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• Michael Ignatieff, author of Fire and Ashes: Success and Failure in Politics , wrote in the New York Times about the political dysfunction that occurs when leaders abandon good-faith negotiations in favor of a “war” mentality .
• Sunil Amrith, author of Crossing the Bay of Bengal: The Furies of Nature and the Fortunes of Migrants , wrote in the New York Times about the threat of climate change to the densely-populated Bay of Bengal .
• Mark Mizruchi, author of The Fracturing of the American Corporate Elite , talked with the Washington Post ’s Wonkblog about big business’s decreasing influence over the Republican Party .
• KQED’s Mind/Shift blog highlighted the traits that Ken Bain, author of What the Best College Students Do , found most common among students who are particularly successful .

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October 18: Solomon Northup as Primary Source

British filmmaker Steve McQueen’s 12 Years a Slave , an adaptation of Solomon Northup’s 1853 memoir of his abduction from the North and sale into southern slavery, opens today in limited release. The cinematic virtues of the film have been widely praised, and while its historical accuracy will surely?and rightly?be scrutinized, it was produced in consultation with Henry Louis Gates, Jr., and has earned the respect of Eric Foner. When considering the accuracy of the film, though, Foner cautions viewers to recall the original intent of Northup’s narrative, which was written “to persuade people that slavery needs to be abolished.” Even still, Northup’s rema …