The Iliad
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On bad penis puns.
Modern English is built on a foundation of The King James Bible and William Shakespeare – the former, plagiarized from a person we burned on the stake for his efforts; the latter, Lord Regent of Bad Penis Puns, as though his very name compelled him: Willy-I-Am Shake-Spear, Billy Wagcock, old I am a dick now…
bad puns, Barbara Hamby, capon, Christopher Logue, competition, consensual nonmonogamy, cooperation, education, Emily Wilson, Entitled, etymology, Eugenia Cheng, fornicate, gender, history of English, humor, hysteria, James Joyce, jealousy, Joyce, Kate Manne, Mansplaining, Mathematician's Manifesto for Rethinking Gender, men, mythology, OED, Oxford English Dictionary, patriarchy, Penelope's Lament, penis, penis puns, poetry, polyamorous, polyamory, puns, scortatory, sex, sexuality, Shakespeare, slang, teaching, Telemachus, The Iliad, The Odyssey, Ulysses, vagina, vulgar slang, War Music, women, X+Y
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On translation.
Translation is imperfect, and dangerous, and we should all do it. The act of putting another’s thoughts into our words will bring us closer.
addiction, Cathay, Cherry, Christopher Logue, drug addiction, Ezra Pound, Hayden Pelliccia, Homer, imperfect translation, incomplete equivalence, Iraq, Iraqi translators, literal translation, literary translation, literature in translation, Mark Polizzotti, military interpreters, military service, military translation, mistranslation, Nico Walker, Perry Link, Sympathy for the Traitor, The Iliad, translated literature, translating literature, translating poetry, Translation, War Music
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On the value of religious misinterpretation.
We’re liable to misinterpret old stories when we look at them with modern eyes … but it’s worth knowing what myths might mean in a better world.
Abraham, anachronism, anachronistic crtique, Ants Among Elephants, Bible, can God save us, caste, caste system, Christ, Christian theology, colonialism, conquest, covenant, creation in Genesis, dalit, David Kishik, DK, Dravidar Kazhagam, forgiveness, forgiving god, Genesis, God, God saw that it was good, God’s insecurity, Goldman, grammar, hebrew, Hinduism, human sacrifice, human sacrifice for good harvest, imperialism, incarceration, incarceration crisis, incarceration in the U.S., incarceration in the United States, jail, Jesus, Jesus’s sacrifice, Job, John-Michael Bloomquist, mass incarceration, merciful god, mercy, Noah, Old Testament, oppression, poetry, poetry in jail, rainbow, Rama, Rama threatening ocean, Ravana, Ravana worship, religion, Rudyard Kipling, sacrifice, sacrifice of Jesus, suffering, Sujatha Gidla, Tamil, teaching in jail, teaching poetry in jail, textual analysis, The Book of Shem, The Flood, The Iliad, The Prodigal’s Return, theology, Translation, untouchable, why did Christ have to die, why did Jesus suffer, why does Rama threaten the ocean, why is God jealous, Yahweh
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On silenced voices.
Today’s mystery is, when is a mystery novel not marketed to readers of mystery novels?
black history, Candravati Ramayana, Dravida Kazhagam, Dravida Kazhagam interpretation of the Ramayana, erasure, free will, history is written by the victors, James Meredith, my own fragmentary education, mystery novel, Nabaneeta Dev Sen, Nat Turner, Parul Sehgal, Percival Everett, prejudice, racial protests at elite universities, Ravana worship, Rudolph Fisher, Satan worship, shelving all black authors under African American Studies, silenced texts, silenced voices, The Conjure-Man Dies, The Iliad, the invention of race, University of Mississippi, yale protests
Frank Brown Cloud 