Last update: May 31, 2009.
"Mdiamante" is the Wikipedia username for Matthew Diamante, a San Franciscan who holds a B.A. in History from Tufts University.
PUBLISHED WORKS
The arts section of the San Francisco Chronicle printed a letter of Matthew's on June 27, 2000 and December 28, 2007; the Boston Globe printed a letter on December 3, 2007. Other published works of his include:
2008
- In the wake of the fall elections' Democratic gains, Matthew argued that Congress should impeach and convict Bush and Cheney in the December 1 Tufts Daily. [1]
- Matthew ranked the James Bond films' title themes for the November 28 Tufts Observer. [2]
- In November 2008, Matthew directed the Tufts 3Ps Workshop production Sherlock Holmes: Baker Street Adventures, his own adaptation of two of Arthur Conan Doyle's short stories; the Daily profiled it on November 7. [3]
- Have you experienced G.K. Chesterton's novel The Man Who Was Thursday? Matthew gave it qualified praise in the October 27 Observer. [4] But did he really write that the Old Testament was 7,000 years old? Surely he meant 3,000 or so.
- In order to help his peers decompress from the then-upcoming finale to a long and grueling election, Matthew offered reviews of several history-dramatizing films in the November 3 Observer. [5]
- As a follow-up to his fall 2006 reflections on the politics of that summer's blockbuster films, Matthew discussed those of 2008 in the October 6 Observer. [6]
- Matthew wrote a September 15 letter to the Daily assailing two right-wing op eds; an unedited version is available here.[7]
- Before Obama clinched the nomination, Matthew touted former Vice President Gore as a possible compromise tiebreaker in a February 12 letter to the Daily. [8]
2007
- More than seven years after first trumpeting Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials books in the San Francisco Chronicle, Matthew did so again on December 28, 2007. [9] Excised from the printed letter was a reference to the Vatican newspaper L'Osservatore Romano and a characterization of C.S. Lewis' Aslan as a "Christ-on-steroids" figure. The unedited submission can be read here.
- Matthew commented on a piece by Donna Freitas, Professor of Religion at Boston University, concerning theology in the book and film The Golden Compass in the December 3, 2007 Boston Globe. [10]
- Matthew wrote a review of Macbeth, directed by Rupert Goold and starring Patrick Stewart, for the November 12 issue of the London Student. The LS web site is in shambles, however, so you'll have to take my word for this.
- Granted, a YouTube video hardly qualifies as "publishing", but this very short piece from the fall of 2004 (uploaded October 3) may nevertheless amuse: [11]
- Film critic Roger Ebert responded to a question of Matthew's in his September 20 Answer Man column. [12]
- Matthew phoned in to the KQED radio program Forum with Michael Krasny on August 24; the subject was a right-wing attempt to redirect half of California's Electoral College votes. Matthew's call appears at 41:49. [13]
- Matthew was credited in the May 20, 2007 Commencement issue of the Daily as the director of that April's one-act play Hidden in this Picture; the show was written by The West Wing creator Aaron Sorkin. [14]
- Matthew contributed an editorial on progressive values in popular culture to the March 2007 inaugural issue of Tufts Democrats magazine The Forum. It can be found on page 16 of this .pdf file; or read (sans typos) here.
- Funny: Tufts' right-wing near-tabloid The Primary Source quoted Matthew twice this Spring ([15], [16]). The second quote, however, features two sentences unaccompanied by a crucial third, thus making the cited "example" rather opaque.
- A March 9 letter to the Daily concerning a fellow Jumbo's too-loosely worded assertion that "Roosevelt allowed Hitler to gain power and systematically murder over 11 million people." [17]
- President 43 meets Agent 007 in a February 22 Daily editorial. [18]
- Matthew was quoted in a January 22 Daily News story on the state of political expression amongst today's collegiates. [19]
2006
- Yet another Daily editorial, this time accusing President and Governors Bush of complicity in "a conspiracy of Constitutional negligence" with regard to voting rights. Published December 6. [20]
- A letter to the Daily concerning corporate infotainment and military service. Published November 8. [21]
- A Daily editorial excoriating the Republican Congress and stressing the importance of the 2006 midterm elections. Published October 26. [22]
- A Daily editorial in which the Electoral College is the target of some floccinaucinihilipilification, and the National Popular Vote Campaign is praised. Published October 12. [23]
- A letter to the Daily critiquing a fluff piece on a right-wing speaker. Published September 29. [24]
- An analysis of the political implications of summer of 2006's blockbuster films for the Observer. The published essay [25], which appeared in the September 29 issue, was heavily edited. A complete version of the essay can be found here.
- A Daily editorial praising the seven-year run of The West Wing, and asking "what's next?" for left-wing entertainment. Published May 1. [26]
2005
- The Tufts Daily ran a profile of Matthew on November 28. Though not the most accurate piece, it's an amusing read: [27]
- A year and a half or so after it was written, Matthew's biographical profile of a Putney School teacher appeared in the Spring 2005 Putney Post: [29]
2000
- In my first published work (in the San Francisco Chronicle), I accused the first three Harry Potter books of being "funny and exciting" yet lacking "in terms of quality," championing Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials and Lloyd Alexander's The Chronicles of Prydain instead. [30]
WIKIPEDIA CONTRIBUTIONS
Some Wikipedia articles I've created:
- Agincourt Carol: One of the 15th century's best-known songs.
- "The Ash Grove": A beautiful Welsh folk song.
- "Spanish Ladies": One of, if not the, greatest sea shanties ever known to old salts.
- "The Course of Empire", a five-part series of paintings by Thomas Cole in the 1830s.
- "San Francisco Bound": a 1913 song by Irving Berlin.
- "The Fountain in the Park": a well-known ditty nobody fully remembers.
- Hidden in this Picture: a one-act play by Aaron Sorkin.
MISCELLANEOUS THINGS I LIKE
Wikiality
- An archived version of the Wikipedia article "Earth": [32]
- An archived version of the Wikipedia article "United States" labeling the nation a "federal empire." Funny. [33]
- Uncyclopedia: Wow. Just wow. (Painfully hip Wiki assesment here)
- A list of actors who have played a President of the United States. What? No John Tyler?!
Blogs
- Paleo-Future: An excellent blog that looks back "into the future that never was."
- The Times they Aren't a-Changing: Old and Busted: there's nothing new under the sun. New Hotness: proof of this is blog form.