weekly posts on literature, languages, and learning
Charles Turner Dazey was an American writer and playwright born in Lima, Illinois, in 1855. He wrote a number of successful plays, also leaving a mark in the early film history as a writer of numerous of silent films. He died in Quincy in 1938; sadly, his works quickly became forgotten. Charles T. Dazey I …
The Grammaticus blog is no stranger to the works of Sarah Orne Jewett. Her novella The Country of the Pointed Firs is one of my favourite books, and I wrote about it in the review accessible here. In this post we’ll read one of her winter-themed children’s poems: A Country Boy in Winter, first published …
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It gives me great pleasure to present this week’s guest post—the first ever on Grammaticus. Written by John G. Stamos, ‘A Flower’s Song’ is a wonderful essay on the beauty of flowers and the joy they can give us. John is an accomplished gardener and garden designer from Michiana Shores, Indiana, and the man behind …
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The Weekend Listener is an eclectic list of noteworthy podcasts and radio recordings, old and new, curated for your listening pleasure. For more listening tips please search the website for previous instalments. LANGUAGE Idioms Idioms are a very peculiar feature of ‘natural language’. Defying the rules of syntax and semantics, they usually don't make much …
Helen Hunt Jackson was born in Amherst, Massachusetts, on 15 October, 1830. A prolific writer, poet, and activist dedicated to the rights of Native Americans, she also happened to be a classmate of another—nowadays much more famous—Amherst poet: Emily Dickinson. The two women remained in contact throughout their lives, chiefly through correspondence. Helen Hunt Jackson …
Thomas Hardy was an English poet who lived and worked between two literary eras, connecting the legacy of British Romanticism with the early 20th century poetry. Best known as a novelist, thanks to classics such as Tess of the d’Urbervilles and Far from the Madding Crowd, he is also rightly considered one of the finest …
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We’ve encountered Walt Whitman’s poetry on this blog before: in a longish post where I offered some advice on how to interpret poems, I presented his poem To a Stranger. And now I would like to share with you another poem of his, on a similar theme of the need for love and companionship. Walt …
The Weekend Listener is an eclectic weekly list of noteworthy podcasts and radio recordings, old and new, curated for your listening pleasure. Posts in this series are published on Fridays – please search the website for the previous instalments. LANGUAGE Science Diction | Language Evolves: It’s Literally Fine Photo by Snapwire on Pexels.com Language constantly …
Dear readers, subscribers, and followers of the Grammaticus blog, I have the pleasure of sharing with you a small gift for the upcoming holidays: an ebook containing the unabridged version of the short story The Snow written by one of my favourite authors, Hugh Walpole. Hugh Walpole (1884-1941) Set in the fictional town of Polchester …
The Weekend Listener is an eclectic weekly list of noteworthy podcasts and radio recordings, old and new, curated for your listening pleasure. Posts in this series are published on Fridays – please search the website for the previous instalments. LANGUAGE As It Happens | Swearing feels good - it’s also good for you Where the …
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