January 13, 2015 / Leave a comment
Matthew Arnold 1840-1849 (A man of intellect and of spiritual sensitivity contemplates the purpose of life and its struggles.) “Unwelcome shroud of the forgotten dead,/ Oblivion’s dreary fountain, where art thou”. What a dark way to begin one’s poetical efforts, at 18 years of age! And we need read no further to suspect (correctly) that in Matthew […]
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December 16, 2014 / Leave a comment
John Donne d. 1631 (An earthy, imaginative, thoughtful soul reveals his view of love, steeped in metaphor and emotion.) Crop of Francesca da Rimini with her lover Paolo, by the Scottish painter William Dyce (1837). This painting can be seen in the National Galleries of Scotland. Though not quite as scandalous as Paolo, who is here courting his brother’s […]
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November 12, 2014 / 2 Comments on “On Taste”
Edmund Burke 1759 (What does it really mean for an opinion to be “a matter of taste”?) When we say “it’s just a matter of taste”, a bold and negative message lies behind the word “just”. Whether intended or not, the word creates a whiff of denigration. We discredit the thing we’re describing, reducing it […]
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May 24, 2014 / Leave a comment
Nathaniel Hawthorne 1835-1853 (The exercise of a young author’s pen creates images of the New England landscape and its people.) Mrs. Sophia Hawthorne, after the death of her husband in 1864, respected his wish that no biography be written of him. However, in lieu of this, she released to an eager public three successive volleys […]
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Passages from the American Notebooks
May 24, 2014 / Leave a comment
Nathaniel Hawthorne 1835-1853 (The exercise of a young author’s pen creates images of the New England landscape and its people.) Mrs. Sophia Hawthorne, after the death of her husband in 1864, respected his wish that no biography be written of him. However, in lieu of this, she released to an eager public three successive volleys […]
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