchase this and other timeless New Criterion essays in our hard-copy reprint series.
Alteration agreements
Childe Hassam, The White House, 1925, Etching in black, National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C. Alteration agreements Purchase this and other timeless New Criterion essays in our hard-copy reprint series. The effusion of manufactured outrage has been both hilarious and pathetic.
“Little song of home,” by Steven Peterson.
Little song of home Purchase this and other timeless New Criterion essays in our hard-copy reprint series. We’ve grown old in an older home, a place Where we hear music in the dripping faucet, The rattling door, the fumbled crashing vase, That floorboard always creaking when we cross it. There’s whistling in the worn-out weather stripping And pinging in the ancient radiator, The circuit breakers on a cold night tripping— All home repairs we say we’ll get to later And sometimes do.
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Sarah Purser, Portrait of Roger Casement, (1864–1916), Patriot and Revolutionary, 1914, Oil on canvas, National Gallery of Ireland, Dublin. Casement’s ghost Purchase this and other timeless New Criterion essays in our hard-copy reprint series. Of the sixteen Irish rebels executed for their parts in the 1916 Easter Rising, fifteen are regarded as heroes—near saints—of the Irish independence movement.
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Simon Vouet and Studio, The Muses Urania and Calliope, ca. 1634, Oil on wood, National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C. Goodbye to po-biz Purchase this and other timeless New Criterion essays in our hard-copy reprint series. There are always more reasons than one for leaving a job. You have done it faithfully and well for many years, even decades, and the time has come to explore “fresh woods and pastures new” following a long-postponed vacation.
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In 1931, during the height of the Great Famine caused by Stalin’s forced collectivization, the British playwright and social critic George Bernard Shaw visited the Soviet Union. Shaw dismissed all talk of famine as malicious rumors. To demonstrate his faith in the regime, with a flourish he threw his packed lunch basket out of a train window, just before crossing the border from Poland to Russia.
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Paul Revere, A Westerly View of the Colledges in Cambridge New England, printed 1916, Line engraving, Yale University Art Gallery. September 15, 2026 Taking accountability Purchase this and other timeless New Criterion essays in our hard-copy reprint series. Editors’ note: The following is an edited version of remarks delivered at the Alliance for Responsible Citizenship (ARC) conference in London on June 25, 2026.
New to The New Criterion ?
John Baer, Paving Fifth Avenue, 1953. Credit: Courtesy John Baer Archive. This photo appears in John Baer: The Extraordinary Ordinary / A Memoir in Photographs 1945–54. September 15, 2026 The Critic’s Notebook Purchase this and other timeless New Criterion essays in our hard-copy reprint series. Art: Katherine Taylor, Ruffled Feathers, 2026, Aluminum, Skoto Gallery.
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