Friday Links
September 23, 2024
Catholic Culture Podcast with Ryan Wilson
Political Lessons From the Life of Blessed Emperor Karl
The Borough: A Journal of Poetry
Form and Freedom from Plough
Dennis Wilson Wise on “Tolkien Criticism Today, Revisited”
Valerie Stivers on Sally Rooney’s Crypto-Christian Love
Catholic Culture Podcast with Ryan Wilson
Ryan Wilson joins Thomas Mirius for a fascinating discussion:
A myth is not a lie. A myth is an eternal truth told in a way that’s indirect, that’s embodied and so does not resolve into an easy abstract summary. So you can’t say well the moral is this. The myth resists that.
Political Lessons From the Life of Blessed Emperor Karl
Why are so many Americans obsessed with monarchs? Eduard Habsburg shares his thoughts on American interest in and love for his family, especially Blessed Emperor Karl:
. . . I think Americans are in a crisis when it comes to their political leaders. And the Habsburgs seem to fulfil a lot of the things Americans really would like to believe in their leaders – but don’t find any more. I believe Americans are, deep inside, pioneer spirits. They want to believe in a man’s word, in the shaking of a hand. They want to believe that a yes is a yes, a no a no and that the only thing that drives their political leading class is the nation’s best interest.
That would be wonderful, wouldn’t it?
The Borough: a journal of poetry
A new poetry journal that favors metrical verse has published their first issue and it does not disappoint. The Australian poet Clarence Caddell is the editor. You can read the first issue at the link.
Form and Freedom from Plough
A visual artist, an architect, and a poet don’t walk into a bar, but they do celebrate the freedom of coloring within the lines:
. . . three artists from different disciplines reflect on the interplay between freedom and structure in their work. Far from inhibiting freedom, these artists find that it is often through accepting formal limitations, structure, and routine that their practice can become intuitive and free-flowing.
Dennis Wilson Wise on “Tolkien Criticism Today, Revisited”
ABOUT NINE YEARS AGO, the Los Angeles Review of Books started something of a minor controversy—a kerfuffle, even—among certain scholars in the Tolkien community. In “Tolkien Criticism Today,” Norbert Schürer reviewed seven recent books in Tolkien studies, and although his individual comments were sound, what riled folks up was his larger claim—nothing more, really, than a logical extension of his analysis—that, with some exceptions, our subfield was in a “sad state”: rife with weak writing, poor quality control, and underdeveloped arguments.
Valerie Stivers on Sally Rooney’s Crypto-Christian Love
Irish writer Sally Rooney is one of the most talked about novelists in the world. The release of her latest book, Intermezzo, basically broke my Twitter feed, which for the last week or so has been swamped with election “news,” the P. Diddy scandal, and Rooney / Intermezzo. Make of that what you will, but thank God for timeline cleansers like the first issue of The Borough. Ever since reading Normal People, I’ve had either an entirely appropriate or a completely irrational loathing for Rooney’s stories. But, I also have a tendency to rear up (I’m sure this is a flaw) when I am told from so many quarters that this or that novel is “the best,” “groundbreaking,” “perfect,” “beautiful” and that I must read it and like it. Rarely is there any explanation for why the book must be read or what’s so great about it (sorry, but salacious sex scenes and text messages as a novelist trope don’t do it for me). Maybe I’m just contrary, but anyway, Valeries Stivers is always interesting, even when I disagree with her. I found this review really fair and thought-provoking and I am grateful to Stivers for writing it.
