What is religion, this phenomenon that we are urged by the New Atheists to consign to the dustbin of history? For them it is fundamentally a belief or set of beliefs concerning a supernatural agency that often directs them to engage in silly rituals or commit violence against those who refuse such engagement. Crane believes this view is deeply misguided. It is one that would not only be rejected by believers; it is one that should also be rejected by atheists. Rather, he says, “Religion, as I am using the word, is a systematic and practical attempt by human beings to find meaning in the world and their place in it, in terms of their relationship to something transcendent.” In seeking to understand religion we need to focus not only on the belief, but also on the meaningfulness of the practice in relation to that belief. Thus the title of his book.
Thursday, March 08, 2018
In case you wondered …
… Must Atheists Trash Religion? - Los Angeles Review of Books. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
FYI …
… Did you know Margaret Atwood wrote her first book of poems in the Sault? - SooToday.com. (Hat tip, Dan Bloom.)
Something to think on …
You won’t arrive. It is an endless search.
— Sherwood Anderson, who died on this date in 1941
Wednesday, March 07, 2018
Hear, hear …
… We’re All Fascists Now - The New York Times.
Yes, these future lawyers believe that free speech is acceptable only when it doesn’t offend them. Which is to say, they don’t believe in it at all.
Interesting review …
… Skin in the game in public services | Reform. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
For reasons of responsibility over local decisions, Taleb considers the US federated system the superior political constitution. The UK has a long way to go to achieve this level of decentralisation, however.Yes, but the federal government has been aggrandizing more and more power.
Our town …
… Hide and seek | George Hunka. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
Most books of Philadelphia history like this, boasting glamorous and unpeopled photographs of interiors and restored exteriors, concentrate on the colonial and early national eras of the 18th and early 19th century. The Hidden City authors turn their attention instead to the later 19th and early 20th centuries, finding the objects of their contemplation in churches both formal and informal; sewers and abandoned subway stations; municipal buildings, some like Philadelphia’s City Hall still abuzz with activity and some like Germantown’s Town Hall in disuse; and prisons like Eastern State and Graterford, designed on the long-abandoned idea of the panopticon as a means of moral punishment.
Hmm …
… Going Beyond the STEM Trend, Ireland Pushes Philosophy - Pacific Standard. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
Well, I guess it depends on what you mean by philosophy. I had two years of it. The grounding was scholasticism. The courses were logic, metaphysics, rational psychology, ethics, aesthetics, existentialism, and the history of philosophy. The textbooks for the metaphysics course were Avery Dulles's Introduction to Metaphysics and William Luipen's Existential Phenomenogy (the latter has proved a major influence on my thinking). Most important was the teacher of the courses in logic, metaphysics, aesthetics and existentialism. Edward Gannon, S.J. is who I studied philosophy under, and that made all the difference.
I didn't know, by the way, that Berkeley, Calif., was named after George Berkeley. Meaning, of course, that we are mispronouncing it.
Well, I guess it depends on what you mean by philosophy. I had two years of it. The grounding was scholasticism. The courses were logic, metaphysics, rational psychology, ethics, aesthetics, existentialism, and the history of philosophy. The textbooks for the metaphysics course were Avery Dulles's Introduction to Metaphysics and William Luipen's Existential Phenomenogy (the latter has proved a major influence on my thinking). Most important was the teacher of the courses in logic, metaphysics, aesthetics and existentialism. Edward Gannon, S.J. is who I studied philosophy under, and that made all the difference.
I didn't know, by the way, that Berkeley, Calif., was named after George Berkeley. Meaning, of course, that we are mispronouncing it.
Something to think on …
What comes after is not always progress.
— Alessandro Manzoni, born on this date in 1785
Tuesday, March 06, 2018
An authentic man …
… Civil liberties: Mario Vargas Llosa: “Political correctness is the enemy of freedom” | In English | EL PAÍS.
