Todd Edward Anderson

A Christian story-teller, poet, and thinker writing from Ottawa, Ontario.

Category: Newsletter

  • “Great Books” and the Cultivation of Critical Thinking

    “Great Books” and the Cultivation of Critical Thinking

    This week, through a question-and-response format, I offer some reflections on “Great Books”, Critical Thinking, and the purpose of university in an effort to dispel what I believe to be some underlying misconceptions about the value of reading and studying various texts (like Shakespeare or Plato) in the context of formation. I hope to offer a fresh point of entry. Here are the main points:

    1. Close Reading produces Critical Thinking.
    2. Critical Thinking is a moral activity.
    3. Literature is the most efficient site for performing close readings.
    4. Eagerness or Curiosity, not “Great Books”, is the ideal condition within which close readings are generated.
    5. “Great Books” offer the most consistent body of literature and the widest possible set of readers to converse with.
    6. AI undermines formation by impairing collective eagerness.

    What is the value of a university education?

    The cultivation of Critical Thinking, meaning growth in intellectual and moral (humane) maturity.

    How is Critical Thinking cultivated?

    Critical Thinking is achieved via close reading in which the reader attends to the logical relationships (syntax) of the object in view and practices the construction of meaning. The object could be a painting, stellar chart, opera, drama, chemical analysis, sculpture, movie, verbal argument, dataset, logistics map, murder scene, overflowing toilet, short story, employment agreement, etc. In the process of close reading, an individual encounters competing patterns or interpretive options which exist prior to the encounter and suddenly are revealed to be an environment within which the act of reading and thinking occur. This experience of revelation – moving from surface of the “text” to its hidden ground or pattern – can be reversed and repeated, which forms the essential movement or mental gesture that ultimately results in intellectual formation and critical thinking.

    Example of this process:

    A plumber arrives at a client’s home, shuffling past a very rusty car with a broken windshield and tiptoeing around bags of garbage to get to the front door before being met by a woman who appears overtired, clearly struggling to manage three irascible, small children in a messy home. The toilet is clogged. A close reading of this situation gives the plumber the option to behave humanely by recognizing and responding to the obvious destitution of the client. Such a capacity (the training of humane awareness) need not be achieved by pouring over the grammatical construction of a Shakespearean sonnet, but it will only be acquired if the plumber had previously learned to pay attention to these sorts of patterns and clues, and see in them a moral obligation. Otherwise, as with any other client, he might have filtered out or explained as uninteresting (meaning facts that did not involve or obligate him) the various clues, plunged the toilet as quickly as possible, and left the woman with a bill she has no means to pay. The syntax of this scene is the perception of a logical connection between various parts, leading to a variety of interpretations (including, “she is poor and needs help”) that can then be acted upon.

    What is the benefit of cultivating Critical Thinking by means of literary study?

    The chief benefit is the capacity of literature to endure repeated close reading gestures leading to fresh experiences of revelation combined with the relatively straightforward scaling of individual close reading to various social dynamics (large or small classroom; instructor and learner or peers-only; highly contextualized or vestal encounters). Some objects (i.e. the plumbing example above) have a natural critical decay in which the scene of analysis or close reading dissipates or is reduced in scope, accessible only in its afterlife in memory; other objects require technical competency before close reading is viable (i.e. many STEM fields, linguistics). Critical Thinking still develops in these fields, but re-reading in community is best-suited for the sustained cultivation of Critical Thinking.

    Is “Great Books” misleading as an ideal set of objects for the cultivation of Critical Thinking?

