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Week in Pictures for Nov. 30

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Here is a slide show of photographs from the past week in New York City and the region. Subjects include sewage problems following Hurricane Sandy; residents returning to Ortley Beach, N.J.; and camels enjoying the Manhattan streets.

This weekend on “The New York Times Close Up,” an inside look at the most compelling articles in Sunday's Times, Sam Roberts will speak with The Times's Carolyn Ryan, Joe Drape and Matt Flegenheimer. Also appearing, Calvin Trillin and Karen Allen. Tune in at 10 p.m. Saturday or 10 a.m. Sunday on NY1 News to watch.

A sampling from the City Room blog is featured daily in the main print news section of The Times. You may also browse highlights from the blog and reader comments, read current New York headlines, like New York Metro | The New York Times on Facebook and follow us on Twitter.



30 Cars in 75 Days, and, Police Say, One Thief

Reynaldo NazarioN.Y. State Dept. of Corrections and Community Supervision Reynaldo Nazario

On May 18, a man named Reynaldo Nazario got out of prison, having spent 9 of the last 10 years locked away on a series of convictions relating to auto theft.

Within a few weeks, prosecutors said, he went to work.

On Aug. 9, according to a criminal complaint, Mr. Nazario, 35, showed up at an auto graveyard in the shadow of Interstate-95 in the Bronx with a 1997 Honda Accord that he had stolen elsewhere in the borough, claimed to be its owner, and sold it for scrap for $350.

Two days later, the complaint says, he did the same with a 1995 Accord.

On Aug. 21, the complaint says, Mr. Nazario scrapped two m ore mid-1990s Accords, and two days after that, an Accord and a Toyota Camry.

And so on and so on, according to the complaint. For more than two months, if the authorities are to be believed, Mr. Nazario operated a one-man auto-theft ring.

On the morning of Oct. 23, the authorities said, he took in a 1994 Accord â€" the most-stolen car in America â€" was paid his $350 and placed under arrest.

He had sold to the scrap yard, according to the authorities, 30 stolen cars in the span of 75 days, or an average of one every 60 hours.

The scrapyard, New England Auto Parts on Boston Road in Eastchester, had been cooperating in an undercover investigation run by the police, the Bronx district attorney's office said. Some of the cars were returned to their owners, the office said; it was not immediately clear what happened to the rest.

On Friday, the district attorney's office announced that Mr. Nazario, of West 182nd Street in University Heights in the Bronx, had been indicted on charges of 26 of the thefts. The other four cases are still being heard by the grand jury, officials said.

Looking at the list of thefts attributed to Mr. Nazario, patterns emerge. All of the cars were from the 1990s. Twenty-six of them were Honda Accords. Three were Nissans, and one was a Toyota. The longest Mr. Nazario went without taking in a stolen car, the complaint says, was 10 days. In the three days of Oct. 10 to Oct. 12, he took in six cars, the complaint said.

He is charged with 26 felony counts of grand larceny, 26 counts of criminal possession of stolen property and 26 counts of falsifying business records. If found guilty and given consecutive terms, he could be sentenced to more than 100 years in prison.

So far, though, Mr. Nazario's stretches have been shorter, according to the State Department of Corrections and Community Supervision. He served 15 months starting in 2002 for unauthoriz ed use of a 1987 Toyota Camry; two years and 10 months for an assault that involved hitting several police officers with a stolen car, crushing one of the officers against another car; two years for criminal possession of a stolen 1995 Accord; 10 months on a parole violation; and two years one month for stealing a 1997 Honda.

At New England Auto Parts, located on a desolate cul-de-sac behind a barbed-wire-topped fence across from a forlorn-looking copse of bare trees and down the block from a bowling alley, employees said they had been instructed by their boss not to speak to the news media.

Matthew Wolfe contributed reporting.




Criminal Complaint Nazario, Reynaldo (PDF)

Criminal Complaint Nazario, Reynaldo (Text)



The Week in Culture Pictures, Nov. 30

Andrea Mohin/The New York TimesNew York City Ballet in George Balanchine's “The Nutcracker,” a seasonal tradition at the David H. Koch Theater.

Photographs More Photographs

A slide show of photographs of cultural events from this week.



Judge Says Man Who Set Woman Ablaze Must Be Examined Before Sentencing

Jerome Isaac, who admitted to setting a woman on fire and killing her inside an elevator, appeared in a Brooklyn courtroom on Friday. John Marshall Mantel for The New York Times Jerome Isaac, who admitted to setting a woman on fire and killing her inside an elevator, appeared in a Brooklyn courtroom on Friday.

The man who set a woman ablaze in an elevator last December - brutally killing her just steps from her apartment - said that he had heard voices and that the devil had told him what to do, a Brooklyn State Supreme Court judge said on Friday.

The man, Jerome Isaac, 48, made these statements after waiving an insanity defense and pleading guilty last month to first-degree murder and second-degree arson.

< p>Mr. Isaac faces at least 50 years in prison.

But on Friday, as Mr. Isaac prepared to be sentenced, the judge, Justice Vincent Del Giudice, cited a probation report that detailed Mr. Isaac's statements and delayed the hearing. Mr. Isaac needed to undergo an examination of his mental health before he could be sentenced, Justice Del Guidice said.

“I want to be sure he's competent,” he said.

Mr. Isaac's lawyer, Howard Tanner, said he believed Mr. Isaac was competent.

