… The Greatest English Poet You Haven't Heard of | New Republic. (Hat tip, Rus Bowden.)
Actually, quite a few of — especially those familiar with Robert Frost — have known of him for quite some time.
Tuesday, April 30, 2013
Committing science …
… Science-Based Medicine — A Skeptic’s Guide to the Mind. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
Mirror neurons have been offered as an explanation for empathy, but the evidence is not sufficient to infer that. [Burton] questions research into the “neural correlates of consciousness” by investigators like Christof Koch, because the behavior of individual neurons can’t explain emergent properties with a higher level of complexity.
Heading toward the sunset …
… The New York Times Book Review's retirement plan | Michael Wolff | Comment is free | guardian.co.uk. (Hat tips, Dave Lull and Julie Chovanes.)
The supernaturalist …
… Celebrating Kierkegaard's bicentenary | OUPblog. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
In his Works of Love, a spiritual classic, Kierkegaard entreats us to love and respect each ‘other’ as God loves us, never assimilating that other person to self. Horrified by the advent of democracy, ‘government by the numerical’ as he quips derisively, he was nonetheless quick to take advantage of freedom of the press to attack a complacent establishment in both church and state. He writes sarcastically of the ‘distinguished corruption’ of those who flee from one distinguished circle to another, taking care lest in the poor they should meet another human being. If today in celebration of their famous son the Queen of Denmark will parade from church to university, it was not ever thus. Rather, it was a motley crew of students and the poor who accompanied his funeral cortège from that same church to grave. These things are far from simple.
India vs China...
... India sings peace to an occupier
But for the lesson of 1962, India’s leaders may still have mocked George Washington’s famous words: “To be prepared for war is one of the most effective means of preserving peace.” Even today, the leadership in ruling and opposition parties remains largely clueless on statecraft and national security affairs. A dysfunctional foreign policy is holding back India’s rise.
A thought for today ...
Even when poetry has a meaning, as it usually has, it may be inadvisable to draw it out... Perfect understanding will sometimes almost extinguish pleasure.
— A. E. Housman, who died on this date in 1936
Whither logic...
I dont get the point of the article. What Knox and her consorts did was brutal and illegal. Where does questioning prevalent social mores come into the picture? It is a disservice to Henry James to use his subtle and charming story to present an analogy for a senseless crime and couch it in some mindless intellectualising.
Monday, April 29, 2013
Natural law, new and old …
… Edward Feser: Discerning the thoughts and intents of Hart. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
Rage, rage against Adult Contemporary poetry …
… The bitter fool by David Yezzi - The New Criterion. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
How did the main effects of poetry ever boil down to these: the genial revelation, the sweetly poignant middle-aged lament, the winsome ode to the suburban soul? The problem is that such poems lie: no one in the suburbs is that bland; no reasonable person reaches middle age with so little outrage at life’s absurdities. What an excruciating world contemporary poetry describes: one in which everyone is either ironic, on the one hand, or enlightened and kind on the other—not to mention selfless, wise, and caring. Even tragic or horrible events provoke only pre-approved feelings.
Up in the park …
… App-reciating the sounds of a Philly landmark.
Here's the app: The Empty Air: The Rittenhouse Square Sound Walk.
Michael is a neighbor of ours.
Something to look forward to …
… The TLS blog: Alexandria: The Last Nights of Cleopatra, at Fowey and Hay on Wye. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
If it is anywhere near as good as The Spartacus Road, it is not be missed.
If it is anywhere near as good as The Spartacus Road, it is not be missed.
Out and about …
… Dabbler Diary – Recusants, hoopleheads and grockles — The Dabbler. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
Rumors of decease …
… New York Times, BuzzFeed, Andrew Sullivan Herald Death of the Blog | New Republic. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
I can't see why something the Times does should be seen as the harbinger of anything other than the slow decline of the Times.
I can't see why something the Times does should be seen as the harbinger of anything other than the slow decline of the Times.
How about beyond teaching …
… Beyond Critical Thinking | The American Conservative. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
My wife is a retired teacher. I am who I am in large measure because of some great teachers I had. I even did a stint of teaching once, so I know how hard it is to do. But teaching not is the be-all and end-all of education. It is one essential component. A good teacher draws out of the student (ex ducere) capacities and understanding the student was either unaware of or not sure how to handle. A good teacher helps a student to learn how to explore the contents of his consciousness. But not everything should be made int a subject to be taught. The quality of education has certainly not improved thanks to people getting doctorates in it. That simply professionalized it.