    The short answer is yes. There is no ideal set of objects, only an ideal posture of eagerness (studere) or curiosity, which causes Critical Thinking to flourish because the subject attends with interest and therefore develops the capacity to overcome difficulties present in any field of study. However, what is typically meant by the “Great Books” or Western Canon of literature, is a collection of texts that showcase either original ideas or a degree of technical capacity proven to offer close readers sustained and varied experiences of revelation in addition to providing breadth of ongoing community engagement. Contemporary readers of Socrates or de Tocqueville participate in a rich conversation with writers and thinkers from their own century, or from the preceding fifteen, all of whom have attempted to conduct their own close readings, grappling with ideas at the centre of what it means to be human. This does not mean “Great Books” ought to be valorized or afforded a special position as decanters of Critical Thinking compared with a sea of unworthy literature. Rather, given the scope of a university education, Critical Thinking is most readily achieved by giving students as many opportunities to perform close readings and as many imitable interlocuters of the same objects as can reasonably be managed in order to produce as many experiences of revelation as possible in their time at the university. The value of a university over a library, in this respect, is in its arranging ideal conditions for this process: (time, texts, interlocutors, instructors), but the same procedure could be achieved (and often is) by an individual willing to pay for library late fees, or a weekly club eager to finish a novel and discuss it. What has so often been misunderstood, both by proponents of “Great Books” as well as detractors, is the role of re-reading or continuous, repeated encounters with the same objects in the cultivation of Critical Thinking. Just as bricklayers, by repeated use of the same bricks, grout, scaffolds, trowels and hammers, achieve a high degree of critical awareness of their craft (which might culminate in their ability to perfectly cut and set a partial brick in place with one stroke), so Critical Thinking is best served by repeated encounters with the same objects, especially when those objects are shown by historical precedent to be mediators of many experiences of revelation. The challenge is that students, having met an object once, often carry away an impression that they have “read” it. For a seasoned reader, close reading and Critical Thinking does occur with first exposures, but as a strategy of formation, few suggestions could be more detrimental than for a student to “move on” from an object they have encountered once. As it stands today in contemporary university culture, the reading situation is even more dire. Students do not complete many of their books and yet still proceed to render their judgements and perform close readings, constructing all manner of meanings about a thing they have not rightly encountered. This merely ensures their intellectual progress will be opaque to themselves and stunted into dependency. Hence why “Great Books” is a useful launch pad for Critical Thinking – it reasonably predicts timeless ideas and compelling syntax will be encountered with opportunity for a range of conversations across time and culture, facilitating habits of close reading for an eager student.

    Why is morality included in the definition of Critical Thinking?

    For thinking to rise to the level of maturity, it must account for obligation. Childish thinking perceives only the self and instinctual benefits that instrumentalize others. When revelation occurs (movement from surface-experience to pattern-recognition), the individual meets alternative notions that precede and underwrite their own, which gives rise to moral awareness. What ought the individual to think, believe and feel, or how ought they to behave in light of the other? Childishness sees no other, but devours the pattern, incorporating it as an extension of the self, and thus eliminates any moral frame or duty to another. But Critical Thinking enlightens by placing the reader continually in the path of other minds. This does not depend on “Great Books” or a set curriculum that is particularly moral in subject; concerns of obligation arise in the contemplation of a sunset or cartoon just as readily as the recitation of a creed or examination of a philosophy paper. It depends, rather, on eagerness to encounter, contend with, imitate, or explain the logical relationships and patterns of meaning made available by the close reading of any object and its interlocutors. The development of moral maturity does not guarantee a reader will be prudent, just, courageous, or temperate, but the cultivation of Critical Thinking will necessarily embed moral categories, which the individual may tolerate, disdain, contort or embrace. The claim that some injustice has been dealt to us (an idea we learn to articulate from a very early age) such that we are owed a remedy or restitution is itself a marker that we have read closely some scene or experience, discerned competing interpretations, and evaluated between these interpretations. In alerting others to the injustice, we are necessarily inviting them to join as a reader, sharing some standard of evidence or morality. We may be bending their ear and colouring their view in our appeal, but it is nevertheless engaging moral faculties in our minds. Thus, you cannot cultivate critical attention without awakening moral awareness. The same technique that trains the reader to recognize patterns and logical relationships also trains the reader to recognize obligation. This is built into the grammar of language (and here, language means not simply words on a page, but the code essential to the production of an object, be it clay, paint and canvas, stage and costumes, etc.), which involves a recognition of the relationship between words laid out according to a custom handed down to the reader. In the sentence, “John assaulted Jane”, the moral implications depend upon the syntax; to reverse actor and recipient alters obligations (“Jane assaulted John”). Each sentence inaugurates a critical inquiry that is itself moral, and the grammar skews our starting point. The second instance may prompt a meretricious evaluation (“did John deserve it?”) or a pragmatic one (“was Jane in danger”) to justify the actor, whereas the first sentence stirs up moral discomfort or outrage if the same procedure is engaged (“did Jane deserve it?”). This sort of moral training occurs all the time in daily life (though the stakes are often hidden below the surface) and is very much heightened by natural obligations (like parenthood). The advantage of a university is its focus on the sort of re-reading that offers a student many and varied encounters with shared objects, and so (like the bricklayer), training in the range of responses possible and their moral entailments. In this sense, the procedures of a university may be unlike, though complementary to, religious instruction. The goal of the university is to train the faculty of apprehension itself, recognizing the logical and moral dimensions of such training. Religious instruction begins with a set of stock commitments or creeds that shape interpretation and obligation for community and individual.

