weekly posts on literature, languages, and learning
As the summer slowly draws to a close, I return to the book I love to re-read this time of year. Sarah Orne Jewett’s 1896 novella The Country of the Pointed Firs is a gentle and relaxing, almost meditative account of an idyllic summer spent in a small fishing village on the coast of Maine. …
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Donna Tartt’s debut novel “The Secret History” was first published thirty years ago, but it’s one of those books that age really well. In terms of genre, it's been described as a campus novel, but don't mistake it for a piece of YA fiction set in a college; nor is it, in spite of the …
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John Grisham’s first novel, A Time to Kill, was set in the small town of Clanton in Ford County, Mississippi: population of 10,000 but “enough conflict to support fifty-one lawyers.” That 1989 book has since been followed by dozens of titles that have earned him the reputation of a master of legal thriller. In Ford …
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[This post has been written with ESL/EFL students in mind, CEFR level B2 and above.] Let’s be honest, reading poetry doesn’t come naturally to most of us. Same as with visual arts or classical music, sometimes it's difficult to understand complex symbolism or to follow a poet’s train of thought. And what to do with …
Continue reading "How to interpret a poem (with a little help from Walt Whitman)"
A young woman is brutally attacked in her rural Indiana home and almost left for dead. Her memory is patchy, evidence inconclusive, yet in court she insists that it was her extremely jealous husband who did the deed; of that she is absolutely certain. On the basis of her testimony, he gets convicted and ends …
A small town in rural Minnesota. A family struggling with a history of alcoholism, mental illness and suicide. And snow - lots and lots of it. The Center of Winter is Marya Hornbacher’s first novel, but she is no stranger to writing on sensitive topics: her first book was much acclaimed Wasted: A Memoir of …
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In case the current pandemic and a host of other global disasters haven't been enough to spook you, here are a couple of suggestions as to how you might spend your evenings this Halloween season (or, if you're anything like me, most evenings during the entire year!). PODCAST: Classic Ghost Stories At the moment of …
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"...the strangest and maddest of myths are often merely symbols or allegories based upon truth..." H. P. Lovecraft, "The Shadow Over Innsmouth" (1931) This August 20 marks the 132nd anniversary of the birth of H. P. Lovecraft, one of the most influential horror fiction writers. During his lifetime his work was either ignored or underappreciated …
grammaticus 