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Who Needs This When The Classics Are Already Bursting With Sex?
by Ivan Hewett, The Telegraph
Forget naked flesh and heart-throb tenors — the real eroticism is in the music.

Deep In The Swamp, An 'Extinct' Woodpecker Lives
by James Gorman, New York Times
The ivory-billed woodpecker, a magnificent bird long given up for extinct, has been sighted in the cypress and tupelo swamp oft he Cache River National Wildlife Refuge here in Arkansas, scientists announced Thursday.

Al Gore Gets Down
by Ari Berman, The Nation
Why Gore's TV network won't change much.

Baby Madness
by Jennifer Gonnerman, Village Voice
How one young woman's delusions cost her years of freedom.

Dim Sum Under Assault, And Devotees Say 'Hands Off'
by Keith Bradsher, New York Times
A report by the Hong Kong government suggesting that eating many kinds of dim sum regularly may be bad for your health is threatening to overshadow whatever else might be worrying the people of this city.

A Short History Of The Chinese Restaurant
by Gish Jen, Slate
From stir-fried buffalo to Matzoh Foo Young.

Film Taboo Is Smashed, To General Shrugging
by Stephen Holden, New York Times
A deepening revulsion toward the pornographic view is evident not only in the hysterial engendered by Janet Jackson's antics at the Super Bowl and other such incidents, but in a new breed of European art films that might be called anti-erotic sex films.

The New Human
by Karen Olson, Utne
How the stories we tell will shape our future — for better or worse.

We'll Map Manhattan
by Randy Cohen, New York Times
I propose to create, with the help of the Book Review's readers, a literary map of Manhattan — not of its authors' haunts but those of their characters, a map of the literary stars' homes.

For New York's Bagel Shops, Passover Week Is No Festival
by Eric Dash, New York Times
If it is hard to be a Jew on Christmas, it may be even tougher to run a bagel shop at Passover.

How To Get Out Alive
by Amanda Ripley, Time
From huiicanes to 9/11: What the science of evacuation revelas about how humans behave in the worst of times.

Art On The Move
by Suzanne Muchnic, Los Angeles Times
Computers have become integral to expression. Change and energy are tools. In this kinetic landscape, artists, museums and collectors all scramble to adjust.

Watching TV Makes You Smarter
by Steven Johnson, New York Times
For decades, we've worked under the assumption that mass culture follows a path declining steadily toward lowest-common-denominator standards, presumably because the "masses" want dumb, simple pleasures and big media companies try to give the masses what they want. But as that "24" episode suggest, the exact opposite is happening: the culture is getting more cognitively demanding, not less.

Will 'The Simpsons' Ever Age?
by David Carr, New York Times
Matt Groening says 350 episodes are merely the halfway point.

How To Be Your Own Publisher
by Sarah Glazer, New York Times
Self-publishing companies have been growing rapidly in recent years, displacing old-style vanity presses and competing with the number of titles produced by traditional houses.

Look Who's In The School Kitchen, Dishing Out Advice
by Sarah Lyall, New York Times
Celebrity chef Jamie Oliver has begun a school-meals project that has captured the imagination of a country growing fatter and unhealthier.

Casting Off Cookies?
by Jennifer Frey, Washington Post
Fruits and veggies become the main course on 'Sesame Street'.

Yesterday's Papers
by The Economist
Is Rupert Murdoch right to predict the end of newspapers as we now know them?

Book Smart
by Joy Press, Village Voice
Could cyberspace be the novel's best friend? Litblogs take off — and grow up.

On Broadway, Ads Now Get To Play Cameo Roles
by Stuart Elliott, New York Times
Product placement and endorsement deals have long been staples in television shows, movies and radio programs and even, more recently, on video games. Now, advertisers, casting about for new ways to attract increasingly distracted consumers, have turned their attention to the theater world.

Automated Storyteller
by Andre Mayer, CBC
There is an acknowledged double standard in how we view a prolific genre writer and a fruitful literary author.

Rediscovering Brasserie Balzar
by Meg Hourihan, Megnut
I loved our waiter. I loved our dinner. I loved Balzar once again.

As Cash Flows In, India Goes Out To Eat
by Monica Bhide, New York Times
As India has opened its doors to foreign trade, millions of its people have found themselves with more lucrative jobs, less free time and greater exposure to foreign influences. In the process, what they eat and the way they eat have changed.

The End Of Oil Is Closer Than You Think
by John Vidal, The Guardian
Just kiss your lifestyle goodbye.

Learning The Thai Sex Trade
by Alex Renton, Prospect
Thailand generates fantasies, both for tourists in search of sex and for aid workers peddling lurid tales of trafficking. The tsunami created more false horror stories. What are the facts of the trade?

