Friday Links
May 17, 2024
The Nature of Things Fragile: A. M. Juster reviews Peter Vertacnik’s new book
Fr. Damian Ference: Capturing a Misfit: A Review of Wildcat
How Rembrandt can help you survive in a sad, lonely, angry, and mean society
In Loving Memory of Kaye Park Hinckley
Dairy of a Thinking Mother
Wiseblood Books: Open Submission period for fiction
The Nature of Things Fragile: A. M. Juster reviews Peter Vertacnik’s new book
A. M. Juster’s review of New Criterion Poetry Prize winner Peter Vertacnik’s poetry collection:
Almost all of the poems in The Nature of Things Fragile are metrical, and most of them also use rhyme. His diction usually lacks the ornamentation of Auden and Hecht; his style seems closer to the plain language of Robert Frost. His book demonstrates mastery of most of the major received forms, but his most inventive work may be in his epigrams.
Fr. Damian Ference: Capturing a Misfit: A Review of Wildcat
Fr. Damian Ference on Wildcat:
I’ve been studying Flannery O’Connor for over twenty-five years, and I still remember reading “A Good Man Is Hard to Find” for the first time, and then “The River” and “Good Country People.” I remember laughing and being horrified. I remember wondering what I had just read and not knowing if I liked it or not. I remember asking friends and family members to read with me so that I could discuss these dark and humorous stories. I didn’t find many takers. So, I looked to O’Connor herself for answers. I picked up a hardbound used copy of The Habit of Being at Half Price Books and started to get to know the woman behind the stories through her letters. I discovered she was a devout Catholic, a voracious reader, a terrible speller, a good friend, funny as funny gets, and was slowly dying of lupus. Next, I bought a copy of Mystery and Manners, a collection of her essays in which she goes about explaining how she understands art, and faith, and writing in the South, and writing as a Catholic. Since then, I’ve read everything in her canon, plus most of the secondary sources. I’ve taught her stories, written articles, and recently published a book about Flannery O’Connor. Needless to say, I was thrilled when I heard that Wildcat was in the works.
How Rembrandt can help you survive in a sad, lonely, angry, and mean society
Cythnia Haven’s Bookhaven blog is always a treat. In this post she shares her thoughts on Rembrandt’s masterpiece, “The Return of the The Prodigal Son,”
which is about fracture and redemption, an aging artist painting a scene in which he imagines all his losses are restored. It is a painting about what it is like to finally realize your deepest yearnings — for forgiveness, safety, reconciliation, home. Meanwhile, the son’s older brother is off to the side, his face tensely rippling with a mixture of complex thoughts, which I read as rigid scorn trying to repress semiconscious shoots of fraternal tenderness.
In Loving Memory of Kaye Park Hinckley
Some sad news on Kaye Park Hinckley, “beloved wife, mother, grandmother, aunt, cousin, and friend” who passed away at her home in Dothan, Alabama on May 4, 2024, at the age of 79 after bravely battling cancer.
Dairy of a Thinking Mother
For the moms out there, Kristin Prugh shares her thoughts “on a number of topics that have affected my life as a mother: from food, health, education, money, and technology, to philosophy, poetry, and film to traveling as a family and raising teenagers.”
Wiseblood Books: Open Submission Period for Fiction
Wiseblood Books will open their submission window from June 1st to June 30th, 2024 for complete, full-length fiction manuscripts. Please see the guidelines at the link.
