The Resurrection

“If the internet could express emotions, a collective groan of despair would have filtered through a quarter of a million modems […] with the sudden closure of a site called Arts & Letters Daily.” The “directory of ideas” – created by Canterbury University’s Denis Dutton – was temporarily cancelled due to the bankruptcy of its chief sponsor, American magazine Lingua Franca. Fortunately for SMH fans, not to mention the other 250,000, the site was rescued by the Chronicle of Higher Education. Dutton was amused and flattered by the distressed e-mails that he received: “Somebody said that he felt like he’d been used to drinking coffee out of his favourite cup and suddenly his wife had broken it.”