Category Archives: Commentary

Opinion or analysis concerning whatever’s on my mind.

Gender Reveal Vagary

The byline for a good essay in The New York Times is “Abraham Josephine Riesman,” tagged as follows: Mx. Riesman is a journalist and the author of a biography of Vince McMahon. It’s my first encounter with “Mx.” in The … Continue reading

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‘Women Hold Up Half the Sky’

“Women hold up half the sky” is a dictum of Mao Zedong cited by China’s current ruler, Xi Jinping, to endorse the equality of the sexes. Here’s his mission statement for the “equal” woman: “The broad number of women must … Continue reading

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As Sure as Dearth and Texas

An old saying for something that’s drearily predictable is, “It’s as sure as dearth and Texas.” Dearth is so prevalent, it’s easier to name things there’s not a dearth of: inequality and bad weather come to mind. Weather can be … Continue reading

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John Donne and Tate

There’s a biography of John Donne I’d like to read. As a preacher he was a crowd magnet in the pulpit of Saint Paul’s in London. He wrote love poems, some laced with misogyny, and later wished he hadn’t. He … Continue reading

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The Agony of Hamline and Macalester

“Art need not defer to religion. If that’s no longer obvious we’ve gone astray.” (Michelle Goldberg) (Michelle Goldberg, “A Left-Leaning College Didn’t Want to Offend, So It Closed Down Her Art Show,” New York Times, 2-13-23) The story of what … Continue reading

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Diametric ‘Scape States

“He’s showing us in the natural world our own inner landscape,” said [collector Bernard] Lumpkin, who owns four Gavin canvases. “When you’re inhabiting a painting by Cy, you’re inhabiting a world which is simultaneously strange and familiar; real and surreal; … Continue reading

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Verse from Two Directions

“I tire of being made to feel smart rather than pleased.”(Peter Schjeldahl) 1. Online One finds lineated speech flowing freely, touching on themes of love, nostalgia, rage, nature, disillusionment, mortality and healing. There’s earnestness, the odd hard edge, whiffs of … Continue reading

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‘Cucumber Sandwiches. Season with Pepper Apparently’

My title is, in full, a text message received from a correspondent in early morning with no context. I read it silently then more attentively aloud. With growing alarm I realized it was a perfect dactylic pentameter. Rubbing sleep from … Continue reading

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‘When Did He Do Well? Ne’er!’

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I’ve filched my title from the standup comedy of the matchless Gary Gulman. If you don’t know him, you owe it to yourself to track down on YouTube, exempli gratia, his explanation of how the states got their abbreviations. (c) … Continue reading

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Something Memorable in the Way of Verse

The Poets There he sat among them(his old friends) a walking ashthat knows how to smile.And he still dreamed of a styleso clear it could wash a faceor make a dry mouth sing.But they laughed, having foundthemselves more astonishing. They … Continue reading

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