The Common Reader

LOSER BACK HOME IS HAVING A GOOD TRIP Loser Back Home (LBH), who prefers to remain pseudonymous, is traveling through China right now. He has made some 31 social media videos. commonreader.wustl.edu/?p=71…

OF LEARNING TO PAY ATTENTION: I think more about what else in my social life I should see, ask, remember, and do, even when I can do little. Remember F. Scott Fitzgerald: Relationships are the brutality that sustains. commonreader.wustl.edu/of-le…

RECIPE STORIES: MONKEY MEAT Everybody called it monkey meat, or mystery meat, which did not diminish patrons’ appetites and in fact sold more skewers due to its mystery. commonreader.wustl.edu/recip…

📷 SOMETHING I LEARNED FROM YOU: POISE IS TOO OFTEN LIKE POSE I laughed and told my son that the singer reminded me of myself in high school—gawky, skinny, comic not handsome, watching everyone else but doing your own thing a little too enthusiastically. commonreader.wustl.edu/somet…

WRITING IS LIKE MAKING LOVE The best thing about writing for oneself is that you always own your own work and can do exactly as you like with it. commonreader.wustl.edu/writi…

“EVEN A NOBODY IS MORE POWERFUL THAN YOU THINK” Predictably, a court in Russia banned the documentary film “Mr. Nobody Against Putin,” ruling it “propagates extremism and terrorism”; Russia has named Talankin, the film’s main character, a “foreign agent.” commonreader.wustl.edu/even-…

“NUREMBURG”: HOLOCAUST AS MELODRAMA In the end, the only thing to be done with a movie like this is to throw it to the wolves of Reddit. commonreader.wustl.edu/nurem…

AI TARGETS WRITERS AND EDITORS A few days ago, a man in Memphis messaged me by LinkedIn to ask if I was the person who had offered to help him market his book. When I said no, he showed me the email that offered to make his novel a smash hit. commonreader.wustl.edu/ai-ta…

AI AND THE INHABITED BODY AI does not (yet) understand the mysteries, perspectives, uncertainties, and feelings—the experience itself—of inhabiting a body in the physical world. commonreader.wustl.edu/ai-an…

‘GO BAGS’ IN RELATIONSHIPS The impulse is to think that someone who makes plans for something else also helps bring it about. That fantasy does not seem to be doing us much good as a body politic. commonreader.wustl.edu/go-ba…

WHEN I SAT WITH NALA DOG WHILE HER FAMILY WAS IN TEL AVIV You know how in family obituaries they sometimes single someone out as a “special aunt,” or “special cousin” or “special nephew”? I had that kind of special relationship with a dog one time. commonreader.wustl.edu/when-…

STRANGE DAYS AT THE SOCCER JOCK PARTY APARTMENT I could imagine generations of soccer players moving into this apartment with a coffeemaker, a fondue pot, a meat thermometer, what have you, then moving out and leaving it all behind. commonreader.wustl.edu/stran…

The new debut record by American Pirates of Bloomington, Indiana, “What a Friend,” artfully blends so many different kinds of folk music that it comes across as an anthology or a variety show, yet with kindred themes and a unifying sound. commonreader.wustl.edu/ameri…

I asked a friend which of two things she thought true: Are our lives narratives? Or are they many quick stories/events/incidents that pop up, one damn thing after another, which are tied together only by the meanings we assign? commonreader.wustl.edu/are-y…

Saint Louis Art Museum’s Art in Bloom, now in its twentieth year, is the museum’s most popular event: a weekend centered on pairing specific works of art iwith flower arrangements that reimagine them. commonreader.wustl.edu/best-…

Cartoons are one of my favorite things on Instagram, especially when they touch on humor, confusion, sadness, practical philosophy, and cultural critique. commonreader.wustl.edu/carto…

URBAN FISHING AT CHRISTMAS Jefferson Lake is 14 feet at its deepest but holds Largemouth Bass, Channel Cats, Crappie, Carp, Topminnows, Golden Shiners, and Bluegill. Being a non-fisherman and non-city dweller, I was surprised by the variety. commonreader.wustl.edu/urban…

CHRISTKINDLMARKET IN CHICAGO A HOLIDAY FAVORITE A drive from St. Louis this week through the windswept fields and windmill farms of Illinois was pleasant, as was the cinnamon-scented fellow at the front desk of a River North hotel in Chicago. commonreader.wustl.edu/chris…

IN SMALL-TOWN INDIANA, LAM RUNS A LOST AND FOUND FOR THE FORGOTTEN AMONG US If you have ever cared for an addict, you know the desperate feeling of no easy solutions. commonreader.wustl.edu/on-th…

ANATOMICAL SPECIMENS SHARE A SCONE Wanting answers, we create reductions: I am. She was. The administration will. commonreader.wustl.edu/anato…