“He's been remorseful throughout this process,” Mr. Tanner said, adding that Mr. Isaac had pleaded guilty to “spare the family any further trauma.”

At one point, a daughter of the victim, Deloris Gillespie, burst into tears.

“Several doctors already examined him,” the daughter, Sheila Gillespie-Hillsman said in an interview, adding, “I just want to get this over with.”

Relatives and authorities said the killing stemmed fro m a disagreement over money: Ms. Gillespie had hired Mr. Isaac to help her clean out her three-bedroom apartment in the Prospect Heights section of Brooklyn.

But when Ms. Gillespie came to believe that Mr. Isaac was stealing from her, she fired him.

On Dec. 17, 2011, two surveillance cameras at Ms. Gillespie's apartment building captured Mr. Isaac with a gas canister, and wearing white gloves and a surgical mask. As Ms. Gillespie was about to exit the elevator, near her fifth-floor apartment, Mr. Isaac sprayed her with an accelerant, then tossed a Molotov cocktail inside.

Mr. Isaac later told the authorities that Ms. Gillespie owed him $2,000.



Neil LaBute Will Write and Direct \'Reasons to Be Pretty\' Follow-Up

MCC Theater has a reason to be happy: Its playwright-in-residence, Neil LaBute, plans to direct the premiere of his play “Reasons to Be Happy” for the theater next year. The new play is described as “companion piece” to Mr. LaBute's savage comedy “Reasons to be Pretty” and features the same four characters â€" Greg, Steph, Carly and Kent â€" though in different romantic pairings.

No casting has yet been announced for the new play, which was reported by The Wrap.

MCC's production of “Reasons to be Pretty” debuted at the Lucille Lortel Theater in 2008 before moving to Broadway the following year. Although the move uptown was short-lived, the production was critically acclaimed and nominated for three Tony awards. That play was billed as the third in a trilogy that included “The Shape of Things” and “Fat Pig,” all of which centered around the subject of physical beauty.

“Reasons to Be Happy,” scheduled to run from May 16 to June 2 3, replaces a previously announced production of John Pollono's “Small Engine Repair,” which has been delayed because of scheduling conflicts for the cast.



Big Ticket | Sold for $22.5 Million

 A co-op at 907 Fifth Avenue owned by Huguette M. Clark.Ozier Muhammad/The New York Times A co-op at 907 Fifth Avenue owned by Huguette M. Clark.

The most livable of the antiquated and somewhat ghostly trio of apartments at 907 Fifth Avenue once owned, but rarely occupied, by the reclusive copper heiress Huguette M. Clark sold for $22.5 million, the most expensive sale of the week, according to city records. Mrs. Clark died in May at age 104, leaving two wills, a $400 million fortune and no direct heirs.

The co-op has three bedrooms, six and a half baths and three fireplaces, but most important, it offers a full 100 feet of prime frontage on Fifth Avenue opposite Central Park. The formidable views and inherent grandeur, though , amount to virtually the only aspect of the apartment that does not demand extensive renovation. The place also has a monthly maintenance fee of $14,176.

The buyer, Frederick J. Iseman, the chairman of CI Capital Partners, a private equity firm, paid above the $19 million asking price for No. 8W because he was permitted to annex one room and a part of a hallway at the adjacent No. 8E, the smallest of Mrs. Clark's holdings there and the only apartment that has yet to attract a qualified buyer. That two-bedroom, two-bath unit had been listed at $9 million, but there will be a downward adjustment in price when it is returned to the market in January.

In addition to its nonpareil location in a 1915 Italianate palazzo building designed by J.E.R. Carpenter, the most appealing features of No. 8E include a 47-foot-long gallery, soaring ceilings and a corner living room with park views.

The first of the apartments that sold, her Louis XVI-style penthouse, happened to be the only one of the three in which Mrs. Clark actually lived, in antisocial splendor, attended by servants and a multimillion-dollar collection of dolls: No. 12W was snatched up in July by Boaz Weinstein, a hedge-fund whiz kid, for $25.5 million, $1.5 million above the asking price. Mrs. Clark, of her own volition, spent the final decades of her life in a hospital room and died at Beth Israel Medical Center.

Although the prime minister of Qatar, Sheik Hamad bin Jassim bin Jaber al-Thani, had made Mrs. Clark's estate what he hoped was a pre-emptive offer of $31.5 million for both eighth-floor co-ops, the notoriously fussy co-op board at 907 Fifth refused to entertain the notion of combining the units.

Mary Rutherfurd and Leslie Coleman of Brown Harris Stevens again represented the estate, and Roberta Golubock of Sotheby's International Realty handled the transaction for Mr. Iseman.

116 East 70th Street.Marilynn K. Yee/The New York Times 116 East 70th Street.

In the same price range, but in far superior condition, a five-bedroom town house at 116 East 70th Street, a tranquil block distinguished by its exquisite architecture and celebrity residents, sold for $22,398,750 to Susan Weber Soros, the former wife of the billionaire philanthropist George Soros. The 1869 town house, its facade dominated by two levels of copper-clad bow windows above fluted columns, was originally listed at $26 million in 2010. When the price was reduced to $22.5 million this year, a smitten Mrs. Soros, the founder of the Bard College Graduate Center for the decorative arts, bought it and blithely listed her splashy corner apartment at the Majestic at 115 Central Park West, No . 19E/F, for $50 million.

