Saturday, October 16, 2010

Staunch courage of yesteryear

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Bishop Latimer to Nicholas Ridley on their way to execution by public immolation as ordered by Queen Mary in 1555. "Be of good comfort...
Friday, October 15, 2010

A stranger to history

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From Jacques Barzun in Where is History Now? from The Culture We Deserve : History is not a piece of crockery dredged up from the Titanic; ...
Thursday, October 14, 2010

The two modes of thought do not mix well

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From A Jacques Barzun Reader by Michael Murray, the essay History as Counter-Method and Anti-Abstraction: The reason lies in the difference...
Wednesday, October 13, 2010

Still, it is a family. It has its private language and its common memories . .

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From George Orwell in his essay The Lion and the Unicorn: Socialism and English Genius : England is not the jewelled isle of Shakespeare...
Tuesday, October 12, 2010

Not just a discovery but an orientation

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At 2am on October 12th, 1492, Columbus (or one of his crew members) spotted an island in the New World, the first documented sighting by Eur...
Monday, October 11, 2010

In order to live in a wider world

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From Jacques Barzun's Begin Here: The Forgotten Conditions of Teaching and Learning But why, after all, learn to read differently by t...
Sunday, October 10, 2010

Even the intelligentsia have only accepted it in theory

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From George Orwell in his essay The Lion and the Unicorn: Socialism and English Genius : And yet the gentleness of English civilization is ...
Saturday, October 9, 2010

How is "real book" defined?

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From Jacques Barzun's Begin Here: The Forgotten Conditions of Teaching and Learning How is "real book" defined? Quite simply...
Friday, October 8, 2010

Wiser for all time

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From Jacques Barzun's Begin Here: The Forgotten Conditions of Teaching and Learning The student who reads history will unconsciously d...

It is easier than ever to travel, and not at all easier to write well

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From an essay by Graeme Wood in Foreign Policy, October 5, 2010: Travel Writing is Dead : The simplest reason for this catastrophic turn is...