Robert Dean Lurie

Latest by Robert Dean Lurie in Chronicles

• Reviews

  August 2018

  Britons at War

  Is there a distinctly British brand of heroism? That is the implicit question running through Christopher Sandford’s Zeebrugge, a gripping new history of the British naval raid in April 1918 on the German-held Belgian port of that name.

  Read More

• Reviews

  June 2013

  The Mind of the South

  Sadly, William Gilmore Simms’ desire for an enduring voice turned out to be a case of wishful thinking. By the beginning of the 20th century, the man who had been not only the “Old South’s foremost public intellectual,” as David S. Shields puts it, but one of the most successful American authors of the antebellum era, had been all but forgotten.

  Read More

• Vital Signs

  December 2009

  Twice-Baked and Twice as Bad

  Every couple months or so, my wife and I host an event we call Twice-Baked Tales. We’ll have friends over for a home-cooked meal followed by a screening of a movie (usually from the 1930’s, 40’s, or 50’s) and its remake.

  Read More

• Vital Signs

  June 2008

  Soundtrack to the New Old South

  Sometime in the early 1990’s, while attending an event called a “song swap” in Athens, Georgia, I met an extraordinarily gifted songwriter named Patterson Hood. The swap itself was essentially a weekly gathering of aspiring tunesmiths sharing their latest creations; we would sit in a circle and each play our songs, the other musicians joining in if they had the chops or the inclination.

  Read More

• Vital Signs

  August 2007

  The Theater of the Mind, R.I.P.

  Step back from the home-theater system for a moment and try to wrap your brain around this one: Just a couple of generations ago, high-tech “home entertainment” consisted solely of words and sounds delivered to the household via a static-plagued monophonic speaker.

  Read More