Meanwhile

Things have been a little quiet here at AtWQ, mainly because I spent half of August on vacation.  This doesn't mean I haven't been writing, though--I published several shorter, more conversational pieces at Lawyers, Guns and Money while I was traveling, and during the last week as I was reacclimating to normal life (including recovering from a minor, vacation-related injury).  For good order's sake, I thought I'd link to those posts here.

• My trip included several days in London, where I watched several plays.  One of them, the musical Fun Home (based on the graphic memoir by Alison Bechdel) left me feeling rather overwhelmed, and contemplating the way that art affects us emotionally, sometimes against our will.  I wrote a bit about that and opened the floor to thoughts on what people look for in that respect.  (The other plays I saw were King Lear and Hamilton; I wrote a bit about my reaction to both in the comments.)
  
  
• The second week of my trip was spent in the country, reading lots of books.  I'll have some more about most of them in an upcoming Recent Reading Roundup, but I wrote up Richard Powers's The Overstory for LGM, because its themes and preoccupations lined up so strongly with that blog's political focus.  In particular, the novel's depiction of communication failure between environmental and logging interests is one that the writers at LGM have chronicled on many occasions.
  
  
• Crashing back to reality, I read with disappointment that admitted sexual harasser Louis CK had been welcomed with open arms for a brief set at a New York comedy club.  I wrote a little about why this is despicable, and discussed, in particular, the kind of arguments that tend to be trotted out when privileged, famous men who have done little or nothing to make up for their abuses try to get their fame and fortune back.