Monthly Archives: June 2015

Justice Scalia, Blind Like Pentheus

Scalia attacking his fellow SCOTUS justices sounds like Pentheus excoriating Teiresias and Cadmus in “The Bacchae.” Unlike Scalia’s fellow justices, Teiresias gives as good as he gets.

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The Bard Endorsed Same Sex Marriage

In “Twelfth Night,” 400 years before Obergefell v. Hodges, Shakespeare dreamed of same sex marriage. He would have been celebrating Friday after the Supreme Court ruled in favor of same sex marriage.

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No Room in This House for Two “I”s

A Rumi parable speaks to the recent killings in Kuwait City and Charleston. It shares certain themes with Barack Obama’s Friday eulogy to Reverend Pinckney.

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Poetry Enlarges the Moral Imagination

Shelley’s “Defence of Poetry” makes one of the strongest cases in history for how poetry changes the world.

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Plato’s Warning: Beware of Poets

While Plato advocated banning poets from the ideal republic, his censure works as an indirect testimony to literature’s power.

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The Fear of Not Reading All We Should

Many readers have they anxiety that they haven’t read all the books they should have. Bibliotherapists claim that they can offer relief.

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Prescribing Lit for What Ails Us

I had mixed feelings about a recent article in “The New Yorker” on bibliotherapy.

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Puck’s Summer Magic

“Midsummer Night’s Dream” dips into ancient British legends about the mystical aspects of midsummer.

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Milton’s Satan Invades Charleston

Once again, light has attracted darkness in America with the Charleston church killings. John Milton describes how this dynamic works in “Paradise Lost” and Leslie Marmon Silko does so as well in “Ceremony.”

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