Monthly Archives: August 2019

Angelic Minds vs. the Human Senses

By Robin Bates | Published: August 10, 2019

Spiritual Sunday I share today a C. S. Lewis poem about the difference between human and angelic perspectives.  If angels represent pure spirit, then they are not impeded from touching the divine. By contrast (to draw on Paul), humans “see through a glass darkly” and miss out on a “face to face” encounter. In “On […]

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The Vanity of Trumpian Wishes

By Robin Bates | Published: August 8, 2019

Friday I recently returned to Samuel Johnson’s great poem The Vanity of Human Wishes in search of insights into our present political moment. Johnson is one of the wisest writers I know—wherever I push my thinking, he is always there before me—and Vanity distills the folly of our desires into a series of remarkably compact […]

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“Beowulf” Understands U.S. Violence

By Robin Bates | Published: August 7, 2019

 Thursday When I launched this blog over 10 years ago, I called it Better Living through Beowulf because Beowulf is the starting text for those of us specializing in British Literature. I used Beowulf to represent all of literature and felt free to write about any literary work that provides insight into the life we […]

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Toni Morrison Understood America

By Robin Bates | Published: August 6, 2019

Wednesday “National treasure” is an overused metaphor, but it is entirely warranted in the case of the late Toni Morrison. Bluest Eye showed us how we internalize race prejudice, Sula helped us understand “bad girls,” Song of Solomon shaped Barack Obama, Tar Baby exposed the emptiness of the middle class promise, Beloved explored the impact […]

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Why Fascists Obsess about Invasions

By Robin Bates | Published: August 5, 2019

Tuesday In an important article, Washington Post’s Phil Rucker pointed out how the El Paso shooter’s diatribe, in which he talks of a “Hispanic invasion of Texas,” mirrors Donald Trump’s language. Rucker reminds us of what we’ve been hearing from our president: President Trump has relentlessly used his bully pulpit to decry Latino migration as […]

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Trump’s Baltimore Symbolism

By Robin Bates | Published: August 4, 2019

Monday White terrorist incidents are like extreme weather events: although one can’t attribute any particular incident to climate change, one can identify patterns. Since Donald Trump’s election, there has been a spike in hate groups, in hate crimes, and in people upbraiding strangers who don’t look or sound like them. It was only a matter […]

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Racism, Traveler of Darkness

By Robin Bates | Published: August 3, 2019

Spiritual Sunday  When Dylan Roof walked into a Charleston Sunday School class and gunned down those who had welcomed him in, South Carolina poet Marcus Amaker composed the following poem. God may seem absent when hatred opens fire upon innocents, as occurred once again yesterday in El Paso, but Amaker finds hope in the belief […]

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Ensnar’d with Flow’rs I Fall on Grass

By Robin Bates | Published: August 1, 2019

Friday I found utterly dispiriting this past week’s Democratic debates in which candidates lasered in on tiny differences while a fire rages all around us. I haven’t wanted to relax my vigilance regarding Donald Trump since autocrats win when we become so worn down that we stop paying attention. Nevertheless, these two wretched debates made […]

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