Lighten up …
… Talking the Hind Legs off a Donkey. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
I've heard the complaint before about people wishing you a good day. I've also heard "wonderful day" and "blessed day." It's no big deal. And certainly no reason to get bent out of shape. Better to complain about nit-picking.
Hard to read, but important …
… Bryan Appleyard — The Future According to Google. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
The problem with prophecy is that the prophet merely projects the present into the future (what else could he do, unless he could actually foresee the future?). But the future will be affected by all sorts of factors we know nothing about, and can know nothing about.
The adventure continues …
… Daughter recalls mother’s inspiring role in story - Movies - The Boston Globe. (Hat tip, Marc Mostovoy.)
A thought for today …
Great music is that which penetrates the ear with facility and leaves the memory with difficulty. Magical music never leaves the memory.
— Sir Thomas Beecham, born on this date 1879
Sunday, April 28, 2013
Centenary celebration …
… Six New Books on R.S. Thomas | Review and Notes | Doubt and Belief. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
What think you?
… The Wooden Spoon: the Reaction to a Poem for Dzhokhar.
The poem (qua poem) is so jaw-droppingly awful that further comment seems pointless.
The poem (qua poem) is so jaw-droppingly awful that further comment seems pointless.
Stage economics …
… Theater's Expiring Subscription Model | Sightings by Terry Teachout - WSJ.com. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
Some theater company ought to start an online drama channel featuring classic plays — Strindberg's Ghost Sonata, for instance, or Giraudoux's Tiger at the Gates — to which one could subscribe for a modest fee.
The problem of pain …
… PJ Lifestyle — Is It Even Possible to Accurately Measure Physical Pain? (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
When poetry is a career, not a vocation …
… Nice Poem - I’ll Take It - NYTimes.com. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
A thought for today …
The more I think about language, the more it amazes me that people ever understand each other at all.
— Kurt Gödel, born on this date in 1906
More views...
...Review: The fateful debate about books and e-book
The question assumes that society is bound to totally reject the way it did things previously, such as walking (when you have a car), phoning someone (when you have a videophone) or writing anything by hand (when you have a computer).
The difference between these examples and the debate between physical and ebooks is that physical books might ultimately cease production.
Saturday, April 27, 2013
He should have quit …
… Thirty Years of Writer's Block. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
Sorry. If you can't do the work, don't expect a check.
Sorry. If you can't do the work, don't expect a check.
Sparrows …
… Anecdotal Evidence: `Unsullen, Unresentful, Full of the Grace of Cheerfulness'.
My bird feeder attracts mostly house sparrows. In large numbers. They are quite aware that I feed them, and when I'm late filling the feeder they perch nearby expectantly, perhaps even resentfully. I watch them fight, and they never seem to warm to me. They rarely come to the feeder if I am in the yard. I think they rather take me for granted, at least as far as the food goes. For some reason I love them.
A thought for today …
Hero-worship is strongest where there is least regard for human freedom.
— Herbert Spencer, born on this date in 1820.
Friday, April 26, 2013
A mistress of literary economy …
… The TLS blog: Muriel Spark makes the case for abridgement. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
Technological vulnerability
… Pinging the Whole Internet Reveals Unsecured Backdoors That Could Tempt Hackers and Cyber Criminals | MIT Technology Review. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
On Tuesday, [HD] Moore published results on a particularly troubling segment of those vulnerable devices: ones that appear to be used for business and industrial systems. Over 114,000 of those control connections were logged as being on the Internet with known security flaws. Many could be accessed using default passwords and 13,000 offered direct access through a command prompt without a password at all.
Knowing when to stop — or not …
… Jackson and Bukowski: Literature of the Drunk. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
I always envied my friends who … knew when to stop; who could stop, take breaks, repair themselves between bouts with healthy eating, exercise and non-morbid thoughts.Such people are just drunks, not alcoholics.
About time …
… The Coming Revolution in Public Education - John Tierney - The Atlantic.
When Gerald "Jerry" Conti decided a month ago to go public with his reasons for deciding to retire from his teaching career after 27 years at Westhill High School in New York, he leveled blistering and impassioned criticisms against the corporate reforms that, he says, are harming our educational system. Conti's cri de coeur went viral on the Web, embraced by a massive audience of teachers and parents, who found in it a clear and moving expression of their own dissatisfactions.