Elites who defend regimes they would never put up with… Bertrand Russell, for example, defended very noble causes and was a very admirable person in many ways but at the same time he defended dreadful things and allowed himself to be manipulated by the left who had no respect for his work or ideas and had not even read them. How do you explain the contradiction? Unfortunately, intelligence is not a guarantee of intellectual honesty.
What he should do …
… is resign and go into therapy: Democratic Governor Painted Polar Bear on a Collage to Deal With Stress of Trump News.
Who needs a Gov. Nutcase?
More books!
Richard Thaler, who has just been awarded the 2017 Nobel Prize for Economic Sciences, is considered one of the founding fathers of behavioral economics. When the University of Chicago professor sat down with MarketWatch to talk about his own research, why humans don’t behave the way economists say they should and his book “Misbehaving,” we asked him for reading recommendations.
Interesting picks …
… David Mamet's 6 favorite books with amazing dialogue. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
Bramah, especially, seems worth looking into.
Beware the "Big Story" …
… Civilisations and the undiscovered self – Mark Vernon.
What doesn’t occur to Harari is that these presumed fabrications must, also, apply to the story he is telling. He’s using language, too, so why should the science he celebrates be any less deluded than the information our ancestors transmitted? Why mightn’t it not be just the latest evolutionary adaptation, with the production of technology acting as social glue for us much as the building of temples is presumed to have acted as social glue for our ancestors?
Hmm …
… When Catholics Criticize the Pope | Dan Hitchens | First Things. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
Even if the pope does not intend the present doctrinal confusion, it still calls for an urgent remedy. Leo XIII was speaking out of a well-established tradition when he quoted an ancient warning: “There can be nothing more dangerous than those heretics who admit nearly the whole cycle of doctrine, and yet by one word, as with a drop of poison, infect the real and simple faith taught by our Lord and handed down by Apostolic tradition.”My own loyalty is to God, who I am sure will resolve these matters in good time.
Not who you might think …
… Who’s the Greatest Songwriter of All Time? | The American Spectator. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
In praise of P.G.-osis …
… Frivolous, Empty, and Perfectly Delightful. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
The comic touches that bedizen Wodehouse’s prose are one of its chief delights. A drunken character is described as “brilliantly illuminated.” An overweight baronet “looks forward to a meal that sticks to the ribs and brings beads of perspiration to the forehead.” A woman supposed to marry that same stout gentleman has the uneasy feeling that, so large is he, she might be “committing bigamy.” A minor character “has a small and revolting mustache,” another “is so crooked he sliced bread with a corkscrew.” Wodehouse spun jokes out of clichés. His similes are notably striking. A man known to be unable to keep secrets is likened to “a human collander.” Another character is “as broke as the Ten Commandments.” The brains of the press departments of the movie studios resemble “soup at a cheap restaurant. It is wiser not to stir them.” These similes often arise when least expected: “The drowsy stillness of the afternoon was shattered by what sounded to his strained senses like G.K. Chesterton falling on a sheet of tin.” There is a passing reference to “a politician’s trained verbosity,” a phrase I find handy whenever watching a contemporary politician interviewed on television. Like Jimmy Durante with jokes, so P.G. Wodehouse with arrestingly amusing phrases—he had a million of ’em.
Something to think on …
Let woman out of the home, let man into it, should be the aim of education. The home needs man, and the world outside needs woman.
— Pearl S. Buck, who died on this date in 1973
Monday, March 05, 2018
No surprise here …
…NYT's Nicholas Kristof Would Flunk an 8th Grade Science Test | American Council on Science and Health.
The real problem is that the New York Times has only one editorial standard: To publish whatever sells more copies to their Upper West Side clientele. That means throwing biotechnology and chemistry under the bus while embracing organic food, acupuncture, and other forms of witchcraft.
Running on empty …
… The Age of Travesties | City Journal.
