The Novel Virus: In Defense of Fiction
As 2020 draws to a close, there is a pre-echo of normalcy in the air, the possibility of a return to a glorious summer even as we head into what…
Share
Posts by tag
Literature
14 posts
The Delight of Sentience: “Inside Story: A Novel” by Martin Amis
Martin Amis opens and closes Inside Story by addressing the reader directly. From the beginning, then, we are confidantes of the author and the implied promise of the book’s title is fulfilled—this…
Share
Own the Filth: Writing Into the Ethical Compromises of Fiction
Novelists these days face difficult working conditions, even the few who land seven-figure deals. Witness this year’s fiercest skirmish on the literary frontline of the culture wars: the clash over…
Share
The Unbeliever Knows His Qur’an Best
Photo by Masjid Pogung Dalangan The Koran! well, come put me to the test Lovely old book in hideous error drest Believe me, I can quote the Koran too, The…
Share
“Lying Bastard” by Clint Margrave. Book Review.
Grim, uncouth, and hilarious: these are the adjectives I’d use to describe Lying Bastard, the upcoming debut novel of prolific poet and polemicist Clint Margrave. The story follows the mindscape…
Share
Dostoevsky’s Campaign Against Rationalism and Progress
Fyodor Dostoevsky was defeated by history. A man who viciously attacked and satirized the ideologies of rationalism and communism and defended traditional religious and family structures, Dostoevsky died just decades…
Share
Being Human Is A Quest: A Review of Salman Rushdie’s Quichotte
Inspired by Miguel de Cervantes’ Don Quixote, Salman Rushdie’s Booker Prize-nominated novel Quichotte (pronounced in the French way, key-SHOT) is a work of postmodern picaresque with a metafictional narrative…
Share
Politics vs. Aesthetics: Why Great Art Cannot Conform to Our Political Views
Percy Bysshe Shelley proclaimed poets “the unacknowledged legislators of the world.” Today, that distinction belongs to Twitter mobs. Dispensing mob justice in brief and brutal 280-character decrees, these sneering Solons…
Share
Why We Need Fantasy Literature
J. R. R. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings has sold around 150 million copies worldwide, which makes it one of the bestselling fiction novels of all time. Some even…
Share
The Ugly Truth About Not Seeing Beauty
To look at a thing is very different from seeing a thing. One does not see anything until one sees its beauty. Then, and then only, does it come into…
Share
Aesthetic Denialism and the Rise of Acadumbia: Yale, Bloom, English and How It All Went South
The Awakening of a Passion In the early 1990s, when I was in high school, I fell in love with literature and decided I wanted more. I attended a middle…
Share
Literature, Authenticity and Race
As Cathy Young observes in a recent essay, the media has not given J. D. Salinger a warm welcome into his centennial year. Two days before the celebrated author’s birthday, the Washington…
Share
Excuse Me, You Appear to Have a Broken Moral Compass
Helen Dale will be speaking at the Battle of Ideas on “Cultural Appropriation in Literature: Whose voice is it anyway?” on Sunday 14th October Sunday 7 October was the 1-year…
Share
Why You Should Read (More) Poetry
“Poetry,” wrote a jaded WH Auden, “Makes nothing happen.” The creative energy that had bloomed amid the ashes of the First World War had been snuffed out by the horrors…
Share