Browse Authors

A Voice in the Chorus PAUL BAUMANN The clattering sound of typewriters—“slapsplapslap…slap…slapslap….slapslap…ching!”—can be heard in veteran Time magazine essayist Lance Morrow’s new book. But...

Revisiting Cardinal Spellman (February 2023)

Master Builders PAUL BAUMANN I recently spent too many hours plowing through John Cooney’s four-hundred-page 1984 biography, The American Pope: The Life and Times of Francis Cardinal...

A Catholic politics? (March 2022)

The Pillage of Afghanistan On February 11, President Joe Biden signed an executive order allocating the funds of the Afghanistan central bank that are frozen in the United...

â€˜Mankâ€™ (March 2021)

PAUL BAUMANN 'Citizen Kane' Revisited The 'Commonweal' connection I had read quite a bit of praise for Mank, the new movie about the making of Citizen Kane, before watching it on Netflix. The...

A Promised Land (February 2021)

BOOKS Looking Down from the High Ground PAUL BAUMANN A PROMISED LAND BARACK OBAMA Crown $45 | 768 pp. As an ardent and occasionally shameless admirer of President Barack Obama, I am chagrined...

Coventry (January 2020)

BOOKS The Story or the Truth? PAUL BAUMANN COVENTRY rachel cusk Farrar, Straus & Giroux, $27, 250 pp. R achel Cusk, the best-selling British author of what has been called the “Outline”...

William Barr, Catholic moralist (December 2019)

SHORT TAKES PAUL BAUMANN William Barr, Catholic Moralist The U.S. attorney general reduces the Gospel to a ‘micro-morality'—one that doesn't apply to his boss. I finally got around to reading...

Nobody's Looking at You (May 2019)

Paul Baumann Relentless Interrogator Nobody's Looking at You Essays Janet Malcolm Farrar, Straus and Giroux, $27, 304 pp. Janet Malcolm, a frequent contributor to the New Yorker and the New...

History Submerged (December 2018)

TRAVEL Paul Baumann History Submerged SEE THE ORKNEYS WHILE YOU CAN In September of2003, I took a trip to Scotland with Commonweals longtime contributor and movie critic Rand Cooper. As it...

As a City on a Hill (November 2018)

Paul Baumann Pilgrims & Progress As a City on a Hill The Story ofAmerica's Most Famous Lay Sermon Daniel T. Rodgers Princeton University Press, $29.95, 368 pp. "A s a city on a hill" is a...

Time to Leave? (October 2018)

Paul Baumann Time to Leave? WHAT IT MEANS TO BE LOYAL AFTER SCANDAL Damon Linker is the erudite and artful senior correspondent for the TheWeek.com. He was an editor at First Things from 2001 to...

Editor's Notebook (July 2018)

EDITOR'S NOTEBOOK Paul Baumann A Farewell Note MY THREE DECADES AT COMMONWEAL After twenty-eight years at Commonweal, fifteen as editor, I will be stepping aside after this issue. I am...

Douthat in the Lion's Den (June 2018)

NOTEBOOK Paul Baumann Douthat in the Lion's Den THE NEW YORK TIMES'S RESIDENT CATHOLIC MEETS HBO'S VILLAGE ATHEIST New York Times columnist Ross Douthat was on HBO's Real Time with BillMaher in...

A Precarious Unity? (May 2018)

ARTICLES A Precarious Unity? Ross Douthat's Critique of Pope Francis Paul Baumann To Change the Church Pope Francis and the Future of Catholicism Ross Douthat Simon & Schuster, $26, 256...

Fr. Nonomen (May 2018)

NOTEBOOK Paul Baumann Fr. Nonomen REQUIESCAT IN PACE After a relatively brief but difficult battle with melanoma, Fr. John Baran, known as Fr. Nonomen to readers of Commonweal, died the Saturday...

Editor's Notebook (February 2018)

EDITOR'S NOTEBOOK Paul Baumann Strike 3 ? ANOTHER DAY, ANOTHER ANGRY LETTER Over the years, I have received my fair share of intemperate letters. One hesitates to respond, let alone to respond...

