literary

The enthusiasm for “Fifty Shades of Grey” and the next two in the trilogy has forced library officials to dust off their policies — if they have them — on erotica.

In Richard Ford’s new novel, a 15-year-old boy watches his family fall apart, and flees north to something even worse.

Chad Orzel continues to amuse and enlighten in the follow-up to his book “How to Teach Physics to Your Dog.”

Some scientists who had an unwavering belief in the truth of their ideas also had no compunction about breaking the rules to prove it.

Sam Shakusky, the protagonist of Wes Anderson’s new movie, “Moonrise Kingdom,” is a classic romantic hero. He’s independent, even a bit of a loner; resourceful (he can survive in the woods by himself); and passionate. Only one obstacle prevents him from being with his . . . (Subscription required.)

In her sixth solo show at the Greene Naftali gallery, the sculptor Rachel Harrison looks more formalist, feminist, and sphinxlike than ever. Her rollicking polychrome fusions of found objects and hand-fashioned forms remain so encrypted with references that viewers can sometimes feel outsmarted. Take the photograph of a nondescript . . . (Subscription required.)

August Strindberg was so skeptical of received dogma that he once lay down in a Berlin street with an upright broom as a sundial to satisfy himself that the world was round. Prideaux, his latest biographer, shares this passion for firsthand impressions, lamenting the reductive image of him as the . . . (Subscription required.)

The preview screening of the studio’s new comic blockbuster, calculated to jump-start buzz among Manhattan’s movers and shakers, evoked the kind of silence one associates with outer space. When the credits rolled, heralding the evaporation of a hundred and eighty million smackeroos, the audience rose . . .

Fountain’s excellent first novel follows a group of soldiers at a Dallas Cowboys game on Thanksgiving Day. Having recently survived a shoot-out in Iraq, they are on a government-funded media tour and are about to return to the front lines. Through the eyes of the titular . . . (Subscription required.)

For a moment, he was obscured by the Havana night. It was as if he were invisible, as he had been before coming to Cuba, in the midst of revolution. Then a burst of floodlights illuminated him: William Alexander Morgan, the great Yankee comandante. He was standing, with his back . . .

PageBreak -->OPENINGS AND PREVIEWS Please call the phone number listed with the theatre for timetables and ticket information. THE BAD GUYS Second Stage Theatre Uptown presents a comedy by Alena Smith, in which a group of childhood friends reunite for a summer barbecue. Directed by Hal . . .

I’m trying to remember when I first saw the performance artist Carmelita Tropicana, but that’s like trying to remember someone’s first time making you laugh: there are no specifics, just feelings. Often dressed like a more surreal Carmen Miranda—Carmelita wears more glitter . . .

8220;The humorous story is strictly a work of art,—high and delicate art,—and only an artist can tell it,” Mark Twain wrote. Will Eno’s “Title and Deed” (elegantly directed by Judy Hegarty Lovett, at the Pershing Square Signature Center) is a . . . (Subscription required.)

Look—it’s the Lively, hauled out above the tide line up on a trailer with two flat tires. What— fourteen-foot? Clinker-built and chained by the stern to a pile of granite blocks but with the bow still pointed westward down the long voe, down . . . (Subscription required.)

A couple of weeks ago, when Mark Zuckerberg wore his trademark hoodie to meetings with potential investors in Facebook’s I.P.O., not everyone was impressed. Michael Pachter, an analyst at Wedbush Securities, said that it was a “mark of immaturity” and Zuckerberg’s way of &#8220 . . .

On a recent Sunday morning in the black township of Kwa Thema, near Johannesburg, a young lesbian couple went to church. Kwa Thema is one of many settlements that were created by the apartheid regime to contain and control the black majority population, and it remains isolated today. The two . . . (Subscription required.)

PageBreak -->ROCK AND POP Musicians and night-club proprietors live complicated lives; it’s advisable to check in advance to confirm engagements. B. B. KING BLUES CLUB & GRILL 237 W. 42nd St. (212-997-4144)—May 24: In their high-haired, eighties heyday, the pop . . .

goatTitle-->NEW SCHOOL In October, 2008, the New York Public Library selected the architect Norman Foster to create a new plan for the library’s main research building, on Forty-second Street. The plan—which involves removing the building’s famed stacks of books—has . . .

goatTitle-->NEW YORK CITY BALLET In what may be a timely nod to the much lauded film “The Artist,” New York City Ballet brings back Susan Stroman’s “Double Feature” this week for five performances. A Broadway veteran who has made a handful of . . .

When Richard Carmona talks to voters in Arizona, he likes to tell them that their state—his state—has a lousy reputation. He travels a lot, and people often ask him where he lives. “I say, ‘Arizona,’ ” he says. “And they go, &#8216 . . . (Subscription required.)