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Before denizens of the web could pass hours wandering down rabbit holes like McSweeney’s Internet Tendency or The Onion, what did well-read, culturally au currant folks do for amusement?

In an article published by the British Library, Stephanie Forward, Ph.D., writes: “In England, the Romantic poets were…inspired by a desire for liberty… There was an emphasis on the importance of the individual; a conviction that… more

The Romantic poets, long in English poetry’s pantheon, present a paradox. As a movement, they are defined by their emotional power, preoccupation with nature, fascination with the mythic, and their search for the ideal in earlier… more

What would happen if Dr. Seuss started throwing shade? To the untrained ear, it might sound something like the satiric barbs of Alexander Pope, diss-master of the Enlightenment. Consider his dismissal of Lord Hervey, referred to… more

The situation at the beginning of Book Three of Homer’s Iliad is this: a truce had been called between the Trojans and the invading Achaians after nine long years of war in order to allow for a single-combat, winner-take-all, fight… more

Karl Marx famously observed, "Capital is dead labour which, vampire-like, lives only by sucking living labour, and lives the more, the more labour it sucks." His comments have inspired critics such as Franco Moretti to interpret… more

The Romantics—Coleridge, Wordsworth, Southey, Shelley, and a dozen others—are probably the poets whose names we recall best from school. As a movement in English language poetry, Romanticism towers over all others and still… more

William Shakespeare’s plays have been performed in many ways. They’ve been translated into nearly every language on Earth and at least one “alien” language (Klingon). Sometimes they have undergone serious changes. Legal requirements… more

It was dangerous age to publish poetry. Imagine a poem, today, attacked as subversive and “as wicked as anything that ever reached the world”—a poem by a poet who today is in the pantheon of English Romantic poetry. Any poet of our… more

Long before Christopher Nolan was wowing audiences with expensive CGI and notions of thoughts being placed into minds via dreams, epic Greek literature was doing much the same. For those who need a brief refresher on the concept… more

This summer's Top Gun: Maverick blasted past other films in U.S. theaters and continues its path around the globe. There are many reasons for its financial success—it's now the ninth-highest grossing film in domestic box office… more

Neil Gaiman’s Sandman, transformed from a comic book into a Netflix series, premieres today. Comic fans have long been aware of the complex narrative and the genre bending mix of horror, fantasy, myth, and family drama that comprise… more

July’s featured birthday is Francesco Petrarca, usually rendered into English as Petrarch. A scholar, poet, and churchman, he is regarded as one of the first humanists and is sometimes even called the “Father of the Renaissance.”… more

It is a truth universally acknowledged that a reader in possession of a Jane Austen novel must be in want of a film adaptation. In fact, such readers want many film adaptations, if not to revisit Austen's world then to have the… more

Readers across the political spectrum love George Orwell's 1984His concepts of the "Ministry of Truth" and "Newspeak" permeate discussions about political rhetoric, while "the Hate" is a ritual that viewers of news programs might… more

I recently had the chance to get on a Zoom call with Reading Room blogger and literature professor Garth Bond and with horror movie writer , director, and producer Adam Simon. We decided to get together to talk about horror from the… more

I recently had the chance to get on a Zoom call with Reading Room blogger and literature professor Garth Bond and with horror movie writer , director, and producer Adam Simon. We decided to get together to talk about horror from the… more

We don’t actually know for sure what day Shakespeare was born. We know that he was baptized on April 26, 1564, and since infants were generally baptized within three days of birth, he was probably not born any earlier than April… more

Recently, I was putting together a course on George Orwell's Animal Farm. Naturally, I got distracted and began researching the beast fables that provided Orwell with some of the background literary inspiration for his work. I had… more

In his Dictionary (1755), Samuel Johnson famously defines "Tory" as "One who adheres to the antient constitution of the state, and the apostolic hierarchy of the church of England." For the rival "Whig" party, he could summon only… more

From Homer to the medieval romances, the tradition of telling tales aloud to an audience around a fire, either read from a book or performed from memory by a bard, has long been a part of the Western literary tradition, as has the… more

From: Caroline Breashears

Date: 5 March, 2022

To: Garth Bond

Cc: OLL

Subject: Dangerous Reading Room Liaisons

In a previous visit to the Reading Room, I made a case for The Arabian Nights as an anti-epic embodying the commercial values of medieval and early modern Islamic silk road merchants. Today, I want to talk a bit about the actual… more

The Scottish Enlightenment is a vital part of the history of liberty. The works of Hutcheson, Carmichael, and Smith are foundational to the discussion of a free society. But the Scottish conversation about liberty did not end in the… more

From: Garth BondDate: Tuesday, February 15, 2022 at 8:06 PMTo: Caroline Breashears

Cc: OLLSubject: Dangerous Reading Room Liaisons