Missile strikes. Sanctions. Nuclear negotiations. Drone attacks. Regional escalation. Regime change. The language is almost always strategic: deterrence, retaliation, regime stability, security interests. But if you step back and ask a simpler question — who is living inside these headlines? — the story shifts. This is where Howard Zinn’s A People’s History of the United States becomes unexpectedly relevant. IContinue reading “Iran, the Headlines, and the People We Don’t See”
Tag Archives: teaching
quick review/recommendation–consider this: moments in my writing life after which everything was different (2020)
Chuck Palahniuk’s new book might be one of the most down to earth texts on the craft of writing. And I’ve long admired Palahniuk and his craft of writing–his fiction and his non-fiction. And back in the day when I started teaching fiction, I started using his lessons from litreactor.net and his compiled 36 WritingContinue reading “quick review/recommendation–consider this: moments in my writing life after which everything was different (2020)”
tom spanbauer and literary minimalism
Preparing for Lit 150 and discussion of Amy Hempel’s stories “The Cemetary Where Al Jolson is Buried” and “The Harvest”. This morning I’m reviewing Tom Spanbauer’s notes on literary minimalism: Notes on Literary minimalism—(exemplified by Mark Richard, Amy Hempel and Chuck Palahniuk) Literary minimalism is characterized by an economy with words and a focus on surface description. Minimalist authorsContinue reading “tom spanbauer and literary minimalism”
representations of columbus
Columbus owes Washington Irving quite a bit. Also his portrait/face has never been authenticated. In fact, Charles Patrick Daly calls this painting from 1592 “pure fancy.” Not much changed in these different cartoon and feature film representations of Columbus: