Yes It’s Poetry, But Is It Good?

Yes It’s Poetry, But Is It Good?

The Soul is a Stranger in this World: Essays on Poets and Poetry By Micah Mattix. Cascade Books, 2020. Softcover, 164 pages, $21. Reviewed by Karl C. Schaffenburg Lovers of poetry will find much to enjoy in this volume, which collects short essays written by the...
Poets of Brutality and Redemption

Poets of Brutality and Redemption

Sex, Economy, Freedom & Community: Eight Essays by Wendell Berry. Counterpoint [1993], 2018. Paperback, 208 pages, $18. Reviewed by Marlo Safi Today, brutality abounds. In its countless iterations, whether the brutality toward the unborn; the poor and...
Scalia’s Applied Faith

Scalia’s Applied Faith

On Faith: Lessons from an American Believer by Antonin Scalia. Edited by Christopher J. Scalia and Edward Whelan. Crown Forum, 2019. Hardcover, 256 pages, $22. Reviewed by Jeffrey Folks Antonin Scalia was a faithful and patriotic man who devoted his life to the...
The Rise of Black Intellectual History

The Rise of Black Intellectual History

New Perspectives on the Black Intellectual Tradition Edited by Keisha N. Blain, Christopher Cameron, and Ashley D. Farmer. Northwestern University Press, 2018. Paperback, 272 pages, $34.95. Reviewed by Chidike Okeem While the physical prowess of African people is much...
Unwelcome Information

Unwelcome Information

By James V. Schall, S. J. Recently, Brent Barnes, a friend from Houston, gave me three handsomely bound volumes from a London edition of Samuel Johnson’s essays in The Rambler. Already in 1801 this edition was the fourteenth in this famous series. Barnes found these...