Cold case solved …
… BBC News - The curious tale of the stolen books. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
"The scale of the theft is quite extraordinary," says Robert Harding, director of Maggs Bros, a London rare book dealer. "It's one of the biggest such thefts in recent decades."
Harding says that if undamaged, the copy of de Bry's America could be worth £150,000, while the Shakespeare would be worth about £50,000. He says others are also worth five-figure sums.
Practical classicist …
… The Rumpus Interview With Kevin Smokler - The Rumpus.net. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
That's about right …
… Richard Dawkins elected king of the intellectual-aspirants junior prom | MobyLives. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
Dawkins is a scientist who, for decades, has done no science to speak of. He doesn't practice science; he exploits it. I doubt if The God Delusion took away the faith of any religious person who slogged his way through it. Dawkins was speaking to the choir in his church of atheism.
The elusive gladiator …
… Pinning Down Spartacus by Mary Beard | The New York Review of Books. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
It is ironic, given the popular renown that the movie still has, that almost all of those involved came close to disowning it: Kubrick claimed that it was the only film he had made that he did not like (“it has everything but a good story,” he wrote—oddly, because that is one thing it does have); Fast thought the film did not live up to the radical implications of his own book; Trumbo was disappointed that the extraordinary successes of Spartacus were not given sufficient emphasis, and that the rebellion ended up seeming little more than a plucky jailbreak (he produced an eighty-page critical dissection of the first cut). Kirk Douglas alone appears to have been reasonably content with the way the finished product came close to his own vision of “Spartacus the slave, dreaming of the death of slavery, driving into the armor of Rome the wedge that would eventually destroy her.”
A thought for today …
When you arise in the morning, think of what a precious privilege it is to be alive — to breathe, to think, to enjoy, to love.
— Marcus Aurelius, born on this date in 121
Thursday, April 25, 2013
Hmm …
… What Martial Arts Have to Do With Atheism - Graeme Wood - The Atlantic. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
Those videos defy description. They are the physical manifestation of the same kinds of reasoning errors and self-deception we see in religion--with the crucial difference that, in martial arts, it is possible to expose a person's misconceptions in real time for all to see. But what's amazing--and this should really worry people of faith--is that, even in the martial arts, a person can persist in delusion for decades, gather students, and become a famous master of his fake discipline without knowing that he has wandered completely out of contact with reality. This madman can't even begin to do what he thinks he can do--and what he is apparently renowned for doing--because the skill he is displaying and that his students are striving to emulate doesn't exist. The whole thing is a collective delusion. If religion were a sport, it would look like that first Yanagi Ryuken video. The second video, of course, is what science has been doing to religion, over and over, for the last few centuries.
"They are the physical manifestation of the same the same kinds of reasoning errors and self-deception we see in religion…" The errors displayed in the video are identified with those perceived to characterize religion. Such identification, however, is precisely what needs to be be demonstrated. Petitio principii.
In case you wondered …
… How Men Should Dress for the Kentucky Derb: A Visual Guide | The Art of Manliness. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
I don't know. I've seen some strange sartorial combinations at the track.
I don't know. I've seen some strange sartorial combinations at the track.
Often good, sometimes bad …
… My Life With All Those Damn Editors | About Editing and Writing. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
RIP...
...How Sunil Tripathi became a victim
Somewhere in all this frenzy, an ignorant overzealous Redditor posted a photo of a 22-year old Indian American student from Brown University who went missing on 16 March. A link had been established. In the world of breaking news where speed far outweighs fact-checking, one potential marathon bombing suspect had been identified. This was a “breakthrough”. What followed, however, especially the reaction from fellow Indians, was horrifying for those of us living away from our country of origin. With each passing tweet, the chorus to establish Tripathi’s guilt grew. And with it, grew the fear of retribution that the Indian community in the US would likely face in the coming days. “Secular liberals” on Twitter approached this piece of news with glee. For them, he became an embodiment of “Hindu terror” and they finally had a face to prove their theory. They tweeted, retweeted, got into arguments, and generally felt vindicated that they had been right all along. Those on the Right side of the political divide felt attacked. They vigorously defended Tripathi and his family and relied on the lack of incriminating evidence to absolve his name. One wonders if they would’ve been as assiduous in their efforts to prove his innocence if the alleged suspect had been an Indian Muslim.
