Category: Politics

The Compassionate Poetic Genius of Gwendolyn Brooks

October 10, 2021

Welcome to the revised Part 3 of Poetic Traditions of Compassion and Creative Maladjustment. This revision is presented to correct technological difficulties encountered with the previous upload. Thank you for your patience and please enjoy the episode: June 7, 2017, marked the centennial of the birth of Gwendolyn Brooks, (she died December 2000), who in … More The Compassionate Poetic Genius of Gwendolyn Brooks

Reading Rumi after 9/11 and again at the end of the War in Afghanistan (part 1)

September 24, 2021

Can Poetry and the Taliban Coexist?
Aside from being a country plagued by a succession of wars and economic woes, Afghanistan is also the birthplace of one of the great figures of world literature: Jalal ad-Din Mohammad Rumi. .. … More Reading Rumi after 9/11 and again at the end of the War in Afghanistan (part 1)

Election Day 2020: Democracy, Personal Whims, and Accountability – Conversations with the World 101

November 3, 2020

Welcome to Conversations with the World 101. Originally part of the virtual launch party for the book Greeting Flannery O’Connor at the Back Door of My Mind, this edited version is being presented as Americans head to the polls for Election Day 2020. This is what it’s all about: Quotations from my work in different … More Election Day 2020: Democracy, Personal Whims, and Accountability – Conversations with the World 101