Blog

J.W. Waterhouse’s “Echo and Narcissus” (1903, oil on canvas). Courtesy Walker Art Gallery. Narcissus falls in love with his reflection not because he has an inflated sense of self but because he has no strong, healthy core identity. These days, he is too much with us.

The 2024 presidential election and the irrational cult of narcissism

October 31, 2024

These days, everyone is making closing arguments — Vice President Kamala Harris, former President Donald J. Trump, comedian Jimmy Kimmel of ABC’s “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” — as if we the people were we, the jury, which I suppose we are. I might as well make one as well.

Andrey Rublev at the 2023 Monte Carlo Masters. After losing to Carlos Alcaraz at the Nitto ATP Finals in Turin, Italy, recently, he reacted by hitting himself in the knee to the point of drawing blood. *Photograph by* ***si.robi***.

Tennis, Congress and anger (mis)management

November 19, 2023

From the courts of the Nitto ATP Finals in Turin, Italy, to the halls of the United States Congress, these have not been the best of times for men and anger management.

The Robert F. Kennedy Memorial in Arlington National Cemetery in Arlington, Virginia, includes a wall that contains part of the improvised speech Kennedy made before a Black crowd in Indianapolis on the night the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated, April 4, 1968. It’s considered one of the great empathetic speeches of the modern era. *Photograph by* *Rob Miller.*

Ron DeSantis and 'the awful grace of God'

September 5, 2023

What are we to make of Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’ bid for the presidency? After he was overwhelmingly reelected governor last November, the New York Post dubbed him “De Future.” But he stumbled early on the campaign trail — bleeding money and staffers, hardly confidence-inspiring in a man looking to become the most powerful executive in the world; sliding in the polls; and turning in a mediocre performance in the Republicans debate, after which everyone was talking about irritating, more-Trump-than-vous Vivek Ramaswamy and, to a lesser extent, disapproving schoolmarm Nikki Haley, Christian milquetoast Mike Pence, blustery Jersey boy Chris Christie and steel magnolia Asa Hutchinson.

My favorite photograph of Novak Djokovic ,at the moment it all began to happen for him, defeating Jo-Wilfried Tsonga in the semifinals of Wimbledon 2011 to become the number one-ranked men’s player.

The improbable triumph of Novak Djokovic

August 22, 2023

In our endless summer of discontent — the heat, the humidity, the devastating wildfires, the smoke, the wayward storms, the indictments, the losing Yankees, to name but a few — I’d like to take a break and return to a subject that helped inspire my fiction and this blog, tennis and in particular Novak Djokovic, whose career trajectory has a lot to do with two pairs of themes that fascinate me — power and rivalry and context and perception.

In 1976, President Gerald R. Ford presented the Congressional Medal of Honor to Rear Admiral James B. Stockdale for his leadership as a prisoner during the Vietnam War. Stockdale, whom I interviewed when he was a vice presidential candidate on Ross Perot’s 1992 independent ticket, said that the writings of Epictetus helped him get through his ordeal. U.S. Navy photograph by Dave Wilson.

A guide to living through the chaos

January 14, 2023

I no sooner arrived in Washington, D.C., for Christmas than the sister I was traveling with came down with Covid and the sister we were visiting developed a non-Covid virus. Other family members became sick as well. (Miracle of miracles, I never got Covid.) On my return, I had a sinus attack that has left me tired, which is why this New Year’s post is so tardy. Apologies, dear readers.

As I sat alone at breakfast in the hotel, shuttling between drop-offs for the Covid sister in the room next to mine and visits to the non-Covid sister, I had an opportunity to read a book that has had a profound effect on my life and that I believe can help you navigate the world as well.

Eugène Delacroix’s “Medea About to Murder Her Children” (1862), oil painting. Musée du Louvre. The ancient Greek myth — the subject of Luigi Cherubini’s “Medea” at The Metropolitan Opera — has also been misinterpreted, most recently in Maureen Dowd’s column on Vladimir Putin.

Our crisis of critical thinking and leadership

October 6, 2022

In his perceptive eulogy for Queen Elizabeth II, Justin Welby, archbishop of Canterbury, observed: “People of loving service are rare in any walk of life. Leaders of loving service are still rarer.”

Ain’t that the truth. At the risk of sounding like the hammer always in search of a nail, I must nonetheless note once again that we are in an increasing crisis of leadership, from Vladimir Putin’s bungling attempts to conquer Ukraine, which would be laughable if they weren’t so horrific and dangerous, to the ham-fisted handling of Miami Dolphins’ quarterback Tua Tagovailoa’s concussion. (The doctor/consultant who cleared him to play was fired. Really? The team’s front office and ownership should all be fired.

What does it mean to be a leader? it means you are a steward of everything and everyone in your care, a servant of others. It means you take responsibility, even when you are not directly involved in the action. Say what you want about QEII, put she saw herself as a steward, one who remained on the job till her dying day.

For most, however, it’s me, me, me all the time, and it doesn’t help that people don’t really understand this, because they have a limited understanding of culture.

The latest novel in my series “The Games Men Play,” a romantic historical thriller built around the opera “Turandot,” is due out from JMS Books Sept. 17.

Riddling the readers with my new book

September 9, 2022

A number of tough deadlines have prevented me recently from blogging and ashamed of it I am, too, as there have been so many juicy storylines on which to comment — the ridiculous ruling on former President Donald J. Trump’s request for a special master, which will undoubtedly be appealed by the Justice Department;

The less than Churchillian new British prime minister, Liz Truss;

The new nonbinary Joan of Arc play, which asks the question, Does it matter that Joan of Arc was a woman? (Of course it does, since it’s one of the reasons she was executed);

And the zigzag rise of Nick Kyrgios, one of a long line of idiosyncratic players (John McEnroe, having another moment, still; Andre Agassi and Novak Djokovic, who should just get the damn jab and be done with it already) in an idiosyncratic sport.

But I want to beg my readers indulgence for a moment as I announce the Sept. 17 publication of my latest novel, “Riddle Me This.”“Riddle Me This” (JMS Books, Sept. 17)….