Tag Archives: Bluest Eye

Bluest Eye and Ohio’s Abortion Politics

By Robin Bates | Published: August 16, 2023

Morison’s “Bluest Eye” functions as an implicit rebuke of the Ohio legislature’s attack on abortion.

Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged abortion politics, Fundamentalism, Toni Morrison | Comments closed

We Need Disturbing Lit If We Are to Grow

By Robin Bates | Published: June 26, 2023

If we want literature to improve our lives, often we must read–and teach–works that unsettle.

Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged C.S. Lewis, cancel culture, Cat's Eye, censorship, Clansman, Friedrich Engels, Karl Marx, Light in August, Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe, Lottery, Margaret Atwood, Ruth Franklin, Shirley Jackson, Thomas Dixon, Toni Morrison, William Faulkner | Comments closed

Book Bans Leave Children Defenseless

By Robin Bates | Published: April 25, 2022

Parents seek to protect their children through book bans. Instead, they make them more vulnerable to a changing world.

Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged Arundhati Roy, Beloved, book bans, censorship, God of Small Things, Khaled Hosseini, Kite Runner, Toni Morrison | Comments closed

Lit as a Survival Toolkit

By Robin Bates | Published: January 3, 2019

Thursday Friend and occasional guest blogger Carl Rosin alerted me to a heartfelt Commonweal article by an English professor describing how literature helped her confront and work through childhood abuse. Cassandra Nelson’s difficult history leads to some remarkable insights into trigger warnings, which she opposes. Nelson’s view on trigger warnings is pretty much my own […]

Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, Bruno Bettelheim, childhood trauma, Dante, Inferno, Junot Diaz, King Lear, sexual abuse, sexual assault, Toni Morrison, William Shakespeare | Comments closed

Lit for Survivors Lost in a Dark Wood

By Robin Bates | Published: January 28, 2018

Monday Commonweal recently published a heartfelt article by West Point visiting English professor Cassandra Nelson on how literature can help trauma survivors recover. Nelson begins with an angry comment about a University of Chicago dean’s facile dismissal of trigger warnings, even though she herself opposes them. She, however, speaks from the vantage point of one […]

Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, Child Abuse, Dante, Inferno, Junot Diaz, PTSD, Toni Morrison, trauma, trigger warnings | Comments closed

Children Lit’s Changing Racial Landscape

By Robin Bates | Published: October 15, 2015

My mixed race granddaughters have children’s books with protagonists of color. It’s a far cry from the Dick-Jane-and-Sally books of my childhood and of the reality described by Toni Morrison’s “Bluest Eye.”

Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged Childhood, Children's literature, racism, segregation, Toni Morrison | Comments closed

What Personal Reading Histories Tell Us

By Robin Bates | Published: June 4, 2009

I can’t recommend enough the value of writing your reading history. It will reveal to you sides of yourself you didn’t know you had.

Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged Alice Walker, Bernard Waber, Blume, Book of Light, Cat in the Hat, Clifton, Color Purple, Dr. Seuss, Freckle Juice, Go Ask Alice, I Know Why the Caged Burn Sings, Ira Sleeps Over, Judy Blume, Lucille Clifton, Maya Angelou, Missing Piece, Norman Holland, reading histories, Shel Silverstein, Toni Morrison | Comments closed