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Kalidasa: Life and Works

Source: Introduction to Translations of Shakuntala and Other Works, by Arthur W. Ryder (London: J.M. Dent, 1920).

INTRODUCTION . KALIDASA—HIS LIFE AND WRITINGS

Kalidasa probably lived in the fifth century of the Christian era.…

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Petrarch

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Petrarch

Source: Introduction to Some Love Songs of Petrarch, translated and annotated with a Biographical Introduction by William Dudley Foulke (Oxford University Press, 1915).

INTRODUCTION AND BIOGRAPHY

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Pope, Alexander: A Biographical Sketch

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Alexander Pope

Source: The Complete Poetical Works of Alexander Pope. Cambridge Edition, ed. Henry W. Boynton (Boston and New York: Houghton, Mifflin and Co., 1903). BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH.

Copyright: The text is…

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The Three Theological Virtues Revealed: The Wife of Bath’s Tale

The Wife of Bath’s Tale is likely the single-most selected work from Chaucer’s corpus to be used in the classroom. Yet this tendency to single it out also works to obscure the Tale’s role in the larger story, the connections which…

Crouchbackus Contritus: Evelyn Waugh’s Sword of Honor Trilogy as a Chivalric Romance

Several far-better known and experienced reviewers than I have written on Evelyn Waugh’s Sword of Honor Trilogy, noting the resemblance of its major romantic sub-plot to the prophet Hosea while at the same time generally consigning…

John Milton—Secret Fan of The Crown?

For those of you who, like me, became hooked on Netflix’s award-winning drama about Queen Elizabeth II and the modern British monarchy during the Covid lockdown (or, in my case, shortly thereafter), the end of The Crown was somewhat…

Our Traditional Shakespeare’s Birthday Post

The Logic of Desire: From Homer’s Odyssey to Alice in Wonderland

When one idly day-dreams one frequently imagines how things might be different. What if the clouds were red? What if I had a million dollars, tax-free? What if I did not have to wake up at 5 a.m. during the week? Generally, one…

Evil In Plato’s Republic and Dante’s Paradiso

In Plato's Republic, Socrates confidently asserts to Glaucon, Plato’s older brother, that evil cannot be done consciously, or rationally, for one doing evil believes himself to be doing good, and one cannot do evil to another,…

A Tale of Two Antonios

The Merchant of Venice and Twelfth Night both end in double marriages, featuring the kind of comedy Disney would later seize upon: boy meets girl, boy marries girl, boy and girl live happily ever after. But what of the other boy?…

The Strained Quality of Mercy in Shakespeare’s Merchant of Venice

At the end of The Merchant of Venice, Shylock gets himself into quite a legal pickle. Unlike many tragedies (and many proverbial pickles), Shylock’s situation is entirely of his own making –due to his rigid adherence to law, not his…

A Dirty, Filthy, Book Review

Book review: A Dirty, Filthy Book: Sex, Scandal, and One Woman's Fight in the Victorian Trial of the Century, by Michael Meyer, Penguin UK
Publication date: February 8 2024

The Freedom of Poets 2: Thomas Wyatt and Petrarch

Shannon Chamberlain, in her Reading Room post on the character of Thomas Wyatt in Hilary Mantel’s Wolf Halltrilogy, offers a lovely reading of the historical Wyatt’s brilliant sonnet, “Whoso List to Hunt.”

Marriage, Cake, and the Paradox of Twelfth Night

It shouldn’t be surprising chez Shakespeare, but whenever I pick up Twelfth Night, I am amazed by the continual invitation to play – the ludic dare to experiment with gender, sexuality, crossdressing, feasting, drinking, and social…

Twelfth Night: Feasting Gone Wrong?

To drink or not to drink? To laugh or not to laugh? To jest or not to jest? These are the questions that run through Sir Toby Belch’s mind during the entirety of Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night. Yet, beneath his jocular, inebriated…

Twelfth Night: Feasting Gone Wrong?

To drink or not to drink? To laugh or not to laugh? To jest or not to jest? These are the questions that run through Sir Toby Belch’s mind during the entirety of Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night. Yet, beneath his jocular, inebriated…

Thinking about Literature: Not just Good and Evil

The story repeats itself every time I teach literature. The discussion about texts, almost inexorably, ends up with students trying to figure out whether the text is 'good' or 'bad'. As if, in the end, as judges on a pedestal, our…

Folks is Folks

Sarah Skwire doesn’t say YOU MUST READ SHAKESPEARE…but if you do, you’ll probably learn from him. And then you can reread him later to learn more and different things. In this hour-long conversation with Sabine El-Chidiac at The…

Jonathan Swift’s Resolutions

In 1699, Jonathan Swift, one of our favorite writers, made a list of resolutions for his life. While they weren't technically New Year's resolutions, we present them here for the entertainment and edification of our readers.

Causes of the Trojan War: Agamemnon’s Grisly Choice

The final cause of the Trojan War was Agamemnon's choice to sacrifice Iphigeneia at Aulis after the goddess Artemis bound the troops there due to a perceived slight. The goddess insisted that the blood of Atreus be spilt, or no…

Me and My Shadow: Liberty, “Breaking Bad”, and Shadow Possession

What is the nexus between liberty and Breaking Bad, named by Rolling Stone as the third-best television show of all-time? The archetypal tale of Walter White’s “transformation from Mr. Chips to Scarface” teaches that there is no…

The Spirit of Christmas, Scrooge, and Dante

What could possibly connect the spirit of Christmas, A Christmas Carol’s Ebenezer Scrooge, and Dante’s Inferno? Though they are differing representations at the literal level, each work portrays a similar underlying religious…

Santa Claus in Purgatory

Though Dante Alighieri is well known for his Inferno and the fact that he was happy to include bishops, popes, and kings in it, it would surprise many readers to hear that he included Santa Claus in his infernal masterpiece too.

Dante and the Symbolic Meaning of the Colors of Christmas

Though the Christmas season is rapidly approaching, and Christmas trees, both artificial and natural, are adorning the homes of many individuals, it is far less likely that the denizens of those homes understand the origin of their…

Justice and Marriage in Shakespeare’s As You Like it

When As You Like It opens, the political world of its unnamed duchy is truly out of joint. At both the familial and ducal level, injustice is ascendent. What marks the play as a comedy—rather than one of Shakespeare’s blood-thirsty…