    How can Critical Thinking be trained in an Age of Social-Media and A.I.?

    The essential function of Generative Language Models is the disruption of the conditions of Critical Thinking and their cohesion (time, text, interlocutors, instructors), though this is partly an extension of other technological habits (ubiquity of phones). The disruption occurs because the outcomes of Critical Thinking (writing, argument) are easily and quickly feigned by these applications, undermining the eagerness and curiosity of the student, which as I noted above, is the ideal posture for the cultivation of Critical Thinking because it fortifies the student against the strain and difficulty inherent to formation. Via constant attention to Social-Media (conceived broadly), student engagement is assaulted by dis-traction, a drawing away from close reading tasks. These two factors are highly addictive or habit-forming. It follows that Critical Thinking can only be trained if eagerness is upheld and distraction limited. One final element in connection with the function of “Great Books” bears on the intersection of Social-Media, A.I., and Critical Thinking: shared objects diminish substantially in a digital age, not necessarily because individuals are not eager for good, beautiful, or truthful things, but because their lives, relative to those of our predecessors, are exposed to overwhelming varieties and rich sub-communities of objects at every given moment in time. The intense privacy of modern experience must be part of the calculus of eagerness, for it is not merely the task of the university to offer up a path or course through the wonders of “Great Books” (or an equivalent set of objects for inquiry), but the university must also contend with a vast range of influences and points of departure that make the cohesion of a community impossible, since daily encounters with objects may differ so widely and natural curiosity is superficially sated. Many receive a deluge of memes, advertisements, articles or videos as they “doom-scroll” or browse, but the algorithmic nature of the digital sphere ensures significant disparity between one individual’s experience and another’s. This dual nature of Social-Media (an ever-available melting pot and a privatized escalator of interest) pulls against sustained attention to the logical relationships of an object of inquiry. Student bodies, since they have so many other things they can immediately turn to and engage with, will find it difficult to generate an environment of eagerness outside of a classroom setting (and often even within!). A group of beloved instructors can model eagerness to mitigate these effects, inviting students to observe and participate in conversations that naturally rise to the level of close reading, but such a commitment must be thorough to be at all effective, meaning the instructors must model an entire lifestyle and community of traction and curiosity. “Great Books”, though not a panacea, offers continuity not merely for a course or student body, but with contemporaneous university experiences (other students across the globe also reading Jane Austen) and our forebears, providing raw materials for the production and sustenance of eagerness.

    Todd Anderson (Stuff of the Rind, Sand and Sail, The Reluctant Prophet) writes the newsletter Mirth to share a behind-the-scenes look at his writing process as well as to offer readers the first fruits of his poetry and reflections. He grew up in the forests of small-town Ontario, contending against nature in all its beauty and harshness.  His training as a literary scholar of Latin and English literature inflects his love of poignant turns of phrase, but it is the influence of his family and their myriad adventures together that infuses his story-telling and poetry with its substance and power.  Todd lives and writes in Ottawa with his wife and six children. If you are interested in supporting Todd’s work, please follow the links below to donate or buy his books.

  • Art

    Art

    The sky behind the clouds 
    Was baby blue and the clouds 
    Were peach and stately canvas for the sun 
    And the sun was marching 
    Away from palette and brush 
    And the palette was drying out 
    But the brush was still full of oil 
    And the oil mixed in the bristles 
    And mixed on the canvas 
    But the bristles could not know 
    The magic they delivered to me that evening –   
    A magic undisturbed by streets 
    And shadows and dim lights 
    That paint shadows from above the street –  
    A magic trailing off to west 
    And the peach clouds followed 
    As sheep relaxed and pure 
    Wander to the stable and find rest. 

    Todd Anderson (Stuff of the Rind, Sand and Sail, The Reluctant Prophet) writes the newsletter Mirth to share a behind-the-scenes look at his writing process as well as to offer readers the first fruits of his poetry and reflections. He grew up in the forests of small-town Ontario, contending against nature in all its beauty and harshness.  His training as a literary scholar of Latin and English literature inflects his love of poignant turns of phrase, but it is the influence of his family and their myriad adventures together that infuses his story-telling and poetry with its substance and power.  Todd lives and writes in Ottawa with his wife and six children. If you are interested in supporting Todd’s work, please follow the links below to donate or buy his books.

