An Italian-American Writer & Poet with a Yankee Outsider Perspective
I hadn’t a clue in high school and college–gay life wasn’t recognized in polite Charleston, South Carolina society during the 1950s and 60s. Yes, rock n rollers with duck tails and pompadours rumbled against the crew cuts, but they all … Continued
It takes a particular genius to bring alive a hero so ossified and marblized as George Washington. We see him in full-length statues and half portraits later in life, with his mouth a tight scar across his hawk-nosed face. The … Continued
There were none of the above in our childhood zoo–Hampton Park, Charleston, South Carolina. Well, maybe a medium-sized brown bear in a tiny cage, sitting like a teddy bear as we stared at his doglike snout. But in our peninsular … Continued
Puccini’s La Boheme is the quintessential Italian love story. Yes, I know, there’s always Verdi’s La Traviata with Violetta (reformed high-class prostitute) dying of TB at the end. She’s left her middle-class lover at the instigation of his father–to “save” … Continued
Dear Readers, to leave a comment, type in the box, then scroll down to “Comment as:” If you have signed into your own Google.doc account, your name will probably be there, but if not, if you’ve arrived from outside the … Continued
It was supposed to be natural. I’d gone with my husband to childbirth education classes, learning to pant for relieving pains. The pregnancy was uneventful–I was twenty-eight years old and in good health, I walked to classes, ate well, gained … Continued
Michele Bachman is providing mini lessons on the Southern branch of American Christianity. Granted, as she keeps telling us, she’s from Iowa. Her current constituents in Minnesota may also be surprised to find that they’re supporting a branch of Christianity … Continued
Living in modern cities with street lights dimming the dark, we settle into a comfortable amnesia. This is all there is: kilowatts and miles per hour. Each day fractured into little bits. Nerves, heart, even our prose growing ever speedier. … Continued
In these days of intense partisanship, when disgust at our fellow citizens runs high, it’s been a good counteractive to listen to David McCullough read his account of 1776, when a rag-tail army, dirty, foul-mouthed, and cold, eventually forced the … Continued
First or second go-around farmers in Minnesota grew a little bit of everything from chickens and turkeys to beef and dairy cows to wheat, corn, flax, rye, and the numerous tiny crops of their summer kitchen gardens. When I visit … Continued