Leading universities have turned themselves into hybrids of Mr. Rogers’ neighborhood and Mao’s Red Guards. They have become madrassas of identity politics, given over to dogmatism, indoctrination, the coddling of grievance, and the encouragement and manipulation of neurotic youthful insecurities for the purpose of consolidating political power. The effects of travesties being committed on American campuses, where the mind of the hard Left is embedded in faculties, administrations, and boards of overseers, will be felt for generations. The damage may be irreparable.
FYI …
MAKING POEMS THAT LAST – March – April 2018
A POETRY WORKSHOP WITH LEONARD GONTAREK
ENROLLMENT IS LIMITED / Sign Up In Advance
Reserve a place in the class via: gontarek9@earthlink.net
While there’s no guarantee you’ll become the next Robert Frost, with the guidance of award-winning, prolific poet Leonard Gontarek, it’s at least a possibility. Encouraging students to explore as many avenues as possible and remove themselves from their work, he’ll help you find—then strengthen—your style and voice.
Philadelphia Weekly, Nicole Finkbiner
The workshop will include discussions of contemporary and international
poetry, translation, the students’ poetry, and the realities of publishing poetry.
Narrative, persona, political, homage, and confessional poetry will be
covered with a focus on what makes a poet’s voice original and their own.
Specific direction and assignments will be given, with attention
to the basic elements and forms of poetry.
Through invention students will build more accurate and textured work.
The workshop will be presented in six 2-hour classes,
All Saturdays, 11 AM to 1 PM: March 10, 17, 24, 31, April 7, 14.
The cost is 144 dollars for 6 classes.
24 dollars per class. You may pay as you go. Sign up in advance.
Please contact Leonard Gontarek with interest: gontarek9@earthlink.net,
215.808.9507 – Independent workshops and manuscript editing available.
Location: 4221 Osage Avenue in West Philadelphia.
Leonard Poem here:
https://voxpopulisphere.com/
Leonard Poem here:
http://www.cleavermagazine.
Leonard Poem here:
http://www.versedaily.org/
Leonard reading Promise:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?
Leonard Gontarek is the author of six books of poems:
St. Genevieve Watching Over Paris, Van Morrison Can’t Find His Feet,
Zen For Beginners, Déjà Vu Diner, He Looked Beyond My Faults
and Saw My Needs, and Take Your Hand Out of My Pocket, Shiva
(Hanging Loose Press, 2016) – Available from Small Press Distribution & Amazon.
His poems have appeared in American Poetry Review, Field, Poet Lore,
Verse, Handsome, Fence, Blackbird, The Awl, Poetry Northwest,
and in the anthologies, The Best American Poetry, The Working Poet,
and Joyful Noise: American Spiritual Poetry. He has received five
Pushcart Prize nominations and twice received poetry fellowships
from the Pennsylvania Council On The Arts.
He was the 2011 Philadelphia Literary Death Match Champion.
He coordinates The Philadelphia Poetry Festival, Peace/Works: Poetry Readings
for Peace, and the Green Line Café Reading and Interview Series.
Since 2006 he has conducted 1000 poetry workshops in venues including,
The Moonstone Arts Center, Musehouse, The Kelly Writers House,
University City Arts League, Free Library of Philadelphia,
Mad Poets Society, Philadelphia Arts in Education Partnership,
and a weekly Saturday workshop from his home in West Philadelphia.
In 2014 he created the first Philly Poetry Day. He was recipient of
the Philadelphia Writers Conference Community Service Award in 2014.
In 2015, his poem, 37 Photos From The Bridge, was a Poetry winner for the Big Bridges
MotionPoems project and the basis for the winning film from the Big Bridges poetry
film contest sponsored by MotionPoems and the Weisman Art Museum in Minneapolis.
Take Your Hand Out Of My Pocket, Shiva, by Leonard Gontarek.
