Tag: Literary criticism
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For Those in Peril on the Sea (and Life): Shipwrecked with Barbara Newhall Follett’s Lost Island
“Even beauty changed. You changed. You were caught in the midst of complex currents of continual change. Perhaps it was good, if only you could accept it completely—if only your heartstrings would accept it. Perhaps it could keep you alive and happy and excited, if you knew how to use it. That was how you…
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📚Join me and my editor for discussion about writing and publishing (and my next book)!📚
Hello all, I wanted to let you know that I am (excitedly!) doing a live guest spot on my editor Jessica Hatch’s Stubstack podcast, Comp Title Book Club, this Saturday, January 13th, 2024 at 2pm EST! Jessica is veteran editor and author with experience in both traditional and indie publishing, and she is using all…
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My Best Books of 2023
Here we are, folks, at the end of another year, and I thought we’d keep a new tradition going by doing a round up of my favorite books I read this year. Like last year, this list will be my favorite books that I read this year, not necessarily ones published this year (though I…
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Original Chick Lit: 19th Century American Women Writers, Readers, and the Little House that Millbank Built
“Ma spread the between-meals red-checked cloth on the table, and on it she set the shining-clean lamp. She laid there the paper-covered Bible, the big green Wonders of the Animal World, and the novel named Millbank.” – On the Banks of Plum Creek, chapter 17 “Every window and shutter at Millbank was closed. Knots of…
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The Fifth Horse-Man: Apocalypse and Allegory in the Roman de Fauvel
“Le jugement contre Fauvel est déjà prêt, et il sera jugé; lorsqu’il aura été condamné, il subira le châtiment éternel avec le prince des démons.” [“The judgment of Fauvel has already been set, and he will be judged. When he is condemned, he will undergo eternal punishment with the Devil.”] – le Roman de Fauvel…
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Caught in a Bad Roman-ce Again: Medieval Myth- Making and the Octavian Romances
Somtym byffell ane aventure,In Rome ther was ane Emperoure,Als men in romance rede.He was a man of grete favoureAnd levede in joye and grete honoureAnd doghety was of dede.In tornament nor in no fyghteIn the werlde ther ne was a better knyghte,No worthier undir wede.Octovyane was his name thrughowte;Everylke man hade of hym dowteWhen he…
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Bite-Sized Bard: The Lambs and Tales From Shakespeare
“The following Tales are meant to be submitted to the young reader as an introduction to the study of Shakespeare, for which purpose his words are used whenever it seemed possible to bring them in; and in whatever has been added to give them the regular form of a connected story, diligent care has been…
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Unfinished Business: The Second Part of Mary Wroth’s Urania
A year and a half ago, I introduced all of you to Mary Wroth and her sprawling Jacobean pastoral roman à clef, Urania. In that post, I promised to keep my eyes peeled for an ultra-rare copy of Urania’s incomplete second part in the wild and report back if I successfully got my hands on…
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More Literary Runaway Lovers: Alessandro Manzoni’s The Betrothed and the Birth of the Modern Italian Novel
“Dear readers, all twenty-five of you, imagine the impression the meeting with the two bravi must have made on the poor man!” – The Betrothed, Chapter 1 I’m arguably running a week behind schedule here because last week the other lady of the house and I were in Las Vegas trying to dip our toes…
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The Little House that Libertarianism Built: Myths of the American Frontier and Rose Wilder Lane’s Let the Hurricane Roar
“We are having hard times now, but we should not dwell upon them but think of the future. It has never been easy to build up a country, but how much easier it is for us, with such great comforts and conveniences, kerosene, cookstoves, and even railroads and fast posts, than it was for our…
Sarah Holz 