What she is parting with, besides her Philippe Starck-designed interiors and furniture, which are included in the deal along with a separate staff unit, are park views from every principal room and a master suite with a terrace that fronts the park.

What she is gaining, besides the potential for amusement in having Woody Allen as a neighbor, is a light-catching five-level home with four outdoor spaces and a glass breakfast solarium leading to a 26-foot-deep garden.

“You can't hit a wrong note on that street,” said Paula Del Nunzio of Brown Harris Stevens, who represented the absentee sellers, identified as Copper House, a limited-liability company based in Wellington, Fla. S. Christopher Halstead of Halstead Property represented Mrs. Soros; he is also the listing agent for her very available 11-room spread at the Majestic.

Big Ticket includes closed sales from the previous week, ending Wednesday.



Neil LaBute Will Write, Direct Followup To \'Reasons to be Pretty\'

MCC Theater has a reason to be happy: Its playwright-in-residence, Neil LaBute, plans to direct the premiere of his play “Reasons to be Happy” for the theater next year. The new play is described as “companion piece” to Mr. LaBute's savage comedy “Reasons to be Pretty” and features the same four characters â€" Greg, Steph, Carly and Kent â€" though in different romantic pairings.

No casting has yet been announced for the new play, which was reported by The Wrap.

MCC's production of “Reasons to be Pretty” debuted at the Lucille Lortel Theater in 2008 before moving to Broadway the following year. Although the move uptown was short-lived, the production was critically acclaimed and nominated for three Tony awards. That play was billed as the third in a trilogy that included “The Shape of Things” and “Fat Pig,” all of which centered around the subject of physical beauty.

“Reasons to be Happy,” scheduled to run from May 16 to June 2 3, replaces a previously announced production of John Pollono's “Small Engine Repair,” which has been delayed because of scheduling conflicts for the cast.



Graphic Books Best Sellers: The End of \'Scalped\'

At No. 3 on our paperback graphic books best-seller list this week is volume 10 of “Scalped,” written by Jason Aaron and illustrated by R.M. Guera. It is the final volume of the series that chronicled trials and tribulations at the fictional Prairie Rose Indian Reservation in South Dakota. It was part of the Veritgo imprint from DC Comics. At the heart of the story are Dashiell Bad Horse, who grew up on the reservation and became an undercover agent for the F.B.I., and Lincoln Red Crow, the corrupt casino owner. The series has been on our paperback list several times before, including back in March and August this year.

The series is brutally violent, bleak and engrossing. I only read it in collected edition form, which i s the equivalent of watching a season's worth of a television series in one sitting instead of consuming them in intervals as single episodes (or, in the case of comics, single issues). It's sad to see “Scalped” end, but the plus side is that Mr. Aaron was able to complete his story. There are no hanging threads from the series being abruptly cancelled. There's another pro, at least for me: The more I read comics, the more I crave a complete story, rather than a never-ending adventure with a status quo that seems constantly reset to zero. The characters in “Scalped” changed (or died real deaths, unlike those in superhero comics, where the afterlife has a revolving door). I'm happy to have the 10 volumes in my library alongside finite series like “Preacher” and “Y the Last Man.”

As always, the complete best-seller lists can be found here, along with an explanation of how they were assembled.



Are TV Viewers Sick of Medical Dramas?

Mamie Gummer, left, in Left, Jack Rowand/CW; right, Nathaniel Bell/FOX Mamie Gummer, left, in “Emily Owens, M.D.” and Jordana Spiro in “The Mob Doctor.”

Medical dramas are one of television's oldest and most reliable staples, but based on Nielsen ratings from this season viewers may be growing tired of the genre. Two first-year-resident programs, “The Mob Doctor” on Fox and “Emily Owens, M.D.” on the CW network, were effectively fired on Wednesday after dismal fall performances.

While Fox was careful not to use the word “canceled” when it announced that “The Mob Doctor” would not be getting an additional episode order this seaso n, the decision to burn off some of the remaining episodes on Saturdays in December and the show's average total viewership, at 3.7 million, strongly suggest that the program will not return.

But “Emily Owens, M.D.” was officially canceled by CW. The news came as no surprise, as the show averaged only 1.3 million viewers. Like “The Mob Doctor,” all 13 episodes from the network's initial order will air.

Those programs are joined by other medical shows with low audience totals, like ABC's “Private Practice” (at 5 million average viewers for its final season), “Hart of Dixie” on CW (1.4 million), and the hospital-set comedy “The Mindy Project” on Fox (3.4 million).

The only show that seems immune to this malady is ABC's “Grey's Anatomy.” Currently in its ninth season, that program frequently ranks as the No. 1 drama on television in the advertiser-beloved 18-to-49 category while averaging 9.9 million total viewers.



This Week\'s Movies: Nov. 30

This week, Times critics offer their thoughts on the crime drama “Killing Them Softly” with Brad Pitt, the martial arts film “Dragon” and “King Kelly,” a film shot almost entirely with cellphones. See all of this week's reviews here.



City Lifts Advisory on Recreational Water Activities

New York City environmental officials announced on Friday that they were lifting an advisory urging people to avoid coming into contact with local waterways.

The advisory, issued by the city's Department of Environmental Protection, was put in place after Hurricane Sandy damaged many of the city's wastewater treatment plants. But water quality testing over the last two weeks showed that the waters were again safe for recreational use.

The advisory applied to the Hudson River, the East River, New York Harbor, Jamaica Bay and the Kill Van Kull.



