Steveawiggins

LATEST ARTICLES ( 4674 )

• Horror Week

  

  “Remember, remember, the fifth of November,” the old rhyme goes.  Earlier this week I advocated for Halloween being the start of the holiday season. Read more

  Posted on 05 November 2021 POLITICS, RELIGION, SOCIETY

• Story Time

  

  Why am I so nervous about this?  I’ve done it hundreds of times.  Perhaps it’s because it’s a public place in a pandemic.  Maybe it’s because I’ve never used... Read more

  Posted on 04 November 2021 POLITICS, RELIGION, SOCIETY

• Holiday Season

  

  Halloween, in some ways, is the unofficial kick-off of the holiday season.  This was made clear to me when someone recently played the song “Soul Cake” in the... Read more

  Posted on 03 November 2021 POLITICS, RELIGION, SOCIETY

• What’s Poppin’?

  

  “How are things in the world of finance?” Admiral Boom calls to a passing George Banks.  The bland answer of fine as everything is good with the pound sterling... Read more

  Posted on 02 November 2021 POLITICS, RELIGION, SOCIETY

• Horror Show

  

  The horror film history narrative runs something like this: although there had been some scary movies in the silent era, the term “horror” was first used to... Read more

  Posted on 01 November 2021 POLITICS, RELIGION, SOCIETY

• Spirit of Halloween

  

  So it’s Halloween.  It’s also Sunday.  I’ve been thinking quite a lot about the spirituality of this particular day.  Now it’s often treated as a trick, a... Read more

  Posted on 31 October 2021 POLITICS, RELIGION, SOCIETY

• Angel of Harvest

  

  It’s been a few weeks ago now, but one October Saturday we attended the Lehigh Valley Vegstock.  Autumn is the season for harvest festivals and a surprising... Read more

  Posted on 30 October 2021 POLITICS, RELIGION, SOCIETY

• Author Talks

  

  are one of my favorite perks.  While work obligations mean I often can’t attend, I was glad to have caught this week’s visit by Mathias Clasen. Read more

  Posted on 29 October 2021 POLITICS, RELIGION, SOCIETY

• Not Quite Quetzalcoatl

  

  It must be difficult to write the same basic story over and over. And nostalgic adults like me can be tough critics as we try to recapture faded childhood... Read more

  Posted on 28 October 2021 POLITICS, RELIGION, SOCIETY

• Feeling Used

  

  It may be perverse of me, but it makes me happy that used copies of all my books can be found on Bookfinder.com. I discovered Bookfinder many years ago and it i... Read more

  Posted on 27 October 2021 POLITICS, RELIGION, SOCIETY

• In Praise of Paper Maps

  

  One of the tricks, I’ve mentioned before, for getting around accessing books I can’t afford, is the used book market.  Now Amazon is probably just about as bad... Read more

  Posted on 26 October 2021 POLITICS, RELIGION, SOCIETY

• Listening to History

  

  One thing fascists around the world are attempting to do is rewrite history. Inevitably white, they want to paint themselves as good and superior. Read more

  Posted on 25 October 2021 POLITICS, RELIGION, SOCIETY

• A Day with Books

  

  .  Is there any better kind of day?  Before I lapse into poetry I want to put in one more plug for the Easton Book Festival.  Today is the last day for this... Read more

  Posted on 24 October 2021 POLITICS, RELIGION, SOCIETY

• Skin In

  

  It took me back to my younger years. Tanya Krzywinska’s A Skin for Dancing In: Possession, Witchcraft and Voodoo in Film. Wide ranging and insightful, this... Read more

  Posted on 23 October 2021 POLITICS, RELIGION, SOCIETY

• Ebf

  

  The third annual Easton Book Festival is underway.  As part of it Eric Ziolkowski, the chair of the Religious Studies department at Lafayette College,... Read more

  Posted on 22 October 2021 POLITICS, RELIGION, SOCIETY

• New Monster

  

  The Babadook is a horror film about loneliness. Written and directed by Jennifer Kent, it has an arthouse cinema feel to it. I missed it when it came out in... Read more

  Posted on 21 October 2021 POLITICS, RELIGION, SOCIETY

• Interview Two

  

  October turns the northern hemisphere mind toward Halloween.  It must be strange to receive northern media while living in the global south—Halloween occurs jus... Read more

  Posted on 20 October 2021 POLITICS, RELIGION, SOCIETY

• Kindred Spirit?

  

  Possession stories have a poignancy to them that perhaps other horror stories lack. The loss of self-control is a frightful thing. Read more

  Posted on 19 October 2021 POLITICS, RELIGION, SOCIETY

• Documenting Horror

  

  Watching documentaries always seems to raise questions.  I recently found A History of Horror with Mark Gatiss on YouTube. Produced by the BBC in 2010, the set... Read more

  Posted on 18 October 2021 POLITICS, RELIGION, SOCIETY

• Steel Industry

  

  It was a building on Broadway, just south of Times Square.  I don’t know the name of the building or remember what business it may have housed, but I did... Read more

  Posted on 17 October 2021 POLITICS, RELIGION, SOCIETY