A Devastating, Meaningless War

Fintan O'Toole, Amir Ahmadi Arian, and Orly Noy on the War in Iran ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌

Sponsored by the University of California Press It has now been two and a half weeks since Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu started a war in Iran for a shifting and contradictory set of reasons, which seem to elude the president in any case. Other than murdering hundreds of Iranian civilians and bringing another Khamenei into power, Fintan O’Toole wonders in the Review’s March 13 issue, what is the point of this violence? In Donald Trump’s war on Iran, everything is meta except the bombs. At the point of impact, where buildings shatter and flesh is shredded, the war inhabits the material world of awful human consequences. But up to that point, as it exists in Trump’s mind, it seems to be a crazy historical pageant in which disconnected scenes from past American imperial misadventures are randomly reenacted.  And in the NYR Online this week, Amir Ahmadi Arian and Orly Noy write about those awful human consequences, and about watching powerlessly from afar—from the United States and Israel, respectively—as their homeland is devastated by cruel imperial whims. Below, alongside O’Toole’s, Arian’s, and Noy’s essays, are other recent pieces on the war in Iran.    Fintan O’Toole Signifying Absolutely Nothing Trump’s war of choice in Iran is a performance of horrific military strength that betrays a stark political weakness.     Advertisement   Amir Ahmadi Arian Of Fire and Rain It was sometime in the afternoon, checking my phone for news from home, that I saw the flames.   Orly Noy Longing for My Tehran On the Israeli news, I watch as the country whose citizenship I hold devastates the one where I was born.     Advertisement   Pankaj Mishra A Bitter Education “Marco Rubio’s encomiums to white Western civilization, and Hegseth’s pornographic fantasies of ‘death and destruction from the sky all day long,’ proclaim today a sadistic urge to re-impose the racial hierarchies of the nineteenth century.”   Arang Keshavarzian Iran Transformed “With the war’s instigators trying to bend the Dey protests to their own purpose, it has become all the more urgent to understand the uprising’s causes and legacy.”   David Cole The Lie of ‘Preventive’ War “Ultimate responsibility for the Iran war lies with Trump, but the road to it was paved by his predecessors—of both parties.”   Joost Hiltermann Fool’s Errands “Having started a war unjustified by self-defense, and put US regional interests at risk in the process, Trump seems to have scored an own goal.”   New Subscriber Benefit! Subscribers are now able to share unlocked versions of our articles with friends, family, and social media channels. When signed in to your account, look for this gift box icon in any of our articles.     Advertisement   Special Offer Subscribe for just $1 an issue Get the deal Politics   Literature   Arts   Ideas You are receiving this message because you signed up for email newsletters from The New York Review. Update your address or preferences View this newsletter online The New York Review of Books 207 East 32nd Street, New York, NY 10016-6305     Preferences  |  Unsubscribe

Westoxification

Plus: Abortion Now; Satire; Radical Prophetesses; Khirbet Khizeh; Hamnet; the Oscars ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌

Sponsored by the Brandeis University Press   Today in The New York Review of Books: Pankaj Mishra mourns the severing of India and Iran’s historic ties; Amy Littlefield investigates how people are getting abortions after Dobbs; Aaron Matz honors satirists; Erin Maglaque studies the radical prophetesses of early modern England; Nathan Thrall revives a lost classic of Hebrew literature that dared to portray the violence of the Nakba; and, from the archives, Stephen Greenblatt on the historical Hamnet as well as a wealth of Oscar movie reviews.   Pankaj Mishra A Bitter Education In its quiescence to the West’s war on Iran, India is squandering a precious legacy.   Amy Littlefield Since Dobbs The telehealth network circumventing abortion bans has given people new choices—even as they contend with new forms of uncertainty.     Advertisement   Aaron Matz All of Us Yahoos A new history of satire wants to limit the genre to its political ramifications, but satirists are often interested in the whole person and their capacity for vice.   Erin Maglaque God’s Impertinent Prophets A new history brings to light the dissenting women who wrote, preached, and testified during England’s tumultuous seventeenth century, claiming the standing to speak as excluded outsiders who had un unfiltered knowledge of God.   Nathan Thrall ‘Dirty Work’ The Israeli writer S. Yizhar’s 1949 novella Khirbet Khizeh portrays the violent reality of the Nakba. For decades it was part of the canon of Hebrew literature. That has changed.     Advertisement   Free from the Archives It’s Oscar night in America. For the ninety-eighth year in a row, the silver screen’s shiniest stars are assembling in the city of angels to celebrate the year in cinema. Among the most-nominated films this year is Chloe Zhao’s adaptation of Maggie O’Farrell’s 2020 novel Hamnet, which tells the story of the death of Shakespeare’s son and the subsequent writing of Hamlet. In the Review’s October 21, 2004, issue, Stephen Greenblatt took on the historical facts of the Shakespeare family’s tragedy, endeavoring “to trace Hamlet back to a personal experience of grief and to sketch a long-term aesthetic strategy that seems to have emerged from this experience.” And below Greenblatt’s history, we’ve collected five essays from the last year about some of tonight’s nominees: Nawal Arjini on Marty Supreme, Jonathan Lethem on One Battle After Another, Beatrice Loayza on The Secret Agent, Kevin Power on KPop Demon Hunters, and Miranda Seymour on Frankenstein. Stephen Greenblatt The Death of Hamnet and the Making of Hamlet Sometime in the spring or summer of 1596 Shakespeare must have received word that his only son Hamnet, eleven years old, was ill. Whether in London or on tour with his company he would at best have only been able to receive news intermittently from his family in Stratford, but at some point in the summer he presumably learned that Hamnet’s condition had worsened and that it was necessary to drop everything and hurry home. By the time the father reached Stratford the boy—whom, apart from brief visits, Shakespeare had in effect abandoned in his infancy—may already have died. On August 11, 1596, Hamnet was buried at Holy Trinity Church: the clerk duly noted in the burial register, “Hamnet filius William Shakspere.”   The Review Goes to the Oscars Nawal Arjini East Side Story Marty Supreme, Josh Safdie’s new film, is both a character study of monomania and a moving fable of how the American century of table tennis was lost. Jonathan Lethem Frantic Realism Paul Thomas Anderson fits a generation’s worth of cineplex joys into One Battle After Another, but the revolution refuses to get off the couch. Beatrice Loayza Timekeepers In The Secret Agent, his sad, riotous new feature, the Brazilian filmmaker Kleber Mendonça Filho at once archives a vanished world and mythologizes it. Kevin Power Promo Time At the center of KPop Demon Hunters is a fantasy of unmediated connection between fans and idols, a frictionless vision of the perfected market. Miranda Seymour Mary Shelley’s ‘Hideous Progeny’ Through Mary Shelley’s letters, journal, and work-in-progress, we can trace the development of Frankenstein—adapted once again into a movie, this one directed by Guillermo del Toro—from a simple ghost story to her most famous novel.     Advertisement   New Subscriber Benefit! Subscribers are now able to share unlocked versions of our articles with friends, family, and social media channels. When signed in to your account, look for this gift box icon in any of our articles.   Special Offer Subscribe for just $1 an issue Get the deal Politics   Literature   Arts   Ideas You are receiving this message because you signed up for email newsletters from The New York Review. Update your address or preferences View this newsletter online The New York Review of Books 207 East 32nd Street, New York, NY 10016-6305       Preferences  |  Unsubscribe