Jeffrey Bilbro is an Associate Professor of English at Grove City College. He grew up in the mountainous state of Washington and earned his B.A. in Writing and Literature from George Fox University in Oregon and his Ph.D. in English from Baylor University. His books include Words for Conviviality: Media Technologies and Practices of Hope, Reading the Times: A Literary and Theological Inquiry into the News, Loving God’s Wildness: The Christian Roots of Ecological Ethics in American Literature, Wendell Berry and Higher Education: Cultivating Virtues of Place (written with Jack Baker), and Virtues of Renewal: Wendell Berry’s Sustainable Forms.
Jeffrey Bilbro
Articles by Jeffrey Bilbro
George Herbert, Simone Weil, and Front Porches
“What a Famous Poet Can Teach Rural Pastors.” Stephen Witmer looks at George Herbert’s classic and asks, “what if we were to read Country Parson for its original purpose: as a guide…
Learning to Read “the Book in Front of Us”
As the fall semester looms, the minutia of meetings and syllabi revisions threatens to drain the excitement from my impending return to the classroom. As a way of warding off…
Educating Nones, Water, and Killing Umps
“5 Questions with Gracy Olmstead.” Gracy Olmstead talks about rural communities, seasonal rhythms, and more. “Inhabiting Memories and Landscapes.” Brecon Cathedral in Wales is hosting a conference next summer on…
Air Conditioning, Modern Friendship, and Rooftop Farming
“The Great Land Robbery.” In the Atlantic, Vann R. Newkirk II narrates a tragic story about black land ownership in the Mississippi Delta. Between racist lending practices, global commodity markets,…
Addictive Technology, Land Use, and Saving the Amazon
Most of my reading time this week went to poring over proofs for the first issue of the FPR print journal. We should have copies fresh from the press at…
Beyond Capitalism, National Conservatism, and Millennial Nuns
“Going Home with Wendell Berry.” Amanda Petrusich corresponded with Berry and then spent two days in Port Royal continuing their conversation. The result is a rich and wise conversation in…
Convenience, Abortion, and Friendship
I’ll be taking a break from the internet for a couple of weeks to recreate (and to get some writing done). I’m not sure when I’ll resume these weekly Water…
Plastic, Local Feasting, and Family Farms
“Book Review: Dignity by Chris Arnade.” Jake Meador uses Patrick Deneen’s recent work to frame a reading of Arnade’s photographs and stories. In a book that does not shy away…
Pelagians, Lithium Mines, and Progressive Occultism
“The Politics of Dystopia.” Ross Douthat seems to be thinking about Deneen’s book these days: “On right and left, it has become easier to imagine ways the liberal order might…
“Free America,” Work Colleges, and Seeds
“The Small and the Human, and ‘Free America’.” The University Bookman ran an excerpt from Allan C. Carlson’s forthcoming book, Land, True Liberty & Democracy: The Story of ‘Free America.’ It narrates the story…
Mythical Mammals, College Libraries, and David French-ism
“More Than Mildly Amusing.” I heartily second Elizabeth Bittner’s recommendation of Mr. Mehan’s Mildly Amusing Mythical Mammals; it’s a children’s book that rewards re-readings, and the glossary combines wit and wisdom. “How…
What Are People For? Control or Love?
The arguments that Deneen and Shatzer advance are really two sides of the same coin; as one interpreter of Marshall McLuhan put it, “We make our tools, and then our…
A Hidden Life, Carbon Credits, and the American Solidarity Party
“Has Our Food Become Safer in the Last 10 Years?” Four experts discuss food safety regulations, consolidation, and local food systems for Civil Eats. “Starting Seeds.” Darby Weaver surveys some of…
Back Row America, Marilynne Robinson, and Peter Maurin
“Our Unsexy Future.” Joseph Bottum reviews Hacking Darwin: Genetic Engineering and the Future of Humanity by Jamie Metzl, drawing attention to “an underappreciated principle of any new technology as it starts to…
Underrating Humans, John Lukacs, and the Digital Town Square
“James Matthew Wilson on What Poetry Is, and Isn’t.” Mary Spencer interviews James Matthew Wilson for National Review about his work as a poet. “Are Robots Really Coming for Your Job?” Bill…
Aaron Wolf, Kansas, and a Treasonous Meritocrat?
“‘It’s a Groundswell’: The Farmers Fighting to Save the Earth’s Soil.” Matthew Taylor reports for The Guardian on how no-till farming, or “conservation agriculture” can help to improve soil health. On Easter,…
Underland, 737 Max, and Earth Day
“What Lies Beneath: Robert Macfarlane Travels ‘Underland.’” Robert Macfarlane writes about his new book and the subterranean journeys it traces. “Wendell Berry, Wes Jackson and David Kline.” Listen to the…
Salvaging: Boat Trailers, T.S. Eliot, and Resurrection
I do not know much about gods; but I think that the river Is a strong brown god— . . . Unhonoured, unpropitiated By worshippers of the machine, but waiting,…
English Land Ownership, The Overstory, and Artificial Intelligence
“Winning the Peace.” Part reflection on C.S. Lewis’s “Learning in War-Time” and part a response to Alan Jacobs’s The Year of Our Lord 1943, Christopher Beha’s Harper’s essay is an excellent defense of…
Madeleine L’Engle, Slow Media, and Populism
“A Flourishing Tree.” Tamara Hill Murphy reviews Placemaker: Cultivating Places of Comfort, Beauty, and Peace by Christie Purifoy, a book that circles “round and round the subject of finding, losing, and making…
Monsanto, the Heartland Forum, and Becoming Creaturely
“The Center Holds.” Nicole M. King reviews The Midwestern Moment: The Forgotten World of Early Twentieth-Century Midwestern Regionalism, 1880-1940, edited by Jon K. Lauck, for the University Bookman. The table of contents…
The Table, Topsoil, and the Midwest
Plough Quarterly No. 20: The Welcome Table. The Spring issue of Plough Quarterly is online and has many essays of interest to Porchers. To mention just a few, Norman Wirzba writes about hospitality…
Dairy Farmers, Nebraska, and the Common Good
"Sealed in Blood: Aristopopulism and the City of Man.” Susannah Black wrote a small book in response to Patrick Deneen’s recent talk on aristopopulism. It’s quite rich and merits slow,…
Caretaking, Decadence, and Widow Places
“Caretaking.” There are many gems in this conversation between Wendell Berry and Helena Norberg-Hodge in Orion Magazine. Here’s one from Berry: My quarrel with “movements,” and the reason I use it…