To understand Donald Trump’s stunning victory, turn to Dostoevsky’s Grand Inquisitor. The lure of an authoritarian leader and the challenges of a pluralistic and multicultural society can be found in Ivan Karamazov’s parable.
I’ve just realized that the Lazarus mentioned in Eliot’s “Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock” is a different once than I’ve been assuming. This makes me appreciate the poem even more.
Dostoevsky’s Grand Inquisitor helps explain Donald Trump’s popularity: people want certainty more than they want freedom of thought.
Obama in his Oval Office speech on terrorism said that “freedom is more powerful than fear.” Dostoevsky’s Grand Inquisitor would beg to differ.
Psychologists say that a strong sense of narrative identity can lead to the profound sense of happiness described by Aristotle. Literature helps us make sure we have available to us the best narratives.
Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged Aristotle, Brothers Karamazov, Charles Dickens, David Copperfield, Emma, eudaimonic well-being, Great Expectations, happiness, Jane Austen, King Lear, stories, William Shakespeare | Dostoevsky may provide a compelling explanation for the recruiting success of ISIS: young people want to escape from freedom.
Top 10 Literary Parent-Child Relationships from Hell.
Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged "All that Rises Must Converge", "Daddy", "Letter to a Dead Father", Aeschylus, Brothers Karamazov, D. H. Lawrence, Euripides, Flannery O'Connor, Hamlet, King Lear, Medea, Midsummer Night's Dream, Oedipus, Oresteia, parents and children, Phillip K. Roth, Portnoy's Complaint, Richard Shelton, Romeo and Juliet, Sons and Lovers, Sophocles, Sylvia Plath, William Shakespeare | To match my 10 strongest literary women characters, here are my 10 most sensitive male characters.
Ivan Karamazov attacks those Christians who rationalize suffering by finding a higher purpose in it.
