Monthly Archives: August 2021

Poets and Climate Change’s 5-Alarm Fire

By Robin Bates | Published: August 11, 2021

Literature has a role to play in the fight against climate change. Coleridge early on showed us how.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , | Comments closed

Plantations that Bury Their Black Past

By Robin Bates | Published: August 9, 2021

Two black authors (Clifton, McQueen) report similar experiences when visiting southern plantations: the erasure of slave history.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , | Comments closed

Chaucer Was No Sexist or Anti-Semite

By Robin Bates | Published: August 9, 2021

In which I agree with a recent article defending Chaucer against charges of sexism and anti-Semitism.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , | Comments closed

Spiritual Lessons from a Happy Hypocrite

By Robin Bates | Published: August 8, 2021

In Beerbohm’s story “The Happy Hypocrite,” we learn that to fake virtue can have unintended consequences.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , | Comments closed

What To Make of a Diminished Biles

By Robin Bates | Published: August 6, 2021

For Simone Biles’s fall from Olympic heights, two Robert Frost poems and Le Guin’s Earthsea Tetralogy bring some needed perspective.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , | Comments closed

Beowulf Would Favor Vaccine Mandate

By Robin Bates | Published: August 5, 2021

Beowulf would favor vaccine mandates and passports and his firmness would convince the rest of society to go along.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , | Comments closed

The Poetry of Hummingbirds

By Robin Bates | Published: August 4, 2021

Hummingbirds are simultaneously beautiful and terrifying, as D. H. Lawrence points out.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , | Comments closed

Can We Be Beowulf Strong?

By Robin Bates | Published: August 3, 2021

“Bowulf,” a poem about rage, violence, and the end of empire.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , | Comments closed

Ibsen for Character Formation

By Robin Bates | Published: August 3, 2021

Woolf’s “Voyage Out” explores how literature contributes to character formation.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , | Comments closed