Christmas Critics (December 2017)

Paul Baumann Suzy Hansen’s Notes on a Foreign Country: An American Abroad in a Post-American World (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, $26, 276 pp.) has gotten a good deal of attention, and deservedly so....

A Plague of Snakes Transfigured (November 2017)

ART Paul Baumann A Plague of Snakes Transfigured CRISTOBAL DE VILLALPANDO AT THE METROPOLITAN MUSEUM OF ART up rom Colonial Mexico, a Towering Vision of Grace” was the headline for the New York...

The Catholic Imagination, Then & Now (June 2017)

EDITOR'S NOTEBOOK Paul Baumann The Catholic Imagination THEN & NOW Irecently spoke, alongside my colleague Dominic Preziosi, at Fordham University's Lincoln Center Campus during a conference on...

Padre Pio Under Glass (March 2016)

Paul Baumann Padre Pio Under Glass In February the bodies of two long-dead Catholic saints, the extraordinarily popular Padre Pio and the lesser-known Padre Leopoldo, were driven across Italy, and...

An editorial dissent (September 2013)

AN EDITORIAL DISSENT Limited & Proportionate Paul Baumann Contrary to the speculation in some quarters, there exists a spectrum of views on political as well as theological questions among...

Christmas Critics (December 2012)

Paul Baumann It is hard to imagine two more exotic, enchanting, difficult, and yet different childhoods than those described in Alexandra Styron's Reading My Father (Scribner, $15, 285 pp.) and...

A Refuge? (November 2009)

Editor’s Notebook Paul Baumann A Refuge? CATHOLICS, THE CHURCH & THE CULTURE WARS An amusing description recently appeared in the Times Literary Supplement regarding what talents and...

Yes, Mr. President (July 2009)

The Last Word Yes, Mr. President Paul Baumann “Apologies for the short notice,” began the e-mail I received late in the afternoon on Tuesday, June 30. It was from the assistant press...

A LETTER TO OUR READERS (November 2008)

Commonweal . November 21, 2008 A Letter to Our Readers Dear Commonweal Reader, It has been a tumultuous 2008, to say the least, with economic gloom, chaos in the financial markets, and a...

Confusions (November 2008)

Confusions infrogmation The last Word Paul Baumann David Carlin, to discuss the question of whether a Catholic can vote for a prochoice candidate. Early in October, I appeared at St....

Among the Catholic Commentariat (June 2008)

Among the Catholic Commentariat My Seven Hours of Fame Paul Baumann C ommonweal is not very high on the media food chain, and I’m not one of the handful of usual suspects the media rely on...

A LETTER TO OUR READERS (December 2007)

Commonweal . December 7, 2007 6 Dear Commonweal Reader, Over the years, in subtle and not-so-subtle ways, I’ve told you something of the challenges of publishing a small magazine—...

Cary Grant, Angel (January 2007)

The Last Word t--. t*% i ! Cary Grant, Angel Paul Baumann T he New York Times ran a brief "Appreciation" titled "'The Bishop's Wife'" at the bottom of its column of editorials on...

Editorial 'Adveniat regnum tuum' (December 2004)

Adveniat regnum tuum' Advent, at least in the Northern Hemisphere, is the season of diminishing light. The closer we come to the winter solstice, the greater we seem to need hope and reassurance....

Editorial Bush redux (November 2004)

Bush redux George W. Bush does not deserve a second term as president. His record of miscalculation, error, and deceit with regard to the invasion of Iraq alone should have been enough for voters...

Editorial A Catholic president? (November 2004)

A Catholic president? This eightieth anniversary issue of Commonweal goes to press a week before Election Day. Many of our subscribers will know the result of the 2004 presidential race-if there is...

Notebook Catholics & democracy (November 2004)

NOTEBOOK CATHOLICS & DEMOCRACY Michael Williams & the culture wars Home readers may recall that I have a serendipitous connection with Commonweal's founding editor, Michael Williams (1877-1950)....

