Arts & Entertainment
Alan Dershowitz Speaks
Local summer kid, and internationally acclaimed lawyer, author, and lecturer Alan Dershowitz will be speaking this coming Wednesday, July 27, at 5:30 p.m. at the Chilmark Public Library. His talk is entitled The First Amendment: From Pentagon Papers to Wiki Leaks.
Tennessee Williams (1911-1983) was born in Columbus, Mississippi, with all the proper psychological accoutrements to become a great writer. His family was abysmally dysfunctional, his mother a narcissist with a streak of snobbery, denial and grandiosity (much like the mother in The Glass Menagerie), and his father an often-absent, smalltime businessman with a temper, active fists and an aversion to his delicate son, who, as we all know, was destined to grow up to be a homosexual, a tough row to hoe in the deep South.
BEARING DRIFT: A Story of Tragedy, Heroism and How Thirty-Four Sailors Rescued the U.S. Coast Guard. By Peter Sloan Eident. Pirate Press. 350 pages, $29.95.
The tagline of the Martha’s Vineyard Summer Institute, “from the front lines of politics, science and the arts,” proved too true last week when the program’s scheduled July 21 speaker, Cong. Barney Frank, was called back to the front. Mr. Frank and his colleagues in Congress won’t be taking their customary recess as the political battle continues over the federal debt ceiling.
But another formidable speaker, Kenneth Feinberg, will fill the July 21 bill.
Could it be that western system of market capitalism has broken down so badly that its failings present a threat to democracy itself?
That was the question left ominously hanging at the end of a presentation by three eminent economists — two from the Harvard Business School and one private forecaster — at the Martha’s Vineyard Hebrew Center on Thursday night.
Harry Potter Party
For those who haven’t been able to score a ticket to the latest Harry Potter movie, or who have seen the movie eight times already over the weekend and are driving your family nuts and need now to immerse yourself in the arena of fellow fanatics, the Edgartown Library has just the ticket.
A Harry Potter party is being held Wednesday, July 20, from 4 to 6 p.m.
The event is for children of all ages and will include snacks, wand making and games. Costume dress is also encouraged.