Available from:
Small Press Distribution
800.869.7553
spd@spdbooks.org
spdbooks.org
Hanging Loose Press
347.227.8215
print225@aol.com
hangingloosepress.com
“This is a book of human hungers so exact in its recognitions it leaves a reader stricken with a sense not just of how detailed our desires are, but how rare it is to have them articulated in ways yet unspoken. 'In my poor country, we poured sugar/ on everything to not notice our hunger,' Leonard Gontarek writes, but where that coat of sweetening fails, this poet stays to record what is still needed, what is still hungry, what is still so very, and beautifully, human.”
—Katie Ford, author of Blood Lyrics and Colosseum
“With its spare language, dry wit, and unnerving honesty, Gontarek's latest book delivers a sucker punch of solitude and desire. Here is a voice that offers no simple solutions to the whirl of the universe, but instead stands next to you and points out the small essential thing you forgot to notice. Deliberate, bare, and infused with a searing humor, these poems hiss and bloom at the same time.”
—Ada Limón, author of Bright Dead Things and Sharks in the River
A POETRY WORKSHOP WITH LEONARD GONTAREK
ENROLLMENT IS LIMITED / Sign Up In Advance
Reserve a place in the class via: gontarek9@earthlink.net
While there’s no guarantee you’ll become the next Robert Frost, with the guidance of award-winning, prolific poet Leonard Gontarek, it’s at least a possibility. Encouraging students to explore as many avenues as possible and remove themselves from their work, he’ll help you find—then strengthen—your style and voice.
Philadelphia Weekly, Nicole Finkbiner
The workshop will include discussions of contemporary and international
poetry, translation, the students’ poetry, and the realities of publishing poetry.
Narrative, persona, political, homage, and confessional poetry will be
covered with a focus on what makes a poet’s voice original and their own.
Specific direction and assignments will be given, with attention
to the basic elements and forms of poetry.
Through invention students will build more accurate and textured work.
The workshop will be presented in six 2-hour classes,
All Saturdays, 11 AM to 1 PM: March 10, 17, 24, 31, April 7, 14.
The cost is 144 dollars for 6 classes.
24 dollars per class. You may pay as you go. Sign up in advance.
Please contact Leonard Gontarek with interest: gontarek9@earthlink.net,
215.808.9507 – Independent workshops and manuscript editing available.
Location: 4221 Osage Avenue in West Philadelphia.
Leonard Poem here:
https://voxpopulisphere.com/
Leonard Poem here:
http://www.cleavermagazine.
Leonard Poem here:
http://www.versedaily.org/
Leonard reading Promise:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?
Leonard Gontarek is the author of six books of poems:
St. Genevieve Watching Over Paris, Van Morrison Can’t Find His Feet,
Zen For Beginners, Déjà Vu Diner, He Looked Beyond My Faults
and Saw My Needs, and Take Your Hand Out of My Pocket, Shiva
(Hanging Loose Press, 2016) – Available from Small Press Distribution & Amazon.
His poems have appeared in American Poetry Review, Field, Poet Lore,
Verse, Handsome, Fence, Blackbird, The Awl, Poetry Northwest,
and in the anthologies, The Best American Poetry, The Working Poet,
and Joyful Noise: American Spiritual Poetry. He has received five
Pushcart Prize nominations and twice received poetry fellowships
from the Pennsylvania Council On The Arts.
He was the 2011 Philadelphia Literary Death Match Champion.
He coordinates The Philadelphia Poetry Festival, Peace/Works: Poetry Readings
for Peace, and the Green Line Café Reading and Interview Series.
Since 2006 he has conducted 1000 poetry workshops in venues including,
The Moonstone Arts Center, Musehouse, The Kelly Writers House,
University City Arts League, Free Library of Philadelphia,
Mad Poets Society, Philadelphia Arts in Education Partnership,
and a weekly Saturday workshop from his home in West Philadelphia.
In 2014 he created the first Philly Poetry Day. He was recipient of
the Philadelphia Writers Conference Community Service Award in 2014.
