Events
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Start: 7:00 pm
Commentary was founded in 1945 by Jewish American writers, children of immigrants steeped in radical socialist politics and labor activism. A forceful advocate of civil rights, a forum for fiction writers Bernard Malamud and Philip Roth and a home for literary critics, the magazine's writers' response to the 60s counterculture is now known as neoconservatism—a school of thought that influenced the political right from the Cold War through the current war on terror, laying the foundation for today's wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. Journalist and scholar Benjamin Balint traces all these shifts and the extraordinary influence of the magazine in Running Commentary: The Contentious Magazine that Transformed the Jewish Left into the Neoconservative Right (Public Affairs). "Benjamin Balint's history of Commentary magazine is nothing less than a history of the intellectual life of Jews in America as they go from being cultural outsiders to consummate insiders ... [His] judicious, non-partisan account doesn't miss a shift in the political landscape, whether on the Left or the Right ... This is intellectual history as it should be written: lucid, capacious, and unfailingly readable." - Daphne Merkin. A former Seattle resident and University of Washington graduate, Benjamin Balint is presently a Herman Kahn Fellow at the Hudson Institute and an editorial writer for the Jerusalem Post.
Start: 7:00 pm
Co-presented with the GARDNER CENTER FOR ASIAN ART AND IDEAS, SEATTLE ASIAN ART MUSUEM. We are delighted to be helping present this evening with acclaimed historian, travel writer, and literary instigator William Dalrymple. Based in both London and New Delhi, he has written seven books, among them an evocative account of Delhi (City of Djinns), the Wolfson Prize-winning White Mughals, and the Duff Cooper Prize-winning The Last Mughal. He makes this first Seattle appearance for his newest work, Nine Lives: In Search of the Sacred in Modern India (Knopf), a book which has already been a top-ranked bestseller in India and the UK. "Dalrymple vividly evokes the lives of these men and women, with the sharp eye and good writing that we have come to expect ... But Nine Lives is different from his other works; it is not so much about places as about the religious lives of people who live in those places, and is a glorious mixture of journalism, anthropology, history, and history of religions, written in prose worthy of a good novel." - Wendy Doniger, Times Literary Supplement. "Gripping, and often very moving ... Characters rarely allowed into contemporary Anglophone writing about India are given an opportunity to describe their deepest aspirations without the slightest hint of authorial condescension." - Pankaj Mishra, The National. In addition to his writing, William Dalrymple, with writer Namita Gokhale, is co-artistic director of the wonderful Jaipur Literature Festival, held annually in January. The 2010 festival featured a number of the people from Nine Lives, making for some remarkable presentations of words and music. Free entry with Seattle Asian Art Museum admission. The Seattle Asian Art Museum is at 1400 East Prospect in Volunteer Park. For more information, please call Elliott Bay at (206) 624-6600, or see www.seattleartmuseum.org.
Start: 7:30 pm
Co-presented with the TOWN HALL CENTER FOR CIVIC LIFE. Here from New York, where he teaches interactive telecommunications at NYU is author Clay Shirky with a new book on our relationship with technology. His earlier book, Here Comes Everybody: The Power of Organizing without Organization, made a big splash, helping define the landscape of things for many. The new book, Cognitive Surplus: Creativity and Generosity in a Connected Age (Penguin Press), picks up where the earlier left off. "Digital-age guru Shirky argues that new technology is making it possible for people to collaborate in ways that have the potential to change society ... In this well-written and highly speculative book, Shirky suggests that in these ways new media has enormous potential to transform our lives ... The author discusses the many factors that have given rise to social media and suggests the conditions that will best allow voluntary groups to take advantage of the world's aggregate free time to benefit society ... An informed look at the social impact of the Internet." - Kirkus Reviews. $5 tickets are available at the door starting at 6:30 p.m., or in advance via www.brownpapertickets.com (or 1-800-838-3006). Preferred seating for Town Hall members. Town Hall Seattle is at 1119 Eighth Avenue (at Seneca). For more information, please call Elliott Bay at (206) 624-6600, Town Hall at (206) 652-4255, or see www.townhallseattle.org.
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