Trump resembles the two conmen in Nikolai Gogol’s “Dead Souls.” But where he was once like the flamboyant Nozdrev, he has evolved to the more insidious Chichikov.
Sign up for my weekly newsletter
Category Archives: Uncategorized
Diplomacy thru Lit Aided Václav Havel
The recent deceased Luers, when Czechoslovak ambassador in the early 1980s, used American writers to support dissident Václav Havel, later president.
Posted in Uncategorized Tagged dissenters, Fletcher Burton, Franz Kafka, theater of the absurd, Václav Haval Comments closed
Mirror on the Wall, Who Is Evilest?
Lit Hub had a reader poll to determine the evilest literary character. Maybe not surprisingly in the Trump era, Orwell’s dictator won.
Also posted in Ayn Rand Tagged 1984, Blood Meridian, Cormac McCarthy, Doctor Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, Evil, George Orwell, Sigmund Freud, Stand, Stephen King, Walt Kelly Comments closed
On Carlsbad Caves, Science and Religion
A visit to Carlsbad Caverns led me to theological speculations, partly because they’re magnificent and partly because I was reading Byatt’s “Possession.”
Posted in Uncategorized Tagged A.S. Byatt, Alfred Lord Tennyson, Carlsbad Caverns, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Great Gatsby, human wonder, In Memoriam, possession Comments closed
The Spiritual Power of Cliff Dwellings
Many years ago Willa Cather’s “Professor’s House” made me want to visit the New Mexico cliff dwellings. This past week I was finally about to fulfill that wish.
Posted in Uncategorized Tagged Bandolier Cliff Dwellings, Blue Mesa, cliff dwellings, Professor's House, Puye Cliff Dwellings, Willa Cather Comments closed
For Mother’s Day, a Pregnant Mary
Hopkins’s “May Magnificat” associated pregnant Mary with spring bursting out all over.
Posted in Uncategorized Tagged "Cherry Tree Carol", "May Magnificat", "Spring", "Sumer is ycomen in", Gerard Manley Hopkins, Mary, pregnancy Comments closed
Tolstoy’s Advice for Diplomats
Former diplomat Fletcher Burton shows Tolstoy’s brilliance in depicting diplomats and diplomacy in War in Peace.
Posted in Uncategorized Tagged diplomacy, Fletcher Burton, Leo Tolstoy, War and Peace Comments closed
An Iranian Hostage Recalls Tolstoy
In which one of the 1980 Iranian hostages explains why “War and Peace” meant so much to him at the time.
Posted in Uncategorized Tagged Alexander Solzhenitsyn, Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich, Emma, George Eliot, Homer, Iliad, Iranian hostage crisis, Jane Austen, Leo Tolstoy, Life and Fate, Middlemarch, Pride and Prejudice, Vasily Grossman, War and Peace Comments closed
Dorian Gray, a Parable for Our Time
A recent Broadway production of “Picture of Dorian Gray” provides insights into our own narcissist-in-chief.
Posted in Uncategorized Tagged Anton Chekhov, Donald Trump, narcissism, Oscar Wilde, Picture of Dorian Gray, Uncle Vanya Comments closed