In 2015, his poem, 37 Photos From The Bridge, was a Poetry winner for the Big Bridges
MotionPoems project and the basis for the winning film from the Big Bridges poetry
film contest sponsored by MotionPoems and the Weisman Art Museum in Minneapolis.
Take Your Hand Out Of My Pocket, Shiva, by Leonard Gontarek.
Available from:
Small Press Distribution
800.869.7553
spd@spdbooks.org
spdbooks.org
Hanging Loose Press
347.227.8215
print225@aol.com
hangingloosepress.com
“This is a book of human hungers so exact in its recognitions it leaves a reader stricken with a sense not just of how detailed our desires are, but how rare it is to have them articulated in ways yet unspoken. 'In my poor country, we poured sugar/ on everything to not notice our hunger,' Leonard Gontarek writes, but where that coat of sweetening fails, this poet stays to record what is still needed, what is still hungry, what is still so very, and beautifully, human.”
—Katie Ford, author of Blood Lyrics and Colosseum
“With its spare language, dry wit, and unnerving honesty, Gontarek's latest book delivers a sucker punch of solitude and desire. Here is a voice that offers no simple solutions to the whirl of the universe, but instead stands next to you and points out the small essential thing you forgot to notice. Deliberate, bare, and infused with a searing humor, these poems hiss and bloom at the same time.”
—Ada Limón, author of Bright Dead Things and Sharks in the River
Hmm …
… The Unlikely Pulp Fiction Illustrations of Edward Hopper | Literary Hub. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
Too bad for Hopper that he didn't understand that a professional follows the advice of Ecclesisastes: “Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might.”
In case you wondered …
… What do I mean by Skin in the Game? My Own Version – INCERTO – Medium. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
Alas, you can detect the degradation of the aesthetics of buildings when architects are judged by other architects. So the current rebellion against bureaucrats whether in DC or Brussels simply comes from the public detection of a simple principle: the more micro the more visible one’s skills. To use the language of complexity theory, expertise is scale dependent. And, ironically, the more complex the world becomes, the more the role of macro-deciders “empty suits” with disproportionate impact should be reduced: we should decentralize (so actions are taken locally and visibly), not centralize as we have been doing.
Anniversary …
… Informal Inquiries (2nd edition): Charlotte Bronte writes a “Dear John” letter.
When I read Wuthering Heights in my teens and then came upon some of her poetry (especially "No Coward Soul Is Mine") I actually had a crush on Emily Brontë.
I've reviewed a number of literary biographies, but I tend to want to get at authors through their work.
When I read Wuthering Heights in my teens and then came upon some of her poetry (especially "No Coward Soul Is Mine") I actually had a crush on Emily Brontë.
I've reviewed a number of literary biographies, but I tend to want to get at authors through their work.
Vintage appreciation …
… The Strength of Robert Frost | commentary. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
Frost could be very puritanical about the celebrated; all he would say about Faulkner, after they had gone down to Latin America together on a cultural mission for the State Department, was that the novelist was “intemperate.” If the listener took this as an unexpressed suggestion about Faulkner's novels—Frost had a poet's disapproval of fiction anyway as lacking true style—Frost would not exert himself to limit the criticism. He had the almost physical repulsion of other temperaments that often, not always, comes with very powerful imaginative capacity.
Worrisome …
… Charles Bukowski’s Posthumous Poetry: As the Spirit Wanes, Shit Happens - Los Angeles Review of Books. (Hat tip, Rus Bowden.)
The examples provided certainly indicate to me that Bukowski's originals are better by far.
Desolation, no …
… On Poetry: Overcoming desolation with humanity | Local News | record-eagle.com. (Hat tip, Rus Bowden.)
RIP …
… Poet Diana Der-Hovanessian Passed Away - The Armenian Mirror-Spectator. (Hat tip, Rus Bowden.)
