Steven Hoch, the Russian historian and former provost at Washington State University, has been assigned to teach at the University's branch campus at Richland. There, he will teach a seminar on the Russian Revolution at an annual salary of $245,000. The department might have hired three full professors, five or six assistant professors, or a small army of adjuncts for that money. Hat tip.

Thomas Hegghammer,"Until the end of time," The National, 16 January, reviews Jean-Pierre Filiu's L'Apocalypse dans l'Islam, a study of the apocalypse in Sunni and Shia Islam since the 7th century.

"Inaugural Words: 1789 to the Present," NYT, 17 January, has a word cloud for every inaugural address since George Washington's first.

Michael Kammen,"Chagall, chronicler of a century's triumphs, terrors," Boston Globe, 18 January, reviews Jackie Wullschlager's Chagall: A Biography.

Matt Taibbi,"Flat N All That," New York Press, 14 January, takes aim at Thomas Friedman's Hot, Flat, and Crowded. Especially recommended for connoisseurs of venom well delivered.