Tag Archives: Mary Shelley

Shelley Predicted Microsoft’s AI Problems

By Robin Bates | Published: April 3, 2016

Monday My son Tobias Wilson-Bates, currently a Marion L. Brittain Postdoctoral Fellow at Georgia Tech, recently published a short essay about robotics and literature in a school newsletter. Sign me up immediately for the Proud Fathers Club. The relationship between machines and literature has long fascinated Tobias, which makes Georgia Tech a good place for him […]

Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged , , | Comments closed

Panicked by Trump? Turn to Lit

By Robin Bates | Published: February 28, 2016

As Trump panic starts to set in, pundits are turning to literature to get an understanding of how it has all happened. This past week saw references to “Oedipus,” “Frankenstein,” “War and Peace,” and “Slaughterhouse Five.”

Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged , , , , , , , , , , | Comments closed

Trump as Frankenstein’s Monster

By Robin Bates | Published: August 27, 2015

What is it about Donald Trump that brings out the literary analogies? First a Salon columnist compared him to Odysseus’s Cyclops, then the New Yorker’s John Cassidy saw him as Gulliver, and most recently Rachel Maddow of MSNBC and others have compared him to Frankenstein’s monster. I’ve written about the Cyclops parallel here, but let’s take […]

Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged , , , , , | Comments closed

Alice in Standardized Education Land

By Robin Bates | Published: January 5, 2015

“Alice in Wonderland” can be read as an early attack on standardized education.

Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged , , , , , , , , | Comments closed

GOP, Obama Have Both Created Monsters

By Robin Bates | Published: February 11, 2013

Karl Rove and Barack Obama have both “created monsters” (in the Tea Party and drone strikes respectively). Mary Shelley would understand.

Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged , , , , , | Comments closed