POETRY:—

Medieval.   Renaissance.   Restoration.   Neoclassical.   Romantic.  Victorian.   Modern.   Contemporary.

MOVIES:—

Titicut Follies (1967), Frederick Wiseman.   Come and See (1985), Elem Klimov.   The Battle of Algiers (1966), Gillo Pontecorvo.   Pather Panchali (1955), Satyajit Ray.   Children of Paradise (1945), Marcel Carné.   A Man Escaped (1956), Robert Brésson.   La Dolce Vita (1960), Federico Fellini.   The Passion of Joan of Arc (1928), Carl Theodor Dreyer.   The Rules of the Game (1939), Jean Renoir.   M (1931), Fritz Lang.   The Umbrellas of Cherbourg (1964), Jacques Demy.   Secrets and Lies (1996), Mike Leigh.   King Lear (1971), Peter Brook.   The Testament of Dr. Mabuse (1933), Fritz Lang.   Wages of Fear (1953), Henri-Georges Clouzot.   Singin’ in the Rain (1952), Stanley Donen and Gene Kelly.   The 400 Blows (1959), François Truffaut.   La Strada (1954), Federico Fellini.   Lessons of Darkness (1992), Werner Herzog.   On the Waterfront (1954), Elia Kazan.   Blue Velvet (1986), David Lynch.   All That Jazz (1979), Bob Fosse.   Aguirre, The Wrath of God (1972), Werner Herzog.   Dial M for Murder (1954), Alfred Hitchcock.   8½ (1963), Federico Fellini.   Paths of Glory (1957), Stanley Kubrick.   The Apartment (1960), Billy Wilder.   The White Diamond (2004), Werner Herzog.   Badlands (1973), Terence Malick.   Why Does Herr R. Run Amok? (1970), Werner Fassbinder.   The Best Years of Our Lives (1946), William Wyler.   Citizen Kane (1941), Orson Welles.   Stagecoach (1939), John Ford.   Rear Window (1954), Alfred Hitchcock.   Night of the Shooting Stars (1982), Paolo and Vittorio Taviani.   It Happened One Night (1934), Frank Capra.   i Vitelloni (1953), Federico Fellini.   The Maltese Falcon (1941), John Huston.   The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1920), Robert Wiene.   The Treasure of Sierra Madre (1948), John Huston.   The Wild Bunch (1969), Sam Peckinpah.   The Lady Eve (1941), Preston Sturges. Nights of Cabiria (1957), Federico Fellini.   Rebecca (1940), Alfred Hitchcock.   The Big Sleep (1946), Howard Hawks.   All about Eve (1950), Joseph L. Mankiewicz.   Notorious (1946), Alfred Hitchcock.   Night of the Hunter (1955), Charles Laughton.   Double Indemnity (1944), Billy Wilder.   Rififi (1955), Jules Dassin.

PAINTERS:—

  Giotto (1267–1337).   Fra Angelico (1387–1455).   Masaccio (1401–1428).   Filippo Lippi (1406–1469).   Jan Van Eyck (1422–1441).   Botticelli (1445–1510).   Leonardo (1452–1519).   Filippino Lippi (1457–1504).    Michelangelo (1475–1564).   Pontormo (1494–1556).   Holbein (1497–1543).   Bronzino (1503–1572).   Bruegel (1525–1569).   Caravaggio (1571–1610).   Ribera (1591–1652).   De La Tour (1593–1632).   Balthasar van der Ast (1593–1636).   Velazquez (1599–1660).   Rembrandt (1606–1669).   Vermeer (1632–1675).   Goya (1746–1828).   Turner (1775–1851).   Ingres (1780–1867).   Manet (1832–1883).   Corot (1796–1875). Cezanne (1839–1906).   Eakins (1844–1916).  Sargent (1856–1925).   Hammershøi (1864–1916).   Hopper (1882–1967).   Balthus (1908–2001).   Wyeth (born 1917).

NONFICTION:—

Hannah Arendt.   Isaiah Berlin.   Noam Chomsky.   Charles Darwin.   Richard Dawkins.   Daniel C. Dennett.   Richard Feynman.   James Frazer.   Ernst Gombrich.   Temple Grandin.   Primo Levi.   George Orwell.   Samuel Pepys.   Bertrand Russell.   George Santayana.   Hugh Trevor-Roper.   Paul Valéry.

PARTICULAR INTERESTS:—

American politics.   Atomic bomb.   The brain.   Evolution and Darwinism.   Golden-age jazz.   Hoaxes and forgeries.   The Holocaust.   Secular humanism.   Old-time American folk music.   Primates.   Prosody.  Rational skepticism.   Totalitarianism.   Words.   World War II.