Tolls on Rockaway Bridges to Resume on Saturday

Toll collection will resume this weekend on the two bridges in the Rockaways, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority said on Friday.

Tolls had been suspended on Nov. 4 on the Marine Parkway-Gil Hodges Memorial Bridge and Cross Bay Veterans Bridge, six days after Hurricane Sandy battered the Rockaways.

The $3.25 cash toll and $1.80 E-ZPass toll for cars in both directions on both bridges will be collected starting at 12:01 a.m. on Saturday.



Book Review Podcast: The Rolling Stones Turn 50

Julia Rothman

This week in The New York Times Book Review, the editors select their 100 Notable Books of 2012. The special holiday issue also features Pat Irwin's review of two new books about the Rolling Stones, a biography of Mick Jagger by Philip Norman and “The Rolling Stones 50,” a coffee-table book published by the band. About the latter, Mr. Irwin writes:

Leafing through the first hundred pages or so, I was struck by how hard they worked. They're living, breathing proof of the argument in Malcolm Gladwell's “Outliers” (which discusses the Beatles at some length, but doesn't mention the Rolling Stones). As Gladwell summarizes a study out of Berlin's elite Academy of Music: “The thing that distinguishes one performer from another is how hard he or she works. That's it. And what's more, the people at the very top don't work just harder or even much harder than everyone else. They work much, much harder.” That's the Rolling Stones.

On this week's podcast, a big show for the Book Review's big holiday issue, with discussions about the notable books, the Stones, a dictionary controversy, Joseph Cornell, the Dallas Cowboys, Shakespeare apps and best-seller news. Sam Tanenhaus is the host.



The Sweet Spot: Nov. 30

Who's more of a grinch, David Carr or A. O. Scott, when it comes to holiday movies and music?



British Artist Angered by Theft of his Work from Christie\'s

A solid gold sculpture by the British artist Douglas Gordon, a winner of the Turner Prize, was stolen from a Christie's warehouse in London, the British newspaper The Guardian reported. “I don't think this is an art theft,” Mr. Gordon said. “I'm pretty sure it has been melted down.” The gold used in his work, “Left Hand and Right Hand Have Left One Another,” was worth about 250,000 pounds ($400,000), he said. The piece was insured for twice that amount.

What has further riled Mr. Gordon, however, is that Christie's did not tell him about the theft until two weeks after it occurred. “It is like someone borrowing your car, and then you finding out from a neighbor that it has been crashed,” he complained. “It looks like I am the last person to know.” A Christie's spokesman said: “This matter is under investigation and we are in contact with all parties involved. We cannot comment further.”

The theft is an embarrassment for Christie's, whic h boasts of its storage facility's “world-class security, management and expertise.”



Owners of Storm-Damaged Homes Get Water-Bill Reprieve

New Yorkers whose properties were damaged in the storm are getting a break on their water bills.Wayne Parry/Associated Press New Yorkers whose properties were damaged in the storm are getting a break on their water bills.

Homeowners whose properties were badly damaged by Hurricane Sandy will get a reprieve on their water bills, Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg announced Friday: no payments are due until June.

The grace period, which covers more than 3,000 homes that have red or yellow tags, comes the day after the mayor announced a similar break on property taxes for homes damaged in the storm.

Under the water-bill measure, the city will also waive standard fees for some homeowners whose water service was interr upted by the storm and will suspend interest fees and collection on damaged properties that were delinquent before the storm.



Popcast: Parsing the Music - and the Psychodrama - of Rihanna

Rihanna performed in Berlin this month as part of a frentic tour to promote her new album, Unapologetic.Markus Schreiber/Associated Press Rihanna performed in Berlin this month as part of a frentic tour to promote her new album, “Unapologetic.”

This week, Rihanna topped the Billboard album chart for the first time in her career with “Unapologetic,” her seventh studio album. It's one of the few milestones that had eluded Rihanna, who has 12 number one singles on the Billboard Hot 100, tying her with Madonna and the Supremes for fourth on the list.

On this week's Popcast, host Ben Ratliff talks about “Unapologetic” with pop critic Jon Caramanica, covering the music, the attitude, and the ongoing public psychodrama between Rihanna and her former boyfriend and abuser, the R&B singer Chris Brown.

Mr. Ratliff and Mr. Caramanica are also joined by music journalists Mary H.K. Choi and Julianne Escobedo Shepherd, both of whom were on Rihanna's seven-country, seven-day promotional tour in advance of the a lbum that turned from fun tag-along to dark night of the kidnapped soul.

RELATED

Jon Caramanica's article on Rihanna's “Unapologetic”

Julianne Escobedo Shepherd's tour roundup

Mary H.K. Choi's tour roundup

PLAYLIST

‘Diamonds'

‘Numb (featuring Eminem)'

‘Pour It Up'

‘Nobody's Business (featuring Chris Brown)'

‘Loveeeeeee Song (featuring Future)'

‘What Now'



Cleaning Out the Beatles\' Closets

The leather jacket that George Harrison wore when he first began performing with the Beatles in Liverpool and Hamburg will be auctioned off along with other musical memorabilia on Dec. 12 at Bonhams in London.

The jacket, with an estimate of $144,000 to $193,000, is part of a sale that includes a pair of Harrison's custom-made boots, a guitar that Paul McCartney used in a pre-Beatles group formed by John Lennon, the Quarrymen, and hundreds of photographs.



