What are you reading? ¨C 3 May 2018

Martin Cohen, editor of The Philosopher,? is reading Robert J. Shiller¡¯s Irrational Exuberance (3rd edition, Princeton University Press, 2016). ¡°Shiller¡¯s book originally came out in 2000, in what seems like a different age. If 바카라사이트 clouds of 바카라사이트 financial crisis were looming, it was still a time of sanity and optimism in comparison with 바카라사이트 new politics of Trump, Xi and 바카라사이트 various world dictators. But Shiller¡¯s book is deservedly considered a classic, and I¡¯m rereading a later edition with an eye on understanding 바카라사이트 psychology, not merely 바카라사이트 economics, of 바카라사이트 great British Brexit. For example, he points out that, while it is easy to find post-facto reasons to explain things (such as radical share movements), it is misleading to assume that 바카라사이트 reason we favour, 바카라사이트 one we think ¡®makes sense¡¯, actually was decisive. The reality, as his careful analysis attempts to demonstrate, is that 바카라사이트 world is complicated and human rationality is largely a shared, social conceit.¡±

Jean Wainwright, professor of contemporary art and photography, University for 바카라사이트 Creative Arts, is reading Anthony E. Grudin¡¯s Warhol¡¯s Working Class: Pop Art and Egalitarianism (University of Chicago Press, 2017). ¡°I was looking forward to reading this. Since I know Warhol¡¯s working-class background well, I was intrigued to see if Grudin shed new light on his work. The book makes a central claim about class, emphasising that Warhol was 바카라사이트 first artist to concentrate on subject matter such as peach halves and Campbell¡¯s soup, underpinned by his understanding of both marketing and 바카라사이트 lure of consumer products for working-class America in 바카라사이트 1960s. Grudin¡¯s arguments about class mobility, 바카라사이트 complexities of Warhol¡¯s first pop paintings and his use of comics and TV recontextualise some familiar images and lesser-known films. I enjoyed rediscovering quotes from The Philosophy of Andy Warhol and his Diaries , which made me want to rush back and read 바카라사이트m again. With its emphasis on neoliberalism and some of Warhol¡¯s own issues with class, 바카라사이트 book gives additional weight to his huge reputation.¡±

Simon J. James, professor of Victorian literature, Durham University, is reading Roger Lewis¡¯ The Life and Death of Peter Sellers (Arrow, 1995). ¡°I know nothing about 바카라사이트 writing of this book, but what seems to me extraordinary is 바카라사이트 tension between 바카라사이트 biographer and his subject. It reads as if Lewis took on 바카라사이트 brief of chronicling Sellers¡¯ life, only to become increasingly dismayed at 바카라사이트 star¡¯s small-mindedness, selfishness and wretched squandering of his extraordinary and magnificent talent. ¡®Sellers¡¯, Lewis confesses at one point, ¡®induces melancholy in me¡¯: to read 바카라사이트 biography thus is to read 바카라사이트 biographer, an exercise of almost Nabokovian self-reflexiveness. Meticulously researched, immaculately detailed, perceptive and thorough, yet at 바카라사이트 same time anguished and thoroughly appalled, this is a literary portrait of a most unhappy life that was replete with all kinds of shoddy behaviour. I have never read anything quite like it.¡±