Editorial Debates & decisions (October 2004)

Debates & decisions As we go to press, President George W. Bush and Senator John Kerry are preparing for their third and final debate. It is conventional wisdom that Senator Kerry won the first two...

Editorial The war president (May 2004)

The war president One year ago, dressed in a flight suit and striking the pose of a warrior, President George W. Bush landed in a jet on the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln. Addressing the...

Editorial Beyond the numbers (March 2004)

STAFF Editor: Paul Baumann Man a, ut Editor: Patrick Jordan Assocrrife• Editors: Daria Donnelly (Al Large•) Grant Gallicho Maurice Timothy Reidy Production Editor l" Lwc brxrrster: Tiina...

Editorial Premature judgments (December 2003)

EDITOTIALS Premature judgments As expected, the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court has ruled (Goodridge, et al. v. Department of Public Health) that denying same-sex couples the right to civil...

Editorial Democracy at home & abroad (November 2003)

Democracy at home & abroad Bold. Visionary. Idealistic. Courageous. These were just a few of the adjectives used by supporters to describe President George W. Bush's November 6 speech before the...

Editorial That's entertainment (October 2003)

That's entertainment Although much of the country was mystified by, even aghast at, California's recall election, Californians appear to have enjoyed the spectacle immensely, turning out in droves...

Editorial A remarkable presence (October 2003)

A remarkable presence John Paul II, who marks the twenty-fifth anniversary of his papacy October 16, has been the only pope many, perhaps most, Catholics now alive have ever known. His influence,...

Editorial The war on terrorism (September 2003)

The war on terrorism It has been two years since Islamist terrorists destroyed the World Trade Center and crashed a plane into the Pentagon. Since September 11, 2001, life in this country and in...

Editorials Further than 'Roe'? (July 2003)

FURYHER THAN 'ROE'? Should states be permitted to criminalize homosexual sodomy but not heterosexual sodomy? Of course not. Singling out a class of persons is discriminatory and violates the...

Editorials Learning curve (July 2003)

EDITORIAL Learning curve can the bishops get anything right? If events surrounding last month's U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) meeting were any indication, the answer is no. The...

Editorial War & partisan politics (May 2003)

War & partisan politics A French Catholic journalist and priest recently visited Commonweal's office (don't tell Attorney General John Ashcroft about this possible collaboration with the "enemy")....

Editorial After victory (April 2003)

After victory H owever dubious George W. Bush's decision to go to war, the swift mil-itary victory of the United States and Britain over Saddam Hussein's forces in Iraq is a good thing. A short war...

Editorial Tax fraud (April 2003)

EDITORIAL Tax fraud He resident George W. Bush wants Congress to pass a budget for fiscal year 2004 whose centerpiece is a $726-billion tax cut (over ten years). The president plans to eliminate...

Editorial Baghdad & beyond (March 2003)

Baghdad & beyond On March 17, President George W. Bush, having failed to secure backing from the UN for the use of force against Iraq, issued his final ultimatum to Saddam Hussein. The dictator and...

Editorials Still challenged (February 2003)

STILL CHALLENGED The destruction of the space shuttle Columbia on February 1 the oldest orbiter in the NASA fleet and of its valiant crew, will assume an unshakable place in our collective memory....

Editorials Will war come? (February 2003)

EDITORIALS Will war come? As the headline in the New York Post approvingly proclaimed, President George W. Bush's January 28 State of the Union speech was an instance of "Pounding the War Drum."...

Notebook A word from the editor (January 2003)

NOTEBOOK A WORD FROM THE EDITOR How I got here & why I stayed I began subscribing to Commonweal and submitted my first article to the magazine as a student at Yale Divinity School twenty-three...

Family connections (December 2002)

PAUL BAUMANN OF SEVERAL MINDS FAMILY CONNECTIONS Monsignor O'Brien's Daytop Village I went for my first helicopter ride the other day. Naturally, I was apprehensive about buzzing around...

'Ground Zero' (October 2002)

OF SEVERAL MINDS PAUL BAUMANN 'GROUND ZERO' Looking west from Church Street I did not pay close attention to the media coverage of the September 11 commemorative events. So much of it seemed...

