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‘Wicked’ and the Rise of the Villain Protagonist
On Super Bowl Sunday, we saw a trailer for the Broadway hit-turned movie, Wicked. The first installment of what’s supposed to be a two-part movie saga in a vein of the Oz franchise, Wicked stars Cynthia Erivo as Elphaba, aka the “Wicked Witch of the West.”
When I first saw the title of the movie, the thought of Disney’s Maleficent, which hit theaters a full ten years ago, popped into my head. Here’s another movie with a female lead, about someone who was traditionally recognized as a villain,...
How ‘Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes’ Reveals the Worth of the Human Person
Compared to the previous four films in the franchise, The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes sagged in its opening weekend, bringing in a meager figure below $50 million at the American box office. Yet, with it, the entire Hunger Games franchise overshot $3 billion in the global box office. It touched the hearts of audiences and had teenage girls admiring how attractive young Coriolanus was.
It garnered mixed reviews from critics, with some calling it “good,” and others “bad.” I...
Save 25% OFF Gifts for Grandparents
An email about great Catholic gift ideas for grandparents and loved ones.
Help Victims of Human Trafficking
An email talking about a ministry devoted to helping victims of abuse and human trafficking.
Grow Closer to Jesus and Mary with the Rosary
A promotional email for a religious goods product.
St. Augustine and Shuri: Sorrow Over the Death of Our Loved Ones
Each year, the Catholic Church celebrates Hallowtide in autumn. This triduum of feast days includes All Hallow’s Eve (Halloween), All Saints’ Day (a holy day of obligation), and All Souls’ Day.
These are days on the liturgical calendar that call to mind our mortality, the joy of the Church Triumphant, and the need to pray for the faithful departed. Together, they kickstart the month of November, the month dedicated to the poor souls in Purgatory.
The idea of life after death is not exclusivel...
8 Exotic Birds Driven to Extinction in Modern History
Birds are fascinating creatures. Their feats boggle the imagination. Hummingbirds can flap their wings 200 times per second, and the thick skull of a woodpecker can withstand slamming its head against an object at a force 1,000 times that of gravity.
These creatures have sparked fantasies in the hearts and minds of people who came before us – like the Phoenix or Halcyon of ancient mythology. Paleontologists point to the avians as modern-day descendants of the dinosaurs. But, like the dinosaur...
Book Reviews – January 2022
Legend has it that her mother named her Clara (light) knowing she would be a light to the world. The Papal Degree of Canonization opened with the phrase, “O how great is the vibrancy of this light.” It recognized her miracles and the graces she channeled, but it emphasized Clare’s special gift, that her denial of self was not based on her personal desire to live an ascetic life, but to glorify God. St. Clare can serve as a light to our paths as we come to know her better through this book tha...
Stephen Orgel, Wit’s Treasury: Renaissance England and the Classics.
Stephen Orgel, Wit’s Treasury: Renaissance England and the Classics. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2021, 216 Pages, $39.95 (hardcover) ISBN: 9780812253276.
If there are any preconceived notions of a poet who refrains from sassy defamation of a critic or an academic who manages not to say something controversial, Wit’s Treasury shatters such notions. At the heart of the book is the organic development of the understanding and appreciation of literary classics, many of them ap...
Gereint and Enid: A Tale of Fidelity and Trust
Gereint and Enid: A Tale of Fidelity and Trust
Several of the legends recounted in The Mabinogion, a collection of Welsh folktales developed and culminated in medieval times, include characterizations of King Arthur or “Emperor Arthur” who ruled over several sub-monarchs. In these legends, Arthur is not really the protagonist, seldom having even a prominent role in the stories. Yet, the stories themselves stand up well as rather typical chivalrous quests, and readers can find virtue in them i...
What It Means to Be Part of a Family in “Across the Spider-Verse”
Following the popular acclaim of its predecessor, Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse continued the comic book aesthetic of the previous film, explored some neat coloring tones that helped express the mood in different scenes, and really doubled down on the themes of family, child-rearing, and child-parent relationships.
Hear the conversation from the Voyage Podcast about the big themes from this movie:
After waiting several years since we last saw Miles Morales finding support and belonging ...
8 Great American Autobiographers You Should Be Reading
Since our earliest times, humans have been storytellers, and there doesn’t seem to be a topic any more interesting than ourselves. The autobiography is always a great resource to those looking to delve into the intricacies of history. But Americans, displaying their “melting pot” of diversity, might be said to have perfected the autobiography.
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From colonial times to expanding the frontier, from tales of injustice to those of exploration, a slew of American autobiograp...
The Parables and Proselytizing of George MacDonald
The power of storytelling ignites something deep within us. A primordial spark rising like the morning star in our hearts that awakens our intellects and emotions and leads us to ponder the things that matter, those things that can bring us joy, and the things that make us who we are. Fine works of art and literature, that strike us to the core, often carry with them subtle notes of Divine Providence.
Our creativity points back to our Creator, the one true God who revealed Himself as Yahweh, ...
Dr. Jekyll, Mr. Hyde, and Robert Louis Stevenson’s Fixation with Moralistic Tales
What we today herald as literary “classics,” the fruits of a Christianized Western culture, offer us a creative approach to finding God in our lives and to cultivating virtue. They often present us with the struggle of good versus evil, or – at least – they borrow the imagery and symbolism of a vestigial Christianity.
Alexandre Dumas’ The Count of Monte Cristo, filled with episodes of tragedy and treasure, revenge and repentance, is ultimately a story about avoiding despair; the characters le...
7 Amazing Libraries of the Ancient World
Our learning institutions are no exception to the march of time. Libraries, like the books they contain, have evolved over the ages. From sacred space to haunt of the learned, from the private collection to the public recreational center, our idea of what constitutes a library gets regularly reinvented.
In its earliest known developments, the library was typically just a collection of various writings, with public lending being less common. Often, it was affiliated with some sort of cultic pr...