What Good Is Poetry? Shakespeare’s ‘Winter’ and the Hard Joys of the Season

What Good Is Poetry? Shakespeare’s ‘Winter’ and the Hard Joys of the Season
“Winter,” 1890, by Ivan Shishkin. Oil on canvas; 49.4 inches by 80.3 inches. Russian Museum. Public Domain
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The world bound up in the snow and ice of winter is as fascinating as it is forbidding.

Hoary mountains, blinding blizzards, snowy deserts, solid waters, fluid fires of the aurora borealis, and air that stings to breathe all give the distinct impression that men ought not keep company with such inhospitable presences.

Sean Fitzpatrick
Sean Fitzpatrick
Author
Sean Fitzpatrick serves on the faculty of Gregory the Great Academy, a boarding school in Elmhurst, Pa., where he teaches humanities. His writings on education, literature, and culture have appeared in a number of journals, including Crisis Magazine, Catholic Exchange, and the Imaginative Conservative.
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