Langston Hughes’ “Mother to Son” opened up a profound conversation with our building’s housekeeping staff.
Lit to caution election night winners and bolster election night losers.
Also posted in Kipling (Rudyard), Milhauser (Steven), Millhaouser (Steven), O'Connor (Flannery), Peacock (Thomas Love), Sartre (Jean Paul) | Tagged "Mother to Son", "War Song of Dinas Vawr", Barack Obama, Election 2012, Everything that Rises Must Converge, Flannery O'Connor, Flies, If, Jean Paul Sartre, Langston Hughes, Martin Dressler, Mitt Romney, politics, Rudyard Kipling, Steven Milhauser, Thomas Love Peacock |
Today, for July 4, I offer up two ultra-American poems. Walt Whitman embraces multitudes” in “I Hear America Singing,” and Langston Hughes, in an addendum, mentions some of those Americans that, in the past, have been forgotten. May we all remember that America is astounding in its willingness to open itself to all people.
When I wasn’t teaching class yesterday, I was continuing my marathon essay-grading session. I took a break to write today’s post, however, and used a well-known poem by Langston Hughes to reflect on what I was asking my students to do. In “Theme for English B,” the only black student in a college composition course [...]
I’m fascinated by the way that literature has helped shape and guide different American president, a subject I’ve written about in the past. Thus I was thrilled to stumble across a Barack Obama reading list compiled shortly after his inauguration. I don’t know how I missed it. According to the website The Curious Autodidact (great [...]
Also posted in Augustine, Bible, Doctorow (E. L.), Jefferson (Thomas), Malcolm X, Melville (Herman), Nietzsche (Friedrich), Twain (Mark), Uris (Leon), Warren (Robert Penn) | Tagged Barack Obama, politics, reading |
