Shakespeare's Sonnet 130

Poetry Workshop: Meeting Shakepeare’s Similes, Metaphors, and Ironies

One a recent TV Commercial, a happy-go-lucky pitchman compares buying insurance to selecting ice cream flavors: there is one for each need. Although his sale comparison method could be considered

Illustration of the French Revolution by Hablot Brown (phiz)

The Experiences Needed to Read or Write A Tale of Two Cities

In In our class, we considered the life Dickens needed to have before he could have had the experiences, skills, and maturity to write a novel that would stand out as one of the best ones in literature…Sorry there will be no spoilers here about how well he succeeded. You will have to read or re-read the book when you are seasoned enough to comprehend it.

1950s Philadelphia Hotel

Dickens and Being Recalled to Life

Thinking about this boy who was once me, it is very tough to approach him because he has been buried in my mind for over 70 years and now must be recalled to life. It helps me to dredge up this painful memory by thinking about how Dickens wrote about young boys who were neglected and mistreated by their parents.

Parenting Our Three or Four Daughters

I can’t remember many difficult parts about raising our three daughters. We didn’t expect the delight that an unexpected fourth daughter about 17 years later would bring. However, each one had a few challenges.

Kate Chopin

Race and Gender in Kate Chopin’s Short Story, “Desiree’s Baby”

by Mary Ramsey Evans… While Kate Chopin is most often remembered for her controversial novel, The Awakening (1898), she also wrote almost one hundred short stories, many of them published