Evangelist at the Times …
… Remembering John McCandlish Phillips | First Things. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
An impressive start …
… A Commonplace Blog: Anonymity, terrible anonymity. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
I, too, was the fine arts editor of my college newspaper for a time. And before that it's book critic. The first book I ever reviewed was Graham Greene's A Burnt-Out Case. I liked it. The first book I ever reviewed professionally was Dag Hammarskjöld's Markings. I liked that, too, though the prose, I noticed later on, was precious and self-conscious. Hitchcock's book sounds intriguing.
Heretic and Inquisitor …
… The New York Times vs. David Mamet | FrontPage Magazine. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
… ["THe Arnarchist"] is informed by Mamet’s politics, sure, as Redford’s movie is informed by his, but “The Anarchist” is much more deeply informed by Mamet’s Jewish faith. The verbal battle between Cathy and Ann is underscored by a bold critique of Christian forgiveness in light of the demands of Jewish justice. In this, “The Anarchist” sings a sort of counterpoint to the Merchant of Venice. Since Merchant – and much western culture — depicts Jewish justice as rigid and bloodthirsty while Christian mercy droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven, to see Mamet stage the argument from a Jewish perspective is radical and bracing.
A thought for today ...
A lost but happy dream may shed its light upon our waking hours, and the whole day may be infected with the gloom of a dreary or sorrowful one; yet of neither may we be able to recover a trace.
— Walter de la Mare, born on this date in 1873
Wednesday, April 24, 2013
A thought for today ...
Book love ... is your pass to the greatest, the purest, and the most perfect pleasure that God has prepared for His creatures.
— Anthony Trollope, born on this date in 1815
Per Petterson
On a whim, really, I took up Per Petterson's I Curse the River of Time - and I have to say, I'm glad I did.
This isn't a perfect book, but there's plenty to like, including Petterson's sensitivity to - you guessed it - the passing of time.
Petterson's novel focuses on the various stages of our lives and our attempts to recreate (or locate) moments past. These moments needn't be epic in nature: indeed, for every wall that falls, or every regime that changes, there are thousands of lives lived - millions of interactions worth remembering.
That seems to be one of Petterson's points: against the backdrop of European history at the end of the 1980s, he casts a faint light upon the experiences of one family. And he does so, I think, with considerable success.
I didn't love Petterson's prose, but I think that he's come close in this book to uncovering that junction between memory and nostalgia. Everything here is coated with a thin layer of regret. The trick is to transform that sorrow into something else, something more like contentment with the present. The past will always elude us.
The last word is reserved for Petterson:
"...all the summers were gone, and not only because I had forgotten them after twenty-five years, but because there was no longer any point remembering them."
Tuesday, April 23, 2013
Ground level …
… First Known When Lost: Small Things.
I, to, have been playing in the dirt recently, getting the garden ready. Of course, I am now in my second childhood.
I, to, have been playing in the dirt recently, getting the garden ready. Of course, I am now in my second childhood.
No defense required …
… Can Literature Be Defended? | The American Conservative. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
I read a book or a poem or an essay and I enjoy what I read. It enlightens me maybe, or lifts my spirits, or makes me think about something worth think about. Or I just enjoy it. Justification enough for me.
The noble walking stick …
… The Smart Set: Pimp My Walk - April 17, 2013. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
I have a rather nice collection of walking sticks — and even some staffs. My favorite is the ask stick I bought in Kinsale back in 2004.
I have a rather nice collection of walking sticks — and even some staffs. My favorite is the ask stick I bought in Kinsale back in 2004.
So much for debate...
...Fixing the Republic
...And the federal government remains a maze: the Interior Department oversees salmon while they are in freshwater but the Commerce Department takes over as soon as they swim into saltwater.
The elusive future …
… 13 Worst Predictions Made on Earth Day, 1970 | FreedomWorks. (Hat tip, Julie Chovanes.)
A sample:
A sample:
"In a decade, urban dwellers will have to wear gas masks to survive air pollution… by 1985 air pollution will have reduced the amount of sunlight reaching earth by one half." — Life magazine
Memories on stage …
… on The Ingenious Gentleman and Poet Federico García Lorca Ascends to Hell, a novel by Carlos Rojas (Yale University Press)) | On the Seawall: A Literary Website by Ron Slate (GD). (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
“Death is a solitary confinement where each of the dead has an empty theater along the spiral of hell. That is the tragedy of immortality before the spectacle of what has been lived: not ever being able to share it with anyone, as if I were the only man who has lived in vain on earth. Or just the opposite, as if I were the only dead man in the world.”
