by Toni McNaron | Jun 2, 2016 | Toni's Blog
He died, between breakfast and dinner on New Year’s Day, 1954. I was almost 17, a senior in high school, so we never had a conversation as two adults. In the 1980’s a favorite form of therapy for working with dead people was called Gestalt. In it, the...
by Toni McNaron | May 12, 2016 | Toni's Blog
In 1770 Oliver Goldsmith published “The Deserted Village,” a lamentation over the loss of an agrarian ethos in England. In April, 2016, I found myself back in Birmingham, AL, my birthplace. I’d made the trip to help my college roommate mark...
by Toni McNaron | Mar 30, 2016 | Toni's Blog
The recent publication and popularity of Stacy Schiff’s biography of Cleopatra has brought back memories of productions I’ve seen of this moving play about adult heterosexual love experienced in a Roman world unconducive to playfulness and passion. When I was in my...
by Toni McNaron | Mar 21, 2016 | Toni's Blog
Marilynne Robinson is producing serious fiction about major questions confronting us today. Now that her trilogy about a seemingly sleepy Iowa town is complete, we can begin to assess her contribution to 20th and early 21st century literature. When her first work,...
by Toni McNaron | Jan 13, 2016 | Toni's Blog
In the tanakh section of the Hebrew Bible, we meet the great prophets Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel and others. They share an ability to consider the past, look squarely at the present, and predict or imagine a future. Listening to or reading these men’s words stirs...
by Toni McNaron | Dec 21, 2015 | Toni's Blog
On December 6th, Pope Francis opened the massive door at the Vatican, officially beginning the Year of Mercy (2016). This is a Jubilee year in the church’s calendar, so historically the sitting pope has opened this giant portal as part of the celebration in Rome....
