1,252 words
Christopher Nolan, one of my favorite living directors, is now working on a movie of the Odyssey, to be released next summer. Frankly, everything I am hearing about it fills me with dread, especially the cast full of Africans. I may just skip reviewing it. I may skip it altogether. But just in case, I have been preparing by rereading the Odyssey and surveying other adaptations. (more…)
Unknown artist and date, The Pilgrimage to Canterbury
Unknown artist and date, The Pilgrimage to Canterbury
4,059 words
Part 1 of 3 (Part 2 here)
There’s an old story within a story told by a pilgrim knight about ancient Thebes and two Theban cousins named Arcite and Palamon.[1] According to everyone who knew them, no two warriors were more perfect. (more…)
6,299 words
Part 2 of 2 (Part 1 here)
Dante’s Inferno
Dante Alighieri’s conceptual map of Hell also lay at the intersection where biblical and classical ideas about the afterlife crossed. Virgil, fellow Italian poet and ancient Roman author of the Æneid, accompanied him during much of his journey, for Virgil was someone who had imagined his own hero Aeneas successfully navigating the underworld. (more…)
“Off with her head!” An original illustration for Lewis Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland (1864)
“Off with her head!” An original illustration for Lewis Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland (1864)
7,655 words
The Sphinx-riddle. Solve it, or be torn to bits, is the decree.
— D. H. Lawrence
A question, readers: what is the most profound of all human activities? With the previous sentence, I’ve already provided the answer, for it is the question itself — the thing that drives all exploration and philosophy. How can philosophy (or any knowledge) exist without first the riddle, the profound need for the answer? (more…)