Leonard Bernstein, Mel Brooks, Betty Friedan, and Norman Mailer. Brilliant, brash, yet soulful, they were 100 percent Jewish and 100 percent American. They upended the restrained culture of their forebears and changed American life.They worked in different fields, and, apart from clinking glasses at parties now and then, they hardly knew one another. But they shared a historical moment and a common temperament. For all four, their Jewish heritage was electrified by...

The New York Times –bestselling author and critic investigates whether teens can be turned on to serious reading and what kinds of teachers can do it."Denby makes an impassioned case for the critical importance of books to the lives of young people." — The New York Times Book Review"[A] masterpiece… . . . Denby is especially astute in describing what it takes to c...

In early 2000 the bottom dropped out of the life of writer David Denby when his wife decided to leave him. Propelled to make some money quickly, and seized by the 'irrational exuberance' of the stock market, then approaching its peak, Denby enthusiastically joined the investment frenzy. Over the next few months he listened raptly to bullish stock analysts, dreamy hi-tech gurus and boastful heads of companies. He plunged into a season of mania and was swept forward on currents of hope, gree...

Snark – nounAlso snarky (adj.) and snarkily (adv.)But just what is snark?We all think we recognize snark when we see it – it’s a tone of teasing, snide, undermining abuse, nasty and knowing, that’s spreading through the media. Its practitioners think it’s funny, but it isn’t big and it certainly isn’t clever. So where did it all go wrong? What happened to the black comedy, the clever irony and the pinpoint satire we once admired and how did they turn into a charmles...

A candid memoir of money, desire, and greed, from the author of Great Books.David Denby was a happy and content man living in New York City with a good job, a wife and two sons, and an Upper West Side apartment. But in 2000, he found himself channeling his anger and grief over his wife's decision to end their 18-year marriage into investing. Convinced that the only way to redeem his shattered life--and hold on to the comfy Manhattan apartment he and his wi...

A bestselling author and distinguished critic goes back to high school to find out whether books can shape livesIt's no secret that millions of American teenagers, caught up in social media, television, movies, and games, don't read seriously-they associate sustained reading with duty or work, not with pleasure. This indifference has become a grievous loss to our standing as a great nation--and a personal loss, too, for millions of teenagers who may turn into adult...

Ben Hecht’s critically acclaimed autobiographical memoir, first published in 1954, offers incomparably pungent evocations of Chicago in the 1910s and 1920s, Hollywood in the 1930s, and New York during the Second World War and after.“His manners are not always nice, but then nice manners do not always make interesting autobiographies, and this autobiography has the merit of being intensely interesting.”—Saul Bellow, New York TimesNamed to Time’s list of All...