The Tragedy of Lady Macbeth
Lady Macbeth’s tragedy is the tragedy of being a woman. What more powerful way to show this than through a difficult woman to like?
Macbeth
A Trick of the Light
Macbeth’s failures are failures to understand the interplay of perspective and perception in interpretation.
Witches in Literature, or Bodies as Translators of Fear
Lady sorceresses are vessels of fear through their bodies , or representations used to translate terror. A witch’s greatest strength is her body, as when Circe seduces and distract Odysseus from his journey; it is her greatest weakness, too, as when the Wicked Witch of the West is destroyed: doused in water, her body disintegrates.
Fear and Narrative
There’s a little door in the corner of our almost-three-year-old daughter’s bedroom, and she’s very convinced something is going to come out of it. It isn’t even a door, really—it’s an access panel for getting at the problematic plumbing in the bathroom next door. I’ve come to really, really wish it were somewhere else in…
The Strings Attached
In the town where I grew up, Newtown, Connecticut, the town hall, the library, and a school all stood as monuments to the generosity of one benefactress, Mary Elizabeth Hawley. They were named after various members of her family and built in that 1920s/30s style meant to evoke stony permanence. Mary had an unusual life…