Category Archives: Literature

More Hyborian Thoughts

This is a return to a post I wrote three years ago this month after first reading the original Conan stories by Robert E. Howard. I have since re-read all of them and want to write in more depth than … Continue reading

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New Light on a Delicate Subject

The World of the Shining Prince: Court Life in Ancient Japan by Ivan Morris Vintage (Reprint), May 21st, 2013 (Originally published in 1964) This began as a post related to a previous post on The Tale of Genji by Murasaki … Continue reading

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A Tale of Two Conans

Conan – Blood of the Serpent by S. M. Stirling, Titan Books, December 6th, 2022 Last month I reviewed The Siege of the Black Citadel by “The Legend” Chuck Dixon. I mentioned in the review that it was the first … Continue reading

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The Siege of the Black Citadel Review

The Siege of the Black Citadel by Chuck Dixon, Castalia House, February 23rd, 2023 Although I’ve been supporting Castalia House since it began, it has been a long time since I reviewed a book from the publisher. Almost seven years … Continue reading

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Further thoughts on Brideshead Revisted

This is a follow-up to my previous post as I felt it was different enough to warrant its own. This will focus on the characters of Rex Mottram and Celia Ryder. I didn’t mention either at all by name in … Continue reading

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Thoughts on Brideshead Revisited

I mentioned a few years ago in a post that I had been intending to re-read Evelyn Waugh’s Brideshead Revisited along with Dostoyevsky’s Crime and Punishment. After finishing the former late last week, I decided I needed to write something about … Continue reading

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A Most Interesting Man

Simon Leys: Navigator between Worlds by Philippe Paquet (translated by Julie Rose), La Trobe University Press, September 18th, 2017 The name of Simon Leys has appeared a couple of times on this blog. The first quoting portions of his fascinating … Continue reading

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Entering at the Margins of Classic Chinese Literature

The Water Margin (Shuihu Zhuan) is one of what are known as the ‘Four Great Novels of China’ and was originally written by Shi Naian during the Ming Dynasty and published in 1368 AD. Though there is scholarly dispute on … Continue reading

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A Religious Road Trip

American Pilgrim by Roosh Valizadeh Kings Media, February 16th, 2021 One of the earliest posts I wrote when I started this blog was a review of Roosh’s Free Speech Isn’t Free which chronicles his notorious speaking tour that sparked outrage … Continue reading

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Outer Space: A Fantasy Wallpaper

There are a lot of terms of different types of science fiction and fantasy and people can get quite pedantic about these different sub-genres and exactly how to define them. Off the top of my head there is cyberpunk, hard … Continue reading

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