Dos Passos and Orwell

Last weekend, at the American Literature Association in Chicago, I presented on John Dos Passos and George Orwell–how their lives converged and their legacies diverged. They met once during the […]

The Art of John Dos Passos

Interesting reference to the painting style of John Dos Passos in The Guardian: “Yun Gee’s Street Scene is composed at a vertiginous angle, giving the piece an off-balanced sensation. Consisting […]

Talisman from The Best Times

From John Dos Passos’s memoirs The Best Times: “For years a wooden box full of my father’s letters has stood on my mantel at Spence’s Point. It is a box […]

John Dos Passos in Politico

From Politico: “All right, you have won,” John Dos Passos wrote in his bitter U.S.A. trilogy passage about the death of Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti. “There is nothing left […]

Papa's Living Room Air Show

My 2nd poem about my paternal grandfather, Rodney Marshall Coggin, went online today. “Papa” was a Marine aviator in the Pacific during World War II. Thanks to Cathexis Northwest Press […]

The Sound of New York City

Music writer Philip Clark blogged recently about his book-in-development, Sound and the City – a history of the sound of New York City and an investigation into what makes it […]

New Collection of Critical Essays on John Dos Passos

Congratulations to Profs. Rosa Bautista and Aaron Shaheen, Dos Passos scholars par excellence, on their newly published collection of critical essays on John Dos Passos’s interwar chronicles. Handsome publication! Bravo!