  • Two Rivers

    Two Rivers

    When women came at evening to draw, 
    The foreigner stilled his thirsty camels. 
    Clay jar in hand, Bethuel’s daughter 
    Descended to the spring, as ev’ry virgin 
    Descended, rising rich in water. 
    Had he lingered while she passed, 
    Shouldering her burden back to town, 
    Another might have heard the cry, “I thirst” 
    And felt a golden ring pierce her sweet nose. 
    What lass could know the camels were a sign, 
    Hard panting with a naked sun behind? 
    Not nature, but her heart taught best to serve 
    Where chores were thick and family most thin.

    Todd Anderson (Stuff of the Rind, Sand and Sail, The Reluctant Prophet) writes the newsletter Mirth to share a behind-the-scenes look at his writing process as well as to offer readers the first fruits of his poetry and reflections. He grew up in the forests of small-town Ontario, contending against nature in all its beauty and harshness.  His training as a literary scholar of Latin and English literature inflects his love of poignant turns of phrase, but it is the influence of his family and their myriad adventures together that infuses his story-telling and poetry with its substance and power.  Todd lives and writes in Ottawa with his wife and six children. If you are interested in supporting Todd’s work, please follow the links below to donate or buy his books.

  • Parting Syntax

    Parting Syntax

    This week’s analysis concerns a piece from my Collected Poems in which a scene of Springtime gives rise to reflections on parting.

    Sparrow
    I know her by her soft wings
    When she visits in springtime.
    Now gone among the lilacs at lakeside,
    My girl is gone from me.
    On the ridge a hedgerow hides a nest.
    Soft matins offered there
    When I pass early in the morn
    Offered no more. 
    In mind’s eye,
    I see far off her low arc curl and cape.
    Flit and flit from branch to fledgling branch
    Dear one.
    You are not lost,
    Though all your yearnings yet remain.
    Where can we dwell
    If not in the heart of others?

    Since the poem lacks a formal metrical structure and rhyme scheme, the lion’s share of the work is performed by syntax and alliteration.  There are eight sentences in total; let’s unpack each.

    I know her by her soft wings
    When she visits in springtime.

    “When” is a relative pronoun that generates a temporal hypotactic clause.  You do not need a technical description to feel this grammatical reality as you read, but it helps us articulate the poetic effect of the sentence.  The first clause, “I know her by her soft wings”, since it arrives first in our minds, is experienced as a complete scene.   Because it is in the present tense, we imagine the speaker’s knowledge of the “soft-winged” thing to be an on-going, existential one. We assume he sees this bird often, perhaps even on a daily-basis.  “When”, in line two, arrests this blissful statement and rearranges it in light of another reality: time.  It’s not merely that the speaker “knows” the sparrow when he sees it.  Now his sight of the creature is constrained by discrete moments and seasons.  The “when” binds the sentence – forcing a relationship between two clauses that might have stood on their own: “I know her by her soft wings.  She visits in springtime”.  This forced relationship between clauses is hypotaxis (hypo – “over” or “governed by” and taxis – “arrange” or “order”) and like other tools in a writer’s toolkit (metaphor, simile, rhyme, meter), establishes a pattern to be managed and accounted for.

    Now gone among the lilacs at lakeside,
    My girl is gone from me.

    This portion introduces two interpretive steps withheld by the first sentence.  “Now gone” moves us from an ambivalent or hopeful reading of the first lines, in which the speaker was poised to tell us all about the wonderful visitation of his favourite bird just returned at the cusp of Spring.  The reader associates this departure with the bird hinted at in the title and line one, but the second half of the second sentence forces another interpretive step.  All this time, the bird was a metaphor for a girl, which causes the reader to reevaluate their reception of earlier lines, not by discarding the image of the bird, but by learning to see double – to carry forward bird and girl together.  With this new pattern in place, phrases like lilacs at lakeside, which stand out due to the alliteration, are a fresh opportunity to imagine meaning in either direction.  On the one hand, it is easy to envision a sparrow resting on lilac branches with their beautiful violet blossoms.  On the other, “lilacs at lakeside“ becomes a symbol for affection between the speaker and the girl – perhaps a nostalgic scene of profession (if a romantic interpretation is in view) or familial wonder (if we imagine a mother or father watching their little girl pick flowers by the shore).

