Monthly Archives: June 2023

Reflecting on Career Paths Not Taken

By Robin Bates | Published: June 29, 2023

In which I reflect on roads not taken in my career.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged "Garden of Forking Paths", "Road Not Taken", careers, Carleton College, Jorge Luis Borges, Robert Frost | Comments closed

Cardiac Alert: Nostalgia & a Forsyte Feast

By Robin Bates | Published: June 28, 2023

A description of a “Forsyte feast” in “Man of Property” takes me back to the dinners of my childhood.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged Forsyte Saga, John Galsworthy, leg of lamb, Man of Property | Comments closed

Prigozhin Didn’t Take the Tide at the Flood

By Robin Bates | Published: June 27, 2023

Did Prigozhin disregard Brutus’s advice, failing to take the tide when it was at its flood? If so, he might come to regret it.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged Hamlet, Insurrection, Julius Caesar, Macbeth, unsuccessful coup, Vladimir Putin, William Shakespeare, Yevgeny Prigozhin | Comments closed

We Need Disturbing Lit If We Are to Grow

By Robin Bates | Published: June 26, 2023

If we want literature to improve our lives, often we must read–and teach–works that unsettle.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged Bluest Eye, C.S. Lewis, cancel culture, Cat's Eye, censorship, Clansman, Friedrich Engels, Karl Marx, Light in August, Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe, Lottery, Margaret Atwood, Ruth Franklin, Shirley Jackson, Thomas Dixon, Toni Morrison, William Faulkner | Comments closed

Moriarty and SCOTUS’s Dark Web

By Robin Bates | Published: June 25, 2023

The Moriarty of America’s judicial system is Leonard Leo, who keeps a low profile as he links SCOTUS justices with rightwing billionaires.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged Arthur Conan Doyle, Clarence Thomas, corruption, Final Problem, Leonard Leo, Samuel Alito, SCOTUS, Sherlock Holmes | Comments closed

Poems that Celebrate Long Marriages

By Robin Bates | Published: June 24, 2023

Two poems to celebrate our 50th wedding anniversary, by Kunitz and Fanthorpe.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged "Atlas", "River Merchant's Wife", "Sonnet 116", "Touch Me", "When You Are Old", 50th marriage anniversary, Ezra Pound, Marriage, Relationships, Stanley Kunitz, U.A. Fanthorpe, W.B. Yeats, William Shakespeare | Comments closed

Man of Property and the Dobbs Decision

By Robin Bates | Published: June 22, 2023

In Galsworthy’s “Man of Property,” Soames sees his wife as property. With its Dobbs decision, meanwhile, the Supreme Court sees women similarly.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged Dante, Dobbs decision, fourth circle of hell, Inferno, John Galsworthy, Supreme Court, women as property | Comments closed

Ukraine: What Would Leo and Fyodor Do?

By Robin Bates | Published: June 21, 2023

Dostoevsky and Tolstoy’s novels work as indictments of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged Anna Karenina, Brothers Karamazov, Child Abuse, Crime and Punishment, Fyodor Dostoevsky, Hadji Murat, Leo Tolstoy, Resurrection, Russian Invasion of Ukraine, sadism, Vladimir Putin, War and Peace | Comments closed

Trollope, Trump & Another Phrase for Lying

By Robin Bates | Published: June 20, 2023

Lizzie Greystock has a Trump-like phrase for escaping accountability: “incorrect version of the facts.”

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged alternate facts, Anthony Trollope, Donald Trump, Eustace Diamonds, Kellyanne Conway, Trump documents case | Comments closed