Congratulations to Jason Makansi!
Friends, I highly recommend Jason’s novel–here’s a blurb I wrote for it… “Religious texts aver that to save one life is akin to saving the entire world. The beauty of Jason Makansi’s novel is in…
Category: World Literature
The Seeds at Work within Us
Years ago, I read with pleasure Goethe’s Maxims and Reflections (translated by Elisabeth Stopp). A good number of them are worth revisiting, much like many of those I’ve encountered over the years from La Rochefoucauld,…
The Future Belongs to South America
Jessie Sandova, From the Monastery to the World: The Letters of Thomas Merton and Ernesto Cardenal (Counterpoint Press, 2017) I had initial high hopes for reading the correspondence of Thomas Merton and Ernesto Cardenal. I started…
Dharma Brother Wang Wei
Devoted Buddhist Semi-recluse Noticer of the minute particulars Painter of vast emptiness Appreciator of interbeing moment by moment Befriender of sages, visitors and travelers moving in and out of the Ch’an world His wife dead…
A Late Night Raid on Victor Terras’s A Karamazov Companion: Commentary on the Genesis, Language, and Style of Dostoevsky’s Novel/1
for Cami “I love Russia, Aliosha, I love the Russian God, though I am a scoundrel myself.” –Dmitry Karamazov So, maybe you’ve already taken the plunge back in Wisconsin, and are now immersed in “A Nice…
“True Happiness and Joy”
Egyptian novelist Naguib Mahfouz received the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1988. He was the author of 40 novels, 350 short stories, and five plays. When I was in Palestine in 2003, I would read…
Three Hours in the Morning
In Talking with Sartre, U.S. professor John Gerassi explores a fascinating range of subjects with the French intellectual, writer, and activist. At the book’s conclusion, Gerassi writes, “What we must do instead, he said, is…
In Praise of Sentimental Slop
Back in the late 90s, when the spring semester ended, and the grades had been turned in, I’d treat myself with another reading of Dostoevsky’s magisterial The Brothers Karamazov. I’ve lost track of how many…
For All My Friends Who Are Free Spirits
“What is now proved was once only imagin’d.” –William Blake Free Spirits desire the emancipation of all humankind Free Spirits conceive a habitable, harmonian world Free Spirits know that no revolution has gone far enough…
On the New York Literary Establishment in the Fifties
“There’s no room for youth and vitality in New York. It is a city full of guilty academicians.” –Gregory Corso “Too big, too multiple, too jaded.” –Jack Kerouac “We want everyone to know that we…