In the end, they decided she was innocent — and that was all she was ever allowed to be. I’ve always felt that Daisy Miller is less a story about impropriety than about cowardice. Not Daisy’s — heaven forbid — but ours. Ours as readers, as observers, as members of those polite little tribunals that … Continue reading Not Bad: A Epitaph for Daisy Miller
Tag: classics
John Martin’s Pandemonium: A Sermon of Fire and Futility
John Martin (1789–1854), Pandemonium, 1841.Oil on canvas. Tate Britain, London. Public domain. There are certain paintings before which I feel less a viewer and more a trespasser — a mortal who has wandered into a divine quarrel. John Martin’s Pandemonium (1841) is one such work. One scarcely enters it so much as one plummets into … Continue reading John Martin’s Pandemonium: A Sermon of Fire and Futility
The Lottery: A Sermon in Sunlight
This isn’t a story that creeps like fog, but a story that strikes like a thrown stone. Though Shirley Jackson’s The Lottery manages both. It begins with a sky of perfect summer blue, as though God Himself had painted it fresh for a village fête, and ends with Tessie Hutchinson screaming under a rain of … Continue reading The Lottery: A Sermon in Sunlight
The Government Inspector: A Farce in Which Humanity Trips Over Its Own Shadow
Been a while since I looked at a play. So.. There are moments in literature when I realise the human race isn’t merely flawed but gloriously, catastrophically absurd. Gogol understood this long before Beckett ever let Vladimir and Estragon wander out onto a dusty road to wait for a man who’d never come. If Waiting … Continue reading The Government Inspector: A Farce in Which Humanity Trips Over Its Own Shadow
The Room in the Tower: A Dream with Teeth
For years I dreamt of a house that hated me. It wasn’t merely haunted — it was hostile. Its walls bowed with resentment, its staircase groaned in complaint, and the air inside was the colour of rot. Every visit was the same: I would wander through its ruined corridors, knowing instinctively that one door was … Continue reading The Room in the Tower: A Dream with Teeth
Wording 