Of all the 20th anniversaries this year (Mean Girls!Napoleon Dynamite! J-Kwon’s “Tipsy”!),the most significant is this: 2004 was the year that set our national unraveling in motion. We didn’t feel our brains breaking at the time, and therein lies the problem. We got angry at the wrong people (Janet Jackson), shrugged off dangerously precedent-setting practices (swiftboating), and entertained ourselves to death with the things that would be our undoing (Facebook, Donald J. Trump). Now our brains are shattered, but maybe by looking back at this momentous year, we can train them to notice the warning signs. It might be the only way out of this mess. |
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And that's only the beginning of the chaos up there. |
| Our foolproof guide to getting caught up beforeDune: Part Twohits theaters. |
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To quote the recently departed N. Scott Momaday, “If you believe in the power of words, you can bring about physical changes in the universe.”Wandering Stars, Tommy Orange’s follow-up to his massive hitThere There, brings about changes to the universe—or at least the literary universe. It’s a follow-up, yes, but the first half ofWandering Starsdoes not immediately provide what readers might want: answers to the mystery surrounding the end ofThere There. "It felt undeniable that regardless of what I wrote for the second book, people would read it just to find out," Orange tells Esquire. "It was just more important to me to try and write something new than to figure out how to replicate what 'worked' the first time." |
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Because this is the last thing you want to lose. |
| What's a better stamp of excellence than an Academy Award? |
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The year in music started off with some big bangs. Just a few weeks into 2024, we already had news of Spring albums from the Twin Towers of pop, Taylor Swift and Beyoncé. Those proclamations shook the walls, but they were hardly the whole story—January and February (historically a slow period in the music business!) also saw new releases from the likes of Green Day and Usher and announcements of upcoming music from Justin Timberlake, Kacey Musgraves, and Billie Eilish. Here are some of the early standouts. |
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