    On the ridge a hedgerow hides a nest.

    This sentence releases the emotional pressure of the previous two by steering our attention away from reflections on loss and away from bird and girl to an adjacent interest.  Alliteration helps to loosen the heavy grip of nostalgia; “ridge a hedgerow hides” offers a playful auditory interlude – it is fun to say aloud (like a minor tongue-twister) and delivers a new subject not entirely detached from the lake or the lilacs, since it is nestled within them, but like all good nests, becomes a momentary reprieve from the danger of longing.  Notice the interlocking pattern of sounds: r – dg – h – dg – r – h – d.

    Soft matins offered there
    When I pass early in the morn
    Offered no more.

    The nostalgic eye returns to devour this new object by repeating the temporal hypotaxis above, including the brief trick of a hopeful opening clause (“I know her by her soft wings”).  Here we get, “soft matins offered there”, connecting the innocence of a hopeful morning song to a nest tucked away in the brush.  The “when” in the second line both constrains and leaves unfulfilled the pressure of “offered there” because it is an incomplete thought, forcing the reader to incorporate “offered no more”, which sours the brief sweetness of the speaker’s regular habit.  In other words, the hypotaxis forces the reader to experience the same sourness at the level of grammar, since we don’t want to move beyond the idyllic morning music of birds roused to rejoicing by spring sunrise.

    In mind’s eye,
    I see far off her low arc curl and cape.

    This sourness is extended by abstraction.  The temporal hypotaxis deployed above, which allowed the speaker to relive the moment of the sparrow’s return and sweet morning walks hearing its song from a hidden nest, gives way to memory alone – removed from tangible encounters to a remote, intellectual apprehension.  Hence the prepositional phrase that governs a new kind of inner sight and presses home the distance between speaker and bird.  Again, alliteration steps in to bear the reader: f – r – f – l – r – c – c – r – l – c.

    Flit and flit from branch to fledgling branch
    Dear one.

    Finally, the speaker addresses the bird directly in the form of a command.  The oldest forms of the verb “to “flit” meant, “to convey or carry”; this developed into the meanings “to flow, run,” and finally into our modern idea “to go swiftly, lightly or to dart.”  All three etymological meanings are in view in the speaker’s imperative.  He is saying to the bird or girl: “carry forward my love – bring it with you on your way”; “flow, float along, run untouched by sorrow and free from cares of this world”; “like a butterfly or the sparrow, embrace with joy and agility life’s opportunities, ready to pivot and turn.”  The bird and girl are united in the substantive adjective “dear one”. 

    You are not lost,
    Though all your yearnings yet remain.

    Here hypotaxis does opposite work to the temporal versions above.  Instead of constraining our hope, the concession “though” reinforces it.  “You are not lost” is proclaimed despite the presence of yearnings, which would be received in a fundamentally different spirit if it were structured, “You are not lost, but all your yearnings yet remain”.  The yearnings are made subordinate – they are significant and impactful, but cannot overcome the reality of the girl’s identity and belonging.  Charting a new course, beginning a fresh adventure, carries with it fears of the unknown, and especially the fear that a fledgling belongs neither to the nest it has left, nor to some new home it is searching out.  “Although you may feel lost”, advises the speaker to this bird or girl, “this is part of the process by which you discover you are not lost”.

    Where can we dwell
    If not in the heart of others?

    The final turn in the poem, a rhetorical question governed by another hypotactic sentence, sharpens the theme of nostalgia to a point before driving it home.  The condition “if” recapitulates the search for home (“where can we dwell”) by pointing out that what we are searching for (the bird on its fledgling journey and the speaker in his reminiscences) is not merely the presence of the beloved, which would render belonging and rest, but a new conception of home.  To be at home is to be in the heart and mind of the other – for others to carry us in their hearts, to think of us, imagine our retorts and remonstrances.  This transcends the pangs of physical distance.  Moreover, we may dwell in the heart of many simultaneously.  The poem concludes by reminding us that this spiritual dwelling is in fact the only true one – that we derive pleasure from our physical interactions and long for them precisely because we are already at home in the heart of others.

    This piece was inspired by my eldest daughter’s departure for school in the Fall of 2025, but on re-reading it this week, I was struck by poetry’s readiness to be adapted to new circumstances. We are currently enjoying the presence of this sparrow, back from her adventures for a time, cognizant that she will depart once more, but confident that she is no less home.

