My Journal
Confessions of St. Augustine (a 21st Century Innocents Abroad) – Sixth Installment
I concluded the last blog with a quote from Shaw: "Those who can, do - those who can't, teach." I don't believe that. What I do believe is teaching can be one of the highest callings. Teachers are the unsung heroes of America. Granted, in the second part of the first...
Confessions of St. Augustine (a 21st Century Innocents Abroad) – Fifth Installment
When I got out of the army I decided to take advantage of the GI Bill and continue my graduate work in literature. One professor and one course stood out in particular: a professor who made Professor Kingsley, played by John Houseman, in The Paper Chase, look like...
Confessions of St. Augustine (a 21st Century Innocents Abroad) – Fourth Installment
After having read all seven volumes of Remembrance of Things Past (or sometimes translated as In Search of Lost Time) by Marcel Proust years ago, I always wanted to go back to Paris again, particularly in light of not only after having completing my trilogy (not to...
Confessions of St. Augustine (a 21st Century Innocents Abroad) – Third Installment
To continue with my take on how much our fantasies have bearing on our lives for good or bad, I can't help but wonder if our trip to Paris is the result of my childhood fantasies: that of wanting to be an Indian only to end up drawing pictures of them and eventually...
James Mueller On The 5 Things You Need To Be A Successful Author or Writer
"Find your true voice. Write the book you always wanted to read and paint the painting you always wanted to see. Everybody has a story to tell, except very few will tell it. And most stories have been told before. But it’s how you tell it that makes all the...
Confessions of St. Augustine (a 21st Century Innocents Abroad) – Second Installment
Some say Don Quixote is the greatest novel ever written. Some say War and Peace, followed by Ulysses, Remembrance of Things Past, Brothers Karamazov, and I could go on and on, but regardless of what your opinion is, they all deal with perception, memory, and...
Confessions of St. Augustine (a 21st Century Innocents Abroad) First Installment
No matter what their age, daughters will always be their father's little girls - thus the title The Innocents Abroad. However, when you consider one of them wants to run around the Highlands with a kilt like a Scotsman or a Scotswoman of old, straight out of a Sir...
A 21st Century Confessions of St. Augustine
The Brothers Karamazov (one of the top 5 greatest novels ever written) and Crime and Punishment (one of the top 25 greatest novels ever written) both raise the question: "If there is no god, then all things are permissible." In The Brothers Karamazov, Ivan raises the...