Kathleen Raine Dear friends and readers, Last week we had Rosamond Marriot Watson (fin-de-siecle and Hardyesque poet, 1860-1911). My choice for this week’s foremother poet is Kathleen Raine (1908-2003), whose poems I found among the modern Scots and Anglo-Scots poets in Catherine Kerrigan’s An Anthology of Scottish Women Poets and in Ann Stanford‘s The Women [...]
Archive for April, 2011
Foremother Poet: Kathleen Raine (1908-2003)
Posted in 20th century culture, feminism, Foremother Poetry, French culture, women's poetry, women's art, tagged Ana Mendieta, George Sand, Kathleen Raine, virginia woolf on April 30, 2011 | 8 Comments »
Capriccio: The pleasures of art as standing in for hope
Posted in 18th century, 20th century culture, Austen, comic poetry, Music, opera, painting, Theater, tom stoppard, women's art, tagged Moliere, renee fleming, richard strauss, the Met on April 26, 2011 | 12 Comments »
Renee Fleming as the Countess bowing before the audience after the opera was over: we see a wide portion of the whole set from on high Dear friends and readers, Before too much time goes by, I want to praise and recommend going to see the Met’s production of Richard Strauss’s Capriccio. The Admiral, Izzy [...]
The Grandfather’s story: Robert MacNeil’s reports on Autism today on Lehrer’s Newshour
Posted in 20th century culture, disability issues, Disabilty studies, tagged aspergers syndrome, education, health care, Jim Lehrer, prejudice, wretches and jabberers on April 23, 2011 | 9 Comments »
Robert MacNeil plays with his autistic grandson, Nick Dear friends and readers, Twenty days ago I wrote a review of touching, and intelligent film, about two disabled adults, both autistic, Wretches and Jabberers by Gerardine Wurzburg. I praised the film and hope that it gets more distribution than a few movie-houses in a few cities [...]
Teaching Graham’s Ross Poldark (1, Cornwall 1783-87): the pleasures & uses of popular historical fiction & romance
Posted in 18th century, 18th century novels, Costume drama, Film adaptations, historical fiction, Poldark, political novels/films, Winston Graham, women's novels, tagged Helen Hughes, Jerome de Groot on April 19, 2011 | 16 Comments »
Ross (Robin Ellis) and Verity (Norma Streader) Poldark greeting one another: he has returned from the presumed dead (Poldark Season 1, Part 1, Episode 2) Dear Friends and readers, I’m just delighted to be able to report that generally my students appear to have not just liked, but attended to, and even loved Graham’s Ross [...]
Foremother poet: A. Mary F. Robinson Darmesterer Duclaux (1857-1944)
Posted in 19th century poetry, feminism, Foremother Poetry, French culture, Italian culture, women's memoirs, women's poetry, women's art, tagged Helen Allingham, poetesses on April 16, 2011 | 5 Comments »
Sunset near Naples (c 1785), Joseph Wright of Derby (1734-97) [serves as cover illustration for Anne Radcliffe's Sicilian Romance] Dear friends and readers, A. Mary F. Robinson Darmester Duclaux, lyricist, ballad-writer, translator, sybil, wrote of Italy in a Vernon Lee sort of vein during one part of her long career, lived in France, her prose [...]
The Duchess: a strong protest film
Posted in 18th century, biography, Costume drama, Film adaptations, historical fiction, political novels/films, women's memoirs, womens' films, tagged Georgiana Spencer, Keira Knightly, ralph fiennes, Saud Dibbs, the duchess on April 14, 2011 | 1 Comment »
Ralph Fiennes as Duke telling the Duchess he does not make deals; why should he? Keira Knightley as the powerless stunned wife listening (The Duchess) Dear friends and readers, I’ve returned to my movie studying project (right now I’m watching films and making notes towards a revision of a chapter on Andrew Davies and the [...]
The woman from Planned Parenthood: what is hated is a woman’s access to contraception
Posted in 20th century culture, feminism, politics, tagged planned parenthood, pregnancy on April 10, 2011 | 9 Comments »
Dear friends and readers, I’ve noticed in mainstream media the determination to de-fund Planned Parenthood has not been treated with any clarity or truthfulness. What has been repeated is the mantra of the Republican group refusing to sign the budget is the objection to Planned Parenthood is they support abortion and do abortions. The reality [...]
Foremother Poet: Elizabeth Hands (fl 1789)
Posted in 18th century, comic poetry, feminism, Foremother Poetry, historical fiction, Poetry, political novels/films, satire, women's memoirs, women's art, tagged foremother poet, Paula Feldman on April 9, 2011 | 5 Comments »
Henry Robert Morland, A (Later) 18th century female servant Dear friends and readers, As the anthology of Scottish woman poets I want to use for blogs on their poetry has not yet arrived, I’ve decided to blog about another poet about whom little is known, but whose poetry is felicitious. (It’s not hard to find [...]
Lilian Nayder’s Life of Catherine Hogarth (aka The Other Dickens)
Posted in 19th century novels, biography, Charles Dickens, feminism, tagged Catherine Hogarth Dickens, Charles Dickens, Lilian Nayder on April 8, 2011 | 20 Comments »
Catherine Hogarth Dickens, a photo of her later in life Dear friends and readers, Last week I finished reading Lilian Nayder’s The Other Dickens: A Life of Catherine Hogarth. Were it to be read widely, its content genuinely taken in and disseminated, the book has the potential to alter the common perception of Catherine Hogarth [...]
Amid the Flowering Chestnuts: Wretches and Jabberers: A film about autism
Posted in 20th century culture, disability issues, film studies, political novels/films, politics, Renaissance, womens' films, tagged aspergers syndrome, autism, Gerardine Wurzburg, wretches and jabberers on April 3, 2011 | 14 Comments »
. Vincent Van Gogh (1853-1890), Avenue with Flowering Chestnuts Dear friends and readers, I spent part of yesterday watching a movie made by a woman, Gerardine Wurzberg, about two disabled, to be specific, autistic people: Wretches and Jabberers, in an AMC moviehouse in DC. I sat with an acquaintance. The auditorium was crowded. In a [...]