Reforming the church Is the era of 'faithful dissent' over? (September 2002)

OF SEVERAL MINDS PAUL BAUMANN REFORMING THE CHURCH Will we all become saints? In too many instances the reaction of Catholics to the church's sexual-abuse scandal has been as demoralizing as the...

Catholicism for dummies Where the pundits on the abuse scandal have gone wrong (June 2002)

PAUL BAUHANN CATHOLICISM FOR DUMMIES in the New York Times ("Is the Pope Catholic?" May 4). Hertzberg is no slouch, and while his New Yorker editorials sometimes betray a certain smugness, he is...

Correspondence Sex abuse & baby boomers (June 2002)

CORROSPONDENCE Prove it Peter Steinfels's "The Church's Sex-Abuse Crisis" (April 19) is interesting, but he repeatedly makes use of the assertion that "what we are not seeing is a new post-1993...

Primary boomer From Eugene McCarthy to Bill Clinton (May 2002)

PAUL BAUNANN PRIMARY BOOMER Bill Clinton as scapegoat The tall, gray-haired man walking purposefully down the hall at Commonweal's old Dutch Street offices looked vaguely familiar, but it wasn't...

Mud in your eye (April 2002)

PAUL BAUNANN MUD IN YOUR EYE The sex-abuse scandal as seen from the pews I have spent a fair amount of time over the past ten years, both in print and at cocktail and dinner parties, defending...

At sea Our correspondent risks sunburn & other tropical dangers (December 2001)

PAUL BAUMANN AT SEA Adventures in the Caribbean Rand Richards Cooper, known as "Cooper" to his friends, is best known to Commonweal readers as this magazine's loquacious film critic....

Scrutiny & then some: What's behind the flood of books about the church and the Holocaust? (November 2001)

OF SEVERAL MINOS PAUL BAUNANN SCRUTINY & THEN SOME The church & the Holocaust David I. Kertzer's The Popes against the Jews: The Vatican and the Rise of Modern AntiSemitism (Alfred A....

My son the boy scout: How intolerant is the BSA? (October 2001)

OF SEVERAL MINDS PAUL BAUNANN MY SON THE BOY SCOUT Does he belong to a bigoted organization? Ihad a brief but calamitous career as a Boy Scout. When I was in eighth grade my family moved from...

ANTHROPOLOGY WITH A DIFFERENCE: How Mary Douglas makes sense of hierarchy, ritual, and the nature of religious change. A profile. (August 2001)

ANTHROPOLOGY WITH A DIFFERENCE Mary Douglas at 80 Paul Baumann In its issue of October 6,1995, the Times Literary Supplement printed a list of the "hundred books which have most influenced...

Crossing 125th Street: A commuter encounters an apparition (June 2001)

PAUL BAUMANN CROSSING 125th STREET I sometimes miss the elephants Twice a day I catch a bus across Harlem at 125th Street on my way between the Metro-North railway station and Commonweal's...

AN INTERVIEW WITH ALAN WOLFE (May 2001)

FREE f O DO WHAT? An interview with Alan Wolfe Paul Baumann Alan Wolfe is professor of political science and director of the Boisi Center for Religion and American Public Life at Boston...

You will eat again: The most important conflict in American life explained. (May 2001)

OF SEVERAL MINDS PAUL BAUNANN YOU WILL EAT AGAIN On the front line of the gender wars Not long ago the business of counting chads and elec toral votes in Honda raised the ominous...

Agent Hanssen: The orthodox spy (March 2001)

OF SEVERAL MINOS PAUL BAUNANN AGENT HANSSEH The spy who came in from the fold Sim Philby's My Silent War disclosed how he rose to head the British Secret Service's counterespionage...

Catholicism & anti-Semitism: Novelist Mary Gordon's jaundiced view of John Paul II (February 2001)

C ORRESPONDENCE A clarification In my letter inquiring about the church's agenda regarding a sexual orientation that it considers objectively disordered, the editors of Commonweal replied,...

