Tolstoy shows us deathbed vigils can spur us to a deeper engagement with life.
Tag Archives: Dylan Thomas
Magnificent Women in the Sick Room
Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged "Do Not Go Gentle", "Valediction: Forbidding Mourning", Anna Karenina, death and dying, George Eliot, John Donne, Leo Tolstoy, Middlemarch | Comments closed
A Philosophy Teacher’s Last Lecture
In the memorial service held in honor of my philosophy colleague Alan Paskow, we listened to some observations Alan recorded about his favorite poem, Dylan Thomas’ “Fern Hill.” I share them with you here. Alan recorded them for his funeral service and I think I understand why.
Final Instructions from a Dying Teacher
Last Thursday we had our memorial service for my friend Alan Paskow, the philosophy colleague whom I have written about several times. In my own remarks I invoked Plato’s Crito. I said that, for the three-plus years that Alan lived with the diagnosis of a terminal illness, he was like Socrates after having drunk the hemlock He knew that he was dying but he used his illness as an opportunity to explore with others what it meant. Like Socrates, he was a teacher to the end.
Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged "Fern Hill", death and dying, Plato, Socrates | Comments closed
