Joshua GrassoWherever You Are Is Someone’s Somewhere Else: Or, Why It’s Okay To Settle Down and Not Move UpWhy is a direction the guiding metaphor for our entire lives? Think about it: what is it about “up” that makes it so appealing?…couldn’t…13 min read·Dec 28, 2023--2--2
Joshua GrassoHow I Forgot to Flunk My First Semester of College and Found My Life in a Humanities Textbook17 min read·Oct 22, 2023----
Joshua GrassoThe Novel That Launched a Thousand Childhoods: Ray Bradbury’s Dandelion Wine (and what it means to…Note: all passages from the Bantam/Doubleday edition of the book (1976)10 min read·Aug 3, 2023--1--1
Joshua GrassoFanny Price: Jane Austen’s Greatest Heroine? Or an Insufferable Prude?Of all of Austen’s novels, Mansfield Park (1814) gets precious little attention and far too little love. Why? Actually, I’m somewhat at a…12 min read·Jul 2, 2023--1--1
Joshua GrassoDispatches From the Trenches of World War HumanitiesHUMANITIES MAJORS ARE DECLINING…SOME CALL IT THE END OF THE LIBERAL ARTS. IS THE WAR ALREADY LOST? OR ARE WE FIGHTING THE WRONG BATTLES?18 min read·Jun 4, 2023--17--17
Joshua GrassoThe Practice of Surrender: When Work Becomes Art in The Bhagavad GitaThe Story Behind the Story13 min read·Feb 13, 2023----
Joshua GrassoThe Problem With Star Wars: Myths Aren’t CanonAs a lifelong fan of Star Wars, I’ve watched it evolve from a hit series of movies in the late 70’s/early 80’s, to a pop culture sensation…13 min read·Dec 29, 2022--11--11
Joshua GrassoThe Loneliness of the Post-Pandemic ClassroomNoah Galuten’s essay, “Food, It Turns Out, Has Little to Do with Why I Love to Travel” (2020), documents his experiences eating his way…12 min read·Aug 4, 2022----
Joshua GrassoLiterature Exists in the Margins: or, Why It Isn’t a Comic Book Without the Ads!It’s easy to forget that literature, whenever it was written, is a unique creation of its own time and space. That each book comes from…17 min read·Jun 30, 2022--1--1
Joshua GrassoDo the Classics Make You Classy, or Just an Enforcer of Class?Alex Ross’ book, Listen to This (2010), is full of thought-provoking, genre-twisting conversations about music and its place in modern…8 min read·Jun 18, 2022--14--14