There’s a poem by John Donne that makes a presence of an absence; his absent love becomes as real to the speaker and more fully his than if she were present. This could illustrate what Katherine Rundell wants us to see in the work of John Donne, seventeenth-century metaphysical poet and preacher, . . . . Continue Reading »
Our crosses chip away our defenses, perverse habits, and self-delusions, removing “what hid Christ” so he can be seen. Continue Reading »
Jesus and the Jewish Roots of Mary: Unveiling the Mother of the Messiah by brant pitre image books, 240 pages, $24 In Jesus and the Jewish Roots of Mary, Brant Pitre challenges the oft-heard charge that the Catholic Church’s Marian beliefs are “unbiblical.” He offers a rich . . . . Continue Reading »
The recent deaths of Alan Rickman, David Bowie, and the Eagles' Glenn Frey prompted an outpouring of sorrow online. Why do we grieve when celebrities die? Is it just ‘misplaced grief,' as some say? Or is there a deeper reason why we mourn—and, indeed, should mourn—the famous? Continue Reading »
John Donne, it is clear, is not everyone’s cup of tea. In a notable essay in 1990, Stanley Fish wrote this: “Donne is sick and his poetry is sick. . . . Donne is bulimic, someone who gorges himself to a point beyond satiety, and then sticks his finger down his throat and throws up.” Perhaps . . . . Continue Reading »
However much traditional standards are leveled in our late democratic society, American theater will persist in challenging putatively oppressive values and the figures who enforce them. So I concluded after seeing Wit, the play by Margaret Edson that won the Pulitzer Prize in 1999 and is . . . . Continue Reading »
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