Paine found himself carried forward by the immense wave of his book’s popularity into the heart of New World society. If Common Sense isolated the fears and the angers of the average colonist and focused them into a strategy for the future, its impact was tenfold for the men who would face charges of treason […]
Author: Dwight
At his print shop here, Robert Bell published the first edition of Thomas Paine’s revolutionary pamphlet in January 1776. Arguing for a republican form of government under a written constitution, it played a key role in rallying American support for independence. Picture source at The Historical Marker Database We have it in our power to […]
Picture source at Wikipedia For the Fourth of July I thought I would do something different. The obvious choice would be to look at the Declaration of Independence or its philosophical history and background, but I wanted to re-read Common Sense and look at on one of America’s most problematic founding fathers, Thomas Paine. I […]
Thanks to Anthony @timesflow for tweeting about the planned reissue by Dalkey Archive of Gnomon: Essays on Contemporary Literature by Hugh Kenner. Unfortunately it’s not scheduled to be released until next summer, but it’s a chance to set aside some money for wonderful essays written in the 1950s about 20th century literature. From the bookflap […]
Ivan Mosjoukine (Mozzhukhin) as Edmund KeanI thought I was through with my Kean project, but Sunday evening I checked to see what was on TCM and the onscreen guide promised Kean with Anthony Hopkins, the version I had blegged about a while back! Knowing this slot was usually reserved for silent movies I had my […]
B O D Y literature has the short story “Melancholy Leaves from Democracy’s Autumn Trees” by Jiří Hájíček, translated from the Czech by Gale A. Kirking. The story was originally in the collection The Wooden Knife and included in the English translation of Rustic Baroque. My post on this story and three others included with […]
Winstonsdad’s Blog is hosting Polish Literature month in October and since I’m not very good at posting in a timely fashion with others I thought I would read and post about these books over the next few months. I’m sure there will be more to add to this list. I’m also including a list of […]
I will be occupied for a few days with my Father’s Day presents. Perfect car-centric gifts for this redneck…NASCAR tickets and a Ford (Madox Ford). See y’all in a few days.
Honduran archaeologist Ricardo Agurcia Fasquelle, Executive Director of the Copán Association, presents this inaugural lecture in the Great Battles Series. Until recently scholars depicted the ancient Maya as a peaceful civilization devoid of warfare. This somewhat romantic notion has been overturned by evidence of a starker reality: during the Classic period (ca. 250—900 CE) an […]
Edmund Kean: or, The Life of an Actor by Alexander Dumas The English adaptation by G. H. Jessop and J. St. Maur (published 1881) Note: I’m not sure what happened but this post returned to draft status after being posted. There have been no changes since the original post yesterday. After I read the pictured […]