The secret garden in Burnett’s novel works as a metaphor for the soul.
Tag Archives: Soul
Secret Garden, Hidden Soul
Posted in Uncategorized Also tagged Francis Hodgson Burnett, gardening, Grace, Secret Garden, Spring Comments closed
Putin Quoting Tolstoy? Puleeze!
Putin claimed to quote Tolstoy but didn’t in his meeting with Biden. What he says is reminiscent of Flannery O’Connor’s Misfit, however.
Posted in Uncategorized Also tagged Flannery O'Connor, Good Man Is Hard to Find, Joe Biden, Leo Tolstoy, Vladimir Putin, War and Peace Comments closed
“Invictus,” a Flawed Poem Easily Abused
Thursday In two recent guest posts (here and here), Radnor High School English teacher Carl Rosin describes his students wrestling with two well-known poems that were cited by the Christchurch mass murderer in his justification. One issue is how much leeway a reader has in interpreting a poem. In his students’ responses, Carl mentions some […]
Posted in Uncategorized Also tagged "Invictus", Christchurch massacre, William Ernest Henley Comments closed
Robert Durst’s Iago-Like Soliloquy
How to interpret suspected murderer Robert Durst’s enigmatic words on “The Jinx”? Shakespeare’s villains point the way.
Posted in Uncategorized Also tagged Jinx, King Lear, moral consciousness, Othello, Robert Durst, soliloquies, William Shakespeare Comments closed
Angel Infancy
Henry Vaughan’s “The Retreat” believes that children have a special connection with eternity.
Posted in Uncategorized Also tagged "Retreat", Childhood, Henry Vaughan, innocence, Intimations of Immortality, Williams Wordsworth Comments closed
Read Blake, Stand Up to Your Boss
Businessman David Whyte turns to poetry to hold on to his soul in the corporate world.
Posted in Uncategorized Also tagged "Garden of Love", "I Am Too Alone in the World", Business, David Whyte, Rainer Maria Rilke, Songs of Heaven and Hell, William Blake Comments closed
Hell, an Inner Emptiness that Can’t Be Filled
“I think Hell is a fable,” Doctor Faustus tells Mephastophilis at one point in Marlowe’s 1593 tragedy. While many Elizabethans would have disagreed—the play terrified them precisely because they believed in a literal hell—we’re more sympathetic with the notion now. To most of us, fire and brimstone and devils with pitchforks are the stuff of […]
Posted in Uncategorized Also tagged Christopher Marlowe, Doctor Faustus, materialism Comments closed
Soul-Selling for Dummies
How do I sell my soul? Let me count the ways. I wrote in Sunday’s entry how the ego and the soul are pitted against each other in an unending battle. Just think how much better off we’d all be if humans listened to their higher selves and ego took a back seat. […]
The Hell of Ego, the Heaven of Love
Spiritual Sunday A reader’s response to Friday’s post on the Faustus story has me thinking more about Marlowe’s marvelous play. Marlowe informs us that we don’t need to die to go to hell. If we refuse to listen to the voice of our soul, we can find hell right here on earth. If there were […]
Posted in Uncategorized Also tagged Christopoher Marlowe, Doctor Faustus, King Lear, Religion, William Shakespeare Comments closed
