About
I decided to start a blog for three reasons:
1) People felt that there should be a part of the Threepenny website that was available only online, not in the printed magazine.
2) Some of the things I wanted to write about seemed as if they would benefit from a slightly more timely response than our usual quarterly publication permitted.
3) I was seeing and hearing so much interesting art — especially in the areas of dance and music, though also in literature, theater, and the visual arts — that I couldn't fit everything I wanted to say into The Threepenny Review without taking over the whole publication. And if you are not Diderot or Karl Kraus (and I am certainly neither), it is never a good idea to write the whole magazine yourself. But I figured the rules of blogs would allow me to monopolize one of those.
I struggled to come up with a good title for the blog and at first resisted using my own name, feeling (as those named Lesser are bound to feel) that diminishment is not necessarily a selling point. But then I figured that if people named Grudge or Drudge can use their names on websites, I should certainly not be abashed at calling this The Lesser Blog. So here it is, and I hope you enjoy it.
Wendy Lesser
Editor, The Threepenny Review-
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Category Archives: The Lesser Blog
Available Light
In a 1986 interview, Jerome Robbins attempted to define choreography by saying that it was concerned with not only the way dancers move, “but the way they move in space— because that’s what ballets are about, which is that volume of space which … Continue reading
Pacifica Shostakovich
When I’m in New York, good music is only a short subway ride away. But now that I’m back home in Berkeley, I have to range somewhat farther afield. Last night, my husband and I drove for well over an … Continue reading
Swing Time
I’m in the middle of reading Zadie Smith’s new novel, and it’s one of her best, I think. It addresses all her usual topics—race and its various mixes, growing up in North London, power relationships between girls, sexual relationships between men and … Continue reading
White Light
Every fall for the past few years, at the instigation of Artistic Director Jane Moss, Lincoln Center has put on its “White Light Festival” during October and November. The title comes from a phrase by Arvo Pärt, a famously religious Estonian … Continue reading
Ratmansky’s Serenade
Alexei Ratmansky’s Serenade after Plato’s Symposium is the first dance I’ve seen of his that’s set to American music, and it’s a knock-out. Named after the Leonard Bernstein score it faithfully follows, it is not only the best new dance … Continue reading
A Three-Rattle Week
Even in Berlin, where he has lived for more than a dozen years while conducting the Berlin Philharmonic, you would be hard put to hear Simon Rattle in three different venues in the course of a week. But last week … Continue reading
A Great Così
Così fan tutte is one of those Mozart operas I’ve never been able to warm to. The music is superb—possibly even better than in any of his other operas—but that only makes the cruelty of the plot more noticeable, and … Continue reading
Looking at Art
All summer long, I’ve been waiting to see the four fascinating-sounding art shows that opened in New York while I was away. And now that I’m here, I’ve done so. The first two were at the Whitney: the cumulative Danny … Continue reading
Singing and Opera
I enjoyed the San Francisco Opera‘s new production of Janacek’s Jenufa—just not quite as much as all my friends said I would. They were right about the singing, which was beyond terrific. Karita Mattila as Kostelnicka, William Burden as Laca, … Continue reading
Terrible Movie, Great Concert
In the absence of any surer bet among the early summer offerings, I took a risk last Monday on a movie called The Lobster. After all, I love Colin Farrell and like Rachel Weisz, who were both featured actors in it (and … Continue reading