Henry David Thoreau Archive
Growing Something from Ash
Perhaps I had been waiting for exuberance. Perhaps, the former version of myself, before the loss, expected only ecstatic experiences to unfasten me from sorrow. Does time change me, or the attention to life? Perhaps both. Both have borne hope.
Weekly Round-Up: Howard Zinn, WALDEN, and Stephen King
From a book-banning bill to Stephen King's new collaboration, here's the latest literary news.
Ruefle, Hokusai, and the American View of Asia
Katsushika Hokusai, contemporary of Goya and Turner and Ingres, artistic godfather of Monet and Van Gogh, was recently the subject of an exhibit at the Museum of Fine Arts here in Boston. He’s been on my mind ever since. Most of us know Hokusai’s artwork from the image above,
The Best Short Story I Read in a Lit Mag This Week: “Keller in Effects” by Todd James Pierce
There’s a rich body of art that could be described by that famous quote by Thoreau from Walden, “The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation”—art in particular focusing on the upper class of the 50s and 60s. Think of Richard Yates’ Revolutionary Road, or more recently the
Social Media and Literature
I seem a little less in love with literature because of social media. My apologies to the Ploughshares staff who have to Tweet about this post, but it’s true. For a few months I was an intern for an online literary magazine, helping with their social media. I’d done