A thought for today …
Above all things — read. Read the great stylists who cannot be copied rather than the successful writers who must not be copied.
— Ngaio March, born on this date in 1895
Monday, April 22, 2013
RIP …
… Richie Havens, Woodstock Festival’s Opening Act, Dies at 72 - Bloomberg. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
An exhilarating journey of discovery …
… Nigeness: A Mistitled Book. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
It would better be called The Delusions of Science - the principal delusion being that it is firmly founded on certain unassailable truths that no longer need to be examined.
Arranging lines …
… Poet-think: 'Is this too loud, too soft, am I going on too long?' - latimes.com. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
A thought for today …
Fashion is the science of appearance, and it inspires one with the desire to seem rather than to be.
— Henry Fielding, born on this date in 1707
Sunday, April 21, 2013
A publisher debuts …
… The University Bookman: Literature and the Call of Faith. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
I think that the culture is actually more open today to art informed by faith than it was thirty years ago. This is something that many conservatives have failed to note—in part because they have invested too deeply in what I call a “narrative of decline.” When the Berlin Wall came down in 1989, it was said that Karl Marx had finally died. But I think nearly all the secular “master narratives” lost credibility around that time, including the sort of aggressive secularism of a thinker like Sigmund Freud.
Not your father's dinosaurs …
… Book Review: My Beloved Brontosaurus - WSJ.com.
In some cases, new fossils have changed our understanding of dinosaurs, but as much as anything, paleontologists have learned to reinterpret old ones in exciting new ways. Close examination of skeletons, for instance, reveals that dinosaurs suffered from a variety of diseases, including cancer—evidence that cancer is an ancient affliction. Scientists have also become more adept at linking juvenile forms to adults. This has helped them grasp the caterpillar-to-butterfly-like transformation that dinosaurs like the Triceratops underwent as they matured.
A true bookman …
… Anecdotal Evidence: `A Kind of Patriotism for Beauty and Grace'.
One of the greatest times of my life was an afternoon I spent with Seymour Adelman looking at the treasures in his collection at Bryn Mawr College's library. What a wonderful man he was.
One of the greatest times of my life was an afternoon I spent with Seymour Adelman looking at the treasures in his collection at Bryn Mawr College's library. What a wonderful man he was.
A thought for today
Depression is the inability to construct a future.
— Rollo May, born on this date in 1909
Saturday, April 20, 2013
Bright stars and a golden age …
… Review: Bedford Park by Bryan Appleyard — The Dabbler. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
Thinking on things …
… Rob Bell on images of God for today and American evangelicalism, Pt 4 - Philosophy and Life. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
Back in the days when I wrote regularly for the Faith Life section of The Inquirer I met quite a few of those "very conservative, bad evangelicals." They turned out to be neither frightening nor crazy.
Marx, the anti-Communist...
Writing in the Rhineland News in 1842 in his very first piece after taking over as editor, Marx launched a sharp polemic against Germany’s leading newspaper, the Augsburg General News, for publishing articles advocating communism. He did not base his assault on any arguments about communism’s impracticality: it was the very idea that he attacked. Lamenting that “our once blossoming commercial cities are no longer flourishing,” he declared that the spread of Communist ideas would “defeat our intelligence, conquer our sentiments,” an insidious process with no obvious remedy.
A thought for today …
Throughout history the world has been laid waste to ensure the triumph of conceptions that are now as dead as the men that died for them.
— Henry de Montherlant, born on his date in 1895
Friday, April 19, 2013
We're all ventriloquists...
To some extent this is true of all of us. Look at your out-box: in the past hour you may have sent e-mails to mother, partner, boss and child, possibly even describing the same party. But each one is likely to have been written in a very different voice, and even to have treated the event quite differently — not to do so would be a form of insensitivity. “A man has as many social selves as there are individuals who recognize him,” as William James had it. It’s the man who doesn’t change his voice according to his audience who seems scary, locked inside his own assumptions.
Finding their voices …
… Speech: an ancient genre returns | Books | guardian.co.uk. (Hat tip, Julie Chovanes.)
The problem is that not all speeches amount to genuine oratory. And length of utterance hardly guarantees quality of rhetoric.
The problem is that not all speeches amount to genuine oratory. And length of utterance hardly guarantees quality of rhetoric.
