The 2001 Best and Worst

Though the turning point for America's moral agenda is surely Sept. 11, chroniclers of the arts and other leisure activities still observe the Julian calendar. Hence our annual review of cultural events, recalled with fondness or contempt. Except for the film Kandahar and David Letterman's TV show, the items cited here do not relate directly to the attacks on the U.S. But they do speak to our need to look back: to Greek myths (reinvented off-Broadway), to John Adams (in a new biography), to '70s punk (rekindled by the Strokes). We also look up (at the winged victory of a Milwaukee museum) and, for therapeutic escape, look away (to the canny lunacy of Shrek, to Nike ads and the fierce melodrama of the 2001 World Series). Art can take us out of ourselves or deeper within. In soft times or tough, the Best will endure. And the Worst--well, the Worst is always with us.