Tag Archives: A. H. Tennyson

Into Valley of Death Rode the Democrats

By Robin Bates | Published: November 8, 2010

The Democrats’ “shellacking” at the hands of the Republicans last week (the description is President Obama’s) has me thinking about Alfred, Lord Tennyson’s Charge of the Light Brigade.  But perhaps not in the way that you think. Tennyson’s memorable poem commemorated the insane charge by the British cavalry against Russian machine guns at Balaclava in […]

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Death and Language’s Limitations

By Robin Bates | Published: May 22, 2009

In spending the last two weeks discussing how poetry can come to our aid in a season of death, I have been exploring how poetry responds to its greatest test. Death and dying can trigger our deepest fears, generate panic, denial and anger, prompt us to question everything we believe in, and send on frantic […]

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