Surrender In The Battle Of Poetry Web Sites
by Edward Wyatt, New York Times
This week the poetry world is atwitter over the closing down of an internet site that for the last year dedicated itself to exposing what it calls fraud among the small circle of poetry contests that frequently offer publishing contracts as prizes.

Is That A Poem?
by Billy Collins, Slate
The case for E.E. Cummings.

United By A Love For Literature
by Scott Martelle, Los Angeles Times
The Litblog Co-Op is a joint effort by bloggers to 'shine a light' on some lesser-known fiction treasures.

Leave It To The Wine Guy
by David Shaw, Los Angeles Times
One of the many great things about wine is that it's a pleasure most enjoyed when it's shared. The better the wine, the greater the pleasure of both drinking it and sharing it.

How Did Michael Esiner Make Disney Profitable?
by Edward Jay Epstein, Slate
Not with cartoons.

For Business Travelers, Fees And Taxes Everywhere
by Christopher Elliott, New York Times
While the industry's creative billing is aimed at anyone who hits the road, business travelers — and their employers — are disproportionate victims.

The CSI Effect
by Kit R. Roane, U.S. News
On TV, it's all slam-dunk evidence and quick convictions. Now juries expect the same thing — and that's a big problem.

My Living Will
by Paul Rudnick, New Yorker
I would like someone to turn off the TV.

Can We Make Boys And Girls Alike?
by Stanley Kurtz, City Journal
In the end, gender won't disappear, but the careers of some bright young men probably will.

Question Celebrity
by Hank Stuever, Washington Post
Why does Hollywood advertise so ferociously to itself?

There's Nothing Deep About Depression
by Peter D. Kramer, New York Times
Why do we continue to believe that clinical depression brings with it artistic insight and literary greatness?

Communions
by Colm Toibin, New York Times
The rules that the church still imposes that affect most law-abiding people tend to govern sexuality and gender; they seem difficult to many Catholics because they focus on the matter of how we love and whom we love.

A Champ In The City Of Coffees
by Eli Sanders, New York Times
The United States has never produced a barista deemed to be the planet's best, and for those Americans who have been following the run-up to the World Barista Championship — an admittedly small but passionate bunch — the question is whether Phuong Tran can beat the Scandinavians, who have dominated the annual competition since it began five years ago.

The Changing Complexion Of U Street
by Jose Antonio Vargas, Washington Post
On historic black broadway, a tanning salon sets up shop.

Is Snow White?
by Alex Byrne, Boston Review
And other questions about apperance and reality.

A Bevy Of Teeny Beauties, Minds Set On Being Queens
by Juan Forero, New York Times
In a country where vanity is, well, everything, and Venezuelans readily admit wanting to look more beautiful, the race to become the fairest of them all starts young. And it begins at glamour factories like Herman's, in business 34 years, or at the finishing programs offered by Venezuela's numerous beauty pageants.

Do Art Critics Still Matter?
by Marc Spiegler, The Art Newspaper
Today's frenetic art world pushes criticism to the sidelines — and many critics are not helping matters.

Strawberries And Dreams
by David Karp, New York Times
Certain fruits like pears and lemons are much the same as they were 50 or 100 years ago, but California strawberries have been radically transformed by industrial agriculture.

The Internet DJ
by Chris Alden, The Guardian
MP3 blogs are growing in popularity, attracting thousnads of users daily. But while bloggers see their relationshiop with the industry as one of cooperation, it is a legally grey area.

Finding Their Religion
by Don Aucoin, Boston Globe
Young people are seeking faith in nontraditional ways.

Clever Canines
by Colin WOodard, Chronicle Of Higher Education
Did domestication make dogs smarter?

Trivial Pursuit
by Bryan Curtis, Slate
What classic board game, created in 1979, is on the decline?

Twinkies, 75 Years And Counting
by Chandy Sagon, Washington Post
C'mon, admit it. You eat Twinkies. You love 'em.

Space, The Final Frontier On The Inside Of A Jetliner
by Joe Sharkey, New York Times
Both Boeing and Airbus are now paying a lot more attention to the coash cabins.

The Child Who Would Not Speak A Word
by Harriet Brown, New York Times
Selective mutism, experts say, probably represents one end of a spectrum of social anxieties that includes everything from a fear of eating in public to stage fright and agoraphobia, a fear of open spaces.

The Parachute Artist
by Tad Friend, New Yorker
Have Tony Wheeler's guidebooks travelled too far?

