Monthly Archives: March 2018

When the World Is Mud-Luscious

By Robin Bates | Published: March 21, 2018

e. e. cummings ushers in spring with a joyous celebration.

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Trump on a Hot Tin Roof

By Robin Bates | Published: March 20, 2018

Trump’s lawyer as compared the FBI to the mendacity that pervades “Cat on a Hot Tin Roof.” The play applies, all right, but to Trump and Dowd themselves.

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Female Intimacy in Virginia Woolf

By Robin Bates | Published: March 19, 2018

Virginia Woolf may have used “To the Lighthouse” to explore the possibilities of human intimacy.

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Filled with Some Other Power

By Robin Bates | Published: March 18, 2018

Denise Levertov’s beautiful poem “The Well” works as a commentary on John’s gospel account of the Samaritan woman at the well.

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Believing in the Great White Race

By Robin Bates | Published: March 16, 2018

Teaching Langston Hughes’s “Ku Klux” in Ljubljana prompted the students to think of Europes neo-fascists.

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Grieving for a Loved One

By Robin Bates | Published: March 15, 2018

Someone I love very dearly has just been diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. I turn to “Sonny’s Blues” and “King Lear” to find adequate words.

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Corruption Starts at the Top

By Robin Bates | Published: March 14, 2018

The spread of Trumpian corruption is an instance of the fish rotting from the top. “King Lear” shows this process at work.

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Theories about Lit’s Impact

By Robin Bates | Published: March 12, 2018

A transcript of a talk given at the University of Ljubljana on “how literature changes lives.”

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A Moving Foster Home Story

By Robin Bates | Published: March 12, 2018

Over the weekend I stayed with a former Slovenian exchange student and his foster mother and learned about their moving story.

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