"Reading is the creative center of a writer's life." — Stephen King
April 26, 2018
This is how Laura Ingalls Wilder described her Little House books in a speech in 1937. As it turns out, the “whole truth” was stranger than fiction in many ways. In Prairie Fires: The American Dreams of Laura Ingalls Wilder, Caroline Fraser tells a story that is … Read More
April 19, 2018
D’Mello and his research team identified three guiding principles for implementing confusion in the college classroom: it should be appropriate, intentional and in the context of learning; students should possess the ability to successfully resolve the confusion; and when students can’t resolve it on their own, there … Read More
April 12, 2018
The most radical idea in Johann Hari’s Lost Connections: Uncovering the Real Causes of Depression – and the Unexpected Solutions is that treatment for depression shouldn’t focus on medication only. Because depression has three kinds of causes – biological, psychological and social – treatment plans should include … Read More
April 7, 2018
In these memorable lines from Mike Bartlett’s play King Charles III, the lead character explains his decision to oppose a law the parliament has passed. He knows his actions will throw the modern British system of government into chaos. People will revolt, and tanks will … Read More
March 29, 2018
Or so Rhoda – the aunt in Barbara Pym’s Less Than Angels — thought would happen when “clever” people came to visit the family. Instead, however, she found that the visitors’ sentences could be compared to “scrubbing-brushes, dish cloths, knives” which sometimes “fell to the ground … Read More
March 22, 2018
Really? Moral and human responsibilities? Let’s think about that for a moment. Could it be the case that the teacher’s real work is to “animate inert knowledge with qualities of our own personality and spirit”? Is it our job to “fill and enlarge the character and spirit… Read More
March 16, 2018
Hisham Matar, author of The Return, continues his description of the year after his father had been kidnapped by Qaddafi’s supporters, when the family didn’t know whether the father was dead or alive. “Any repetitive movement increased my heartbeat. Looking out of the window, I … Read More
March 9, 2018
Up and down and up again – the changes in the temperature this spring have caught me off balance more than once. Uncertain times call for poetry, I think, and for contemplating the purpose of poetry. Seamus Heaney’s book The Redress of Poetry shows how poetry … Read More
March 1, 2018
How can a writer who spent all but six years of her life in the same house, living what she herself describes as a “sheltered life,” create such astonishing fiction? In her memoir, One Writer’s Beginnings, Eudora Welty answers this question by arguing that a quiet … Read More
February 22, 2018
Wilmet, the main character in Barbara Pym’s novel A Glass of Blessings, after spending a frustrating afternoon with do-gooder Mary, observes that wicked people were often much more fun to be with. I believe that if Wilmet were a real person, she and I would be … Read More
February 15, 2018
This book, like last week’s book, discusses “Adverse Childhood Experiences,” which is a set of 10 questions that assess the level of trauma kids experience. These questions focus on exposure to mental illness, addiction, abandonment, hunger, physical abuse or danger, sexual assault, and imprisonment. Studies have found … Read More
February 8, 2018
Every once in a while, a book touches a nerve. This one certainly did when a British newspaper published excerpts from Lost Connections in an article titled “Is everything you think you know about depression wrong?” A neuroscientist – who hadn’t read the book – wrote a … Read More
February 1, 2018
It’s easy to recognize “bad” writing, but hard to identify the cause of bad writing. Harvard psychology professor Steven Pinker argues that the problem starts when writers make incorrect assumptions about their readers’ knowledge and vocabulary. Writers who are experts, for example, can be so familiar with … Read More
January 25, 2018
Have you considered taking a DNA test to find out where your family is from? I sure have. I suspect that soon I’ll be among the millions of people who have done so. I’m glad I read It’s All Relative by A.J. Jacobs first though because it … Read More
January 18, 2018
This is the first week in the spring semester at my college, and it’s a critical time for setting the tone and energy level in our classes. That’s why I’m turning again to James Lang’s excellent book Small Teaching, which focuses on simple ways to apply current … Read More