Leland Renato Grigoli
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Clowning Around
It’s confusing, being an “Italian American” visiting the homeland for the first time. The culinary staples of your childhood are only available in the most touristy trattorie, and it’s honestly difficult to find that superlative meal you were promised. You… Continue reading
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Her Birthday
It’s hard, sometimes, to put things into words. I’ve been stuck for a long time on that Stoppard quote—we are forced to work in a language which makes up in obscurity that which it lacks in style. It is, I… Continue reading
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An Ambiguous Defense
One of the weirdest things I learned as a Boy Scout is that concealment in the dark is relative. That is, if you’re trying to hide in a shadow, it doesn’t actually matter how dark the spot you’re standing in… Continue reading
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Memorial Day, 2024
Two and a half years out, my writing has started to stall. There are only so many big ideas one can develop to the degree that they can be written about, after all, and I’m starting to feel like the… Continue reading
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Imagining Truth
I talk to gods, I am an atheist. But I am an artist, too, and therefore a liar. Distrust everything I say. I am telling the truth. The only truth I can understand or express is, logically defined, a lie.… Continue reading
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Defining History’s Future
For the past two years, as soon as June came around, I went into the AHA job ads database and access the data for the last year, the first step in writing the AHA’s annual report on academic hiring. For… Continue reading
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Have Etymology—Will Travel
Freelancer is a word with a clear medieval connotation—has lance, will travel—but subtly different from a knight-errant, which suggests the temporary wandering associated with a noble quest. A freelancer is a knight for hire. Its semantic range cannot now be separated… Continue reading
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We Will All Go Together When We Go
In 1973, Thomas Andrew Lehrer quit comedy because “political satire became obsolete when Henry Kissinger won the Nobel Peace Prize.” Those born after Lehrer’s retirement are likely to be familiar with him because he once sang the periodic table of elements to… Continue reading
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Will History Judge?
There’s a lot of outrage going around these days. With all the shouting heads on cable news and algorithmically encouraged doomscrolling on social media, it’s easy to get caught up in the moment. Outrage sells—or at least it gets people… Continue reading
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Huzzah for the King!
Everyone assumes that I must despise a Renaissance faire. You know, those things where a bunch of people go into a ramshackle pseudotown in the forest somewhere to dress in a variety of historical or fantasy clothes, guzzle mead, and… Continue reading
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