Category Archives: Philosophical, Psychological & Historical Considerations

Bertrand Russell complained about one of his grandmother’s preferred puns, “What is mind? Doesn’s matter. What is matter? Never mind.” And yet we, as a species, continuously attempt to fathom the mystery of the mind, with the help of philosophy, psychology and history. Shakespeare has given us much food for thought on all three, as well as music for those who love the music of words.

Syriza, Not So Greek to Us

Posted on March 6, 2015 by jimmie

CASSIUS Did Cicero say any thing? CASCA Ay, he spoke Greek. CASSIUS  To what effect? CASCA (I don’t know)… but those that understood him smiled at one another and shook their heads; but, for mine own part, it was Greek to me. Julius Caesar, act 1, sc. 2 It was almost inevitable that the meteoric Read More

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Comedy of Terrors

Posted on January 23, 2015 by jimmie

“Madness in great ones must not unwatch’d go.” Hamlet, act 3, sc. 1   While “misery acquaints a man with strange bed-fellows”(1), the FBI looks for strange bed-fellows to increase their misery – in the name of the war on terror and terrors. Some background for our international readers. The

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Charlie Hebdo, Ali Aba and 40 Hypocrites

Posted on January 15, 2015 by jimmie

” ‘Tis too much proved – that with devotion’s visage And pious action we do sugar o’er the devil himself.” Hamlet, act 3, sc. 1 Ali Baba had to deal with forty thieves. After the Charlie Hebdo attack, Paris dealt with forty heads of state. But while the thieves in the tale practiced thievery, the Read More

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Shakespeare and Memories for 2014

Posted on December 30, 2014 by jimmie

When to the session of sweet silent thought, we summon up remembrance of things past…. (Sonnet # 30) …. as we do at the end of the year, our memories for 2014 include, among other things, three historical anniversaries. One hundred years since World War I, six hundred years since the real First World War, fought Read More

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Shakespeare and a Rose for Christmas

Posted on December 23, 2014 by jimmie

“At Christmas I no more desire a rose, Than wish a snow in May’s new fangled mirth, But like of each thing as in season grows.” (Love’s Labours Lost, act 1, sc. 1) I began the blog thinking of the 25th Anniversary of the American invasion of Panama, conducted on Christmas Eve (1989) – when Read More

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Shakespeare, Torture, Ideology and Ridicule

Posted on December 16, 2014 by jimmie

“If that be right which Warwick says is right, There is no wrong, but everything is right.” (King Henry VI part 3, act 2, sc. 2) Historians have written at length on the ideas that inspired great events. Take the 18th century, for example – when there grew, at large, a diffused sensibility towards nature. Read More

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Shakespeare, Ferguson, Reality and Symbols

Posted on December 10, 2014 by jimmie

“We are accounted poor citizens, the patricians good. What authority surfeits-on would relieve us: if they would yield us but the superfluity, while it were wholesome, we might guess they relieved us humanely; but they think we are too dear: the leanness that afflicts us, the object of our misery, is as an inventory to Read More

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Shakespeare and Disbelief

Posted on November 30, 2014 by jimmie

“Most noble sir, That which I shall report will bear no credit, Were not the proof so nigh.” Timon of Athens, act 5, sc. 1 At the United Nations, a motion was recently tabled to condemn the glorification of Nazism. USA, Canada and Ukraine voted against the motion.

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Shakespeare and One Medal Too Many

Posted on November 26, 2014 by jimmie

“What a god is gold, That he is worshipp’d in a baser temple Than where swine feed!” Timon of Athens, act 5, sc. 1 This week, with the customary pomp and circumstance, Obama bestowed the Presidential Medal of Freedom on 18 recipients. It is the highest civilian honor in the Unites States.

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Shakespeare, Courage & a Fallen Hero

Posted on November 20, 2014 by jimmie

“…there’s a special providence in the fall of a sparrow. If it be now, ’tis not to come; if it be not to come, it will be now; if it be not now, yet it will come: the readiness is all: since no man has aught of what he leaves, what is’t to leave betimes? Read More

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