Friday Odds & Sods Endures - In Enduring, Grows Strong

A thousand thousand greetings once again,  amici mei. Although it hardly seems possible, this Friday finds us with the year two-thirds complete, and judging by the weather at least, thoroughly well done. I hope that 2015 has been a happy and productive time for all of you thus far, or if not, at least reasonably tolerable. Let us close our another chapter of the rolling year with a look at this week's Odds and Sods! 

• If university Comp Lit departments got a dollar for every article published on the theme of "whither the humanities" then they would be, if not completely solvent, at least able to open a few new hiring lines. Still, one supposes it keeps adjuncts busy and out of trouble, and noteworthy examples of the genre should be recognized. On that hand, one article that has both good and bad in it, and one that is just ugly. 
• I have tried to avoid direct comment on the increasingly turgid soap opera that is our democracy, but the fact that Donald Trump has a more than zero chance of being our next president forces my hand. In that spirit, a writer reviews the collected writings of the Donald and the psychosexual ugliness of the Republican primary 
• As a palette cleanser after this distasteful business, a well-written review of of a Victorian writer who deserves more attention

Friday Odds & Sods is Burnt To a Crisp

Apologies for the missing post last week, ever-faithful friends. This time, however, I have a much better excuse than writer's block, for last week found me slowly melting into a puddle under the heat of the late July Sun. Of course, such experience, despite it is obvious discomforts, can be a boon, if only for the occasion it lends around four in the morning for the mind to concentrate on questions of great import. To wit: "Who am I?", "What am I doing with my life?", "Why did I not take the opportunity to get an air conditioner when I had a chance?" Alas, dearest friends, I cannot say that I found any answers to these queries during my long, hot, sleepless nights. But I do know that these many more questions of great moment can be found in this week's Odds & Sods.

• I believe I have had occasion previously to remark on my admiration for Joseph Mitchell, like myself a Tar Hell gone to make good in the Metropolis. A talented writer and never one to let the facts get in the way of the truth, I must admit Mitchell is a bit o a hero of mine. I therefore highly recommend this profile of Joe Gould, alias Professor Seagull, the subject of Mitchell's most famous story. 
• Continuing on with the subject of eccentrics, fakers, and frauds, two stories about climbing to the heights on the basis of not very much at all: The illusionist who charmed LA's elite for a pretty penny and how pundits continuously fail upwards.
• A final mystery for the post: Who killed one of the most famous philosophers of the Renaissance? 

Friday Odds & Sods Can Dance if it Wants Too

Hello once again, loyal readers.  Another week of hard labor and hot weather goes into the history book and an too brief weekend comes to separate off more of the same.  All too often, life seems sometimes like the wag's definition of insanity, that is, to repeat the same action over and over again and expect a different outcome.  Of course, one imagines similar complaints could be levelled after every point in man's history - no doubt the hunter-gathers of the Rift Valley were heartily sick of having to pick berries day in and day out.  If there is any grace to be found, then, it must be in the small moments of joy and wonder that populate our time on Earth, and such, I hope, you will find in this week's Odds & Sods. 

• As a proud student of the Humanities, I have of course spent a lot of time working in retail.  This has been a valuable experience for several reasons, not the least of with is the cultivation of a strong sense of humor to serve as a survival mechanism.  I offer this compendium as a secondary means of inoculation for those not so blessed to have worked in the field  
• Speaking of the the Humanities, two stories from the frontline of the modern liberal arts: The emptiness of the digital humanities and Aeschylus on stage at Syracuse
• The Greeks, of course, were the inventors and masters of political speechmaking, a natural outgrowth of democratic politics where a large number of people need to have their opinions swayed in a short amount of time to get anything done.  One can only imagine the bitter tears they would weep reading the memoirs of a modern-day speechwriter

Saturday Odds & Sods is Watching the Fireworks

Happy Independence Day to all my American readers, a belated Happy Canada Day to our neighbors north of the border, and a pleasant Saturday to everyone else. It is starting off as a bit cloudy and cool here in the Metropolis for the Fourth, an unexpected but certainly not unwelcome meteorological development. Having spent the past week engaged in the sort of strenuous white-collar labor to which one should definitely not become accustomed, I'm looking forward to the opportunity to engage in the patriotic pastime of drinking, eating, and losing some extra digits in loud explosions. In any case, I hope your Fourth of July gets off to a bang with this week's Odds & Sods!

• To begin things off on a light note, an examination of Taylor Swift as apotheosis of artistic passive-aggression.  
• If you're still looking for something to read at the beach, and really summer is a third over so get on that, 10 neglected authors that deserve some love.
• In a more serious vein, two more articles for the Future is Terrifying department: the sad end of Japan's lonely elderly (and those who clean it up) and how to get by in a world with no work.
• Finally, the most American song I know, in honor of the holiday