The NFL draft perfectly exemplifies Alexander Pope’s passage about hope.
Tim O’Brien describes a character for whom facts are formed by sensation. Sounds like today’s right wing.
Alexander Pope understood that justice is best served on a full stomach.
A number of poets have written poems about the apocalypse. But it’s always figurative, never literal.
Posted in Arnold (Matthew), Pope (Alexander), Shelley (Percy), Woolf (Virginia) | Also tagged "Hellas", "Second Coming", "Stanzas from the Grand Chartreuse", Apocalyptic literature, Between the Acts, Dunciad, Matthew Arnold, Mayan Apocalypse, Virginia Woolf, William Butler Yeats |
In the immortal words of Muhammad Ali, Roger Federer floated like a butterfly, stung like a bee as he won his 7th Wimbledon title yesterday.
Posted in Ali (Muhammad), Pope (Alexander), Shakespeare (William), Tolkien (J.R.R.) | Also tagged J. R. R. Tolkien, Lord of the Rings, Muhammad Ali, Rape of the Lock, Roger Federer, Sports, Tempest, tennis, William Shakespeare, Wimbledon |
A. S. Byatt points to the renewal symbolism that Britain found in the the coronation of Queen Elizabeth 60 years ago.
The high school incident where Romney forcibly cut a classmate’s hair is less “Lord of the Flies” and more “Rape of the Lock.”
In “Northanger Abbey,” Jane Austen advocates the ideal way to raise one’s kids: encourage them to read good literature and they will learn the life lessons that they need.
Posted in Austen (Jane), Carroll (Lewis), Gay (John), Gray (Thomas), Pope (Alexander), Shakespeare (William), Thompson (James) | Also tagged "Elegy to the Memory of an Unfortunate Lady", Alice in Wonderland, James Thompson, Jane Austen, Lewis Carroll, Measure for Measure, Northanger Abbey, Othello, Reading to children, Seasons, Twelfth Night, William Shakespeare |
Yesterday I talked about irresponsible political commentators and politicians and how they reminded me of the scribblers that John Dryden was worried about in the 1680’s. In the 1740’s Alexander Pope was even more pessimistic about the threat they posed. In The Dunciad he imagines an inevitable cultural slide until “universal darkness buries all.” Harold [...]
Thomas Shadwell Last week when I complained about Christopher Hitchens, I think I was reacting as much to the incessant chatter of pundits as to Hitchens himself. At present there appear to be non-stop voices competing with each other to see who can make the most outrageous claims or confrontational statements, whether on talk radio, [...]
The incomparable Xavi Sports Saturday Spanish sports is having a great year. First of all, Spanish forward Pau Gasol was a major reason why the Los Angeles Lakers won their 16th championship in an archetypal series against the Boston Celtics. Then we were officially ushered from the Age of Federer into the Age of Nadal [...]
The political world seems to be agog over Sarah Palin these days, with Joel Klein of Time and David Broder of The Washington Post, two columnists I respect, telling us to take her very seriously. This has got me thinking of fictional populists, especially Willie Stark in Robert Penn Warren’s All the King’s Men (1946), one of [...]
Having compared Stephenie Meyer’s Twilight yesterday with Frances Burney’s Evelina, I feel I owe my readers an apology and an explanation. The apology is that I violated one of my principles for the website and judged the book by the movie. All I’ve read of Twilight is the excerpt on amazon.com. If I sell the [...]
Yesterday I taught my 18th century literature class how to play the card game ombre. Ombre is played by the characters in Alexander Pope’s Rape of the Lock (which can be found in its entirety here). The poem is a mock epic account of a severe breach of etiquette at a gathering at [...]
