Lo! ’t is a gala night Within the lonesome latter years! An angel throng, bewinged, bedight In veils, and drowned in tears, Sit in a theatre, to see A play of hopes and fears, While the orchestra breathes fitfully The music of the spheres. […]
I’ve recently taught a course on Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, a work which, for all its flaws, continues to grip the popular imagination. What is it about this novel by a teenage girl, written two hundred years ago, that continues to fascinate us? Is the secret of Frankenstein’s success its grappling with timeless questions about the [...]
The soft totalitarian roots of Prime Minister Trudeau’s Liberal government are becoming increasingly transparent through its dismissing of the central truth that builds up society: the life of every person must be safeguarded and protected… Terezín. Auschwitz-Birkenau. Majdanek. Treblinka. These places of suffering, even their very names, signify what Eva Hoffman calls the “abrupt but [...]
There is one rite of passage which we can still expect with absolute certainty, regardless of whether we are old or young, and for which we need to prepare on a daily basis, and that is Death, the one unavoidable last rite of passage from this life into what comes after… Most rites of passage [...]
Jean Sibelius wrote In Memoriam (Op. 59), in memory of Eugen Schauman, a Finnish nationalist who assassinated the Russian Governor-General of the Duchy of Finland, in a bid to further Finnish independence. The work is a funeral march for orchestra. Sibelius composed a first version in 1909 and completed a final version in 1910 (both [...]
How does a human soul cope with the horror of war? Is there room for hope? And what of the Spirit of Death, ever present in times of war and peace? Can Death itself be changed?… Siegfried Sassoon: After the nightmare horror of the Somme, a firing squad would be nothing to fear. And yet, [...]
We have debts to each other. Debts unto death. Debts that survive every desecration. Debts that knit a common world, a common life… I’m at Chesed Shel Emeth cemetery where vandals have scattered gravestones over the Jewish dead. The stones were tossed with twisted discipline, one to the right, one to the left, making the [...]
Do not expect G.K. Chesterton's ballade to be any kind of love poem–he wants to something else instead, to raise your eyebrow, not to say hairs on end... G.K. Chesterton published "A Ballade of Suicide" in his journal, The Eye-Witness, September 21, 1911. This is a ballade, an old French form comprising three octets and a [...]
Death, be not proud, though some have called thee Mighty and dreadful, for thou art not so; For those whom thou think'st thou dost overthrow Die not, poor Death, nor yet canst thou kill me. From rest and sleep, which but thy pictures be, Much pleasure; then from thee much more must flow, And soonest [...]
I would see him from time to time at Catholic events and meetings in Washington D.C. He was a seven-foot-tall African gentleman who was always very courteous and soft-spoken. He had a stately bearing that was at the same time dignified and disarming. I am told he was very pious and could often be seen [...]
I died for beauty — but was scarce Adjusted in the tomb, When One who died for Truth, was lain In an adjoining room— He questioned softly "Why I failed?" "For beauty," I replied— "And I — for truth, — Themself are One — We brethren, are," He said— And so, as Kinsmen, met at Night— We [...]
Euthanasia and physician-assisted death is a topic much in the news these days. After the Supreme Court of Canada’s recent ruling, the Canadian government is busy with legislation overseeing such practices. Perhaps the viewpoint of an ancient school of philosophical thought, Stoicism, may aid contemporary reflections on the matter of physician-assisted suicide, especially since such [...]
Thou unrelenting Past! Strong are the barriers round thy dark domain, And fetters, sure and fast, Hold all that enter thy unbreathing reign. Far in thy realm withdrawn Old empires sit in sullenness and gloom, And glorious ages gone Lie deep within the shadow of thy womb. […]
What the Heart of the Young Man Said to the Psalmist. Tell me not, in mournful numbers, “Life is but an empty dream!” For the soul is dead that slumbers, And things are not what they seem. Life is real! Life is earnest! And the grave is not its goal; “Dust thou art, to dust [...]