March/April 1998 Issue

Robert Duvall’s The Apostle goads not only secularists but conventional believers as well.

The new prophets of evolutionary psychology want to reduce us to mere survival machines.

An expert in murder, P. D. James shuns the voyeurism of violence.

The civil-rights movement as theological drama.

What’s wrong with the conservative line on race.

Academic discipline and political struggle.

Torn between the demands of black nationalism and American democracy.

Established novelists who write poetry are like movie stars who really want to direct.

I was aware that the poetry industry had gone through a number of software upgrades since I last twirled an “oftimes.”