Legends of the Fall (2008)

What a fall!  First, the Philadelphia Phillies win the World Series, thus ending the “Curse of Billy Penn.”

Then, we (much-maligned) Americans elect our first African American to the Presidency, which, while not finally ending the curse* on this nation from our slave-holding past, is certainly an historic step forward to, it is fervently to be hoped, a post-racist future.

And, me?  I’m back in the classroom again after a brief 11 year layoff, teaching about that which most needs teaching about:

Aristotle Contemplating a Bust of Homer

Rembrandt van Rijn
1653
Oil on canvas
143.5 x 136.5 cm
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

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* “Advancement—improvement in condition—is the order of things in a society of equals. As
labor is the common burden of our race, so the effort of some to shift their share of the burden
on to the shoulders of others is the great durable curse of the race. Originally a curse for
transgression upon the whole race, when, as by slavery, it is concentrated on a part only, it
becomes the double-refined curse of God upon his creatures.”  — Abraham Lincoln, 1854

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