Ricky Allman was born in Provo, Utah, and studied art at Utah Valley University, Massachusetts College of Art, Brown University and Rhode Island School of Design. He now teaches painting and drawing at the University…
On May 5, 2009, David S. King passed away at his home in Kensington, Maryland. He would have been ninety-two in June. David’s life was extraordinary because of his exceptional career in public service and…
On Thursday, I hosted my first Thanksgiving dinner. My brother, my sister-in-law, and my four nephews—ages twelve, nine, seven, and twenty-two months—squeezed into the little studio that I share with two cats; and we sat around my table and ate some traditional holiday fare. I had made most of the meal, but my sister-in-law brought the turkey to cook at my apartment. My brother and sister-in-law are a bit chaotic. Because I know this about them and know how much chaos is compounded when four children are involved, I knew not to believe my sister-in-law when she told me that they would arrive at my apartment at 6:00 or 7:00 A.M. to start cooking the turkey. I just went on with my cooking and finished everything I was making before they arrived about four hours late. Since they were expected at a friend’s cabin that night, we had to flash-cook the turkey so they could eat dinner and leave before it got too late.
With his poem, “The Loneliness of the Long-Distance Mormon,” R. A. (Robert Allen) Christmas, among the most flickeringly idiosyncratic lights in the Mormon literary cosmos, may have (purposely or unconsciously) described himself as a living exemplar of the poem’s evocative title. The poem’s protagonist, however, is a high priests’ quorum instructor named Melvin, who was married for fifty years to a Mormon woman before he joined the Church and took his wife to the temple—but only after realizing he was too old to continue playing tennis on Sunday.
Christopher Kimball Bigelow’s The Timeline History of Mormonism: From Premortality to the Present has the appearance of a coffee table book: It’s too large to fit in a standard bookcase, it’s brimming with eye-catching visuals,…
Why is it that so many Mormon books seem to focus on the silver lining and ignore the cloud? Mormon books—especially memoirs and biographies—would benefit from a little more time in the rumblings of the rain cloud. So many stories, characters, and ideas are shortchanged because writers or publishers, who often claim that they are simply giving the market what they want, are too quick to jump to the happy ending. Considering the narrative price that is exacted, it’s surprising that so many readers, writers, and publishers are so intent on playing Pollyanna.
John W. Welch’s CV is enough to trigger fatigue in even the most prolific of scholars. As founding director of the Foundation for Ancient Research and Mormon Studies (FARMS), Welch introduced a new generation of Mormon readers to the work of Hugh Nibley and kick-started a renewed vigor in “faithful scholarship.” He serves as editor in chief of BYU Studies and has joined with others to oversee various projects from the Encyclopedia of Mormonism to the Library of Congress conference on Joseph Smith. His publications include work on topics as diverse as the art of Minerva Teichert and biblical law. Welch is particularly famous in Mormon apologetic circles for his discovery of chiasmus in the Book of Mormon. All of these activities run parallel to his day job as Robert K. Thomas Professor of Law at BYU.
Tregan Weaver was driving home from Madison High in his little black CRX on the first warm day of spring in Rexburg, Idaho. The trees along Main Street were in blossom, the lawns were turning…
I I often went with my father on home teaching visits when I was ten and eleven. I don’t remember why his companions were never around. I suppose they were inactive. Back then, inactivity wasn’t…
Like a wine taster swirling a thin glass stem, I want
to hold the name of God on my tongue, color
my mouth wine-bibber red, let the heat run
down deep past heart and lungs. I want