Things Noted Here & There

Laura Italiano,"Embezzler-busting NYU whiz kid," NY Post, 26 December, has the story of an NYU history major, Michael Peaden. He blew the whistle on the chemistry department's manager for embezzling over $400,000 from the University. Peaden's had no word of thanks yet from NYU officials. Someone -- Thomas Bender, Hasia Diner, Michael Gomez, Linda Gordon, David Levering Lewis, Daniel Walkowitz, Barbara Weinstein, Marilyn Young, Jonathan Zimmerman – someone ought to take the young man out to lunch or something. He's one of ours and he ought to know that we're proud of him.

Yale University attorneys argue that a suit demanding the return of a Vincent Van Gogh painting it has held for 50 years could undo American museums' ownership claims to art and artifacts worth billions of dollars.

You can tour the ruins of ancient Pompeii on Google Maps. There's no better guide through them than Mary Beard's Pompeii: The Life of a Roman Town.

Tim Martin,"For want of a better word," The National, 19 December, reviews The Historical Thesaurus of the Oxford English Dictionary.

Christopher Benfey for the NYT, 23 December, and Ron Charles for the Washington Post, 23 December, review Sheila Kohler's Becoming Jane Eyre.

Gabriel Paquette,"Empire Records," The National, 24 December, reviews Filipe Ribeiro de Meneses's Salazar: a Political Biography.

Carolyn See reviews Ted Gioia's The Birth and Death of the Cool for the Washington Post, 18 December.