The Metaphysics of Music
Singing is not to be understood as an aesthetic sweetener.
The Political Journey of Thomas Mann
by
Ed Simon
Posted on June 5, 2025
in THR Web Features
Image: Illustration for Death in Venice by Maurice Denis/Alamy Stock Photos; photograph of Thomas Mann, Zürcher Museen.
Mann understood, almost too well, the allure of tradition and irrationalism, of the poetic and the mystical.
The Devils’ Citadel Extended
Can the works of the Mechanic Muse be put to genuinely human uses?
The Self That Never Was
Posted on June 17, 2025
in THR Web Features
Image: THR illustration/Shutterstock.
We may be approaching a time when the illusion of selfhood is strengthened, not weakened, because we are surrounded by machines enacting it.
Phenomenology of a Kiddie Ride
Posted on June 26, 2025
in THR Web Features
Image: Porky Pig in mid-gallop; photograph by Leann Davis Alspaugh.
Without a doubt, irony plays a large part in the phenomenon of Porky. His mere existence in a fanciful form at a restaurant that specializes in pork meats is deliciously ironic.