Not what you night think …
… Edward Feser: What is an ad hominem fallacy? (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
… not every ad hominem attack -- an attack “against the man” or person -- involves a fallacious ad hominem. “Attacking the man” can be entirely legitimate and sometimes even called for, even in an argumentative context, when it is precisely the man himself who is the problem.
A thought for today …
All that non-fiction can do is answer questions. It's fiction's business to ask them.
— Richard Hughes, born on this date in 1900
Thursday, April 18, 2013
Poems for Boston …
… UCR: Poems to head to Boston : Inland Schools.
… Pacific Northwest Poet Pays Tribute To Boston.
… A Poem for Boston.
((Hat tip, Rus Bowden.)
… Pacific Northwest Poet Pays Tribute To Boston.
… A Poem for Boston.
((Hat tip, Rus Bowden.)
Publishing trend …
… David Mamet and Other Big Authors Choose to Self-Publish - NYTimes.com. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
Still flourishing …
… The Millions : Counter and Strange: Contemporary Catholic Literature. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
I was surprised to read Robert Fay’s 2011 article here at The Millions, where he claims a “literary vacuum” of contemporary Catholic writing. While I strongly disagree with Fay’s overall thesis that postconciliar liturgical retranslation led to a decline in Catholic art, his short essay introduces important points. Fay writes elegiacally about the postconciliar shift from Latin to English, or local, Mass: “what for centuries had seemed eternal, mysterious, and rich in symbolism — the very marrow that feeds artists — was suddenly being conducted in the same language as sitcoms, TV commercials, and business meetings.” Was Fay’s observation convenient hindsight, or lived reality?
Well, it was certainly a lived reality in my case. I was a Catholic of suspended observance for a good 30 years. The banality of the English Mass, while hardly the cause of that, certainly made it easier. The real problem with the vernacular Mass is the snobbery underlying it, the assumption that the poor people in the pews just couldn't wrap their feeble minds around the Latin and the ritual (though they had managed to do so for centuries, and it was only the intelligentsia (those schooled beyond their intelligence) who had any problem with it (and that was because they thought if the Church became more Protestant, by dropping Latin, Protestants would be inclined to grow more Catholic — or something like that). The same snobbery underlies modern translations of the Bible. For centuries the only book many people read was the Authorized Version of the Bible. Didn't cause them any trouble. But the smart people wanted it dumbed down anyway, because they thought the ordinary people weren't getting it.
I might add that I'm not sure there are any Catholic writers. There are, rather, writers who are Catholic. Even if they no longer practice their faith or have become hostile to it, it must still inform much of their thought and feeling, whether for good or ill.
I might add that I'm not sure there are any Catholic writers. There are, rather, writers who are Catholic. Even if they no longer practice their faith or have become hostile to it, it must still inform much of their thought and feeling, whether for good or ill.
Without context...
What happens when we refuse to say “no” to the bully? What happens when we follow the false light, and deny our conscience in the name of playing along? As it is with Raffy’s penchant for humiliation — or the smuggling of baby turtles — so it is with drone strikes, or torture, or polluting the ocean, or incurring harm in the name of profit.
I think drone strikes and the other issues are far too complex to equate them to school bullying. I am afraid the author is unnecessarily broadening her enterprise: inducing guilt when debate is called for.
Online now.
… Granta 123: Best of Young British Novelists 4 | Archive | Granta Magazine. (Hat tip, Edward Champion.)
A thought for today …
Imagination is more important than knowledge.
— Albert Einstein, who died on this date in 1955
Wednesday, April 17, 2013
Shock and awe …
… Using the Aphorism to Challenge Liberalism | Crisis Magazine. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
A veteran professor of history at a Catholic university notes that
despite their terror concerning grades in my courses, almost all of my students completely ignore the pro-Catholic, record-straight-setting information I give them, and recite the dominant errors and mantras aimed against the Faith on tests. As far as I can determine, this is in no way due to deeply-rooted conviction on their part. Rather, it merely indicates the power of the propaganda fed them from practically every social channel since early youth. They simply cannot expel the erroneous and hostile words from their heads.
What's with it with kids these days? When I was in college, we didn't sit and let ourselves be spoon-fed whatever notions the professor was serving up. We wanted him to demonstrate to our satisfaction that those notions were sound, intellectual nutrition. In most cases the professors could do precisely that — at least at my college.
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