Thursday When I launched this blog over 10 years ago, I called it Better Living through Beowulf because Beowulf is the starting text for those of us specializing in British Literature. I used Beowulf to represent all of literature and felt free to write about any literary work that provides insight into the life we […]
Tag Archives: violence
“Beowulf” Understands U.S. Violence
Posted in Uncategorized Also tagged Beowulf, Beowulf poet, Dayton shooting, El Paso shooting, mass shooting, resentment, white terrorism Comments closed
Fantasy and the Problem of Violence
Thursday Today I will be delivering the following talk as part of Sewanee’s Lifelong Learning series, delivered in a venue that used to be my high school and where I spoke 50 years ago. It may sound strange to some of you that a literary scholar such as myself would talk about fantasy. Aren’t we […]
Posted in Uncategorized Also tagged Beowulf, Beowulf poet, Carl Jung, fantasy, J. R. R. Tolkien, Joseph Campbell, Lord of the Rings, Sigmund Freud Comments closed
Anger in Ancient Greek Works
A new book looks at how the ancient Greeks approached the issue of anger in works such as “Iliad,” “Ajax,” and “Hecuba.
Born with a Knife in the Heart
Israeli poet Haim Gouri reflects upon the story of Abraham and Isaac and concludes that the descendants of people persecuted “are born with a knife in their hearts.”
Posted in Uncategorized Also tagged "Heritage", Abraham and Isaac, Haim Gouri, Israel Comments closed
Why We Fear Clowns
The recent outbreak of criminal clowns can be explained by combining Freud’s essay on the uncanny and Stephen King’s IT.
Posted in Uncategorized Also tagged clowns, Donald Trump, It, Stephen King, Trumpism Comments closed
Drama Shows Us a Way Out of Violence
New School philosophy professor Simon Critchley argues that theatre and the arts in general are vital in helping societies understand and moderate endemic violence. Aeschylus’s “Oresteia” and Shakespeare’s “Hamlet” are particularly important.
Posted in Uncategorized Also tagged Aeschylus, Eumenides, Hamlet, Oresteia, theater, William Shakespeare Comments closed
Love & the Red Fool-Fury of the Seine
Tennyson, responding to Paris massacres in the 1840s, asserts his faith in love and in social truth. Our challenge is to continue to believe this in the wake of the recent terror attacks.
Posted in Uncategorized Also tagged Alfred Lord Tennyson, In Memoriam, Paris terror attacks, Terrorism Comments closed
A Fantasy about U.S. Thirst for War
Neil Gaiman’s “American Gods” understands the thirst of those Americans that want to go to war with Iran.
Posted in Uncategorized Also tagged American Gods, fantasy, Iran, Iraq War, It, Neil Gaiman, neoconservatives, nuclear negotiations, road novel, Stephen King, war Comments closed
Can Lit Make the Rich More Empathetic?
With growing income disparity comes a decline in empathy. Literature can help rebuild our compassion.
Posted in Uncategorized Also tagged Clansmen, empathy, Honoré de Balzac, Income inequality, Jonathan Swift, Thomas Dixon, Thomas Pinker Comments closed
