Tag Archives: Sophocles

France vs. the Little Engine That Could

By Robin Bates | Published: July 13, 2018

Which World Cup story do we root for? The little engine that could or redemption after humiliation?

Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged Casey's Revenge, Croatia, France, Grantland Rice, Little Engine that Could, Oedipus at Colonus, Watty Piper, World Cup | Comments closed

The Stories We Tell Our Robots

By Robin Bates | Published: April 10, 2018

My sons have a podcast–“The Stories We Tell Our Robots”–which links literature with such developments as bitcoin, chatbots, airline pricing, and the like. Their rating system ranges from utopia to apocalypse.

Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged Darien Bates, Oedipus, technology, Tobias Wilson-Bates | Comments closed

Act in All Things as Love Will Prompt

By Robin Bates | Published: March 11, 2018

My lectures on Flannery O’Connor, James Baldwin, Shakespeare and Sophocles all seem to track back to Lent these days.

Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged Flannery O'Connor, Good Man Is Hard to Find, James Baldwin, King Lear, Lent, Oedipus at Colonus, Sonny's Blues, Suffering, William Shakespeare | Comments closed

My Dinner with Mladen

By Robin Bates | Published: March 7, 2018

An account of a dinner with an old Slovenian friend and intellectual.

Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged intellectual conversations, Ion, King Lear, Mladen Dolar, Oedipus at Colonus, Pierre de Marivaux, Plato, Republic, Samuel Beckett, Wayne Booth, William Shakespeare, Worstward Ho | Comments closed

Anger in Ancient Greek Works

By Robin Bates | Published: September 13, 2017

A new book looks at how the ancient Greeks approached the issue of anger in works such as “Iliad,” “Ajax,” and “Hecuba.

Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged Ajax, Beowulf, Euripides, Hecuba, Homer, Iliad, violence, war | Comments closed

Lit Comforts an ALS Sufferer

By Robin Bates | Published: June 23, 2017

This past March an ALS sufferer spoke eloquently, shortly before her death, about how she turned to Sophocles, Kafka, and Shakespeare for comfort.

Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged ALS, death and dying, Franz Kafka, Hamlet, Lynette Williamson, Metamorphosis, Oedipus, William Shakespeare | Comments closed

My Cataract Surgery Recalls Oedipus, Lear

By Robin Bates | Published: February 5, 2017

Recent cataract surgery had me recalling all those literary passages where sharp objects get poked into people’s eyes. The real drama, however, was renegotiating my professional identity.

Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged cataract surgery, eyes, King Lear, Medicine, Oedipus, William Shakespeare | Comments closed

Lit Opens Minds to Suffering of the Other

By Robin Bates | Published: October 23, 2016

Philosopher Martha Nussbaum argues that literature is essential for creating good citizens in a diverse society, turning to Sophocles’s “Philoctetes” and Ralph Ellison’s “Invisible Man” to make her point.

Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged Invisible Man, Marcus Aurelius, Martha Nussbaum, Philoctetes, racial justice, racism, Ralph Ellison | Comments closed

Solace for Vets from Sophocles

By Robin Bates | Published: September 13, 2016

A group has been giving dramatic readings of Sophocles plays in order to reach veterans suffering from PTSD. The results have been astonishing.

Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged Ajax, Philoctetes, PTSD, Veterans, veterans' suicides, war | Comments closed