Clik here to view.
A moment's thought?
Modeling “Model MIT president” and former U-M Provost and COE Dean Charles Vest (Image courtesy of U-M’s Bentley Historical Library.) There stands in front of me a carpenter’s model of a bureau—16...
View ArticleClik here to view.
The welcome table
A very, very, very fine house My colleague, Magdalena Zaborowska, has just published a book on James Baldwin. Its title tells the story: Me and My House: James Baldwin’s Last Decade in France. A...
View ArticleClik here to view.
The writers' workshop
One is the loneliest number Rarely is the table so clear in Angell Hall’s Room 1176 (the Hopwood Room). (Image: LSA.) The life of the professional author is in central ways a lonely one. I don’t mean...
View ArticleClik here to view.
In defense of writing
Take note The U.S. Constitution. Writing matters. Why? This is not a rhetorical question, and the fact we need to ask it may come as a surprise. But for reasons large and small it remains a question in...
View ArticleClik here to view.
A Hall of mirrors
Master class Donald Hall taught at Michigan from 1957-75. I’ve reached the age — something both to celebrate and mourn — where most of my masters are dead. The celebration is, of course, personal and...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Vision and revision
Speaking in tongues Henry David Thoreau Henry David Thoreau, in Walden, makes the following claim: “Books must be read as deliberately and reservedly as they were written. It is not enough even to be...
View ArticleClik here to view.
The road not taken
Roads and tunnels and walls and bridges John Lennon’s “Walls and Bridges.” (Apple Records, 1974.) That our roads and bridges and tunnels require repair is not news. Everywhere they crumble, everywhere...
View ArticleClik here to view.
What goes up
Built to last? Few readers think of “Typee” when seeking out Herman Melville. I had lunch in Manhattan, recently, with two younger friends — one an investment banker, one a rare book and manuscript...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Tongue-tied and illiterate?
What does it all mean? Tile sample from Atik Valide mosque which was built by great architect Sinan in the 16th century in Uskudar (Istanbul / Turkey ). On the tile you can see a sample of Koran...
View ArticleClik here to view.
The accidental cartoonist grows up
“I couldn’t draw at all” Cathy Guisewite, BA ’72. (Image courtesy of Cathy Guisewite.) On the first day the award-winning comic strip Cathy ran in 66 newspapers nationwide, its 26-year-old creator hid...
View Article
