What We’re Reading

Preeti Aroon: The Elegance of the Hedgehog, by Muriel Barbery. A precocious 12-year-old girl in Paris plans to commit suicide on her 13th birthday, and the concierge of her apartment building spends hours reading about philosophy, in the English translation of this popular French book highlighted in the FP article, “Summer Reading of Our Discontent,” and turned into a movie last summer.

Elizabeth Dickinson: Stratfor’s Annual Forecast for 2010 just came out last week, with a few interesting conclusions. Among the highlights are a resurgent Russia, a United States bogged down in Afghanistan, and a new conflict in Africa: “Angola and South Africa have both matured as independent powers. Now begins their cold war.”

Joshua Keating: I’m not exactly sure why human organ markets are a hot topic this week, but it’s certainly always an interesting subject. In the Wall Street Journal, Marginal Revolution co-blogger Alex Tabarrok looks at innovative solutions some countries are implementing to make up for organ shortages, ranging from preferential treatment given to donors in Israel, to financial incentives for donation in Iran. I’m also trying to track down a friend with a fancier cable package than me so I can watch Dan Rather report on the international black market for kidneys tomorrow. 

David Kenner: I’m reading Jay Solomon’s Wall Street Journal article reporting that the Obama administration is increasingly starting to question the viability of the Iranian regime, as it is presently constructed — and is increasingly crafting policy with an eye toward helping the country’s nascent opposition movement. Also, via the inimitable Leah Farrall , I came across this West Point report, claiming that 85 percent of al Qaeda’s victims are Muslims. Finally, I note with interest the reports that prominent Wall Street investors are heading to Damascus to look into finance opportunities in this long-isolated Arab state. The investors were apparently particularly impressed with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and his deputy Prime Minister for economic affairs, Abdullah al-Dardari. 

Christina Larson: Ian Buruma’s essay in The Globe and Mail on how nationalism — not Communism — is "China’s new orthodoxy." Also, scrutinizing Vanity Fair data regarding Warren Beatty’s, er, extreme productivity.

Annie Lowrey: I just read Ethan Watters’ piece in the New York Times Magazine on the export of American ideas about mental illness to other parts of the world. Apparently, the American understanding of psychological afflictions doesn’t just change how conditions like anorexia are treated in other countries — it changes how people express the illness. I’m looking forward to reading the whole book the article is excerpted from, as I’m interested in how much this has to do with the global saturation of American books, movies, and, especially, television shows like House and E.R, as opposed to the global saturation of, say, U.S. medical texts and techniques. Fascinating stuff.

Britt Peterson: I’m laughing over David Thomson’s evisceration of a book about Hollywood scandals past, including the rumor that Frank Sinatra’s secret to bedroom endurance was Wheaties, on my former employer The New Republic’s sharp new reviews site, The Book. Meanwhile, in Hollywood scandals present, Global Voices (via the NYT) has a round-up of Chinese bloggers responding to Eurocentric themes in Avatar: “I believe if Edward Said is still alive, when he sees that Jake is saved by the princess of Na’vi, he would think: this damn screenwriter!”