A Culture Of Death, Not Life
by Frank Rich, New York Times
Mortality — the more graphic, the merrier — is the biggest thing going in America.

Catholics In U.S. Keep Faith, But Live With Contradictions
by Dean E. Murphy, New York Times
American Catholics have come to accept that being Catholic means living with inconsistency. The roughly 65 million Catholics in the United States no longer have as distinctive an identity as they did a generation ago, and as they assimilated more thoroughly into American society, their views on social and moral issues came to mirror those of other Americans.

Hard Labor
by Reshma Memon Yaqub, Washington Post
Susan Ali was determined to give birth to a severely handicapped baby. Her husband was determined to stop her.

Cold Feat
by Doug Most, Boston Globe
When you live and run in Boston, training for the Marathon takes stamina, heart, and a whole lot of Vaseline.

Our Ratings, Ourselves
by Jon Gertner, New York Times
In Houston, a couple of thousand paid volunteers will soon start wearing Portable People Meters. Along with other advances in measuring what we watch and listen to, they may (in addition to transforming what we watch and listen to) finally answer the question: Does advertising really work?

What Rupert Wrought
by Jonathan Mahler, New York
In the mid-seventies, Murdoch recognized New York as the bargain of the century. Now it's his city, we only live here.

'Apprentice' Sponsors Are The Real Losers
by Andy Dehnart, MSNBC
Those millions of dollars spent on product integration haven't necessarily helped the companies — or the candidates.

Washington's Worst Career Moves
by Mike DeBonis, Washington City Paper
Five men. Five promising futures. Five fuckups.

Online Shopping Makes New York A Cardboard Jungle
by Julia Moskin, New York Times
Whether they hate shopping with kids in tow, dislike maneuvering a cart through narrow aisles or just prefer shopping for sodas at 2 a.m., New Yorkers now log on.

The Scientist Is Gone, But Not His Book Tour
by Edward Wyatt, New York Times
It is a problem that might have puzzled the great physicist RIchard P. Feynman himself: how to conduct an author tour when the author is, well, not exactly available.

10,000 Years Of Nostalgia
by Roger Sandall, The Culture Cult
Life gets better, but people feel worse.

In Louvre, New Room With View Of 'Mona Lisa'
by Alan Riding, New York Times
After slumming it in a far-off corner of the museum for the past four years, the "Mona Lisa" moved back this week to the 19th-century Salle des Etats, which has been elegantly refurbished and redesigned to ease the ritual of paying homage to the lady with the mystic smile.

The Novelist, Writ Large
by Jonathan Yardley, Washington Post
Saul Bellow as a literary giant who embraced the stories of the street.

What To Do In Shanghai...
by Henry Blodget, Slate
When you can't buy fake stuff.

Keeping Up With Pontiff Wasn't An Easy Assignment
by Don Lattin, San Francisco Chronicle
Pope John Paul's traveling press entourage was the most international (and for many years the largest) in the world. That meant that the questions were asked in five or six languages, and often answered that way by the multilingual pope. That could be a problem for English-only reporters on a tight deadline. You never knew if the answer given in Spanish, French, German or Polish was going to be the real news, or one of the English answers you were able to understand.

In Any Language, Manhattan's Hot
by Teri Karush Rogers, New York Times
Whatever its exact dimensions, the wave of interest from overseas has cast a decidedly lopsided shadow over the map of Manhattan real estate.

A Lobster's Last Rites
by Doug Most, Boston Globe
At 22 pounds, Bubba tickled our appetites and consciences.

Soap Opera
by Rob Walker, New York Times
TV viewers know the grammar of marketing so well that product placement becomes the entertainment.

Watching The Detective
by Lawrence Block, Village Voice
Sherlock Holmes lives on — in fan societies, annotated versions, and new adventures.

Born To Be A Foreigner In Her Motherland
by Norimitsu Onishi, New York Times
Chung Hyang Gung is a "Zainichi," a child of Japanese and Korean ancestry who is considered an outsider in Japan and on the Korean peninsula.

The Man Who Shot Sin City
by Brian Ashcraft, Wired
How Robert Rodriguez, the one-man digital army behind El Mariachi and Spy Kids, brought an "unfilmable" cult comic to the big screen.

Paint By Numbers
by Jeff Howe, Wired
It's high art meets high finance. It's social security for starving artists. How a tech whiz kid launched the first museum-quality pension fund.

Abandoning The News
by Merrill Brown, Carnegie Reporter
The future course of the news, including the basic assumptions about how we consume news and information and make decisions in a democratic society are being altered by technology-savvy young people no longer wedded to traditional news outlets or even accessing news in traditional ways.