Clik here to view.
A Bird Came Down the Walk
Emily Dickinson Museum, Amherst, Massachusetts – side view of Emily Dickinson’s house. (Photo credit: Wikipedia) For some reason my Dickinsonia instincts and my deep appreciation of her poetry kick in...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Why major in humanities? Not just for a good job — for a good life–today’s...
Thank God, someone wrote a cogent, well-informed and supported piece about this (so I don’t have to). If you want to be a one dimensional moron, go for the money and a tech or highly specialized job....
View ArticleClik here to view.
“Feeling into Words” by Seamus Heaney
English: Picture of the Irish poet and Nobel Prize winner Seamus Heaney at the University College Dublin, February 11, 2009. (Photo credit: Wikipedia) “The poet is on the side of undeceiving the world....
View ArticleClik here to view.
Bogland
margaretjeanlangstaff:As an afterword and for deeper background (pardon the pun) to the previous post on Heaney…from a very interesting blog Originally posted on scienceandartblog: Seamus Heaney, the...
View ArticleClik here to view.
The Universe According to Sarah Jo McCorkle of Viburnum Lane
TO WHOM IT MAY CONCERN (e.g., anything with a pulse on this planet) A Matter of Ultimate Significance A Major Advancement in Human Knowledge *S*H*O*C*K*I*N*G Paradigm Shift `Coming Soon from CHP...
View ArticleClik here to view.
“By Night when Others Soundly Slept”
I had an fairly elaborate post in the works for National Poetry Day, but alas, life intervened and blew it out of the water for the time being. I will finish it and post it later, but I ran across...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Skeered to Death! The Headless Horseman Rides Again!
It never fails, every October, in advance of Halloween, I think of this nightmarish freak featured so prominently in Washington Irving‘s timeless tale THE LEGEND OF SLEEPY HOLLOW. What a rip...
View ArticleClik here to view.
“Numerous Prominent Female Thinkers Lack Wikipedia Entries”
Wikipedia (Photo credit: Octavio Rojas) Ahem. Exxxccuuuse, me! But, dear ole Wikipedia, this really stinks. Not that I’m surprised, really, or even shocked (even). I’ve sensed this for several years...
View ArticleClik here to view.
The Ghost of Flannery O’Connor: A Self-Portrait
All right, let me be upfront about this before we wade into deep water: Every time I look at this painting, I get the distinct impression it was intended to be humorous, ironic and self-deprecating....
View ArticleClik here to view.
On the Need for Critics, and the Means by which their Field might be Improved
margaretjeanlangstaff:Kudos to this discerning writer for taking the time to intelligently address the rampant dumbing down of book criticism, a sad and costly trend for “literature, for the serious...
View ArticleClik here to view.
New Online Emily Dickinson Archive
This reclusive, intensely shy and private poet, virtually ignored by the literati during her 19th century lifetime, has acquired a staying power and an exponentially growing reputation today that...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Split the Lark–and You’ll Find the Music?
A recent online exchange with a fellow blogger about the inexpressible and inexplicable nature of really great books brought to mind the following poem by Emily Dickinson. I thought I’d...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Ah, Victory!
I have always enjoyed Joseph Conrad’s work, but have approached it rather haphazardly, catch as catch can, picking up a novel here and there, savoring it, then moving onto something else, usually a...
View ArticleClik here to view.
What’s So Funny?
Neuroscientists Think (?) They’ve Nailed Laughter–NY Times I wonder what Mark Twain or Woody Allen or David Sedaris (even) would make of this recent NY Times piece. Would that I could get their...
View ArticleClik here to view.
The Rigors of Writing and The Shocking Plunge into Reality
Here’s a thought for today, fellow writers, as you swan dive into your work-in- progress– Though I still have my hair and teeth, I can attest to the truth of O’Connor’s ballsy statement. I would add...
View ArticleClik here to view.
A Rare and Precious Gift –“What’s So Funny” Part Two
Portrait of Sigmund Freud (Photo credit: Wikipedia) “Humor has in it a liberating element … “It refuses to be hurt by the arrows of reality or to be compelled to suffer. It insists that it is...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Art Is Not for Everybody
Filed under: Humor, Literature, Rants, writing Tagged: Art, artists, authors, Catholic writers, commercial fiction, Flannery O'Connor, Literature, popular fiction, writers, writing
View ArticleClik here to view.
What a Lady, What a Writer
As I’m sure you know, Alice Munro won the Nobel Prize for Literature this year on the basis of a lifetime of writing plain spoken, deeply felt and viscerally moving short stories about the intricacies,...
View ArticleClik here to view.
A Star in My Eyes
From the NY Times a few years ago and on my fridge behind a magnet ever since. Brodsky is or was – as a poet – so big, I hesitate to offer any commentary. That’s big (and maybe not dead long enough)....
View ArticleClik here to view.
Flannery O’Connor on Writing
Once one gets through the hesitancy and uncertainty of her youthful scholarship student ruminations at the Iowa’s Writers Workshop in THE HABIT OF BEING, the view broadens, the pace quickens and the...
View Article
