Ian Crouch
Crouch is a frequent contributor to the New Yorker's Book Bench blog and lives in New York.
A Rather Bestial Fellow, Bailey's Cheever: A Life
By Ian CrouchIt may be impossible to consider the life of John Cheever without hearing his voice. In what seems a duel of arrogance with John Updike on the Dick Cavett Show in 1981, Cheever bests Updike’s lilting eyebrows and imperious posture with an aristocratic drawl that would impress even Katharine Hepburn.
Addictive, Ephemeral Stories in a Digital Age
By Ian CrouchSusan Boyle was introduced to the world on Saturday, April 11. You may have already forgotten her, but most likely she’s still kicking around somewhere in your head.
Inside the Fed
By Ian CrouchUntil recently, what most of us knew of The Federal Reserve System came from the popular press’s breathless coverage of its interest rate announcements, especially during the celebrated reign of “rock-star” former chairman Alan Greenspan. The story was always the same: how will the markets react to a rate cut or hike?
Call Her “Sue,”
By Ian CrouchIt's hard to imagine Susan Sontag as a young girl, as someone other than the daunting woman with the stern, brooding pose we’re familiar with from her dust-jacket photographs.
Memories of Great Books, Beam’s A Great Idea at the Time: The Rise, Fall, and Curious Afterlife of the Great Books
By Ian CrouchIn 1952, an aspiring American intellectual looking to fill his home library with expert-approved literature had several options. He could join the Readers’ Subscription Book Club, a mail-order arrangement armed with the prestige of Columbia University professors Lionel Trilling and Jacques Barzun.
