Michael Dirda

1 month ago | nybooks.com | Michael Dirda

Ford Madox Ford’s 1915 novel, The Good Soldier, opens with one of the most arresting first sentences in twentieth-century fiction: “This is the saddest story I have ever heard.” The paragraph that follows, however, almost immediately undercuts it with a series of irresolute, contradictory statements:We had known the Ashburnhams for nine seasons of the town of Nauheim with an extreme intimacy—or rather, with an acquaintance as loose and easy and yet as close as a good glove’s with your hand.

1 month ago | roanoke.com | Michael Dirda

As an author and artist, Maurice Sendak enriched the world with two of our most beloved picture books, “Where the Wild Things Are” (1963) and “In the Night Kitchen” (1970). Yet Sendak’s creative energy also spilled over into more commercial projects, and he often illustrated the work of others, usually favorite writers.

2 months ago | pressherald.com | Michael Dirda

With the possible exceptions of pickleball and gossip, the habitual reading of obituaries may be the favorite sport of older people. After a certain age, we begin to wonder how others have spent their time in what Melville, in “Moby-Dick,” summed up as “this strange mixed affair we call life.” Did they, as Melville went on to say, feel “this whole universe [to be] a vast practical joke” at nobody’s expense but their own? Were they true to the dreams of youth?

Jan 16, 2025 | washingtonpost.com | Michael Dirda

With the possible exceptions of pickleball and gossip, the habitual reading of obituaries may be the favorite sport of older people. After a certain age, we begin to wonder how others have spent their time in what Melville, in “Moby-Dick,” summed up as “this strange mixed affair we call life.” Did they, as Melville went on to say, feel “this whole universe [to be] a vast practical joke” at nobody’s expense but their own? Were they true to the dreams of youth?

Jan 15, 2025 | infobae.com | Michael Dirda

Casi todas las naciones tienen su epopeya nacional, que suele ser el relato de las hazañas marciales de un héroe guerrero. Por ejemplo, en Inglaterra está Beowulf; en Francia, La canción de Roldán; en Alemania, Los nibelungos; en Irán, El Shahnameh. En la mayoría de los casos, el héroe exhibe cualidades sobrehumanas y virtudes distintivas que los oyentes o lectores del poema deben admirar y emular: valor, fuerza, lealtad, autocontrol y, a veces, sabiduría.