Waugh on the media: News from Florida and Ishmaelia (January 2001)

PAUL BAUNANN WAUGH ON THE MEDIA Get it first, then get it right Istarted watching the returns early election night. Consequently, I heard Dan Rather, CBS's king of cornpone, begin the...

Counting votes (November 2000)

A New York Times editorial [October 11] also weighs in on most one-quarter of all U.S. counties the population is this important issue: "The fact is that in the nearly three under...

Nurse Betty Saving Grace (October 2000)

Betty is also speeding off with half...

Shower Space Cowboys (September 2000)

SCRE touches on the universal appeal of...

Small Time Crooks Mission: Impossible 2 (July 2000)

and betray Frenchy, who aspires to the C R E...

Keeping the Faith/The Virgin Suicides Gladiator (June 2000)

skin to come off as a clown, let alone...

The novelist & the director (May 2000)

as I love You? Or was it really You...

Notebook: Our man in Westport (February 2000)

Many of the Hutu rebel fighters have become mere bandits and are no longer under the control of any political authority. Mandela is not naive about the difficulties. His apparent strategy is to...

Notebook (December 1999)

NOTEBOOK CROSSING THE THRESHOLD The pope makes a house call Religion and sex. It's a marriage made in heaven. I learned this while reading George Weigel's back-breaking, thousand-page biography...

Commonweal Confronts the Century (November 1999)

DEPRESSING & EXHILARATING Sommonweal Confronts the Century Liberal Convictions, Catholic Tradition Udited by Patrick Jordan & Paul Baumann l't<nJist<»n\. US, 411 ;>;;. Nary NcGrory T his fat...

BLASPHEMY ON STAGE? (October 1998)

BLASPHEMY ON STAGE? "Corpus Christi': The play & the controversy Paul Baumann ast May, William Donohue, the ever-vigilant president of the Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights, raised...

Critics' choices for Christmas From the "Book of Nonsense" to the "Vegetarian Planet," the joys of "Hardboiled America" to "The Bridge on the Drina," our critics urge you to stuff your stockings with good books this Christmas (December 1997)

Paul Baumann Paul Baumann is executive editor of Commonweal. How many gimlet-eyed and razor-tongued English lady novelists can there be? Ev-idently an unlimited supply. I was vaguely aware of the...

Correspondence Lincoln & Saginaw revisited (August 1997)

Not a feel-good' faith Peter Steinfels's article about Murray Kempton [June 6] hurts me deeply. I am concerned that a respected journalist would attempt to characterize something as deep and...

Correspondence Paul Baumann and columnist David R Carlin, Jr, engage in colloquy with their critics (July 1997)

CORROSPONDENCE Re: Baumann on Carroll Paul Baumann's piece [May 23] on James Carroll's New Yorker article, "The Silence," is so gratuitously nega-tive, so distorting, and so harshly and...

Notebook Breakfast special (July 1997)

BREAKFAST SPECIAL Paul Baumann Things left behind on Dutch Street On Thursday mornings I make a point of head-ing for work at a very godly hour, traveling from Manhattan's Upper West Side to the...

Notebook Re: James Carroll On the Holocaust, the church, and the New Yorker (May 1997)

NOTEBOOK Paul Baumann RE: JANES CARROLL The Church & the Holocaust James Carroll is a National Book Award winner, the author of nine novels, and a regular columnist for the Boston Globe. His...

Notebook Where's Papa? Is Christianity intrinsically anti-Semitic? Sometimes it seems so (July 1996)

Paul Baumann WHERE'S PAPA? A shiva candle on the stove A shiva candle, with its emphatic blue Jewish star, burned in our kitchen for seven days and nights last month. My father-in-law, Max Horst...

Flytes of fancy Evelyn Waugh might not have liked the film but he did like the book Our associate editor likes both (January 1996)

NOTEBOOK Paul Baumann FLYTES OF FANCY 'Brideshead' all over again Santa was very good to me this year. I certainly didn't deserve it. Somehow-perhaps it was my incessant whining-she managed to...

