Last night, the curtain went up on the Tower Players’ production of “The Eumenides” in a dizzying display of towering temples, grotesque demons, and bewitching odes. Angell said he selected this play in part because its key theme — the conflict between “reasoned jurisprudence” and “vengeance” — is a question human societies have debated for...
“How dare you give me a multisyllabic word? Can’t you see I’m a scholar but not a nerd?” When senior English major Keyona Shabazz asked for topics as she freestyled in front of her peers, one student called out suggestions from fish to armadillos to that multisyllabic juggernaut: “Constitution.” Last night, students gathered in the...
Anthony Esolen teaches Renaissance English Literature and classes in Western Civilization at Providence College in Rhode Island. He is a senior editor for Touchstone and writes regularly for First Things, Catholic World Report, and Magnificat. His most recent books include “Ten Ways to Destroy the Imagination of Your Child” and “The Politically Incorrect Guide to...
The lights shift, casting a warm glow on the birch trees and log houses of Fort Michilimackinac. A chorus of Ojibwe and French settler women listen attentively to the keening song of a woman betrayed. The year is 1680. The woman is Medea. And the setting is unusual for Euripides’s play, written in the 5th...
“The old ways are sometimes the best.” This refrain in “Skyfall,” the third James Bond film of the Daniel Craig legacy, gives anchor to the overlying theme to the film: after fifty years in the business, Agent 007 is a classic character who still has a lot to give. The film follows Bond as his...