He was a writer, he was GQ’s Style Guy. Yet he wondered: What was everyone talking about when they talked about mushrooms? Because he was 27 and had never actually tasted a mushroom. And so he set out to understand a world beyond chicken fingers, guided by a pretty good tutor: legendary chef Daniel Boulud.
There have been other Supermans since, and while none have, in my opinion, reached the heights of Christopher Reeve, all have imparted a similar sense of decency, humbleness and grace. From Brandon Routh to various animated incarnations, children growing up over the past 40 years have found new Supermans they could look to as inspirational models of how heroes act.
But what do the children of today have? Warner Bros, custodian of the Superman legacy, has handed the keys of the character over to Zack Snyder, a filmmaker who has shown he feels nothing but contempt for the character. In doing so they have opened the character to an ugly new interpretation, one that devalues the simple heroism of Superman and turns the decent, graceful character into a mean, nasty force of brutish strength.
Dimly Lit Meals for One, a new book based off a popular Tumblr, serves up quite the opposite scenario. Author Tom Kennedy pairs grainy photos of barely (if at all) plated culinary monstrosities with a fictional tale about the sad-sack person who is likely eating it.
“Comedy is music,” Sid Caesar wrote in his autobiography. The great comic follows that crisp sentence with another nearly as brief, seven additional words for those who need an explanation: “It has a rhythm and a melody.”
An expert like Roy Blount Jr., as the old borscht belt masters might say, knows from rhythm and melody. His prose can sing in deft comic riffs, as when he is celebrating, criticizing or just chanting lore about food, the ostensible subject of his new book, “Save Room for Pie.” For example, about a memorable bit of street food he consumed in New Orleans: “I had a kimchi pancake with pork-belly hash that made me want to shout.”