Writing is Remembering
Jacob Blesses Pharaoh Illustration by Owen Jones from "The History of Joseph and His Brethren" (Day & Son, 1869). In the 3rd century BCE, a Greek named Pyrrhus ruled an area in the western Balkans called Epirus. He is remembered for two battles he fought and won against the Romans—the first in 280 BCE, the … Continue reading Far More Pain Than Contentment
Rydal Mount - home of the poet William WordsworthPhoto by Neil Parley CC BY 3.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0). One summer, while vacationing in New Brunswick, Canada, I took a ferry from the mainland to Deer Island, a small island in the Bay of Fundy. While searching for a picnic spot, I passed a bookshop advertising old books … Continue reading How to Count Family
Vanitas Still Life with Books, by Jan Lievens. Date: c.1627 - c.1628; Netherlands. One day when I was in elementary school—the fifth grade, I believe—I was walking down my school's long central hallway; no one else was present. There were classrooms on both sides with doors entering into the hall. Suddenly, a teacher appeared, standing … Continue reading Except for Pride
Joseph and his Brethren, c. 1665-1670. Bartolome Esteban Murillo. In November 1915, in a prison in the state of Utah, a firing squad executed a thirty-six-year-old Swedish-American immigrant. The man had been tried for and found guilty of committing murder during a robbery a little more than twenty-two months earlier. Now, over one hundred years … Continue reading Of Dreams and Dreamers
Breakfast in the Loggia. John Singer Sargent. Date: 1910. I know a woman who spent her summers growing up in a small town on the coast of Maine. One day, in the town’s library, she noticed a row of books atop one of the bookshelves. The books attracted her attention; they were classics, dust-covered, and … Continue reading How Frail I Am
Jacob’s Ladder, by Jacques Stella, Date: 1650. In the section of the Pentateuch that will be read in synagogue this coming Sabbath [Genesis 28:10 - 32.3], the patriarch Jacob is traveling, on rather short notice, to spend time with his uncle, his mother's brother. His brother, Esau, is angry with Jacob. He wants to kill … Continue reading Keep on Climbing
"Odysseus in the Cave of Polyphemus" by Jacob Jordaens (1593-1678). Charles Darwin is fascinating to read, from many viewpoints. There is, of course, the obvious one—the scientific one. He is a keen observer. We marvel at the meticulous details he records about botany, geology, marine biology, and zoology, for instance. It’s impossible, though, not to … Continue reading With Darwin’s Eyes and Ears
