Tag: books
-
The Oresteia: Justice, Revenge, and Societal Order
Aeschylus’s The Oresteia is a foundational text in Western literature. Written in Greece in the 5th century B.C.E., the trilogy grapples with fundamental questions about justice, revenge, and the role of law in society. Comprising Agamemnon, The Libation Bearers, and The Eumenides, the plays are set in the aftermath of the Trojan War and explore the transition from a world…
-
The Name of the Rose: Libraries, Censorship, and the Fear of Laughter
The Name of the Rose (1986; dir. Annaud) is a multinational production starring Sean Connery. The film is an adaptation of Umberto Eco’s debut novel of the same name. Eco was a professor of semiotics, a medievalist, and a philosopher who held academic positions at several American and Italian universities throughout his prolific career. I…
-
Despair and Resilience in The Midnight Library and The Beggar Student
Both The Midnight Library (2020) by Matt Haig and The Beggar Student (1940) by Osamu Dazai tackle despair, but they do so in starkly different ways. I picked up both of these books serendipitously. I miscalculated the amount of time I needed in NYC and had several free hours before my bus left for home, so I stopped by…
-
The Existential Lens of H.G. Wells’s The War of the Worlds: Alien Visitation and Our Humanity
Recently, I had surgery in New York City and wanted to have a small novel with me in case I was admitted for an overnight stay. I chose H.G. Wells’ The War of the Worlds because it felt fitting, given all the buzz about unknown drone activity over the East Coast, particularly in New Jersey and metro…
The Curated Life Worth Reading 