For Dickinson, writing letters offered a way of making a life out of this fantasy; this is why the genre so appealed to her. When, for instance, she addressed the envelopes for her brother to send to Sue, she was of course helping the couple by hastening their courtship, but she was doing something else, too. She was insinuating herself into its private scenes. Letters untether words from bodies; they loosen and redraw the bonds of time and space, and for that matter of sexuality, marriage, and blood relation. A week later, she wrote to Sue again, describing the pleasure she had taken in arranging her friend’s correspondence with her brother: “So Susie, I set the trap and catch the little mouse, and love to catch him dearly, for I think of you and Austin, and know it pleases you to have my tiny services.”
In the meantime, a better understanding of extremal black holes can provide further insights into near-extremal black holes, which are thought to be plentiful in the universe. “Einstein didn’t think that black holes could be real [because] they’re just too weird,” Khanna said. “But now we know the universe is teeming with black holes.”
For similar reasons, he added, “we shouldn’t give up on extremal black holes. I just don’t want to put limits on nature’s creativity.”
At home, if you drink before 12 p.m., it’s indicative of a problem. In an airport, it’s part of the experience.
We can’t curate our entire lives, but we can curate the accessories we keep on our person. For a younger generation locked out of the housing ladder, holidays—particularly short holidays, where you only need hand luggage—are one of the few real luxuries within reach. A small suitcase or security tray becomes a place where your life can look coherent and in control.
We generally enter stadiums to watch football or baseball, or see a huge concert, or perhaps cheer on a favorite political candidate. Chances are such activities don’t lead directly to serious consideration of how and for whom public spaces are used, or how these spaces reflect the strengths and weaknesses of American democracy. But after reading Frank Andre Guridy’s “The Stadium,” you might just find yourself thinking as much about the history of these cavernous facilities as the games on the field.
Subtitled “An American History of Politics, Protest, and Play,” Guridy’s deeply researched book delivers just that. This is a progressive-minded study of inclusion and exclusion, the relationship of highly visible buildings to their neighborhoods, and the ways in which stadiums and arenas have succeeded and ways they’ve failed to live up to the country’s ideals.