Friday Links
January 30, 2026
St. Brigid (detail), Harry Clarke window, St. Mary’s Ballinrobe
2026 Jane Greer Memorial Poetry Contest
Ben Myers on Poetry and the Permanent Things
David Torkington on The Interior Castle
Fra Angelico Etched the Divine in Stone
Nadya Williams on The Haunted Fiction of George Saunders
2026 Jane Greer Memorial Poetry Contest
Thanks to the generosity of the Catholic literary community, and with the blessing of Jane’s family, Dappled Things announces the 2026 Jane Greer Memorial Poetry Contest, for the best poems submitted to the journal this year. Judges include poetry editor Meredith McCann, associate editor Andrew Calis, and guest judge J.C. Scharl. Details at the link. Send us your poems (and funny memes - there’s no contest for the memes, but Jane did love them!)
Ben Myers on Poetry and the Permanent Things
The discussion about literature, art, and the left-right divide swirls up occasionally, as it did this week. Ben Myers’s essay is excellent on the topic. He is correct:
The marriage of art and leftist politics is not as natural and inevitable as those on the left, and indeed often on the right, seem to think. Fewer than one hundred years ago, the single most important literary person in the anglosphere was T.S. Eliot, a consummate conservative. The Vanderbilt Southern Agrarians—including John Crowe Ransom and Robert Penn Warren—were voices for tradition speaking from within the English department. In fact, there is a natural fit between the true work of the English department and the conservative disposition: both strive to pass on to the next generation what is good and true and beautiful, or at least that is what they should do.
David Torkington on The Interior Castle
St Teresa calls the first gentle feeling of God’s love as the Prayer of Recollection and the far more powerful experience of his love that follows, as the Prayer of Quiet. For St Teresa this is the first stage of experiential mystical contemplation and the recipient soon realizes it is a pure gift of God, as it comes and goes without anything we can do to generate or prolong it. In both the Prayer of Recollection and the Prayer of Quiet there are distractions and temptations that are always there beneath the surface. Their strength depends on the power of the mystical experience. In the Prayer of Quiet for instance, sometimes the experience is fairly weak but sometimes there is a lifting sensation in the head and the receiver is raised to experience this prayer to a higher degree of consciousness. Although there are always temptations and distractions beneath the surface, their strength becomes weaker and weaker as the mystical experience becomes stronger and stronger.
Fra Angelico Etched the Divine in Stone
One of the great questions in Fra Angelico studies is how many intricate layers of theological symbolism he wove into his art, gleaned from his erudite studies as a Dominican friar. The theological evolution, ushered in by the Franciscans and Dominicans, demanded new styles to meet new spiritual needs, as scholars including Donal Cooper, Joanna Cannon, and Holly Flora have recently begun to explore. The significance of blood, gold, and emotional displays are just the tip of the iceberg. (H/T to Christopher Honey for sharing this article.)
Nadya Williams on The Haunted Fiction of George Saunders
In his new novel Vigil, George Saunders picks up on this old theme with a new tale that can perhaps be best summed up as: Clarence, the angel from It’s a Wonderful Life, meets Tolstoy’s Ivan Ilych. While Ilych discovers too late the lack of meaning in his life as he nears death, Clarence averts George Bailey’s suicide by showing him that the meaning of his life has been much greater and more positive than he previously realized.
The Back of the Book: The Rhythm of the Saints
In this episode of the excellent The Back of the Book podcast, James Matthew Wilson joins Chris Scalia to talk about literature, poetry, form, and Seinfeld.
