In the October 14 issue of TNR , Leon Wieseltier gives a curmudgeonly defense of publishing negative reviews, specifically of the negative review of Jonathan Franzen’s Freedom published in the same issue. It’s bracing: “A shabby treatment of a consequential subject or a . . . . Continue Reading »
Americans are much less sure of the existence of Hell than of Heaven. Hopefully this is because they have had such glimpses of the Divine that Hell seem fuzzy to them. There seems, however, some chance that it is because they have become too nice to believe anyone is in Hell.In chatting with regular . . . . Continue Reading »
Stephen Greenblatt has an interesting piece on Merchant of Venice in the latest New York Review of Books . His most important insight is the isolation of the comic moment in the play. Merchant is all about Shylock’s hatred, and in the court scene “Portia . . . has devised a test . . . . Continue Reading »
Beowulf contains a great many lessons relevant to daily living. First, don’t go to sleep near the hero or the monster will eat you. Second, after you kill a monster don’t go to sleep before knowing whether the monster has a mother bent on vengeance. If you don’t take care, she . . . . Continue Reading »
What are the cool kids reading after Harry Potter? Well, okay, the “cool kids” never read anything, so it is better to ask: What are the future leaders of America reading after Harry Potter? One answer to this question is a series on Olympus starring one Percy Jackson, son of Poseidon . . . . Continue Reading »
A line from Dickinson: “the nerves sit ceremonious like tombs.” This is an extremely complex literary device, or set of devices. First, personification: The nerves “sit” like people, and sit in a particular way, ceremoniously. Second, the personification spreads out to . . . . Continue Reading »
A student, Heather Denigan, is working on Emily Dickinson, and pointed me to this remarkable poem about baptism: I’m ceded, I’ve stopped being theirs; The name they dropped upon my face With water, in the country church, Is finished using now, And they can put it with my dolls, My . . . . Continue Reading »
Evelyn Waugh’s Helena (Loyola Classics) doesn’t get Constantine quite right, but he has some very sharp observations on other fourth-century personalities and events. His description of the effect of Constantine’s conversion on Lactantius captures the euphoria of the moment: . . . . Continue Reading »
Yale’s David Gelernter reviews Martin Amis’ Pregnant Widow in the current issue of The Weekly Standard , and uses the occasion for reflections on the state of culture. A few money quotes: “This postmodern era is the Age of Irony. Irony implies detachment. Detachment is . . . . Continue Reading »
For the last several weeks I have been trying to develop an ecological orientation through the narrative imagination. By ecological orientation, I mean “a new consciousness of the country” or “a new relation to it,” as the narrator of O Pioneers! describes in the exquisite . . . . Continue Reading »
Subscribe
Latest Issue
Support First Things
