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Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh (left), examines building models at the University of Salford in 1967. During a 70-year career as a working royal, he carried out more than 22,000 solo engagements in addition to being what Queen Elizabeth II called … — Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh (left), examines building models at the University of Salford in 1967. During a 70-year career as a working royal, he carried out more than 22,000 solo engagements in addition to being what Queen Elizabeth II called her “strength and stay.” Courtesy the University of Salford Press Office.

Prince Philip -- the Queen's man

April 11, 2021

Among the photographs The New York Times used to commemorate Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh — who died on Friday, April 9, at Windsor Castle two months short of his 100th birthday and will be buried from there Saturday, April 17 — was a 2017 photo in which the natty duke faces the camera smiling amid a sea of red-garbed Canadian soldiers, who are virtually all facing right. It encapsulates Prince Philip, a part of and yet apart from the British monarchy, “the strength and stay” of Queen Elizabeth II (her words) through 73 years of marriage, the longest in British royal history, who served crown and country with a confounding mix of devotion, action, humility, crotchety humor and a patronizing snobbery that critics have called impolitic at best and prejudiced at worst.

Democrratic presidential candidate Joe Biden at his campaign kickoff rally in Philadelphia on May 18, 2019. All eyes are on Philadelphia and the rest of Pennsylvania as the vote count continues. Photograph by Michael Stokes.

Naked came the ballot

November 6, 2020

So, I’m in the finals at Wimbledon, up two sets to love against Novak Djokovic, who has once more secured the number one ranking in men’s tennis for the year. (Congratulations, Nole.)

In the third set, however, Nole comes roaring back. As he serves at 4-3, I halt play and, motioning to the umpire, announce, “You know what? Im good. Let’s just call it quits so I can hoist the trophy since I’m ahead and I’m sure I would’ve won had play continued anyway.”

LOL. Welcome to a sports metaphor for the 2020 presidential election, in which President Donald J. Trump has declared victory over former Vice President Joe Biden despite being behind in the electoral and popular vote count, with several key states — Georgia, Nevada, North Carolina and Pennsylvania — still to report.

Hattie McDaniel as Mammy, Olivia de Havilland as Melanie and Vivien Leigh as Scarlett in a publicity still from “Gone With the Wind” (1939). Neither Clark Gable (Rhett) nor Leslie Howard (Ashley) initially wanted to participate in what they rightly … — Hattie McDaniel as Mammy, Olivia de Havilland as Melanie and Vivien Leigh as Scarlett in a publicity still from “Gone With the Wind” (1939). Neither Clark Gable (Rhett) nor Leslie Howard (Ashley) initially wanted to participate in what they rightly intuited was a women’s picture in which the ladies would take the lead. Even after George Cukor, famous for directing fine actresses, was fired from the movie and replaced by Gable pal Victor Fleming, the female stars continued to receive secret coaching from Cukor.

'Gone With the Wind' indeed

June 13, 2020

As the Black Lives Matter movement galvanizes the nation, there are renewed calls to remove the names and statues of prominent Confederate leaders from the Capital (and the Capitol) as well as from Army bases throughout the South. As I have written in these pages— and as one young African-American woman put it recently on TV — this isn’t even primarily a case of black and white, even though the issue is pretty much black and white. The Confederacy lost, and the losers don’t get to dictate either the terms of their surrender or the trophies of their defeat. There are no statues of Adolf Hitler in Berlin.

Still, as President Abraham Lincoln said, “Fellow-citizens, we cannot escape history.” The monuments and names of the Confederacy should belong to schools and museums — or at least photographs of them should be. We can’t preserve every one. There they can be curated and studied, so that present and future generations can understand how they came to be erected in the post-Reconstruction and civil rights eras as a way to reassert white supremacy.

The issue of works of arts and entertainment is a more complex matter, however.

Marin Cilic, in action at Wimbledon in 2018, has said he cannot imagine tournaments without fans. He may just have to.

The roar of the (distant) crowd

May 29, 2020

If a tree falls in a forest and no one is there to hear it, does it make a sound?

The old thought experiment is predicated on the notion that sound requires perception, not just airwaves, so no perception, no sound.

That seems to be the thinking behind those bemoaning the prospect of spectator-less spectator sports. What meaning will they have without those who provide the gate, the soundtrack, the inspo, the raison d'être?

Study for Norman Rockwell’s “Murder in Mississippi,” an illustration that accompanied a June 29, 1965 Look magazine article about the June 21, 1964 murders of three civil rights workers in Philadelphia, Mississippi. Photograph by Louie Lamone. From … — Study for Norman Rockwell’s “Murder in Mississippi,” an illustration that accompanied a June 29, 1965 Look magazine article about the June 21, 1964 murders of three civil rights workers in Philadelphia, Mississippi. Photograph by Louie Lamone. From the Norman Rockwell Museum.

The week that was (thus far)

February 27, 2019

If you’re a blogger, these are boon times. Every day seems to bring a fresh controversy, a breaking news story.

Messrs. Congeniality with their eye on the (Nobel Peace) Prize

February 24, 2019

Dear Nobel Committee-san,

It is with the utmost humility and civility in that decorous but still somehow aloof Asian manner — not to mention the teensiest, weensiest bit of arm-twisting by the White House — that I write to you to nominate President Donald J. Trumpet of the United States of America and Chairman L’il Kim Jong-un of North Korea for the Nobel Peace Prize — the committee’s answer to the Miss Congeniality Award.

The literature of rejection

June 9, 2018

I tend to use this headline to write about young men who have a disproportionate rage at the world and take it out on others as mass murderers, assassins, terrorists and serial killers. I’ve also written about a number of literary works that deal with such young men – Homer’s “The Iliad,” John Milton’s “Paradise Lost” and Emily Brontë’s “Wuthering Heights,” among them.

But I think it is also an appropriate title for a post about the Lambda Literary Awards, which I attended Monday night at New York University’s Skirball Center for the Performing Arts as a nominee. My book “The Penalty for Holding,” published by Less Than Three Press, the second novel in the series “The Games Men Play” was a finalist in the Best Bisexual Fiction category. (When I got the news, I had two thoughts: This must be an email for somebody else. And, were any of the characters in my book bisexual? It goes to show that the readers sometimes know more than the authors do.)

As I sat there, I had a feeling of disassociation. I didn’t know anyone …