Helen Vendler

Summer fling with Wordsworth

I’m an Anglophile.  I like repression, I suppose, depth under calm facades.  My favorite writers—Austen, Dickens, Penelope Fitzgerald, Jane Gardam, David Mitchell, Barbara Pym, Andrea Levy to name a few—have always been Brits, and now my favorite education secretary—if one can admit to such pedantic tastes—is English as well.   British education secretary Michael Gove […]

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Spoiler alert

Last Friday night my youngest daughter went to her first high school dance.  Her date was a boy whose mother died when he was three, a fact which partly explains his unusual attire.  All the other boys wore prep-school navy blue blazers, khakis and loafers; he sported an ill-fitting tuxedo, black skater sneakers and a […]

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Great gifts, part 2

Spotlight on another gift today, one that my mother gave me a few months ago, a gift that was unconnected to any celebration.  How wonderful is that! To my list of what kind of gifts are best, add the following:  a gift given for no reason other than the giver thought the recipient would really […]

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