November/December 2009
In This Issue November/December 2009
Imperial Scrolls of China
Monumental paintings from the Qing dynasty document the power of its emperors.
![November/December 2009](https://webarchive.library.unt.edu/web/20120928104351im_/http://www.neh.gov/files/imagecache/humanities_cover/humanities/covers/cover_pic_chinese_scroll_nd2009.jpg)
Volume 30, Issue 6
Detail from the Kangxi Emperor’s Southern Inspection Tour, Scroll Three: Ji’nan to Mount Tai, Qing dynasty (1644–1911), 1698 Wang Hui (Chinese, 1632–1717) and assistants; Handscroll; ink and color on silk; 26 ¾ x 548 ½ in. (67.8 x 1393.8 cm).The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Purchase, the Dillon Fund Gift, 1979 (1975.5a–d). Image © The Metropolitan Museum of Art.
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Features
Soul of a Writer
Jim Thompson found the makings of a new and gritty style working on the Oklahoma State Guide.
By David Geffner -
Departments
Curio
Brass Hip Ornament
Within the culture of the Benin Empire, which thrived from the fifteenth through the nineteenth century in what is now southern Nigeria, only the oba, or sacred monarch, had the authority to
By James WillifordPublic Art in the Bronx
Two images from Public Art in the Bronx, an NEH-supported website launched by the Lehman College Art Gallery (www.lehman.edu/publi
By Steve MoyerSnake Jug
This nineteenth-century ceramic Snake Jug was designed by brothers Cornwall and Wallace Kirkpatrick, the founders of Anna Pottery in Anna, IL.
By Steve MoyerChaste Beowulf
From Making Sense: Constructing Meaning in Early English, a selection of papers on Anglo-Saxon and other medieval texts edited by Antonette diPaolo Healey and Kevin Kiernan and published
Simple Things
Oregon Humanities magazine’s summer ’09 issue provokes much thought on the matter of things, possessions, or, as the editors call it, “stuff.” The issue is stuffed with stuff on stuff, includ
By David SkinnerGo West, Young Trickster
From Coyote Country: Fictions of the Canadian West, wherein Duke research professor in Canadian studies Arnold E.
By Steve MoyerConversation
The Gentleman from Iowa
NEH Chairman Jim Leach takes us from his high-school wrestling days through the stages of his political career to his thoughts on the challenges facing humanity--and the humanities--in the twenty-first century.
Impertinent Questions
Impertinent Questions with Marguerite Rippy
On the creative life of Orson Welles.
In Focus
Vermont's Peter Gilbert
Peter Gilbert recruits top scholars to Vermont's monthly gatherings.
By Sarah Stewart TaylorEdNote
Editor's Note, November/December 2009
“Bridging cultures” is the watchword here at NEH since the appointment of Jim Leach to the chairman’s office.
By David Skinner