    Todd Anderson (Stuff of the Rind, Sand and Sail, The Reluctant Prophet) writes the newsletter Mirth to share a behind-the-scenes look at his writing process as well as to offer readers the first fruits of his poetry and reflections. He grew up in the forests of small-town Ontario, contending against nature in all its beauty and harshness.  His training as a literary scholar of Latin and English literature inflects his love of poignant turns of phrase, but it is the influence of his family and their myriad adventures together that infuses his story-telling and poetry with its substance and power.  Todd lives and writes in Ottawa with his wife and six children. If you are interested in supporting Todd’s work, please follow the links below to donate or buy his books.

  • Albertos the Great

    Albertos the Great

    When you hear them say, Albertos the Great has died, 
    Believe only half their tall tale, for they have lied: 
    Great was my sin, and greater yet the work to mend 
    My smallness.  Yet that labour, fault by fault, my friend 
    Some years ago with pains and anguish undertook 
    And carved at last my name with crimson in his book, 
    Which I, from time to time, read with thanksgiving 
    Since the pages do not hold the dead, but living. 

    Todd Anderson (Stuff of the Rind, Sand and Sail, The Reluctant Prophet) writes the newsletter Mirth to share a behind-the-scenes look at his writing process as well as to offer readers the first fruits of his poetry and reflections. He grew up in the forests of small-town Ontario, contending against nature in all its beauty and harshness.  His training as a literary scholar of Latin and English literature inflects his love of poignant turns of phrase, but it is the influence of his family and their myriad adventures together that infuses his story-telling and poetry with its substance and power.  Todd lives and writes in Ottawa with his wife and six children. If you are interested in supporting Todd’s work, please follow the links below to donate or buy his books.

  • Let May Flower

    Let May Flower

    Let May flower though it turns our hearts
    Toward th’incessant earth
    In search of beauty
    In search of striving
    Because we too are striving
    Though we don’t see
    Though we pretend not to see
    The ground with worms writhing
    A thousand May-born flies
    The ruminations of dappled coastland moors
    Above all the striving whispers of unharnessed wind
    In search and never finding home
    But on through dry and moist air rising
    Since it cannot tire
    It tangles hickory
    Ruffs crested feathers and bill
    While at marsh-end Swallow trill
    Enthroned on swaying bulrush

    Let it flower and rest your joy
    In the unhurried earth
    Long years waiting for a reckoning
    As mastering man sews curse on curse
    Sweat and breath sewn and raised together
    Because we too are striving
    Because even in the garden
    When the earth had not yet learned to strive
    Since we had not yet plucked
    And scarred the tree
    Because it recoiled at our touch
    Though we were not as such filled with violence
    In search of immortality
    But since the waiting and the striving go on
    Palaverating creeks run their mouths
    And run to their mouths
    And spread over the earth the poison of man
    Because man’s searching leaves no thing untouched
    Despite which the soil endures

    Let it flower despite these
    Because another striving
    Summons place to place
    And time to time
    Time striving for place
    And place searching for its time
    The divine search for resurrection
    That purer striving for home
    Because He too is striving
    Let May flower since it turns His heart
    Toward the restless earth

    Todd Anderson (Stuff of the Rind, Sand and Sail, The Reluctant Prophet) writes the newsletter Mirth to share a behind-the-scenes look at his writing process as well as to offer readers the first fruits of his poetry and reflections. He grew up in the forests of small-town Ontario, contending against nature in all its beauty and harshness.  His training as a literary scholar of Latin and English literature inflects his love of poignant turns of phrase, but it is the influence of his family and their myriad adventures together that infuses his story-telling and poetry with its substance and power.  Todd lives and writes in Ottawa with his wife and six children. If you are interested in supporting Todd’s work, please follow the links below to donate or buy his books.

  • Snips and Snails

    Snips and Snails

    The following is a sneak peek at Chapter 1 of Snips and Snails, sequel to my fairy story, Sugar, Spice and Everything Nice.

