I have, as promised, added two sections, the first on the metrical shape of the lines with some small effort to show a parallel effect in English, and, second, on the tightness of syntax and word order that makes the first stanza one complete thought expressed in a complete sentence–something we simply cannot do, at least not very well, in English.
At last we can agree with Alec Baldwin on something. He recently tweeted: “I don’t think anyone involved in the college fraud cases should go to prison. That includes past cases as well. Community service, fines, yes. But prison time, no. My heart goes out to Felicity, Bill Macy and their family,’ the actor said in a tweet Wednesday.”…………….
This is not the title of a new game to replace “Where’s Waldo?” but a chance to interrogate Chad Rayson, the August Derleth of the Iron Range. TFF: So, Chad, what happened to Anterus Smith or by whatever name he wishes to be called? CR: So what is this? You’re Aeschylus writing an ode to Zeus? You want to know what the trouble with you classicists is? TFF; Not especially, in fact, definitely no. CR: I’ll tell you anyway. You’re so tied up in some other word, going in quest of Ulysses or sailing with Jason and the...
In striking out on our own, we did not intend to surrender the wisdom painfully acquired by earlier generations of classical liberals, libertarians, and small-government conservatives. If government interference in private life was a major source of social and moral dissolution, then it made no sense to call upon governments to save the family, restore community, or promote great art.
Not a day goes by that I do not see the word “prolific” being misused. Today, for example, an online USA Today headline reads: “Convicted killer Samuel Little, who claims 93 murders, is ‘most prolific serial killer’ in US history, FBI says.” Similar offenses appeared in headlines for Inside Edition, the LA Times, and newspapers and television stations around the country.
100 million Americans are calling on Congress to impeach the President, but not one in ten has the slightest idea of what impeachment is. Listen to the first installment to our primer on the process.
As it took shape, “paleoconservatism”—like all ideologies—was a piece of bric à brac, cobbled together with pieces from 1950’s liberalism that flew the false flag of conservatism, from which it took hostility to big government, public indecency, and abortion rights; from the misnamed ‘old right,’ from which it borrowed opposition to imperial wars; from the Libertarians, who strongly influenced—most obviously—our anti-imperialism, as well as the emphasis on individual liberty and non-governmental solutions to social problems, and from the populist traditions a suspicion of the ruling elite and a respect for the opinions of ordinary people whose brains had not been...
A podcast on the casino mania that afflicts the dying cities of the American South and Rustbelt–with apologies to Jimmie Rodgers.
Horace’s satire was a sly commentary on his life among the great, as close friend to Maecenas, the wealthy advisor to Augustus. In the first part of this imitation, Pope imagines his friend Dean Swift, a confidant of the Tory ministers, going over the same complaints about fame and influence. Then, when he comes to Horace’s famous fable of the two mice, he makes a stab at pretending it is composed by his friend Matthew Prior–also an important political advisor and diplomat, who wrote more homely verse. Rather than make a detailed commentary on the poem, I’ll be happy to...
