Gertrude Stein’s famous quote, “There is no there there” is often understood as a slight, a pronouncement that a place has no substance. Nothing to see here. Stein was writing about returning to her childhood home in Oakland, California, in her 1937 book Everybody’s Autobiography. One reason her observation has […]
When you think of Cambodia or Vietnam, what comes to mind? Perhaps the majesty of Angkor Wat or the lushness of the Mekong delta. You may picture the narrow tunnels used in the Tet Offensive or the stupas and shallow craters of the mass graves of the Killing Fields. Less […]
When Ann and I first discussed a seminar on literary memoir, featuring works by George Orwell, Vladimir Nabokov, and William Styron, I was intrigued by the opportunity to group such three different writers and books together in one week. I had read various novels by each author, and had read […]
When my manager let me know that I would be spending a couple of weeks working on a project in Germany and the Netherlands, I admit that my first thoughts were not of reports and deadlines but of the Rijksmuseum. In the past several months I had been fortunate to […]