The Life of a Stupid Man was published posthumously in 1927, the same year Ryūnosuke Akutagawa took his own life. That makes this work seem like a literary suicide note - one final, unfiltered outpouring of his disillusionment and despair. It wasn’t crafted for an audience so much as exhaled, a last gasp of a man … Continue reading Shards of a Broken Mind: A Critique of The Life of a Stupid Man
Month: February 2025
A Pathetic and Shadowy Medley: Tolkien’s Catholic Critique of Protestantism
Having spent a considerable amount of time in Durham Cathedral of late, I have also found myself immersed in The Last Office, a compelling work of narrative history that chronicles the sixteenth-century dissolution of the monasteries - most notably, Durham itself. Meanwhile, like many in recent years, I have been hearing the ever-growing clamour for reparations, … Continue reading A Pathetic and Shadowy Medley: Tolkien’s Catholic Critique of Protestantism
The King in Yellow: A Curious Case of Cosmic Horror and Turn-of-the-Century Angst
The unifying thread in the best stories is a mysterious, fictional play - also called The King in Yellow - which is said to drive anyone who reads it into a state of gibbering madness. Of course, Chambers teases us with snippets of this forbidden text but never lets us see the full thing, much like … Continue reading The King in Yellow: A Curious Case of Cosmic Horror and Turn-of-the-Century Angst
Wording 