An Off-Broadway Rarity: \'Tribes\' Recoups Its Investment

Nina Raine, playwright of Sara Krulwich/The New York Times Nina Raine, playwright of “Tribes.”

Even on Broadway, the vast majority of shows end up losing money. So the news that the Off-Broadway play “Tribes,” by Nina Raine, has recouped its investment makes it the little engine that could.

The play's producers Scott Morfee, Jean Doumanian and Tom Wirtshafter announced on Friday that it had grossed over $2.5 million since opening at the Barrow Street Theater in February, earning back its costs.

“Tribes,” which follows the dynamics of an idiosyncratic British family and their deaf son, will play its final performance on January 6.

Barrow Street has had steady success as a home to l ong-running Off-Broadway plays that aren't circus-based or spectacle-oriented. David Cromer's production of “Our Town” played 644 performances and grossed over $4 million there.



The 40th Anniversary of \'Free to Be . . . You and Me\'

If you grew up in the Seventies or Eighties, chances are you not only remember the album “Free to Be…You and Me,” you also remember which role you played in the requisite school play, rampant in elementary schools across the nation. (I was Pamela Purse, the impudent little minx who cried “Ladies First!” in Shel Silverstein's mischievous skit.)

This month, the songs that for many of the era's schoolchildren provided the soundtrack to their lives - and are now played for their children - celebrates its 40th anniversary. An anthology has just been published, “When We Were Free to Be: Looking Back at a Children's Classic and the Difference It Made,” by Lori Rotskoff and Laura L. Lovett, in which essays by contributors that include Alan Alda, Peggy Orenstein, Letty Cottin Pogrebin and Gloria Steinem explore the meaning, impact and legacy of that landmark album.

The woman behind the music, book and hit TV primetime show is the actress, activist and philanthropist Marlo Thomas, most famous at the time for being the star of television's “That Girl” and the daughter of the comedian Danny Thomas. Determined to find literature and music that didn't rely on gender stereotypes for her young niece, Dionne (who also contributed to the anthology), Ms. Thomas came up with a plan to record a rock album, write a book and create a TV show for children born into the Women's Rights and Civil Rights era.

She corralled many of her friends and colleagues from show business to take part in the venture. Harry Belafonte accompanied Ms. Thomas in a song called “Parents are People.” Mel Brooks wrote and performed in a skit about gender roles and assumptions. The football star Rosey Grier sang the ballad “It's All Right to Cry.” And Roberta Flack and Michael Jackson sang and danced to a duet, “You Don 't Have to Change at All,” whose words now bear a melancholic irony.

Despite the star power, expectations for the album's success were not high. But it quickly went gold, and then platinum, and continues to sell today. I spoke with Ms. Thomas recently about the radical ideas she helped bring to the mainstream: That it's OK to cry, that boys can want a doll and that a girl can happily be a brunette - even if she insisted on being a princess. Some things, it seems, haven't changed.

Related: Times reviews of the album and book from 1972 and 1974 by Deborah Jowitt and Erma Bombeck.



Steamy Turkish TV Drama Draws Fire From Prime Minister

“Magnificent Century,” a sort of Ottoman-era “Sex and the City” set during the reign of Sultan Suleiman the Magnificent, is wildly popular in Turkey and across the Middle East. But one person who is decidedly not a fan is Turkey's conservative prime minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who is so incensed at the show's steamy depiction of the heroic sultan that he has urged legal action against the series.

In the latest cultural battle to erupt in Turkey, Mr. Erdogan last weekend slammed the lavish historical drama, which chronicles the palace and harem intrigue swirling around the Sultan, including the rise of Hurrem, the slave who became his powerful wife. Suleiman ruled the Ottoman empire from 1520 to 1566 at the height of its glory and is revered as a valiant warrior and wise Kanuni, or Lawgiver, by a generation of Turks.

Responding to criticism from the opposition that Turkey's intervention in the region was undermining the country's security, Mr. Erdoga n baffled some observers by apparently conflating the critique of Turkey's robust foreign policy with the portrayal of a debauched Suleiman on the show. Suleiman, he seemed to underline, had been a brave and adventurous conqueror.

Critics “ask why are we dealing with the affairs of Iraq, Syria and Gaza,” Mr. Erdogan said in a speech Sunday at the opening of an airport in western Turkey, according to Reuters. “They know our fathers and ancestors through ‘Magnificent Century,' but we don't know such a Suleiman. He spent 30 years on horseback, not in the palace, not what you see in that series.”

He said that the director of the series and owner of the channel that broadcasts it had been warned, that judicial authorities had been alerted and that a judicial decision was expected. “Those who toy with these values should be taught a lesson within the premises of law,” he said, according to The Hurriyet Daily News.

Cultu ral critics and political rivals railed against Mr. Erdogan, accusing him of cultural authoritarianism and censorship. Muharrem Ince, deputy chairman of the main opposition Republican People's Party, accused Mr. Erdogan of behaving like a sultan, saying that he was jealous of the series' popularity and determined to be the only sultan in the country. Mr. Erdogan, whose governing party has Islamic roots, has sought to embrace and rehabilitate the Ottoman Empire, a period of grandeur when the sultans claimed the spiritual leadership of the Muslim world before the empire's ignominious decline by World War I.

