Monday I won’t take credit for this but Washington Post’s Molly Roberts recently penned a very Better-Living-with Beowulf type column where she contrasted two Democratic presidential candidates by examining which version of the Odysseus/Ulysses story they prefer. Her piece gives me an excuse to apply other versions of the story to various 2020 contenders. Roberts […]
Tag Archives: Odyssey
Will Odysseus Shape 2020 Election?
Posted in Uncategorized Also tagged 2020 election, Aeneid, Alfred Lord Tennyson, Beto O'Rourke, Donald Trump, Finnegans Wake, Homer, James Joyce, Joe Biden, Joseph Campbell, Pete Buttigieg, Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, Ulysses, Virgil Comments closed
The Roots of a Beautiful Marriage
Spiritual Sunday Every time I visit Slovenia (six times now, the first two for year-long Fulbrights), I learn something new. In my most recent visit, I discovered it is common for couples to live together for years before getting married (if they ever do). While I can’t speak to overall statistics, I talked with several […]
The GOP & Trump’s Siren Call
Tuesday The other day I detected one of Atlantic’s excellent columnists misusing a classical analogy. I flag Ed Kilgore, not to show off, but because the analogy is indeed enlightening if used correctly. See if you can find the mistake: This would suggest that the occasional efforts by individual Republican congressmen to show some distance from […]
Returning to the Misty Past
John Gatta’s “Spirits of Place” is helping me understand why I have chosen to retire in my home town. Wordsworth, Stowe, Homer, and Frost help out as well.
Posted in Uncategorized Also tagged "Death of the Hired Man", "Pulley", George Herbert, Harriet Beecher Stowe, home, Homer, John Gatta, retirement, Robert Frost, Sewanee, Tintern Abbey, Uncle Tom's Cabin, William Wordsworth Comments closed
Bob Dylan, Gifted Storyteller
Bob Dylan, in his Nobel Acceptance Speech, made it clear that literary influences are as big in his song writing as musical influences.
Posted in Uncategorized Also tagged "Blowin' in the Wind", "Masters of War", All Quiet on the Western Front, Bob Dylan, Erich Maria Remarque, Herman Melville, Homer, Moby Dick, Nobel prize Comments closed
Fantasy, a Portal to the Numinous
People are often drawn to fantasy in our post-Enlightenment world because they hunger for the numinous.
Posted in Uncategorized Also tagged "Crystal Forest", alienation, angels, Beauty and the Beast, Charles Taylor, disenchantment, Enlightenment, fantasy, Georg Lukacs, Harmut Rosa, His Dark Materials, Homer, John Milton, Paradise Lost, Philip Pullman, re-enchantment, resonance, Theory of the Novel, Willam Sharp Comments closed
The Liberal Arts Will Not Die
Thursday My colleague Jeff Hammond, a national authority on Puritan poetry and a much lauded writer of reflective essays, recently gave a stirring defense of the liberal arts for our parents-alumni weekend. Jeff’s observations dovetail very nicely with Percy Shelley’s Defence of Poetry, which I happen to be teaching at the moment. Watching poetry getting […]
Posted in Uncategorized Also tagged Defence of Poetry, Henry V, Iliad, Jeffrey Hammond, Liberal Arts, William Shakespeare Comments closed
Defending Homer against Plato
Plato’s attacks on Homer have to do with the bard’s focus earthly concerns rather than higher ones. Following Plato’s prescriptions, however, will not produce very interesting poetry.
Posted in Uncategorized Also tagged Henry Fielding, Homer, philosophy, Plato, Republic, Tom Jones Comments closed
Homer’s Warning about Revenge Killings
What will it take to bring peace between police and black communities? Homer has a vision of such a truce at the end of “The Odyssey” but it may not be realistic.
Posted in Uncategorized Also tagged "the meeting after the savior gone 4/4/68", Alton Sterling, Beowulf, Black Lives Matter, Ceremony, Dallas police killings, Grendel's mother, Homer, Leslie Marmon Silko, Lucille Clifton, Philando Castille, race war Comments closed
