Monthly Archives: September 2015

The GOP Descends into the Maelstrom

By Robin Bates | Published: September 20, 2015

Poe’s “Descent into the Maelstrom” describes the state of current GOP politics, where even moderate Republicans are being pulled into rightwing extremism.

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Live in the Layers, Not on the Litter

By Robin Bates | Published: September 20, 2015

In a perfect poem for Yom Kippur, Stanley Kunitz urges us to look through the litter and wreckage of our lives and see instead “the layers.”

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Can Lit Help Build an Egalitarian World?

By Robin Bates | Published: September 17, 2015

Neo-Marxist literary theory calls for us to see literature as relevant to building an egalitarian society.

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The GOP Debate & the Ox-Frog Fable

By Robin Bates | Published: September 16, 2015

Last night’s GOP debate often reminded me of the fable of the ox and the frog, with people trying to puff themselves up with hardline positions to impress voters. Here’s a Scott Bates version of the fable.

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Trump as the Duke of Bilgewater

By Robin Bates | Published: September 15, 2015

Although a couple of recent articles have compared Donald Trump to Pap in “Huckleberry Finn,” I find him to be much more akin to the Duke and the Dauphin. Which is to say, an ace con artist.

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Does Studying Lit Truly Change Things?

By Robin Bates | Published: September 14, 2015

Some claims for literature’s power have been inflated, such as those of F. R. Leavis, and sometimes lit has failed to change bad people. Still, it can play an important role in our lives.

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Why We Love the Cat in the Hat

By Robin Bates | Published: September 13, 2015

Dr. Seuss’s “Cat in the Hat” engages children the way Hollywood genre movies engage audiences–but offering titillating transgressive fantasies before hurriedly restoring order.

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Theoretically, a Season for Everything

By Robin Bates | Published: September 12, 2015

The soul, says Amichai Yehuda in this Rosh Hashanah poem, knows that, for everything there is a season. The body, on the other hand, gets the seasons all muddled up.

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Our Indispensable Matriarchs

By Robin Bates | Published: September 10, 2015

May Sarton celebrates elderly matriarchs in her novel “Kinds of Love.” As I spend my sabbatical in my childhood home, I wonder whether we are seeing the last of such women.

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