Critical Readings

CR Episode 155: The Lay of the Children of Hurin, Part II

26 December 2022 Critical Readings

The panel reads the second part of The Lay of the Children of Hurin, which relates the tale of Beleg Strongbow, and the doom of Turin Turambar, giving special attention to how the text connects to other mythological and Anglo-Saxon poems and narratives.

CR Episode 154: The Lay of the Children of Hurin, Part I

19 December 2022 Critical Readings

The panel begins a three-week reading and analysis of the first version of J. R. R. Tolkien’s “The Lay of the Children of Hurin”, a poetic account of Turin Turambar, written between 1918 and 1925, and first published in The Lays of Beleriand (1985).

CR Episode 153: Poetry of Delmore Schwartz

12 December 2022 Critical Readings

The panel examines three poems by Delmore Schwartz, with a particular focus on his language and themes, including a poetic biography of Lincoln, a metaphysical examination of Narcissus, and a portrayal of time as a frightening, existential inferno.

CR Episode 152: Young Goodman Brown

28 November 2022 Critical Readings

In Critical Reading’s first episode dedicated to a work of prose, the panel reads Nathaniel Hawthorne’s short story, Young Goodman Brown, and examines its allegorical structure, considering what it might suggest about both human nature and the modern era.

CR Episode 151: Whitman and the Civil War, Part II

21 November 2022 Critical Readings

The panel concludes its series on American Civil War poetry with Whitman’s Drum Taps and Sequel to Drum-Taps, focusing in particular upon the structure, symbolism, and historical details of Whitman’s three poems on the death of President Lincoln.

CR Episode 150: Whitman and the Civil War, Part I

14 November 2022 Critical Readings

The panel reads a selection of the poems added to the 1860-61 edition of Walt Whitman’s Leaves of Grass, focusing on what the poetry suggests about human nature, political life, and the people of the United States on the eve of the Civil War.

The 1680 Auto-da-fe in Plaza Mayor, Madrid, by Francisco Rizi (1683) FEATURED

CR Episode 149: Longfellow and the Civil War, Part II

7 November 2022 Critical Readings

The panel reads two poems from Longfellow’s Tales of a Wayside Inn (1863): ‘Torquemada’ and ‘The Birds of Killingworth’, examining the role of zeal, dogma, and radical conduct in the poems, and what it may suggest about the war between the states.

CR Episode 148: Longfellow and the Civil War, Part I

31 October 2022 Critical Readings

In the first of a two-part reading of selections from Longfellow’s Tales of a Wayside Inn, the panel reads the beginning of the Prelude and then examines “Paul Revere’s Ride” in detail, with attention to the structure of the text and its formal aspects.

Confederate Surrender at Appomattox FEATURED

CR Episode 147: Melville and the Civil War, Part II

24 October 2022 Critical Readings

The panel concludes a two-part survey of Melville’s reading of the Civil War as viewed through his Battle-Pieces and Aspects of the War (1866) by discussing poems on Stonewall Jackson, the Surrender at Appomattox, and post-war America.

CR Episode 146: Melville and the Civil War, Part I

17 October 2022 Critical Readings

In this first episode of a two-part examination of Melville’s poetic response to the Civil War, the panel reads two poems from his first poetry collection, Battle-Pieces and Aspects of the War (1866): ‘The Conflict of Convictions’ and ‘Gettysburg’.

CR Episode 145: E. E. Cummings on Nonconformity

3 October 2022 Critical Readings

The panel performs a thorough close readings of two well-anthologised poems by E. E. Cummings–‘i sing of Olaf glad and big’ and ‘the Cambridge ladies who live in furnished souls’–examining how their structure and formal aspects reflect their content.

CR Episode 144: Poetry for King Charles

26 September 2022 Critical Readings

In celebration of King Charles III, the panel reads two poems written to celebrate the reigns of his predecessors, King Charles I and King Charles II, including a New Year’s Gift by Thomas Carew and a coronation panegyric by John Dryden, respectively.

Critical Readings

CR Episode 167: The Poetry of Wilfred Owen

CR Episode 166: H. P. Lovecraft’s Polaris

CR Episode 165: Pope’s Epistle to Dr. Arbuthnot

CR Episode 164: Tennyson’s Locksley Hall

CR Episode 163: Love and Death with Edna St. Vincent Millay

CR Episode 162: Thomas Babington Macaulay’s Horatius