Hidden affinities (Art) , June 2012, 47
On “Byzantium and Islam: Age of Transition” at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.

A confusion of harmonies (Features) , April 2012, 17
On Petrach and Luis de Góngora y Argote.

Crooked lines (Features) , September 2011, 68
On Paul Claudels lasting influence in French letters.

Hints, fragments & scintillations (Books) , December 2010, 73
on Ralph Waldo Emerson: Selected Journals 1820-1842 (Library of America) & Ralph Waldo Emerson: Selected Journals 1841-1877 (Library of America) by Ralph Waldo Emerson,Lawrence Rosenwald

The shock philosopher (Features) , June 2010, 10
On the provocative thinking of Simone Weil.

Teaching a dumpling to dance (Features) , April 2010, 4
On The Poetry of Rilke: Bilingual Edition, translated by Edward Snow.

The eternal incognito (Books) , October 2009, 67

View from a falling house (Books) , June 2009, 71

Waiting for the grammarians (Features) , April 2009, 4
On the Collected Poems and The Unfinished Poems of C. P. Cavafy, newly translated by Daniel Mendelsohn.

Instants in a looking-glass (Books) , February 2009, 66
A review of The Whole Difference: Selected Writings of Hugo von Hofmannsthal, edited by J. D. McClatchy.

To a chickadee in winter (Poems) , December 2008, 33

Honoring the ancestors (Poems) , December 2008, 34

Against the logicians (Poems) , December 2008, 35

The house in his mind (Books) , November 2008, 58
On the collected novels and stories of William Maxwell.

The kingdom of Never-to-be (Features) , April 2008, 4
On Walter de la Mare.

Flashes of lightning (Books) , January 2008, 68
On War and Peace, by Leo Tolstoy, translated by Richard Pevear & Larissa Volokhonsky.

A mind emparadised (Books) , November 2007, 73
On Paradiso by Dante Aligheri, translated by Robert and Jean Hollander.

The Heraclitus of New Hampshire (Books) , June 2007, 69
On The Notebooks of Robert Frost, edited by Robert Faggen

Robert Bridges's new cadence (Features) , April 2007, 15
On the poetry of Robert Bridges.

The god within? (Features) , February 2007, 20
On Harold Blooms view of what constitutes the best of American religious poetry.

Delousing the soul (Features) , September 2006, 34
Joris-Karl Huysmans devilish prose

The cracked kettle of Flaubert (Books) , May 2006, 66
On Flaubert: A Biography by Frederick Brown.

An austere opulence (Features) , April 2006, 10
On Geoffrey Hills reading at the Sheldonian Theatre.

Simious seductions (Books) , March 2006, 68
Dane Kennedys "The Highly Civilized Man" reviewed.

From Moses to Musa (Features) , October 2005, 23
Two great holy books revisited.

Cellar (Poems) , June 2005, 28

The jewel in the cobra's mouth (Books) , May 2005, 68
A review of The Clay Sanskrit Library, co-published by New York University Press.

A song and a mistake (Books) , November 2004, 61
A review of Metamorphoses, by Ovid, translated and with notes by Charles Martin; introduction by Bernard Knox.

Petrarch: a splendid excess (Features) , September 2004, 18
On Francesco Petrarch’s love, hate, and precision of feeling.

Blowin' in the wind (Books) , June 2004, 74
A review of Dylan’s Visions of Sin, by Christopher Ricks.

My grandfather's pocket watch (Poems) , May 2004, 31

Traveler (Poems) , May 2004, 30

Of lapdogs & loners: American poetry today (Features) , April 2004, 5
On the distinctive state of poetry in America. The eighth of our series “Lengthened shadows: America and Its Institutions in the Twenty-first Century.”

The voice impersonator (Features) , March 2004, 34
On the success of Poems and Translations, edited by Richard Sieburth, in revealing the polyphonic development of Ezra Pound’s works.

Waiting for the golden pig (Letters) , February 2004, 43
On the Christmas season in the Czech capital.

The disaster parade (Books) , January 2004, 69
A review of A Tragic Honesty: The Life and Work of Richard Yates, by Blake Bailey.

White phalaenopsis (Poems) , December 2003, 51

Daybreak at the straits (Poems) , December 2003, 52

The “born Schulmeister” (Features) , September 2003, 30
On the teacher and mentor Shlomo Dov Goitein, the great German-Jewish scholar of Islam.

Shadow language (Features) , April 2003, 22

The scabrous lyricism of Thomas Bernhard (Books) , February 2003, 64
A review of Thomas Bernhard: The Making of an Austrian, by Gitta Honegger.

Whispered disclosures (Books) , January 2003, 67
A review of Complete poems, by Charles Baudelaire, translated by Walter Martin.

Victor Hugo: the ghost in the pantheon (Features) , October 2002, 23
Considering Hugo upon his 200th year.

Orpheus with arsenic (Books) , February 2002, 63
A review of François Villon’s The Legacy & The Testament, translated by Louis Simpson.

The battle of the book: the research library today (Features) , October 2001, 4
The second in a series titled “The survival of culture”

Rimbaud: sophist of insanity (Features) , June 2001, 16
Upon the publication of Rimbaud: A Biography, by Graham Robb.

Gardens for the sleeves (Features) , April 2001, 22

The last Elizabethan: Hart Crane at 100 (Features) , February 2001, 12
Occasioned by the centennial of Crane’s birth , the publication of The Broken Tower: The Life of Hart Crane, by Paul Mariani & the re-publication of The Complete Poems of Hart Crane, edited by Marc Simon.

A sideshow of one: Umberto Saba (Features) , December 2000, 25
A consideration of the poet and his work upon the publication of a new translation.

Posthumous impresario (Books) , September 2000, 69
A review of Last Poems: Manuscript Materials, by W. B. Yeats, edited by James Pethica.

Flypaper for ghosts (Books) , March 2000, 66
Review of Diaries 1899-1941 by Robert Musil.

Jorge Luis Borges & the plural I (Features) , November 1999, 14

Nostalgia for bad times (Letters) , May 1999, 40
On how the Czech Republic views its past

A sad & angry summa (Books) , February 1999, 64
The Triumph of Love by Geoffrey Hill

Franz Kafka & the trip to Spindelmühle (Features) , November 1998, 32
On The Castle & its translations

Proved upon the pulse (Books) , May 1998, 69
Review of Keats by Andrew Motion

Prague of a hundred towers (Books) , March 1998, 59
Review of Prague in Black & Gold by Peter Demetz