Saturday Good Reads

This is how the biography begins: “Victor Davis Hanson is the Martin and Illie Anderson Senior Fellow in Residence in Classics and Military History at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University, a professor of Classics Emeritus at California State University, Fresno, and a nationally syndicated columnist for Tribune Media Services.” Hanson is a conservative and a defender of Donald Trump (in fact, he's just published a new book, The Case for Trump). 

It’s not difficult to imagine Hanson writing about Trump voters; he does so on a regular basis. But imagine my cognitive dissonance to see an article by Hanson on what progressives need to know about Trump voters published on the CNN web site. Regardless of how you feel about President Trump, the article is well worth reading. (I’m still trying to deal with seeing it on a CNN web site.)

What’s old is new again: Identity politics has a rather ferocious grip on the Western imagination, not to mention Western politics. Its roots, says Akos Balough at The Gospel Coalition Australia, go back a couple of thousand years to the heresy of Gnosticism. Solomon was right, there is nothing new under the sun. 

More Good Reads

Poetry

God, the Playwright – Donald Catchings at An Unexpected Journal.

Monday Morning – Jerry Barrett at Gerald the Writer.

Crashing W.S. Merwin’s Wedding – Edward Hirsch at The Paris Review and Remembering W.S. Merwin: The Poet of Disappearance – Peggy Rosenthal at Image Journal.

The Who I Am– Martha Orlando at Meditations of My Heart.

Theory of the translation of the moon – Kathleen Everett at The Course of Our Seasons.

How I Talk to God – Kelly Belmonte at Literary Life.

Faith

How the Sacred-Secular Divide Impacts the Church – Hugh Whelchel at the Institute for Faith, Work, & Economics.

We All Live in Marx’s World Now – Carl Trueman at The Gospel Coalition.

Life and Culture

The Memory Keeper – B. Miller at The South Roane Agrarian. 

Reflections on the Community of Baseball Fans – Zak Schmoll at Entering the Public Square.

Wisdom First, Job Skills Second – Mark Bauerlein at City Journal.

The Marijuana Delusion – Steven Malanga at City Journal.

Writing and Literature

Handcrafting books: labors of love – CBS Sunday.

Village Poet – Laura Lundgren at Servants of Grace.

American Stuff

Andrew Jackson Unconquered – Bill Kauffman at Modern Age reviews the new biography by Bradley Birzer.

Of Battles and Memories: A Union Officer’s Springtime Letter – Sarah Kay Bierle at Emerging Civil war Blog.

Art and Photography

Flower Therapy – Susan Etole. 

Walking in Memphis – Marc Cohn

Painting: Room in a Farmhouse, oil on panel (1886) by L.A. Ring (1853-1933).