Thursday I’m currently immersed in John Stubbs’s Reprobates, an account of the cavalier poets during England’s 17th century civil war. I met John when I was in Ljubljana—he’s married to a Slovenian high court judge and teaches at the international high school—and the work is even more enthralling than his biography of Jonathan Swift, which […]
Tag Archives: censorship
Puritans vs. Cavalier Theatre
Posted in Uncategorized Also tagged London theatre, Oliver Cromwell, Restoration comedy, William Davenant, William Prynne Comments closed
Great Lit Changes Expectations Horizons
Hans Robert Jauss’s believes that great literature changes horizons of expectation whereas lesser lit simply confirms them. If “Madame Bovary” was brought to trial, Jauss says, it is because it charted a new course in literary history that people didn’t understand.
Posted in Uncategorized Also tagged Gustave Flaubert, Hans Robert Jauss, Madame Bovary, reception theory Comments closed
i sing of Kaepernick glad and big
The case of NFL quarterback Colin Kaepernick not standing for the national anthem brings to mind E. E. Cummings’s “i sing of Olaf,” where an American conscientious objector refuses to honor the flag and is tortured.
Posted in Uncategorized Also tagged "i sing of olaf", Arthur Miller, Colin Kaepernick, Crucible, e. e. cummings, first amendment, football NFL, SCOTUS Comments closed
Literature as a Public Event
In my Theories of the Reader senior seminar, I will have my students study a literary work that became a public event. In today’s post I list a number of possibilities.
Posted in Uncategorized Also tagged English Teacher, Lily King, literature as an event, Tess of the D'Urbervilles, Thomas Hardy Comments closed
Stephen Gosson: Unhinged by Lit
Stephen Gosson, a 17th century Puritan and failed playwright, unloads virtually every poet revered in the 17th century. Though we dismiss his words today, they anticipated contemporary attacks on literature/
Posted in Uncategorized Also tagged attacks on literature, Defense of Poesy, ephuistic style, Invective against Poets etc, John Lyly, Sir Philip Sidney, Stephen Gosson Comments closed
Helms’s Attack on Marvell’s “Coy Mistress”
Tales of unexpected attacks against great literature: in 1966 Jesse Helms, later a rightwing North Carolina senator, attacked Andrew Marvell’s “To His Coy Mistress” for providing male students a chance to talk about erotic matter in front of female students.
Posted in Uncategorized Also tagged Andrew Marvell, rightwing politics, To His Coy Mistress Comments closed
Let Our Teachers Teach
Monday When I wrote last week about a Virginia legislator attacking teachers for assigning Toni Morrison’s Beloved, I didn’t realize that there was a mother in an adjoining county also going after the book. And unlike the Virginia legislator she gives reasons. Here’s from The Post’s article about Laura Murphy, a Fairfax County mother whose son […]
Posted in Uncategorized Also tagged Beloved, High school teaching, John Milton, Paradise Lost, Toni Morrison Comments closed
A Virginia Legislator Attacks Beloved
A Virginia representative has attacked the teaching of Toni Morrison’s “Beloved,” calling the novel “moral sewage.” Given the man’s views on spousal rape and abortion, i think I know what scene in the book set him off.