Turkey's culture and tourism ministry responded that popular Turkish soap operas were generating tens of millions of dollars in export income for Turkey and were widely watched across the region, expanding the exposure of the country. “Magnificent Century” attracts a third of the prime-time audience in Turkey and draws an audience of up to 150 million from Cairo t o Kosovo, analysts said.

Even the sultan's real heirs appeared more sanguine that Mr. Erdogan. Osman Selaheddin Osmanoğlu, son of the last prince in the Ottoman Palace, told The Hurriyet Daily News that while he did not appreciate the lascivious portrayal of his ancestors, he wasn't all that bothered as it was only a fictional work. “I am following the series,” he said. “But I don't take it seriously since it is only a soap opera.”

The show is no stranger to controversy. After it first aired in January last year, the Supreme Board of Radio and Television said it had received more than 70,000 complaints, and said that Show TV, the channel broadcasting the series, had wrongly exposed “the privacy of a historical person” and owed the public an apology.

Mr. Erdogan at the time called the program disrespectful and “an effort to show our history in a negative light to the younger generations.” Dozens of egg-throwing protesters chanted “God is great” outside the Show TV studios.

Some viewers were irate because the series showed the Sultan drinking alcohol - banned in Islam - and womanizing with concubines in the harem. They also complained that the scriptwriters were engaging in dangerous and disrespectful historical revisionism.

Melis Behil, a film studies professor at Kadir Has University, said in an interview that the show, which has helped spur a cultural revival of the Ottoman Empire across the country, had been inspired by the success of historical dramas like ones about the Tudors and thus focused on the manners and personal lives of the characters as opposed to the traditional battlefield scenes of many Turkish epics.

“The religious right are complaining that Suleiman was a great leader and all you are showing is his sex life and private parts,” she said.



Police Seek Two Suspects in Possible Bias Attack

The police are looking for two men they say asked a 70-year-old man in Queens if he was Muslim or Hindu, then beat him.

The attack, being investigated as a bias crime, happened on Saturday around 5:20 a.m. in front of 109-25 46th Avenue in Corona, the police said.

The victim was taken to Elmhurst Hospital Center and treated for facial lacerations.

The police released a security video that shows the two suspects, both around 20, running from the scene. One is described as Hispanic with dark hair in a pony tail, a light blue jacket, dark pants and dark shoes; the other is described as Hispanic, with short dark hair, a dark jacket, a gray hooded sweatshirt, blue jeans, and light colored sneakers.

Anyone with information about the attack is asked to contact Crime Stoppers.



Vatican Sells Stamps to Fund Restoration

ROMEâ€"As its corporate sponsors continue to feel the pinch of the financial crisis, the Vatican has taken an unprecedented step and is appealing directly to tourists and collectors to help fund the restoration of Bernini's 17th century colonnade in St. Peter's Square by buying limited edition stamps.

The Vatican's Philatelic and Numismatic Office is offering a souvenir sheet of two ten-euro stamps that could raise 3 million euros for the project, if all 150,000 are sold.

“Fundraising wasn't going very well,” said the office's director Mauro Olivieri, who came up with the idea for the stamps earlier this year, after officials in various Vatican departments were invited to suggest initiatives to help pay for the restoration of the colonnade. The cleanup began in 2009 and was expected to take four years, but the work began to lag when funds dwindled.

The elegant elliptical colonnade, which draws visitors to St. Peter's Basilica, took Gian Lorenzo Bernin i more than a decade to design and build. He conceived it, he said, “to give an open-armed, maternal welcome to all Catholics.”

The restoration involves cleaning 284 columns, set in rows of four, as well as the 140 statues of saints along the balustrade above, sundry marble decorations, and the two 17th-century fountains on either side of the Egyptian obelisk in the center of the square.

As of this month, visitors to the square can find a large panel on one side of the colonnade, inviting them to “restore the colonnade with a stamp,” an unusual form of direct advertising for the Vatican, Mr.
Olivieri said. “They're trying to get the message across to as many people as much as possible,” he said.



For a School\'s Benefit Concert, the \'Universe Came Together\'

David Gonzalez/The New York Times

Nilsa Astacio walked quickly through the soaring atrium at the Frank Sinatra School of the Arts as she headed to the principal's office.  Her thoughts matched her steps: nonstop.

“This is just wild,” she muttered. “Wild!”

This was not one of those dreams where you found yourself back in chemistry class about to take a test unprepared and undressed. But there was a surreal touch to the whole affair. Eight years after Ms. Astacio graduated from this high school, she was back in Astoria â€" planning a Dec. 7th concert that for the first time will unite alumni and current students for a one-night-only benefit for victims of Hurricane Sandy.

To think, the whole th ing started with a simple impulse: Hey, let's put on a show.

“I didn't even think; I just acted,” Ms. Astacio said. “I want people to see that you don't have to be famous, have a big name or be a millionaire to help other people.”

She doesn't have that lucky trio of traits â€" yet. She works the local club circuit as a rock 'n' roll singer,  something she set her heart on after graduating from Frank Sinatra in 2004. She lives at home with her mother in College Point, which is where she was in the emotionally numbing days after the storm.

Her house was fine. Others were not so lucky. She was restless.

“I was sitting in the dining room with my mom, sister and a friend,” she recalled. “And I said to them that I'd love to do a benefit concert.”

Over in Corona, Raquel Charter was thinking the same thing. She had been Ms. Astacio's Spanish teacher at the school, and had stayed in touch with her and other alumni. She had just returned to her home with her husband, who had surveyed the storm's damage around various neighborhoods served by the nonprofit group where he works.

