Roberto Abraham Scaruffi

This week on nybooks.com: The perverse feud that’s engulfing Turkey, an interview with George Soros, Dick Cheney’s world, religion and morality in China, the faces of Piero della Francesca, Rabih Alameddine’s new novel, an artistic circle in Berkeley, habits of reading, and the betrayal of protesters. THIS ISSUE SPONSORED BY UNIVERSITY OF CONNECTICUT

Turkey Goes Out of Control Christopher de Bellaigue Large parts of the civil service have been eviscerated, much of the media has been reduced to unthinking carriers of politically motivated revelation and innuendo, and the economy has slowed. The Turkish miracle is over.   ADVERTISEMENT   The Future of Europe George Soros and Gregor Peter Schmitz Even with oil over $100 a barrel, Russia’s economy is not growing. Putin turned aggressive out of weakness. He is acting in self-defense. He has no scruples, he can be ruthless, but he is a judo expert, not a sadist—so the economic weakness and the aggressive behavior are entirely self-consistent.   He Remade Our World Mark Danner Almost exactly a decade ago, Dick Cheney greeted George W. Bush one morning in the Oval Office with the news that his administration was about to implode. Or not quite: Cheney let the president know that something was deeply wrong, though it would take Bush two more days to figure out exactly what it was.   Joyce Carol Oates on Lorrie Moore’s new stories, Darryl Pinckney on Harlem, Steve Collon Fox News, Zadie Smith on climate change, and more in the Review’s April 3 issue.   ADVERTISEMENT   Chinese Atheists? What the Pew Survey Gets Wrong Ian Johnson I don’t know how the question was translated for other countries, but in Chinese, the Pew poll used a term for “God,” shangdi, that is applicable in modern China almost only to Protestant Christianity.   Quiet, Sensuous Piero Sanford Schwartz In their bearing and marvelous faces, the people in Piero’s pictures are shy, and also aloof, in a way few artists have matched. His figures can be strangely contemporary in their sexiness, and there is nothing dated about the way they encounter and judge one another, or appraise us.   Where I’m Reading From Tim Parks Books began, in my case, when my parents read to me, so I knew from the start that reading must be a “good” thing. Fervently evangelical—a clergyman and his wife—my parents only did things that were good. They read us children’s stories and the Bible.   Betrayed Charles Simic Every time I see a large crowd of people on TV or in a newspaper, demonstrating against some autocratic government, I have mixed feelings: admiration for their willingness and bravery to take a stand, and a foreboding that nothing will come out of the effort.   Escaping Beirut Robyn Creswell In Rabih Alameddine’s new novel, An Unnecessary Woman, the narrator, Aaliya Saleh, is a septuagenarian literary translator who has stayed in Beirut—“the Elizabeth Taylor of cities,” as she calls it, “insane, beautiful, tacky, falling apart.”   Enamored Magicians Francine Prose In the summer of 1950, a young visual artist named Jess heard Robert Duncan read his poetry, in Berkeley, California. The two shared many of the same passions: Frank Baum’s Oz books, James Joyce’s Finnegans Wake, mythology and magic.   Subscribe to The New York Review today and save 50% off the cover price   ADVERTISEMENT   Islamic Art, Culture, and Politics A discussion with Peter Brown, Yasmine El Rashidi, Haleh Esfandiari, and Shaul Bakhash   Do America’s Colleges Have a Future? Andrew Delbancodelivers the inaugural Sternberg Family Lecture in Public Scholarship