not his employer's opinions, thanks for asking
Live Last read · last published · next check
In case you missed it, book banning is going national. On Tuesday, February 24, HR 7661 was introduced in the second session of the 119th Congress by Rep. Mary Miller, the representative from the 15th, the most Republican district in Illinois. Rep. Miller is known for, among very few other things, quoting Hitler approvingly to … Continue reading "Book Banning Across America"
So a week from today, on February 19, 2026, a book I edited and wrote a little of is officially appearing in the world. It’s about something I think is important–the widespread effort to limit access in classrooms and libraries to books some people think should not be readily available. My press, Bloomsbury Academic, thinks … Continue reading "Not a How-to"
I’m writing this on the night of January 24, 2026, at the end of a day filled with news from Minneapolis, where, at 9 this morning, ICE shot an innocent man after dragging him to the ground and pistol whipping him. The people in charge of the occupation of American have been lying about this … Continue reading "We Have Met the Enemy"
So we woke up today to learn that we’re kidnapping people outside the US now too. The president and whoever was the last person to talk to him decided to attack Venezuela because of drugs, oil, democracy, domestic politics, unresolved daddy issues, FIFA peace prize, whatever. And he didn’t ask Congress because only people who … Continue reading "I Read the News Today, Oh Boy"
So they’re destroying higher education in the US. It was maybe the thing we should have been proudest of. For decades after the Baby Boom filled campuses to bursting and the National Defense Education Act of 1958 responded to Sputnik by pouring billions of dollars into research, American universities were the envy of the world. … Continue reading "This Is Why We Can’t Have Nice Things"
I haven’t written a thing on this blog since June because I’ve been busy and because I’ve been angry. Like maybe most of the people reading this, should such a thing happen, I’ve been moving back and forth between helpless angry and motivated angry, between there’s nothing we can do angry and we have to … Continue reading "Hey You Assholes"
Below please find a few words I delivered to introduce the closing plenary of a seminar last week. It’s short but says something about what it’s like for humanities professors trying to help run departments, divisions, or colleges during the worst assault on higher education this country has ever seen. Association of Departments of English/Association … Continue reading "Going Underground"
Anna Akhmatova This set of poems was written by Anna Akhmatova from 1935-1961. Most of the poems were written in the 1940s, but Akhmatova did not think it would be safe for her to publish them at the time. They weren’t published in Russia until 1987. The below steals from a few different translations I … Continue reading "Requiem"
Dear Donald John,We're just going to pull the band-aid off here: we're writing to tell you that we don't want to see you anymore. We don't want to hurt your feelings, because you seem to be kind of thin-skinned, like the kind of thin-skinned where if somebody makes a joke about you you'll run for … Continue reading "Dear Donald John"
With help from Merriam-Webster: gulf noun 1. A part of the ocean or sea extending into the land The U.S. has a few gulfs, among them the Gulf of Alaska, the Gulf of Maine, and the Gulf of Mexico. California has a couple more gulfs. The country’s also got plenty of sounds and bays and … Continue reading "Gulf of America"