Critics' choices for Christmas Traveling widely, reading closely (even eccentrically), and judging perspicaciously, our panel of Christmas critics has put together a list of titles that includes everything from an obedient Lassie to God's brilliantly wayward "biographer" And then there's the poetry and the theology Please share the good words (December 1995)

Paul Baumann Paul Baumann is the associate editor of Commonweal. Now this is fun! It's not every day, or every Christmas, that one gets to share space with two of the authors one is about to...

Notebook: (June 1995)

NOTEBOOK HITTING BOTTOM CUSTODY OF THE EYES IN NEW YORK In April, New York City started getting rid of the blowzy advertising posters that have long adorned the inside of its subway cars. "Brand...

Where symbols really matter (January 1995)

WHERE SYMBOLS REALLY MATTER Paul Baumann My aunt, my mother's older sister, died in September after a fierce but relatively brief struggle with lung cancer. As a Navy wife- her husband is a...

Saint Joseph, a.k.a. Leopold Bloom (December 1994)

SAINT JOSEPH, a.k.a. LEOPOLD BLOOM ON FATHERHOOD & HOPEFULNESS PAUL BAUMANN J e were lying in bed discussing our children, as married people sometimes do just before turning off the light...

Notebook (October 1994)

EPISTEMOLOGICAL MUDDLES RELIGION & THE MEDIA - ommonweal held its second "War of the Worldviews9" forum on the "neuralgic" relationship between the media and religion at...

Seeing through a glass, darkly (August 1994)

AN INTERVIEW WITH DAVID PLANTE Seeing through n glass, darkly PAUL BAUMANN David Plante, whose distinctive fiction and spare narrative style are often descnbed as "hypnot ic" and "mystical,"...

Notebook (February 1994)

NOTEBOOK FEAR OF FLYING UNRAVELING WITH MICHAEL & LIZ We went to Florida before Christmas to visit with my wife's parents. We flew. To be honest, I'm not wild about flying. Like anything...

An incarnational ethic (January 1994)

AN INCARNATIONAL ETHIC LISTENING TO ONE ANOTHER Paul Baumann Sex, as John S. Dunne has written, is initially "experienced as a terrible purpose at work in one's life, a purpose that is not...

Notebook: (September 1993)

his studied distance from the ongoing Middle East negotia- ceal how much in the magazine was his own work. In one tions in Washington, must have made it abundantly clear to of these,...

The Subversive Family: (June 1993)

thority is both partial and reciprocal......

Editor's notebook (June 1993)

Jew would go back to Germany? You don't go in a lion's den." But on...

Editor's notebook: (April 1993)

done to children, women, and men by poverty, drugs, and un- ...

Editor's notebook (January 1993)

tributed to machinations by leaders of the Catholic church, accusations that recall the nineteenth-century nativists who saw immigrant Catholics marching to the papal baton. An Afri-...

Fetal positions (December 1992)

THERE AT THE 'NEW YORKER' FETAL POSITIONS AND THE ODOR OF NARCISSE he New Yorker's first issue (October 5) under new editor Tina Brown (former editor notoriously of Vanity Fair) presented its...

Editor's notebook (November 1992)

was formed and a fierce war has raged ever since. The crimes of both the government and the SPLA are legion. In particular, there is a religious war being waged against non-Muslims. In January 1992,...

An editor's notebook (June 1992)

AN EDITOR'S NOTEBOOK SUCH, SUCH WERE THE JOYS THE RHETORIC OF RACIAL VIOLENCE I woke early and a bit apprehensive the Thursday morning after the Rodney King verdict in Los Angeles. It was around...

At Weddings and Wakes (May 1992)

BOOKS Imperishable identities Aft Old Momma Towne, the AT WEDDINGS AND WADS widowed Irish matriarch Alice McDermott of Alice McDermott's Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, $19, 213 pp. stunning new...

An editor's notebook (April 1992)

AN EDITOR'S NOTEBOOK LITURGICAL GRIDLOCK LENT BEGINS IN MANHATTAN New York City on Ash Wednesday is a bit like a funeral in a fractious family—even the most estranged relatives are eager to put...

