Category Archives: Poetry

Poetry and the Age

Posted on March 11, 2013 by

I was reading Poetry and the Age the other day while my students were taking a test here in France. The room was quiet, pens busily at work, and suddenly, into the silence I dropped a helpless, delighted laugh. My … Continue reading →

Posted in Nonfiction, Poetry, Short Stories/Essays | 8 Comments

Locomotion

Posted on May 5, 2012 by

When Lonnie Collins Motion (Lo Co Motion) was 7 years old, his parents died in a house fire. Now, four years later, he is living with his foster mother Miss Edna and learning to write poetry with encouragement from his … Continue reading →

Posted in Children's / YA Lit, Fiction, Poetry | 3 Comments

The Aeneid, Books 7-12

Posted on August 30, 2011 by

My last post about the Aeneid mentioned that I found it both familiar and strange: episodes like the attack of the Harpies or the tour of the Underworld that I already knew from other sources, finally here in the original. … Continue reading →

Posted in Classics, Fiction, Poetry | 3 Comments

The Aeneid, Books 1-6

Posted on August 27, 2011 by

Well, it’s the end of August, and the Aeneid is the last entry in My Big Fat Greek and Roman Summer. (That sounded better in my head. Wet Hot Greek and Roman Summer? 500 Days of Greek and Roman Summer? Okay, I may … Continue reading →

Posted in Classics, Fiction, Poetry | 9 Comments

The Odyssey: Books 13-24

Posted on August 14, 2011 by

Halfway through the Odyssey, Odysseus is done with his long journey home: the Phaeacians have brought him back to Ithaca at last, safe and sound and loaded down with treasure. But the main problem of the book is left to … Continue reading →

Posted in Classics, Fiction, Poetry | 8 Comments

The Odyssey, Books 1-12

Posted on August 12, 2011 by

I am about to say something so staggeringly obvious that you will immediately click away and go visit some other, smarter blogger: when you finally read a classic, you usually find out what that classic is actually about, and what it’s … Continue reading →

Posted in Classics, Fiction, Poetry | 10 Comments

The Iliad, Books 17-24

Posted on August 2, 2011 by

As I reached the end of the Iliad, I was so wrapped up in the book that I stopped taking notes on my reading. (I have three pages of notes on books 1-15, and two lines of notes on the … Continue reading →

Posted in Classics, Fiction, Poetry | 5 Comments

The Iliad, Books 9-16

Posted on July 31, 2011 by

Someone made a comment on my last post on the Iliad that she was intimidated to read this work, and reading back over my post, I can see that I didn’t say all I meant to. My observations are a bit scattered, and I … Continue reading →

Posted in Classics, Fiction, Poetry | 7 Comments

The Iliad, Books 1-8

Posted on July 29, 2011 by

I’m sure you’ve all been on tenterhooks, wondering when I was going to get on with my Summer of Greek and Roman Classics. Tenterhooks! Well, here I am, back again, with Robert Fagles’s translation of the Iliad. You may remove … Continue reading →

Posted in Classics, Fiction, Poetry | 10 Comments

Nox

Posted on July 6, 2011 by

Anne Carson’s Nox is a difficult book to describe because it stretches the boundaries of what we call a book. It’s packaged in a box, the size of a thick book, and the text itself is presented on accordion-fold pages, … Continue reading →

Posted in Memoir, Poetry | 20 Comments