Measure For Measure – William Shakespeare, 1604 ★★★★½

A Comedy about Something

Roughly half the time I observed him in action, I figured the Duke at the center of Shakespeare’s satisfying Measure For Measure to be a stand-in for God. The other half, I thought he was the Bard’s answer to J. Peterman, the genially patrician, obtusely pompous character who is Elaine Benes’ boss on the TV series “Seinfeld.”

Well, it is a comedy.

The Land Of Hidden Men – Edgar Rice Burroughs, 1931 ★★½

Lost and Found in an Ancient Jungle Kingdom

Somewhere in my primordial past, decades before my birth, a man looked deep into some misty realm and espied the half-naked youth, bounding across a jungle just a half-step ahead of deadly peril, whom I would someday become, if only in my imagination.

That man was Edgar Rice Burroughs, who put pen to paper and crafted fantasies for a boyhood I had yet to reach.

Those Guys Have All The Fun – James Andrew Miller & Tom Shales, 2011 ★★★

Those Guys Play Rough

ESPN started out a good idea, but quickly became subsumed by ego, hubris, and testosterone.

To figure that out, you don’t need Those Guys Have All The Fun – an hour of their live coverage of any sports event reveals this well enough – but it certainly helps connect the dots. To succeed at ESPN takes a certain kind of mentality, James Andrew Miller and Tom Shales reveal in this 2011 book, where cutthroat tactics and crass individualism hold sway.