Every Part Strengthens a Part
Max Callimanopulos reviews and reflects on James Salter’s “Light Years” for its fiftieth anniversary.
“Noises Off” at the Pittsburgh Public Theater
“Noises Off is a delicate and complicated machine of a play, and director Margot Bordelon has assembled its many moving parts with finesse.”
The Afterlife of Gertrude Stein
Walking through Gertude Stein’s biographical and literary legacy with devotion in Francesca Wade’s “Gertrude Stein: An Afterlife.”
Raymond Saunders Creates His Own Language
Saunders grew up in Pittsburgh’s Hill District and attended Saturday art classes at the very museum that houses his first major retrospective exhibition.
Skating with Lori Jakiela
Jakiela is a master of an essay form that is distinctly her own, a kind of integrated collage style that brings together her background as a journalist and the author of collections of poetry, weaving together quotes, facts, musings, digressions, and stories.
Campus Weird
"Collegiate Gothic" Skewers Academia (and Ohio) in Fine Form
Jan Beatty – Poet. Madwoman. Ally.
Write the poem you’re afraid to write. That’s the mantra-like advice Jan Beatty has been prescribing to budding poets of all stripes for over three decades, as the now-retired professor has seemingly had a guiding hand in the education of every writer in Pittsburgh.
On Raymond Thompson’s “Appalachian Ghost”
Thompson captured photos of the place — the hills of WVA folding into each other like origami, holding mist and dew in the hollows. And he staged new photos which conjure these working men, bearing up under hours of physical labor, covered in white dust, looking otherworldly but also fully human and integral to the achievement.
The Mennonite Verse of Julia Spicher Kasdorf
“Mennonites have not been in the habit of changing details to suit the story: from our very first confessions of faith we've expected language to be a useful, solid bucket to hold truths as clear as water.”
Unlocking the Gateway to the West
My city has also not been particularly adept at acknowledging its sins, past or present, let alone attempting to atone for them.
Ben Gwin’s Essential Labor Story for Our Time
Gwin combines the story of the challenges facing labor unions in the 21st century and workforce realities with a deeply personal exploration of his own relationship to work and his struggles as a single parent.
Donora’s Suffocation
Inside the factories zinc fumes flushed out of horizontal retorts, and spread through the factories as an eerie blue powder.