Hmm …
… A Nation of Iagos | City Journal. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
Having lived out the struggle between race and culture, on the one hand, and faith and self-determination, on the other, I can report that I have not encountered any mysterious racial quality in me inherently at odds with the transformative joy of my Christian conversion. If anything, I never felt truly connected to my “Jewish roots” until I was baptized. I have encountered people—Jew and non-Jew alike—who are angry that I did what I did, who feel I owe some debt to their idea of how a Jew ought to behave. I have always managed to ignore them. But then, I grew up at a time when my race, my Semitism, was said not to matter. Most people have been more than willing to allow my soul to make its own journey in its own way.
Something to think on …
Childhood is not a state which only applies to the first phase of our lives in the biological sense. Rather it is a basic condition which is always appropriate to a life that is lived aright.
— Karl Rahner, born on this date in 1904
Raymond Carver
In my continued effort to read more short stories, I've recently finished What We Talk About When We Talk About Love, Raymond Carver's exceptional collection of vignettes focused on the darker corners of American life.
Let me say up front just how much I enjoyed Carver's prose. I'd read Cathedral several years ago, but Talk About Love is better: it's that much more crisp, that much more refined. Sure, there's that element of the unspoken, but Carver doesn't lean too heavily on this. Instead, he writes about what he sees -- and what he sees is painful, indeed.
For me, several of the stories here read as the literary equivalent of an Edward Hopper painting: there's sorrow, isolation, and grief. And more: there's loneliness, a real sense that, despite our best efforts, we're bound to miss the mark, to say and do what we'll come to regret.
My favorite stories in Talk About Love are those like 'So Much Water' and 'The Third Thing' -- stories that paint a picture, that balance context with implication to render something true. So many of these stories were a revelation: an unyielding view into common experience.
Carver has achieved something special here, I think, and his contribution to American letters cannot be in doubt. This is masterful stuff.
Oscars edition...
James Ivory won Best Adapted Screenplay for 'Call Me By Your Name'. My take on the film and the book from earlier this year: Book versus movie: Gay romance ‘Call Me By Your Name’ shimmers on the page and screen
'Icarus' won Best Documentary Feature. My review of the film: Sport for Scandal
Sunday, March 04, 2018
Hmm …
… Informal Inquiries (2nd edition): Shakespeare’s Philosophy (2006).
Shakespeare was 28 when Montaigne died. The first edition of Florio’s English translation of Montaigne’s essays came out in 1603. It is altogether likely that Shakespeare read those essays. A healthy skepticism of reason’s works and pomps characterizes the outlook of both essayist and playwright. I think that in Montaigne Shakespeare found a kindred spirit.
Q&A …
… A Writer and His Character Discover a Family’s Stolen Past. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
I had greater ambitions for this novel, and I was also excavating some personal stuff that I wasn’t in a hurry to delve into. I wanted something deeper and (dare I say it) more lasting. For my first book, I was in a hurry, and I’d felt like I’d allowed “good enough” to be good enough. I was determined not to settle this time.
Together at last …
… Consider the Lilies: John Cournos, Anna Akhmatova, and H.D. – Boris Dralyuk. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
Q&A …
… How Emily Wilson Translated ‘The Odyssey’ – Chicago Review of Books. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
Intimate engagement with an imaginative text is about far more than just gender, though gender definitely matters. But in fact, since I wasn’t looking at any other translations while I worked on the Greek and my own version, I didn’t really know whether (or if so, how exactly) the text I was creating was different from those created by men. It was only at the end, once I was done with my version and had to explain to the general public what was distinctive about it, that I went and looked closely at various scenes in other translations—and realized that there are some very significant differences that do have to do with gender. For instance, as I’ve discussed before, I don’t import misogynistic language (like “sluts” and “whores”) where the original doesn’t have it, but—as I was shocked to discover—many translations by men indeed do this, even those which are touted for being “faithful.” I also, for example, don’t make the goddess Calypso seem ridiculous—but I discovered that most male translators work very hard to present her as a hysterical, absurd “nymph” whose frustrated sexual desire is essentially laughable. The Greek doesn’t do this, and nor do I. I didn’t know it was even a thing to avoid, until I looked at the other translations.
