Artists and thinkers hold society together. That goes for kindergarteners finger-painting and philosophers redefining how we’ll see the world tomorrow. I play my own modest part through what I write on Medium. Below are links to posts in key areas of interest.
According to Beyoncé in “Diva,” a diva is just a “hustla.” To me, that suggests divas bust their butts to make a buck, only to see much of the benefit go to someone else.
It’s a common complaint in the music business, one that most divas’ drummers might voice if…
Young Helios traveled a straight line west. With his first step, he passed beyond the realm of the familiar, yet as he progressed, each town, each people, became more like the last. …
Greta Garbo, Vivian Leigh, Sophie Marceau and Keira Knightley . . . Many great actresses have played the titular character of Anna Karenina by Russian writer Leo Tolstoy (1828–1910). Having enjoyed the film adaptations, I felt like I already knew the novel by the time I got around to reading…
One of my biggest pleasures on Medium has been publishing short fiction in the horror publication Keeping It Spooky. The publication has fiction, articles and poetry for fans who like anything that sends a shiver down the spine. My stories belong to a variety of subgenres, with reading times from…
Plague nurses haven’t quite made the comeback in recent years that plague doctors have when it comes to heavy metal imagery, but who cares about equality of outcome when there’s inequality of quality?
It takes ten plague doctors to do a single plague nurse’s work, and mine has made her…
“All true saga-writing is a balance between fact and art.”
–Carol J. Clover, The Medieval Saga
Sequels, prequels, spinoffs and reboots… Today, we may be inclined to view these as cheap ways of turning one successful product into an unending stream of successful products, and therefore cheap bucks, but they…
Pucker up for a melodic bludgeoning
Riches everywhere. That’s how I view cruising for new music in the used racks. Sure, everything is available on some streaming platform, but those chance finds you look at askance and only invite into your home because they’re so cheap can turn out to…
When I think of hip-hop and revolution, the first song that comes to mind is Arrested Development’s “Raining Revolution” on its debut album 3 Years, 5 Months and 2 Days in the Life Of . . . (1994).
Arrested Development represents the best of conscious hip-hop, but gangsta hip-hop also…
“My name is Ozymandias, king of kings;
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away.”
— Percy Bysshe Shelley, “Ozymandias”
I started The Gleaming Sword last year during the…
