Category: First Person

My girlfriend and I are holed up in Harlem, just south of its epicenter at 125thand Lenox Ave, a.k.a. Malcom X Blvd. Since there are no delivery dates available from any purveyor until far into next week (I write on March 31),...

The Modern Decameron, Book 2

by James Livingston | Mar 20, 2020 | Commentary, First Person, James Livingston: Politics and Letters, The Literary Section | 0 |

Neifile goes next in The Decameron, Book/Novel 2, ca. 1348. She tells the story of Abraham the Jew, a devout adherent of the faith, who, being a friend of Johannot de Chevigny, a fellow merchant, is constantly subject to...

The Modern Decameron, Book 1

by James Livingston | Mar 17, 2020 | Commentary, First Person, James Livingston: Politics and Letters, The Literary Section | 0 |

In Boccaccio’s Decameron, there were seven women and three men, self-quarantined in the time of plague, Florence, 1348. The women were Pampinea, elected queen by her peers because she was so decisive, insightful, and cheerful;...

Backstreet Boys

by James Livingston | Sep 28, 2019 | Commentary, First Person | 0 |

I don’t want to spend a lot of time on campus, nobody does unless they’re a dean of something, and my teaching schedule validates this desire. Being a professor is a pretty cool gig because most of the work you’re expected...

These Streets

by James Livingston | Apr 14, 2019 | First Person | 0 |

I walk these streets thinking of you, as always, I remember what never happened, I’m pitched forward in time, nostalgic For the moments still unplanned. You’re with me as I’m walking, as...

Response to Srinivasan

by Nannu Nobis | Jan 14, 2019 | Features, First Person | 0 |

I frequently recoil at articles about race in the US written by Indians who qualify because of color – hair, skin, and eyes – but little else. Many Indians speak good English, are highly educated (I know it’s a...

Ricky and Jim and Me: On Whiteness

by Ragini Tharoor Srinivasan | Jan 9, 2019 | Features, First Person | 0 |

In State College, Pennsylvania, five miles north of the airport, in a stately house on a street that hasn’t quite grown into itself—the trees are like shrubs, which is striking given the wooded expanse one hundred yards away—Jim...

My Neighbors

by Jeffrey J. Williams | Jan 7, 2019 | Features, First Person | 0 |

I live in Squirrel Hill. I moved to Pittsburgh fourteen years ago to take a job as a professor at...

Why I Didn’t Report

by Paige Vaccaro | Sep 29, 2018 | Features, First Person | 0 |

Why I didn’t report. Why I wish I did. Why I would testify… if I saw my attacker was nominated as a Supreme Court Justice. Rutgers University 2001 It was my senior year and I lived off campus with two other...