Monthly Archives: September 2016

A Poem in Praise of Libraries

By Robin Bates | Published: September 19, 2016

In his new collection of poems, Norman Finkelstein has one of the best poems I have encountered about libraries. The poem captures the paradoxical nature of libraries, how they both preserve the past but look forward to the future.

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Trump’s Pleasure Dome (with Caves of Ice)

By Robin Bates | Published: September 18, 2016

Coleridge’s Kubla Khan and Donald Trump have a lot in common: both build sunny edifices that prove to be sterile at the core.

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My Blind Eyes Were Touched with Light

By Robin Bates | Published: September 17, 2016

Helen Keller’s poem about revelation–“In the Garden of the Lord”–has a vision of revelation that is all the more powerful because we know the speaker is literally blind. That gives special poignancy to the line, “My blind eyes were touched with light.”

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Trump, “FDA Food Police,” & The Jungle

By Robin Bates | Published: September 15, 2016

Donald Trump yesterday floated a proposal to roll back food regulations. It’s worth remembering that such regulations were first put into place in large part because of a novel, Upton Sinclair’s “The Jungle” (1906).

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For Hillary, Witch Hunts Never End

By Robin Bates | Published: September 14, 2016

Alexandra Petri of the Washington Post alludes to Arthur Miller’s “The Crucible” as she wonders whether Hillary Clinton should be subjected to witch trials to figure out what’s wrong with her.

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Solace for Vets from Sophocles

By Robin Bates | Published: September 13, 2016

A group has been giving dramatic readings of Sophocles plays in order to reach veterans suffering from PTSD. The results have been astonishing.

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Prisons, America’s Growth Industry

By Robin Bates | Published: September 12, 2016

At long last, some politicians from both parties are beginning to express concern over America’s world-leading incarceration rate. Rachel Kranz raised the alarm 16 years ago in her novel “Leaps of Faith.”

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Poems To Mourn a Russian History Prof

By Robin Bates | Published: September 11, 2016

When a Russian history professor died at our college, his colleagues turned to poetry as they wrestled with his premature death. Ovid, Alexander Pushkin, Ivan Turgenev, and Walt Whitman provided powerful words.

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On 9/11, Firemen Ascended Jacob’s Ladder

By Robin Bates | Published: September 10, 2016

Lucille Clifton’s seven 9/11 poems, written in the days following the attacks, use religious imagery to find hope.

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