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The latest New York Review of Books has some really cool stuff online:

The latest booker winner John Banville on the life and career of the English poet Philip Larkin.

J M Coetzee on Garcia Marquez's Memories of My Melancholy Whores.

A long and dense (for me) essay on the history of western music.

An essay on Brokeback Mountain.

A film which I liked, although with a few reservations. It does a very credible job of breaking gay stereotypes (at least for me; they are neither weirdos and freaks nor masochistic artists torturing themselves for the sake of their art) and proving that they are not so different from "normal" people at all. It is also a cautionary tale about the life-destroying after effects of emotional and sexual repression, either inflicted by self or by society or by both. For me though the whole effect nearly got spoiled in one scene where the Heath Ledger character beats up a bunch of unruly bums and then poses for a shot with fourth of July fireworks filling the frame in the background. It was totally artificial and dishonest, as if to prove that, what if he is gay, he is still macho and all and can protect his wife and daughters! But the film more than makes up for this in the final scenes, which are unbelievably, and as a result painfully, subtle and understated. In fact, it is so subtle that you would miss a significant plot point if you blink an eye!

Okay, haven't read any of the links yet myself. :)

Will just be public bookmarks, to be read later!