Jeff's Critical Reads
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Shortly before he died, Plenty Coups, the last great Chief of the Crow Nation, told his story--up to a certain point. "When the buffalo went away the hearts of my people fell to the ground," he said, "and they could not lift them up again. After this nothing happened." It is precisely this point...
Czeslaw Milosz, winner of the 1980 Nobel Prize for Literature, reflects upon poetry's testimony to the events of our tumultuous time. From the special perspectives of "my corner of Europe," a classical and Catholic education, a serious encounter with Marxism, and a life marked by journeys and...
To a President
"ALL you are doing and saying is to America dangled mirages,
You have not learn’d of Nature—of the politics of Nature, you have not learn’d the great amplitude, rectitude, impartiality,
You have not seen that only such as they are for These States,
And that what is less than they, must sooner or later lift off from These States."
Thoughts
"OF obedience, faith, adhesiveness;
As I stand aloof and look there is to me something
profoundly affecting in large masses of men following
the lead of those who do not believe in men."
From Leaves of Grass, Deathbed Edition, chosen by director and bookseller Jeff