Notes on Sontag
The late American writer loved to keep lists. Her biographer traces the backward arc from her viral “Camp” essay to the notes that preceded it
Not Your Ordinary Radioactive Meatball
Also: true and true-enough crime series to latch on to, set in L.A. and N.Y.
Gurinder Chadha
On the memoirs that altered her worldview
Randall Poster’s Deep-Summer Playlist:
Ella Fitzgerald, Vampire Weekend, the Meters, and More …
Beauvoir Revisited
A new book offers a second take on The Second Sex
Dave Brown
The Hollywood maverick who hosts a film festival—every single week
Electric Conductor
How Carlos Kleiber’s opera rehearsals influence the director of The French Connection
Librarian Chic
In September, Prestel will publish a new edition of German photographer Candida Höfer’s Libraries, featuring striking images from literary spaces across the world
Boris-Ripper
Britain’s new prime minister wrote a comic novel with racy language and racial slights
Brunello Cucinelli
Selects three books that ask the big questions
Will That Be All?
An exhibition re-creates the atmosphere of a Pompeiian banquet—just before the volcano erupted
