The Art of Surprise

Summer 2008

Syncopated Clock, Indeed

On Leroy Anderson’s centennial, a defense of the popular composer from an orchestra’s stage

Buoyancy

In literature, as in life, the art of swimming isn’t hard to master

A Look Beyond the Tragic Mystique

Posthumous Keats By Stanley Plumly

The Broken Balance

The poet Robinson Jeffers warned us nearly a century ago of the ravages to nature we now face

Polymer Persons

How can we gaze upon the skinned, displayed bodies of the dead and not be revolted and mesmerized?

Passing the Torch

Why the eons-old truce between humans and fire has burst into an age of megafires, and what can be done about it

The Liberal Imagination of Frederick Douglass

Honoring the emotions that give life to liberal principles

What Kind of Father Am I?

Looking back at a lifetime of parenting sons and being parented by them

The Writer in the Family

The fiction of E. L. Doctorow gave a young man hope of connecting his father and his literary hero

Birthday Boy

“The Horses” by Ted Hughes

Poems read aloud, beautifully

Amy Wetsch

Life, magnified

The Weight of a Stone

Searching for stability in an erratic world led Oliver Sacks and other writers to the realms of geology

New Year, Old Year

“The Horses” by Edwin Muir

Poems read aloud, beautifully

The Snow Maiden

Our final episode of 2018 is a send-off to the solstice

Ho Ho Horror

Why not make this Christmas a little darker?

A Story for Christmas

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