An editor's notebook (February 1992)

AN EDITOR'S NOTEBOOK ANNA QUINDLEN'S CHURCH OBJECTIONS FROM A MAD HATTER I find Anna Quindlen to be a remarkably representative liberal figure, and never more so than when expatiating on the...

Awaiting this year's revelation (December 1991)

AWAITING THIS YEAR'S REVELATION CHRISTMAS, OBSTETRICIANS & 156,436 PLASTIC TOYS PAUL BAUMANN e have two beautiful and affectionate children, both blessed with good health, tolerable...

Critics' choices for Christmas (December 1991)

BOOKS Critics' choices for Christmas Molly Finn MOLLY FINN, a New Yorker, is the author of three cookbooks. A musician, she sings with Amici Musicale. When not singing, she's reading. 'm...

Doing for ourselves (November 1991)

Arevolution as the party of Anglo-conformity and Protestant provincialism-are now seen by the public, fairly or not, as the party of universal values. Conservatives who had few objections...

A search for the 'unfettered self (May 1991)

MANY GORDON ON LIFE & LITERATURE A search for the 'unfettered self' PAUL BAUMANN PAUL BAUMANN is associate editor of Commonweal. "agreeable fantasy." But, as so often with people this writer...

Screen (May 1991)

ne of the commonplaces of casual criticism is to suggest or to deny that there are strong sim- ilarities between Neil Simon and Alan Ayckbourn. Benedict Nightingale was in the denial column...

The sources of desire (May 1991)

forcibly into his writing. "Clumsy life again at her stupid work," Greene said. A convert, he did not come to an emotional under- standing of his faith until he went to Mexico to report on the...

Screen (April 1991)

put the building on the market for $650,000. Even if it sells for only $550,000, he will have secured a gross rate of return of 150 percent over three years. r. C's case is illustrative of a...

Limits of the just war (March 1991)

ably never will learn of it all. The conduct of the war has rendered the initial UN terms of engagement null. We have made waste of Iraq to save Kuwait. And the overriding concern has become only...

These guys know how to write: (October 1990)

SO MANY BOOKS, SO LITTLE TIME These guys know how to write PAUL BAUMANN There aren't many craftsmen who wield as sharp or deft a blade as Wilfrid Sheed. His flashing strokes cut into the object...

Intimately interposed: (September 1990)

OF SEVERAL MINDS Paul Baumann INTIMATELY INTERPOSED COPING IN MANHATTAN It was some time in March before I broke down and surrendered my first quarter to a beggar. It was a bitterly cold night,...

Finding Fault: (August 1990)

PLAYING FOR KEEPS FINDING FAULT Michael O. Garvey Thomas More Press, $10.95 paper, 200 pp. Paul Baumann After reading Michael O. Garvey one hesitates to imagine what the other six redoubtable...

Who won this round? (June 1990)

CONNECTICUT ABORTION LAW WHO WON THIS ROUND? PROLIFE CLAIMS A LEGAL BEACHHEAD Connecticut Acts to Make Abortion a Statutory Right," read the New York Times headline. "Measure is Seen as...

Screen (May 1990)

ROCKIN' & ROLLIN' 'CRY-BABY' & 'MYSTERY TRAIN' In Soul on Ice (McGraw-Hill, 1968) Eldridge Cleaver identified the 1954 Brown v. Board of Education desegregation decision as the pivotal event in...

Screen: (May 1990)

SCREEN WHAT'S LEFT OF DESIRE? 'PRETTY WOMAN' & 'TOO BEAUTIFUL' Director Garry Marshall's popular new film, Pretty Woman, takes its title from Roy Orbison's wonderful rock 'n' roll standard....

School in the marketplace (April 1990)

REPORT FROM CHICAGO SCHOOL IN THE MARKETPLACE THE FUTURE OF CATHOLIC EDUCATION? Be careful how you use the "Y" word around Sister Mary Ellen Caron. "If you visit us, you'll know we're not,"...

