Paradise is lost: Remembering New Orleans
For two decades ANDREI CODRESCU has been living in and writing about his adopted city, where, as he puts it, the official language is dreams. Andrei is a refugee born in Transylvania who found his home in a place where vampires roam the streets and voodoo queens live around the corner; and where, in the French Quarter, no one ever sleeps. Alas, as we now know, Paradise is lost. His new book is New Orleans, Mon Amour — an epic love song, a clear-eyed elegy, a cultural celebration, and a thank-you note to New Orleans in its Golden Age.
ALSO:
For a brief moment, the country tried genuine interracial democracy — in the era of Reconstruction following the Civil War. Historian ERIC FONER explains; his new book is Forever Free: The Story of Emancipation and Reconstruction.
PLUS:
It was thirty years ago today: the legendary Born to Run album is back, remastered. ANTHONY deCURTIS of Rolling Stone will comment on the album where Bruce Springsteen left behind his adolescent definitions of love and freedom. Anthony’s most recent book is In Other Words : Artists Talk About Life and Work.
PLAYLIST: “Tenth Avenue Freezeout”; “Thunder Road”; “Backstreets”; “Born to Run.”
its a death trap, its a suicide rap
We gotta get out while we’re young
Cause tramps like us. . . .
More Stuff to read: Jon Wiener on “UCLA’S DIRTY THIRTY” from The Nation
