Culture

On Anthony Burgess’s A Clockwork Orange, Sam Cooke’s Live at the Harlem Square Club, and why watching something can be the worst way to understand it.

Prince revels in confusion, defying definition and willfully obscuring his past—and, often, his present. How is it, then, that he helps us understand ourselves better?

Almost anybody can join the circus these days, and, thanks to the success of Cirque du Soleil and other marquee shows, probably make a good living doing it. But as the industry finds itself on solid footing, it loses some of the danger and romance that once made it such a unique draw.