“I was really depressed,” Ms. Charter said. “After visiting the different sites, the last thing I wanted to do was sit at home and look at the media. I wanted to do something.”

Ms. Astacio acted first â€" or so she thought â€" when she went to her Facebook page to suggest a benefit concert to her friends. There was already a message waiting for her from her former teacher.

“She was saying I had to bring the alumni together,” Ms. Astacio recalled. “This was like five minutes after I thought of the idea! The universe came together.”

From those initial suggestions, hundreds of people rallied to the cause â€" sort of like a cross between “Babes in Arms” and “The Blues Brothers.” Alumni started sending in samples of their music or videos of their dancing or acting. Lists were drawn for donations, volunteers and other details.  Current students â€" who in the past have done clothing and food drives â€" were enlisted, too, not that they needed much encouragement.

This kind of involvement is not unusual for this school, where arts and academics have been equally valued since it opened in 2001 in Long Island City (and later moved to its gleaming new building near the Kaufman Astoria Studios in 2009). Community service was stressed by its founder, Anthony Dominick Benedetto, a local boy who did O.K. as a crooner.

His show-business name adorns the school's pitch-perfect concert hall: Tony Bennett.

“This school gave us so much,” said Costas Tsourakis, a vocalist who is president of the alumni association.  “We wanted to give back to the community.”

After only a few weeks of planning, 12 alumni performers have been selected for the benefit. Student musicians will join an alumni chorus, while film students alr eady taped a promotional spot featuring Ms. Astacio and Ms. Tsourakis bantering about the benefit.

With a week to go, Ms. Astacio is still a bit amazed by it all: her impulse to help, the response from the alumni and students, the school's eagerness, even her own ability to actually be organized. She now says she'd like to do more. Her family says she's found her calling, to mix the arts with aid.

And her friends?

“They think I'm nuts, but they admire me for it,” she said. “I've taken on this entire show and put it on my shoulders. I kind of think I'm a little nuts. But the outcome has outweighed the craziness â€" so far.”



Spanish Writer Wins Cervantes Prize

The 86-year-old Spanish poet, novelist and essayist Jose Manuel Caballero Bonald has won the Cervantes Prize, the most prestigious literary award in the Spanish-speaking world, for helping to “enrich the Hispanic literary legacy,” the Spanish-language news agency EFE reported.

Often referred to as a member of the Generation of 1950 - writers who worked during the repressive reign of Gen. Francisco Franco - Mr. Caballero Boland wrote about the country's social conditions. A person “who has no doubts, who is sure of everything, is the closest thing there is to an imbecile,” he told EFE in an interview.

Dario Villanueva, president of the jury panel, described Mr. Caballero Bonald as a “teller and creator of stories, and a maestro in the use of the language.” The prize comes with a $167,000 award.

Previous winners include Jorge Luis Borges of Argentina, Carlos Fuentes and Octavio Paz of Mexico and Mario Vargas Llosa of Peru.



\'Books, I Think, Are Dead\': Joe Queenan Talks About \'One for the Books\'

Throughout his career, the humorist Joe Queenan has gleefully skewered pop culture, Baby Boomers, sports fans and much else. In his 2009 memoir “Closing Time,” Mr. Queenan wrote about growing up poor in Philadelphia and suffering at the hands of his violent father. In his latest, “One for the Books,” he recounts a lifetime of reading the classics, the trashy and everything in between. He also makes an impassioned case for the printed book's superiority over its digital competitor. In a recent e-mail interview, Mr. Queenan discussed the future of books, his problem with book clubs, reading 80 books at a time and more. Below are edited excerpts from the conversation:

Q.

You write that it's as if certain unread books are “stalking me,
 taunting me”: “You're not fooling anybody, pally. If you haven't read ‘Ulysses,' you're still a pathetic rube off the streets of Philadelphia. 
And you always will be.” After a lifetime of serious reading, how deeply
 do you still feel conscious of not coming from a typical
 bookish background?

A.

Not at all. I never think about it. The “Ulysses” stuff is just a joke. One thing, though: When I was a callow youth devouring books while mired in an unsatisfactory economic class, I thought this would stand me in good stead once I started hanging out with the bourgeoisie. I figured people would be really impressed that I had read “Silas Marner” and “Mourning Becomes Electra.” Then I finally got invited into the Mansion on the Hill and discovered that the residents were all illiterate slobs.

Q.

One of your book's biggest themes is the supe riority of books to
 e-readers. Are you optimistic about the future of books on paper? And do 
you consider this book more of an early eulogy or a rallying cry?

A.

The book is elegiac. Books, I think, are dead. You cannot fight the zeitgeist and you cannot fight corporations. The genius of corporations is that they force you to make decisions about how you will live your life and then beguile you into thinking that it was all your choice. Compact discs are not superior to vinyl. E-readers are not superior to books. Lite beer is not the great leap forward. A society that replaces seven-tier wedding cakes with lo-fat cupcakes is a society that deserves to be put to the sword. But you can't fight City Hall. I also believe that everything that happens to you as you grow older makes it easier to die, because the world you once lived in, and presumably loved, is gone. As I have said before, when Keith Richards goes, I'm going too. Same deal with books.

Q.

You say you're reading up to 32 books at a time. What are the mechanics 
of that? Has the number of books you read simultaneously grown over time? 
Is there a ceiling, or could you be reading a hundred books at some
 point?

