In today's poetry feature Stephen considers the importance of being idle... I think of idleness as a good thing. I do not associate idleness with lassitude, laziness, or sloth. Rather, I associate it with repose, reverie, and contemplation. People who carry on cellphone conversations in public are in dire need of idleness. ... Read More...
About Author Profile: Stephen Pentz
In today's Dabbler Verse feature, Stephen considers self-awareness, and introduces a poem by C. Day Lewis... Is it possible to look at yourself objectively? To see yourself for who you are? Speaking for myself, I have my doubts. Still, I like to think that I am more optimistic about the possibility ... Read More...
There is truth and beauty in the commonplace, Stephen Pentz finds, as he considers the poetry and troubles of John Clare... I don't know exactly what it is, but there is something beguiling and lovely about the following poem. Some may find it too sentimental. Others may think that there is ... Read More...
As summer ends, Stephen selects two seasonal poems... The sudden shifts in mood and imagery in Ivor Gurney's poetry (both between poems and within a poem) can sometimes be disconcerting and puzzling. It is tempting to ascribe these shifts to Gurney's struggles with mental illness. But one should be wary of ... Read More...
In today's poetry feature, Stephen looks at the big questions and the small questions of life... In the following poem, Elizabeth Jennings speaks of "small answers" and "big answers." Perhaps I have grown old and jaded (by the antics of humanity, my own included), but I prefer small answers. How tiresome ... Read More...
Stephen discovers a remarkably vivid account of a young boy's unwitting encounter with a great poet... While idly browsing through Notes and Queries (the back issues of which - going back to its inception in 1849 - may be found in the Internet Archive), I came upon a wonderful account (written ... Read More...
Stephen gives us two rather wonderful anecdotes... I was pleasantly surprised when I discovered that Ludwig Wittgenstein admired Samuel Johnson. Perhaps I should not have been surprised: both of them sought -- to use one of Wittgenstein's characteristic words -- "clarity," and both of them abhorred -- to use one of Johnson's characteristic words -- ... Read More...
Stephen continues his exploration of the poetic conceit that 'all the world's a stage'... If Life is indeed a drama or comedy in which we are actors, I will hazard a guess that most of us see ourselves as the leading man or the leading lady in the entertainment. James Simmons's ... Read More...
The paranoiac feeling that 'All the world's a stage' has troubled many poets... The poetic conceit that life may be compared to a work of art - most commonly, a play - is an old one. At some point in our lives, the thought may occur to us that we are ... Read More...
In this week's poetry feature, W H Auden and his debt to Robert Frost... At this time of year small piles of sand begin to appear along the seams of the sidewalks. The ants have awakened, and have begun their work. Who knows what is going on beneath our feet? Complicated ... Read More...