    The King’s Decree

    Above the blooming sky and wide firmament, where thin-bound air runs free and joyful; above the celestial trails, where giants wander, greeting one another as strangers on an afternoon walk pass by with a singular nod; above even the congregations and cities of such massive beings, who attend to our skirted plains and ragged mountains as heavy-booted lumberjacks attend to their carpet and foot stools; above all these rose a great city, and at its centre a royal palace.  Akoron the Mighty, whose eternal reign proceeded unblemished in the hearts of all his subjects, ruled with power colossal, unflinching wisdom, and stalwart joy.  The Unrelenting. The Magnanimous. The Hunter.  These titles and more had he accrued, and his court was filled with such as he.  Akoron mounted his throne early in the week, and all eyes were upon him when he pronounced his royal decree:

    “The Grey Stag has been sighted once again upon the Heath, far into the hinterlands.  Send word to all Giant Land: The Great Hunt has begun once more!  Let all hunters present themselves to the royal Master of the Lists to be registered.  We will feast this week-long in the Great Hall and then I shall array my chariot in splendour and lead the hunt.  Let it be decreed.”

    “It is so!” came the reply, a chant from every voice in the court acknowledging and sealing Akoron’s word in keeping with ancient custom.  The crowd erupted in cheers and Akoron raised his great fist and roared with a mighty roar, laughing and rejoicing in his might.  For he had waited many seasons for a fresh sighting of the Grey Stag, and longed for the hunt as roots long for rain.

          Day after day, the giants feasted in the Great Hall, planning their course and journey, sharpening their spears and trading stories of hunts long past.  While they feasted, the jester Buttermilk sang and extolled in brilliant tales the exploits of the king.  And as Buttermilk performed, the son of Akoron, Prince Snails, looked on and laughed with a fervent gaze fixed on the silver-tongued fool, whose garb shone with brilliant gems, gaudy colours and flowing cloth. 

          Now the Prince was one for mischief, having grown up free to roam.  Despite his mother’s discipline and father’s love, which were rendered fully to the boy (he being neither codded nor hard done by, but justly weighed and granted every opportunity to display honour), Prince Snails from time to time would lose himself and act with rashness.  In this nearest season of his life, his father had warned him not to scorn their entreatments, lest he be held back from the Great Hunt.  For a time, this warning held fast in the heart of the young Prince, for he had not as yet partaken in the hunt, save in his imagination as he heard the bards sing in the great halls.  But the feast, with all its excitement, proved too much for Snails, who hatched a plot to cause Buttermilk to tumble down and bring the whole house into riotous laughter just as he delivered the highest of the tales of Wintertide on the eve of the Great Hunt.  And so it was that Snails sat, goblet in hand, eyes fixed on the low dais erected in the great Hall, while Buttermilk, in full festive costume, round as a world to the eyes of mortals (were we perched there in the glittering chandelier which lit the auburn walls), stepped up to the dais and laid one hand on the low railing.  It creaked gently and Snails covered his mouth with his hand to choke back a squeal of delight.  Buttermilk left off the railing and raised both hands alongside his face in earnest attention toward the ceiling, then began in low tones to lay the ground of his tale:

    “When the abyss breathed forth the blackened mire
    And kingly grace had yet to clothe our lord,
    The Stag with antlers grey took to the spire
    And bent its will upon the rushing fjord.”

    Buttermilk lowered his arms and let them rest gently on the rail, and Snails leaned in, ready for his moment.  Squeezing the railing while pivoting sharply to his right, Buttermilk flung out his left arm to the crowd in a powerful gesture.  With all of his weight pressed upon the railing for a brief moment, the sable wood, which Snails in secret had cut near the base, gave way, and with a hilarious yelp, Buttermilk tumbled off the dais on to a table filled with food and drink.  The audience, save one, was stunned and a gasp cascaded through the crowd.  Snails could not contain himself, but laughed full and loud, tears pouring down his face.  He clutched his side and pounded his fist on the table.  Buttermilk was lifted up by those nearby and helped back to his position; someone passed a glass of wine up to him to steady himself, and he drank a strong swig before wiping his mouth and looking around at the crowd.  Then, to absorb their anxiety, he winked and stretched a broad smile across his face.  The crowd roared out at his courage and many voices called out for the Fool to go on and tell his tale.  Through all of this, King Akoron saw his son, though the Prince saw not that he was seen.  But being King, Akoron bided his time, and when the festivities for the day had concluded, he ascended to his son’s room in the evening, sat quietly on the edge of his bed, and said in a gentle voice:

    “You cannot come to the Hunt, my son.”  And when the shocked Snails, face contorting in disbelief, raised his voice to protest, his father merely rose in silence and left the room.