A.

I might read 50 pages of a Maigret novel, then switch to Flaubert, then switch to one of those beautiful little Taschen books about Courbet or Odilon Redon, then switch to Sherlock Holmes, then switch to John Keegan, then switch to “The English Patient.” Last week I read Margot Livesey's gorgeous “The Flight of Gemma Hardy” in two days, then went back to the book about the Spanish Civil War that I have been working on for years. There is literally no limit to how many books you can read simultaneously, provided you have a good memory. I once got up to around 80. Now I have it back down to a manageable 24.

Q.
< p>You cycle through different ways of organizing your books (by height, by
author's nationality, by subject matter). Do you have a favorite method?

A.

No. The whole thing is a form of socially sanctioned insanity. It is a way of trying to control a universe that cannot be controlled.

Q.

You say that, “a genuinely terrible book is a sheer delight.” What's the 
worst book you've ever read? (Let's exclude the most predictably bad,
 like those you cite written by O. J. Simpson and Geraldo Rivera.)

A.

“Atlas Shrugged” is moronic beyond belief, though it just narrowly edges out “The Fountainhead.” Rand is a fascist and a creep, either of which could be forgiven. But she also cannot write. As Oscar Wilde once said, the only truly unforgivable crime is lack of sophistication. I think Wilde said that. He said everything else.

Q.

About a slightl y different category, you write, “reading a bad book by a
 good writer is compelling in a way that reading a good book by a
 mediocrity never is.” What's the worst book by a good writer that you've
 read?

A.

“The Old Man and the Sea” is pathetic, infantile, hokey, almost self-parody. Everything great in Hemingway had curdled into schtick. That said, I just finished re-reading “The Sun Also Rises” for the 15 billionth time.

Joe QueenanDorothy Handelman Joe Queenan
Q.

Have your experiences in book clubs been universally terrible? How might 
you design an ideal book club, or do you think it's impossible?

A.

I was only in one boo k club a long, long time ago. It scarred me for life. People would talk about things like “foreshadowing.” It was like being in high school. An ideal book club would consist exclusively of writers. Those guys know how to pick good books. They're in that line of trade. If I could be in a book club with Thomas McGuane, Jane Smiley, Julian Barnes and Jane Gardam, I'd sign up today.

Q.

You haven't shopped many times at the Strand bookstore in New York,
 which surprised me. As a place to browse and a place for older and odder 
titles, I find it invaluable. What keeps you away?

A.

No charm. I feel like I'm trapped in a Jose Saramago novel where a customer named Borges keeps turning up and asking for a copy of “Don Quixote.” Too much of a good thing is a bad thing.

Q.

In itemizing your library, you say you own “perhaps 30 books I keep
 around as a joke.” Do you buy these y ourself or are they given to you as
 gag gifts? What makes a book a joke rather than just a bad book?

A.

They mostly turned up over the transom at jobs I used to work at. “Hoosier Home Remedies” is my favorite. That is the best title for a book ever. I am not saying that the book itself is a joke - the remedies are excellent - but I only keep it around for laughs. I have held on to “Steve Allen on the Bible, Religion, and Morality” because Steve Allen gave it to me, and because it holds out hope that I may one day be given “Jay Leno on the Bible, Religion, and Morality” or “Ellen on Leibniz.” Of such dreams is a full life made.

Bad books are not so much funny as ridiculous. “1945″ by Newt Gingrich and some industrious history professor is insanely bad. Still, if Gingrich had gotten himself elected president he wouldn't have had time to get these books co-written for him. The republic would have benefited greatly.

Q.

You've written a great deal about movies, often scathingly. Let's get
 sunny: do you have any favorite movies that were adapted from books?

A.

“L.A. Confidential” was a brilliant book and a brilliant movie. The same is true of “True Confessions.” “The Sweet Hereafter” is a great book and a great movie. So is “Black Robe.” “Brokeback Mountain” is a great movie based on a beautiful novella. You can say the same thing about “Emma,” “Sense and Sensibility,” “Great Expectations,” the most recent “Jane Eyre” and several versions of “Pride and Prejudice.” Not to mention “Ran.” As for The Iliad, well, they haven't gotten that one right yet. Still can't figure out what to do with the gods.

Q.

What's the next book you're planning to read?

A.

It took me 34 years to finish “Middlemarch.” The first 31 years were the hardest. I started “Moby-Dick” about 20 years ago and never got past page 100. Captain Ahab, batter up. If I could get through “Middlemarch,” I can get through anything.



Defining the Subway

Todd Heisler/The New York Times

Dear Diary:

Subway (noun):

The underground place of transformation from weary cynic to believer; where you meet a 7-year-old boy to your right who asks you for a helpful hint on his puzzle as he gently kicks your leg as the train rocks along, while on your left, a lady helps shush your baby back to sleep.

The place where you rush after having stood impatiently in line in the punishing cold for an egg white and cheese on a roll - the line that sentenced you to a late arrival at work; where the memory of all that vanishes, and you quietly give your breakfast away without a second thought.

Where a complete stranger with a perhaps not so very clean hat just might nod off on your should er, someone who is already done with their day's work before yours even begins, and you decide you don't even really mind at all; the place from where you emerge, blinking in the daylight on the busy street above, renewing your vow to take better care of your neighbors.

Whoever said New York was too cold and rushed and rude for their liking has never been to my New York.

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