“Tis better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all.” I thought that was Shakespeare’s line.  He’s usually my first guess when I’m unsure. But, surprise, it’s Tennyson.  I was surprised over and over at the many familiar passages in his long poem, “In Memoriam A.H.H.” A.H.H. is Arthur Hallam, a  Read the Rest…

On the inside cover of my college text, Complete Poetry and Selected Prose of Keats (edited, with an introduction by Harold Edgar Briggs, The Modern Library) is a penciled note, “read in Mary-Ellis’ book pg. 312, 317, 329-30” that I’ve been puzzling over.  I think it has to do with Romantic Lit being at 9:00  Read the Rest…

Percy Bysshe Shelley was an intense, wordy young man.  As I plowed through the Shelley selections in the Norton Anthology, I wondered why he was given so much more space than the other romantic poets.  Then I did a calculation (can you tell I am wearying of the Romantics?) and found that Byron, Coleridge, and  Read the Rest…

I just spent a week getting reacquainted with Byron—George Gordon, Lord Byron–and the magic wasn’t happening. When I was in college, he was my favorite of all the romantic poets because he was easiest to understand and he was funny. This mid-life trek through the Norton anthology is highlighting how much I have changed: my  Read the Rest…

In which I find in Samuel Taylor Coleridge a kindred soul. It might be his struggle with depression.  It might be his experience—so common to women—of feeling that nothing he does is respected as much as something a(nother) man does, in this case Wordsworth.  The two of them conceived of a book they called Lyrical  Read the Rest…

A week ago I would have told you that I loved William Wordsworth. After reading the selections in the Norton Anthology of English Literature, I have concluded that it’s only a few of his poems that I love, and a few lines from here and there. I was all excited to read The Prelude because  Read the Rest…

Who couldn’t like Robbie Burns? Well, the British, I suppose.  And he didn’t wear well with the Edinburgh Scots.  When I turned the page from William Blake in my trek through The Norton Anthology of English Literature, there was Robert Burns with all his apostrophes.  After I got used to the a’s, the whas and  Read the Rest…

It hit me the other day what I wanted to do for a summer reading project: read The Norton Anthology of English Literature Vol. I and II.  Collective gasp all around.  This venerable collection has been around a long time but I don’t believe anyone has actually read it—certainly not the college students for which  Read the Rest…

The fussy, self-important and over-committed woman is not one of the more attractive stock characters in our society but she likes to infiltrate her archetype throughout our ranks during the holidays.  This year, she got a toe-hold in me and was meddling with my nervous and digestive systems in no time at all.  It started  Read the Rest…

Every year on November 2, I create an altar of pictures and memorabilia of family and friends who have died, many of whom I wrote about in my book, 99 Girdles on the Wall:My parents, my Aunt Frances,  Meghan, Dennis, Hazel, John.  I sit at the piano and sing two songs during this week of  Read the Rest…