    “Father, oh father, please!” cried the bitter prince as Akoron walked down the hall.  He moved as a tiger at ease, nor turned his head to heed his wayward child, but passed through a door to the royal chambers.  The next morning, a missive came and lay on the end of Snails’ bed, detailing the royal decree, that he must stay and that Buttermilk the Fool was to be his guardian.  Snails wept at the this more than the confinement, for in his own way he loved the Jester and his stories, and believed, when he saw the unsmiling face which greeted him that some rift had formed, and he did not possess the tact (or in truth, the strength of will) to repent.  So it is for the young, who cannot face their shame.  Is it not the same for young and old alike, when pain has sealed the doors to the heart?  How then can we make amends?

    Todd Anderson (Stuff of the Rind, Sand and Sail, The Reluctant Prophet) writes the newsletter Mirth to share a behind-the-scenes look at his writing process as well as to offer readers the first fruits of his poetry and reflections. He grew up in the forests of small-town Ontario, contending against nature in all its beauty and harshness.  His training as a literary scholar of Latin and English literature inflects his love of poignant turns of phrase, but it is the influence of his family and their myriad adventures together that infuses his story-telling and poetry with its substance and power.  Todd lives and writes in Ottawa with his wife and six children. If you are interested in supporting Todd’s work, please follow the links below to donate or buy his books.

  • Amicis

    Amicis

    “Don’t bother with friends,”
    Always struck me as poor advice,
    Which is why no one in their right mind
    Ever gives it as such, instead reserving
    Such sentiments for hard times,
    When the peel of mortality
    Is pulled back from our frail lives
    And for a moment we do not wish
    To see what the loss has meant,
    But only wish to feel the loss itself.
    Here is a remedy: make more than you can
    Keep.  And keep in mind their mind,
    So that, days or years apart, you may
    Produce the fruit of friendship in a thought,
    Its candor and cadence, the head-back laugh
    And twinkle, or the wrought wisdom welding
    Truth to practice at an odd angle,
    Which only your one, obscure, entangled
    Friend could manage and no other.

    Todd Anderson (Stuff of the Rind, Sand and Sail, The Reluctant Prophet) writes the newsletter Mirth to share a behind-the-scenes look at his writing process as well as to offer readers the first fruits of his poetry and reflections. He grew up in the forests of small-town Ontario, contending against nature in all its beauty and harshness.  His training as a literary scholar of Latin and English literature inflects his love of poignant turns of phrase, but it is the influence of his family and their myriad adventures together that infuses his story-telling and poetry with its substance and power.  Todd lives and writes in Ottawa with his wife and six children. If you are interested in supporting Todd’s work, please follow the links below to donate or buy his books.

  • For Now

    For Now

    And now the rain comes. 
    We saw grey clouds swiftly charge, 
    Felt as kindred spirits do 
    At leave-taking, 
    When eye follows eye 
    And each lets fall stored sorrows;
    When Spring melt shocks
    Unexpecting rivers,
    Now burdened with too much water,
    And the crested banks o’erflow.

    Todd Anderson (Stuff of the Rind, Sand and Sail, The Reluctant Prophet) writes the newsletter Mirth to share a behind-the-scenes look at his writing process as well as to offer readers the first fruits of his poetry and reflections. He grew up in the forests of small-town Ontario, contending against nature in all its beauty and harshness.  His training as a literary scholar of Latin and English literature inflects his love of poignant turns of phrase, but it is the influence of his family and their myriad adventures together that infuses his story-telling and poetry with its substance and power.  Todd lives and writes in Ottawa with his wife and six children. If you are interested in supporting Todd’s work, please follow the links below to donate or buy his books.

  • The Fifth Word

    The Fifth Word

    What shall we give to the Ocean
    When it calls out: “I thirst”?
    Who can slake parched waters?
    Is your bucket big enough?
    And at what stream will you supply
    Living water to satisfy His need?

    Todd Anderson (Stuff of the Rind, Sand and Sail, The Reluctant Prophet) writes the newsletter Mirth to share a behind-the-scenes look at his writing process as well as to offer readers the first fruits of his poetry and reflections. He grew up in the forests of small-town Ontario, contending against nature in all its beauty and harshness.  His training as a literary scholar of Latin and English literature inflects his love of poignant turns of phrase, but it is the influence of his family and their myriad adventures together that infuses his story-telling and poetry with its substance and power.  Todd lives and writes in Ottawa with his wife and six children. If you are interested in supporting Todd’s work, please follow the links below to donate or buy his books.