Screen (April 1990)

SCREEN THE BOOKS WERE BETTER 'HANDMAID'S TALE' & 'RED OCTOBER' Dull-witted adolescent righteousness is the sacred vocabulary of The Handmaid's Tale. Adapted from Margaret Atwood's well-received...

Screen: (April 1990)

SCREEN A WEALTH OF GRACES 'LEFT FOOT' & 'PARADISO' The poor, absurdly prolific, Irish working-class Catholic family Christy Brown grew up in would seem to be as constricting and stultifying as...

The way we are (sigh) (December 1989)

SO MANY BOOKS, SO LITTLE TIME The way we are (sigh) PAUL BAUMANN Books Discussed in this Column America Observed, Alislair Cooke, Alfred A. Knopf, $19.95.231 pp. More Like Us, James Fallows,...

Screen: (October 1989)

SCREEN TAKE YOUR GALOSHES 'SEA OF LOVE' & 'BLACK RAIN' As the sexually voracious Helen in Sea of Love, Ellen Barkin goes at men like Giants linebacker Lawrence Taylor goes after opposing...

Correspondence (October 1989)

CORRESPONDENCE One Giant error Rye, N.Y. To the Editors: As a loyal New York Giant fan (baseball) I should point out the factual error in Paul Baumann's book review in the August 11 issue:...

Screen: (October 1989)

SCREEN SCORCHING THE SCREEN 'SEX, LIES' & 'LETHAL WEAPONS' vulnerability to my conduct makes me a better listener in prayer, as in my life with Kate. I try to be more solicitous of what really...

Screen: (September 1989)

SCREEN COMBUSTIBLE VIGILANTES 'CASUALTIES OF WAR' & 'BATMAN' Director Brian DePalma, who can track and dolly and splatter blood with the best of them, brings an uncharacteristic moral fervor to...

Beckoned by the mother tongue: (August 1989)

SO MANY BOOKS. SO LITTLE TIME Beckoned by the mother tongue PAUL BAUMANN ed Williams, the Boston Red Sox's mercurial genius (he had a lifetime batting average of .344), last ambled to the plate...

Never a question of easy grace: (July 1989)

NEVER A QUESTION OF EASY GRACE THOMAS KENEALLY'S FANTASTICAL CREATURES What are we to make of a novelist whose lankly numinous attitude toward the womb is best likened to the Lord...

Mosaics, magicians, & mystery: (June 1989)

SO MANY BOOKS, SO LITTLE TIME Mosaics, magicians, & mystery PAUL BAUMANN These tomes-two of which are deceptively, nay, sinis-terly, thin-each present the literary ideas of an estimable man of...

The Great Divide: (December 1988)

BOOKS Blithely self-centered, if not mean-spirited THE GREAT DIVIDE Second Thoughts on the American Dream Studs Terkel Pantheon Books, $18.95. 439 pp. Paul Baumann This is the book Jeane...

The Bonfire of the Vanities: (February 1988)

BOOKS An icy dip in the real world Whaddaya whaddaya? Only one thing stands between thir- ty-eight-year-old Wall Street whiz Sherman McCoy, once a self-proclaimed Master of the Universe ("There was...

Faith, Sex, Mystery (February 1987)

BOOKS Leaving the Hound at bay When the twentyseven-year-old newly baptised Richard Joan (for Joan of Arc) Thomas ?for Saint Thomas More) Gilman arrived in New Orleans in 1954,...

The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat (March 1986)

between humorous gesture and genuine fear. The only false note in the film follows this escape: a bus fide in which Page opens up to a young woman (Rebecca de Mornay) who, in effect, becomes a...

Baumann, William L. Portier, Nancy Dallavalle, Christopher C. Roberts, Tina Beattie, R. R. Reno, Pat

Baumbach, Jonathan

Baumel, Joan French

Baumgartner, Fedric J.

BAUMSTARK, LYN

Baurn, Gregory

Baxter, Michael J.

Bayard, Martha

Bayley, John

Bayne, David C.

Bayne, William M.

Baytarian, Hagop