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storm of storms: Elie Wiesel, Night

August 21, 2007 by David Baer

Full product information for this item, together with my review, my ranking of the product, and any reader comments, can be found at http://www.amazon.com.

Though the word ‘Holocaust’ has become the most common cipher for one of mankind’s greatest crimes, many Jews and other rememberers of 1939-1945 object to the borrowing of this biblical term to name Hitler’s mass murder.

Why? Because a ‘holocaust’ is a burnt offering that satisfies God. Who, it is asked, can think that the extermination of European Jewry served any purpose, let alone the pacification of an angry deity? Continue Reading »

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man talk: Cigar Aficionado magazine

August 21, 2007 by David Baer

Full product information for this item, together with my review, my ranking of the product, and any reader comments, can be found at http://www.amazon.com.

Cool cars, expensive vodka, Italian suits, football, golf and its accoutrements, watches named after international capitals.

Oh, and cigars. Continue Reading »

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redemption: 2004 World Series. Boston Red Sox vs. St. Louis Cardinals (DVD)

August 21, 2007 by David Baer

Full product information for this item, together with my review, my ranking of the product, and any reader comments, can be found at http://www.amazon.com.

Two years later, the Red Sox fan still wakes up on the odd morning late in September thinking it never happened. It was a utopian dream, the comfort of the drugged and sleeping. Continue Reading »

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capitalism’s numbers: Barron’s

August 21, 2007 by David Baer

Full product information for this item, together with my review, my ranking of the product, and any reader comments, can be found at http://www.amazon.com.

On any list of pure English-language business reportage, Barron’s would figure in the top ten. This newspaper-style weekly compiles more numbers than just about any other publication.

Though ‘fluff’ is not a word commonly associated with the Wall Street Journal, think of Barron’s as ‘WSJ without the fluff’. That’s how focused it is. Continue Reading »

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what guys think about: Men’s Health magazine

August 21, 2007 by David Baer

Full product information for this item, together with my review, my ranking of the product, and any reader comments, can be found at http://www.amazon.com.

You can tell a lot about the readership a men’s magazine is trying to reach by scanning the first three car ads. In the issue in front of me, they flog the Lincoln MKZ, Range Rover Sport, and Audi A6. Continue Reading »

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love conquers all: 1 Corinthians 13

August 21, 2007 by David Baer

In this most famous of biblical passages, it seems on an early morning like this one that a reader could almost substitute the word ‘God’ for the apostle’s ‘love’ and that the poem would still turn out right. This is no accident. Continue Reading »

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Biblical Languages—What’s the Use?

August 20, 2007 by David Baer

Biblical Languages—What’s the Use?
CU Chapter, Religious and Theological Studies Fellowship
4 March 1997

Several years ago, I was asked to say some words to the RTSF chapter at Cambridge University, under the title ‘Biblical Languages—What’s the Use?’ I would love to have know the pre-history of the brief text which that title was. It sounded as though some particular agony lay behind it, the kind that might set biblical scholars to arguing whether it was an individual crisis or, conversely, some undocumented communal upheaval that gave it birth.
Continue Reading »

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must be known to be loved: The Wall Street Journal

August 20, 2007 by David Baer

Full product information for this item, together with my review, my ranking of the product, and any reader comments, can be found at http://www.amazon.com.

Question: Is there a better American English-language daily anywhere?

Answer: no. Continue Reading »

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on accents winged: Homer,The Odyssey

August 20, 2007 by David Baer

Full product information for this item, together with my review, my ranking of the product, and any reader comments, can be found at http://www.amazon.com.

For lovers of language and epic drama, Homer and the Bible brook few competitors. For readers up for a slightly higher degree of difficulty, William Cowper’s eighteenth-century English translation of the Odyssey provides a second layer of beauty. Not only do you get Homer’s genius. You also soak in the resonant and ironic tones of an English dialect that is familiar enough to be almost completely understood but also different enough from modern American dialect to bring astonishing and pleasing insight into the language we speak. Continue Reading »

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No mysteries here. Just solid car talk: Car and Driver magazine

August 20, 2007 by David Baer

Full product information for this item, together with my review, my ranking of the product, and any reader comments, can be found at http://www.amazon.com.

As your grandfather told you, you can’t always judge a book by its cover. Nor, these days, does the title of a magazine always clue you into the content that begins on page three. Continue Reading »

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