2023: A Final Farewell to Some Irreplaceable Icons
Sean MurphyWow, it's sad to look back and see the sheer number of all-times greats we watched depart our planet this year. Of course, these losses are invariably mitigated by the…
The Struggle of Memory against Forgetting: Why Milan Kundera Matters
i. Kundera almost killed me, still in my creative cradle, a writer needing nourishment. He arrived in my life too early. As a reader, it wasn’t soon enough, as what…
The Style’s the Thing: The Inimitable Martin Amis
Martin Amis poses for a photographer June 12, 2000 at a book signing at the Beverly Hills Library in Beverly Hills, CA. (by Frederick M. Brown/Online USA) Style is not…
VCLA’S AUTHOR SERIES AT HANDLEY LIBRARY, VOL. 4: KAREN E. BENDER AND ROBERT ANTHONY SIEGEL
In my experience, the only way to improve on a series featuring amazing authors is to feature two amazing authors. How fortunate, for everyone, that the dynamic duo and husband and wife team of Karen…
Washing Dishes as Antidote for Apathy (Revisited)
Help wanted sign on the Mexican border. Tom Sietsema, the excellent food critic for The Washington Post, wrote a fantastic piece about dishwashers (in general) and his experience, as a dishwasher,…
Appreciating Ursula K. Le Guin and Cultivating the Right Kind of Rebellion
Sometimes, if you're lucky, you find the right books at the right time; more rarely and therefore more miraculous, the right books find you. After first experiencing (not reading, experiencing)…
Washing Dishes as Antidote for Apathy
Tom Sietsema, the excellent food critic for The Washington Post, wrote a fantastic piece about dishwashers (in general) and his experience, as a dishwasher, on 8/7/17. I highly recommend this piece…
On Losing Faith and Finding Myself Instead
AUGUST 30, 2002. I was in a church for the first time in forever. The church where I received the Sacrament of Confirmation. The church where my parents celebrated their…
The “R” Party Putting the “D” in Dysfunctional (And Coal Mines, Unions, Big Business and –of course– George Orwell)
In honor (dishonor?) of our dysfunctional government not doing what it doesn't do best, I think it's timely and appropriate to revisit a blast from the past (a blog post…
Coal Mines, Unions, Big Business and (of course) George Orwell (Revisited)
Watching coal-miners at work, you realize momentarily what different universes people inhabit. --George Orwell Quite by chance (no, really), I saw an old classic that had been languishing in my…