Tag Archives: Percy Shelley

Bloom: The Bard Invented the Human

By Robin Bates | Published: November 26, 2023

I examine how Harold Bloom believes that Shakespeare changed history.

Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged Defence of Poetry, Harold Bloom, Merchant of Venice, Prefact to Shakespeare, Samuel Johnson, Shakespeare The Invention of the Human, William Shakespeare | Comments closed

Pullman and Dante on the Afterlife

By Robin Bates | Published: July 15, 2023

Pullman, drawing on Dante, provides one of the most sustaining accounts of the afterlife that I know.

Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged "Adonais", "Do Not Stand at My Grave and Weep", "Upon Nothing", "World", Afterlife, Amber Spyglass, death and dying, Fragment of Seneca Translated, Henry Vaughan, His Dark Materials, John Donne, John Wilmot, Mary Elizabeth Frye, Philip Pullman, Satyr on Reason and Mankind | Comments closed

The Grand Canyon, Abyss Sublime

By Robin Bates | Published: January 4, 2023

18th century notions of the sublime are attempts to capture something as mind-blowing as the Grand Canyon, which I visited yesterday.

Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged "Mont Blanc", "Sublime and Beautiful", Bill Bryson, Boileau, Edmund Burke, Grand Canyon, James Boswell, Longinus, sublimity | Comments closed

Do Not Stand by My Grave and Weep

By Robin Bates | Published: November 3, 2022

As Slovenes this past week visited the graves of those who have passed on, I thought of Frye’s poem “Do Not Stand at My Grave and Weep.”

Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged "Do Not Stand at My Grave and Weep", Adonais, Afterlife, Amber Spyglass, Dante, death, Inferno, Mary Elizabeth Frye, Philip Pullman | Comments closed

the passing of all shining things

By Robin Bates | Published: October 13, 2022

e.e. cummings has a dialogue with Shelley’s “Ode to the West Wind” in his own poem about autumn. I include Frost and Oliver in the reflection as well.

Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged "In Blackwater Woods", "Ode to the West Wind", "the glory is fallen out of", Autumn, death, e. e. cummings, Mary Oliver | Comments closed

Read Lit, Then Fight for Freedom

By Robin Bates | Published: June 27, 2022

While literature may seem irrelevant to our political battles, it provides (as Shelley points out) an invaluable human compass.

Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged abortion debates, Azar Nafisi, Defence of Poetry, Reading Lolita in Tehran | Comments closed

Wanted: An Elegy to Mourn Covid Victims

By Robin Bates | Published: January 4, 2022

To mourn our 800,000+ covid dead, America needs a good poetic elegy.

Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged "Up Late", Adonais, death and dying, elegies, grieving, Nick Laird | Comments closed

Shelley on Commemorating Freedom

By Robin Bates | Published: July 1, 2021

Shelley’s “Hellas,” written in support of Greek independence, applies well to this year’s July 4th celebrations.

Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged "Hellas", "Grande Chartreuse", American Revolution, Democracy, January 6 insurrection, July 4, Matthew Arnold, Trumpism | Comments closed

Do Not Stand by My Grave and Cry

By Robin Bates | Published: May 1, 2021

As I remember my eldest son, this Clare Harner Lyon poem brings me peace.

Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged "Immortality", Adonais, Clare Harner Lyon, death and dying, Easter, Holy Spirit | Comments closed