One of the long haul reading projects I currently have going is Plutarch’s Lives of the Noble Greeks and Romans, aka Parallel Lives or simply Lives. One of my favorite pieces is on Marcus Claudius Marcellus, in which Archimedes, one of the great mathematicians and inventors appears. While there are plenty of military anecdotes throughout the … Continue reading Do not disturb my circles: Plutarch’s Archimedes
One way I disappointed students was not reading one of their favorite books. This was certainly not the only way I disappointed students, but not having read S. E. Hinton’s The Outsiders was at the top of the list from the beginning of my teaching career. This proved to be particularly disappointing to one student … Continue reading Plain Ordinary People: On Finally Reading The Outsiders
May my crimes alsobe my daughter’s:Stealing flashlights,reading at night. (For Maurice Sendak, 1928-2012) Continue reading Little Billboards #1: For Maurice Sendak
I wrote recently about my initial experiences with The Confessions. Finished sometime around 400 AD, it’s an early version of the memoir, particularly the confessional and spiritual quest genres, though it doesn’t look like the ones published today. If I read it again, I’m going to research current or celebrated translations. If you are a … Continue reading Our Heart Is Restless: St Augustine’s Confessions
Andrei Tarkovsky’s Solaris (1971), a sci-fi film full of slow poetry, led me to the author Stanislaw Lem, whose book inspired it. Since I only had the film to go by, I was expecting something similar to Tarkovsky, but Lem is a different experience. More like the feeling after reading The Metamorphosis a few times … Continue reading An Artificial Certainty: Stanislaw Lem’s Hospital of the Transfiguration
A few years ago, I started reading St. Augustine’s Confessions and just put it down because it wasn’t the right time. A few months ago, I picked it back up and the experience has been much different. The voice of it just grabbed me this time. I’m interested in tracking down some different translations as … Continue reading Learning Love Late
While finishing the last week of the 2018 academic year, the family got some form of stomach virus that started last week. Since that cleared up, we’ve been able to do some much needed cleaning and organizing. We’re also planning our next academic year. The youngest got her cast cut off and she is healing. … Continue reading The Week That Was, or Emptiness, Eagles, and Snow
An overheard conversation between bath and bedtime: 6YO: “Ciao”…”Ciao” means…uh…”Ciao” means “hello” and “goodbye” in…in… Amy: Italian. 6YO: In Italian. 4YO: (clomps in on cast) ¡Hola, Big Dogs! Despite a nice plate of shrimp, peas, orzo, and fresh parmesan, our children decided to skip that and eat the lemons off the cutting board. One of … Continue reading The Week That Was, or This Is He Who Smells
Geese and ducks have returned with their young. We’ve been walking around the pond looking at greeny goslings, all fuzzy like they got stuck under a hair dryer. We’ve also seen ducklings swim behind their parents in those cute little lines that I don’t think I’ve ever seen in person–only on cartoons or in storybooks. … Continue reading The Week That Was, or Them Geeses
Stephen McClurg 