Soccer explains world

Foer, Franklin. (2004). How soccer explains the world: an unlikely theory of globalization. New York: HarperCollins.

Fascinating, enjoyable book.

“Thanks to the immigration of Africans and Asians, Jews have been replaced as the primary objects of European hate.” p.71

Why this world?

I f irst became aware of Lispector in reading Gregory Rabassa's If this be treason : translation and its discontents : a memoir. Seeing this book, I thought it'd be interesting. Sort of, as it turned out, but not enough to excite me and get me to read it. Perhaps another time.

Curious George

Courtesy of de Grummond Children's Literature Collection/ Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company - Final illustration for 'This is George. He lived in Africa.'

A Monkey Born of Trials and Tribulations: interesting article about  the husband-and-wife team of Margret and H.A. Rey, who created Curious George, the little monkey hero of our most famous books," Margret once said, referring to those sacred texts of childhood "Curious George" (since its publication in 1941, it has sold 27 million copies in more than a dozen languages), "Curious George Rides a Bike," "Curious George Flies a Kite" and "Curious George Takes a Job," among others.


A look at some of the drawings by H.A. Rey.

Show will be at The Jewish Museum through Aug. 1

The Endless Allure of El Dorado

The Lost City of Z
By David Grann
(Doubleday, 339 pages, $27.50)



Percy Harrison Fawcett, the affection-starved son of an independently wealthy Devon cricketer, joined the British army, got "slightly gassed" during World War I, surveyed Bolivia, went quietly mad, devoted his middle years to searching for the Lost Cities of the Brazilian rainforest and, while doing so in 1925, vanished.

... his fate remains unknown, and his Lost City – of which Arthur Conan Doyle made much, with the Professor Challenger of his novels based largely on Fawcett – remains unfound.

Now in the hands of David Grann, an amusingly self-deprecating Brooklyn nerd on the staff of the New Yorker, it is brought vividly alive once more in "The Lost City of Z." So good is his recounting of the yarn that no less a luminary than Brad Pitt is said to be interested in a film version.

Review by Simon Winchester, the author of "The Map That Changed the World," "Krakatoa" and, most recently, "The Man Who Loved China."

2 filmsBrazil, Film, Latin America, Music, Musicians, Puerto Rico, Salsa, Spain

Calle 54, and El Cantante