Rock 'n' Roll Dreams
by Frederick Baron ’69
In 200 years, there’s never been another musician—or Amherst freshman—quite like Jim Steinman.
Short Takes
by Katherine Duke ’05
Character Studies: Here are the three best fictional figures ever portrayed by Amherst alumni actors.
The Bicentennial Rereading Project
Very few alumni magazines run book reviews these days. We, however, consider them a hallmark of our publication, so in planning this special issue, we challenged ourselves to put a Bicentennial spin on our book reviews. Normally, we review new works by alumni and faculty. This time, we asked two reviewers: What’s one book you encountered in college that you’d want to review today? For Paul Statt ’78, it was a novel written when the College was a mere 30 years old: Moby-Dick, “the greatest work I’ve ever read.” Statt has reread it three times since freshman year. Makena Onjerika ’10 chose to reread a memoir, Aké: The Years of Childhood. As an Amherst senior in 2009, Onjerika was “biting my nails over whether I would ever amount to anything.” Aké offered comfort. What would it do for her in 2021? Read on to find out.
Call Me Outcast
by Paul Statt ’78
What Melville taught a worried freshman.
Made in Childhood
by Makena Onjerika ’10
Stories are exactly my problem at the moment.