Saturday Good Reads

All of the upheaval over monuments, statues, and the founding of America has led to at least one positive thing – Americans are looking more closely at the statements and documents we tend to take for granted. Like the Declaration of Independence. Jonathan English at The Imaginative Conservative took a look at the declaration, and her discovered it may be more about interdependence. Mike Smith at The American Conservative did the same for the national anthem, and says it’s a fitting tribute to American endurance.

The University of Kentucky plans to remove a mural because it’s been deemed racist. Author Wendell Berry and a Black artist have filed suit to protect the artwork. And they have a point. 

You agree with and support a statement, and you even agree with and support the movement behind the statement. But what when you take a hard look at the organization behind the statement and the movement and suddenly you have a problem? Samuel James at Letters & Liturgy talks about sentences and movements.

More Good Reads

Poetry

Godric of Finchale as a Thorn Tree – Marly Youmans at North American Anglican.

One Foot in Eden – Edwin Muir at Kingdom Poets.

Chinese Mountain Man VI: The Gorge – David Gosselin at The Chained Muse.

Petition Asks for Removal of Walt Whitman Statue from Rutgers-Camden, Another to Uncover Mosaic – Stephen Rodas at Tap into Camden.

Even Seamus Heaney Made Mistakes – Erica McAlpine at Literary Hub.

Keats’ last book – a virtual journey – Keats House at Our City Together (London).

Writing and Literature

A Good Woman is Hard to Find: The “Racism” of Flannery O’Connor – Joseph Pearce at The Imaginative Conservative.

American Stuff

Gettysburg: Profiles in Courage – Mitchell Klingenberg at City-Journal.

American Brake Company – Chris Naffziger at St. Louis Patina.

Faith

Sharp Tongues and Angry Tweets – Darryl Dash at The Gospel Coalition.

A Social Media Jekyll & Hyde Effect – Keith Mathison at Light in Dark Places.

Life and Culture

The Diversity Trap – Zaid Jilani at Tablet Magazine.

Writing about History in a Manichean Age – Sean Michael Chick at Emerging Civil War Blog.

The MacDowell Colony artist retreat renames itself MacDowell – Hillel Italie at Associated Press.

Sunrise with 24 Musicians at the Verbier Festival

Painting: Old Woman Reading, oil on canvas by Boris Ivanovich Mayorov (1931-1991).