Jennifer Howard

This is the second post in a discussion here and on Mark Athitakis’s blog, American Fiction Notes, about Henry Adams’ novel “Democracy.” which was published anonymously in 1880. See Mark’s first post in the conversation here, and a useful background piece on the book’s long history he found here. Mark, Adams does get off some great zingers, doesn’t he? I went in expecting cynicism; I wasn’t looking for humor. The two blur together all too easily, though, in Democracy. When Mr. Gore, the Massachusetts historian-turned-statesman, asks our heroine Madeleine Lightfoot Lee, the skeptical but curious New York widow, whether she’s… Read more...

Bringing back streetcars to D.C. What’s not to love? Change we can all believe in. Or ride on. Some details here. (Photo: streetcars in front of the Russell Senate Office Building, circa 1910. The image is part of the Library of Congress’s collections. I found it here on Flickr.)… Read more...

To rent or not to rent your house out for the inauguration: That’s been a hot topic among capital residents the last few weeks. It’s been all over my neighborhood listservs, and yesterday, at the Foggy Bottom Metro stop, guys with big signs were shilling for inauguralhomes.com, a website where Washingtonians can post their properties and out-of-towners can trawl for a place to stay. Craigslist is hopping with inaugural offers too, or so I hear. Is the Howard household going to clear out for the inauguration and make a quick buck off our Capitol Hill rowhouse? It’s only a mile… Read more...

The Chicago-based mag Stop Smiling has just put out a D.C. issue. I went to a party on Friday for some of the contributors and people Q&A’d in the issue (I’m neither) and got off to a good start by asking the editor who he was. At least I can’t be accused of sucking up. Anyway, it’s a good-looking issue that’s deliberately (I think/hope) all over the place: an analysis of presidential handwriting, a tribute to the Florida Avenue Grill, a cri de coeur about the plight of the Chesapeake Bay, a nifty look at campaign ephemera (buttons, posters, an… Read more...

Mark Athitakis, a DC-based critic and arts editor of the Washington City Paper, has put up a page of who’s reading in the area over the next few months. You can find it here at his American Fiction Notes blog. Good work, Mark…. Read more...

Len Downie, the Post’s former executive editor, says enough already with the DC-bashing: Large numbers of Washingtonians have dedicated much of their lives to real public service that does not involve the ego trips, trappings and hypocrisies of elective office. Amen to that. It’s not all earmarks and Gucci Gulch lobbyists, kids. For all its partisanship and jockeying for power and influence, Washington’s culture—with roots in the New Deal, World War II, Lyndon Johnson’s Great Society and the Reagan Revolution—is receptive to new ideas and new people. It is steadily refreshed by idealistic young professionals who come here to work… Read more...