Not so very long ago, Best Beloved, it was a gray February afternoon, near about tea-time. The winter seemed to have ended, but the spring had not quite arrived; and so there, at the edge of the forest, the animals were in a quandary. The crocus had come and gone; while, running late from somewhere, [...]
Joseph Michael Straczynski (b. 1954), better known to his fans, affectionately, as “Joe” or “JMS,” is one of the most important storytellers of our modern era, though far too few know who he is. Those who know him, know him well. Sadly though, there is no middle ground when it comes to awareness of one [...]
Mein Führer! Put down that pistol! Eva! Relax! It is not all finished! No! I have it figured out! Really! It came to me in a dream. Your Thousand Year Reich is not over! The Amerikaner pig-dogs surging toward Berlin—they can be stopped! The Allied bombing raids – they can be halted! Listen to me, [...]
For seventy-five years, Batman has played a significant role in the American mind and in American culture. He is, for all intents and purposes, an American original, equivalent to Natty Bumppo and Huck Finn. He even possesses many of the same qualities of each of these nineteenth-century literary figures. As Bruce Wayne, he is the [...]
Once after Mass, on a rare lazy Sunday afternoon, I dropped by the train station’s news agent and browsed the book rack for a light read—something one would pick up in an airport to keep occupied, but not busy. I picked out Deborah Crombie’s Leave the Grave Green. The blurb on the back cover reads: [...]
Artist and writer Frank Miller serves as perhaps the best example of what modern popular culture has to offer. This is not faint praise, as popular culture has offered much in the way of mythology and symbolism. Of all the great pop artists of the last half century, Mr. Miller might very well be the best, [...]
In the summer of 1998, while on my ten-day honeymoon in Idaho, I found a tattered red paperback book in a used bookstore. Amazingly enough, Idaho had a lot of bookstores then, and I remember perusing many of them during our ten days of post-wedding bliss. Whether Idahoans still possess a bibliophilic outlook on life, [...]
Oh! What a Revolution! And what a heart I must have to contemplate without emotion that elevation and that fall! —Edmund Burke, Reflections on the Revolution in France On the 20th of July in the year 20– of our Lord, Savior and shadow Secretary of War, the city of Detroit officially wrested itself free from [...]
[N.B. the content of this post is rated PG13] Purity of Essence We must do everything possible to protect our bodily fluids. After all, the human body is mostly water. If one’s water becomes corrupt, his “essences” will follow, and man will lose what power he possesses. He must, no matter the cost, protect his [...]
Ronald Knox, like his fellow Englishman G.K. Chesterton, was both a Roman Catholic and a detective fiction writer. Originally, it was Chesterton’s writing that lead Knox, a former Anglican priest at Trinity College, Oxford, towards converting to Catholicism. When Knox converted in 1917, Chesterton was still the Anglican son of a somewhat apathetic Unitarian family. [...]
Dan Simmons, Hyperion (1989) A month or so ago, I asked two of my Kiwi progressive rock/science fiction friends, Russell Clarke and Paul Watson, for some recommendations for dystopian and apocalyptic fiction. We already share a lot in common, and, after comparing lists, Russell realized I’d not read anything by Dan Simmons. I was already somewhat [...]
The Introduction to, The Young Man’s Guide to Building a House There were giants in the land in those days, but fewer people than there used to be. Now the giants were the typical sort—lumbering and hungry. But the people were very odd, most anyway. It wasn’t uncommon for a giant to reach right into [...]
Clocks and spirals and quotations in forgotten alphabets whirl through animated outer space until a door appears. The eerie old theme music fades to Russell Kirk’s voice: “You unlock this door with the key of imagination. Beyond it is another dimension—a dimension of sound, a dimension of sight, a dimension of mind. You’re moving out [...]
Sherlock Holmes was born (in all probability) on January 6th, 1854—160 years ago today. In answering how this date was discovered out of the secret of Mr. Holmes’ past, the temptation may arise to proclaim, “Elementary, my dear Watson.” Regard, however, for the Canon—the sixty public records of Mr. Holmes’ remarkable career—repudiates common errors. Nowhere [...]