Something to think on …
The art of writing is to explain the complications of the human soul with the simplicity that can be universally understood.
— Alan Sillitoe, born on this date 1928
Saturday, March 03, 2018
Poetry and narrative …
… Book review: The Long Take, by Robin Robertson - The Scotsman. (Hat tip, Rus Bowden.)
Nearly 230 pages long, it follows Walker, a veteran of D-Day who grew up in Nova Scotia, from 1946 to 1953. Instead of returning to Canada, his journey takes him from New York (where he works in the docks), to Los Angeles and San Francisco. He becomes a journalist with two especial interests, being on the “City Desk” – urban regeneration and homelessness. It is clear from the outset that Walker is a damaged individual, and part of the momentum of the poem is a quest for redemption, of being able to put himself back together after witnessing and committing atrocities.
Mystery again …
… The Atheist’s Imagination | Mark Bauerlein | First Things.
… Pinker’s God has no mystery. He’s a do-gooder or a do-nothing. (Secularists don’t assert an evil God—that would be even more superstitious than a good God.) But Christians know that God is, in full, unknowable, and a day of intense suffering is at the center of their worship.
Star turn for an archivist …
… ‘Golden Exits’ wants to bring archivists out of the stacks | The Outline. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
Golden Exits deserves some credit for being the most archive-centric film in a long time, possibly ever. There have been bookstore salesgirls, art gallery assistants, publishing assistants, and, of course, librarians, but archive assistants are much rarer. Here, the adventure comes from the aura of mystery around Naomi. She describes herself as “transient,” and her motives with men and interest in the archive field are opaque. Naomi swoops into Nick’s life, and suddenly makes archive work look like a perfect piece of precious Brooklyn hipsterdom. The specific material is far less important than the atmosphere of the archive itself, as the archive is a convenient space for establishing sexual tension. It’s small and intimate, and right near Nick’s chicly bohemian apartment. “You like routine,” Naomi observes of Nick at one point. It’s obvious she’s there to shake it up.
Does this interview about fake news etc. make sense?
It doesn’t to me. At all. Ironic at least because it’s supposed to be about effective communications.
Hmm …
… The Ultimate Paradox of Divine Creation - Maverick Philosopher: Strictly Philosophical. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
Is divine creation a mystery or an impossibility?I would opt for mystery. As for the solution to the paradox, if by that one means an understanding of it by means of finite that may well be an impossibility.
Masterwork …
… Willa Cather, Pioneer. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
… Cather was right—My Ántonia is a queer book, flickering with darkness and light, a true representation of its time, both in terms of wisdom and in terms of ignorance.One of the takeaways from Nassim Nicholas Taleb's The Black Swan is that to understand the past it is necessary to reconstruct what the people at the time did not know.
Odd couplng …
… The Waste Land & Art: An Intriguing Jumble | by Jenny Uglow | NYR Daily | The New York Review of Books. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
“Journeys with ‘The Waste Land’” tries, perhaps too hard, to embrace that multiplicity. Its origins are interesting. Three years ago, to commemorate Eliot’s stay, thirty-five local volunteers formed the Waste Land Research Group. Together, they read the poem, planned the exhibition, chose the artworks and the organization of the show. Defying Eliot’s “I can connect/ Nothing with nothing,” they were determined, instead, to build connections. This does not altogether work.
Uneasy dinner …
… Salamander Magazine | a magazine for poetry, fiction, & memoirs. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
Profile …
… Critic turned author James Wood: ‘Sometimes I think I’ve lost my nerve. I’m not slaying people anymore’ | Books | The Guardian. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
The 52-year-old, who lives in Boston with his wife, the novelist Claire Messud, and their two teenage children, describes himself as naturally “buoyant”, a disposition in evidence at a cafe in New York. Wood is in the city to teach a masterclass at Columbia University, a duty he combines with being a book critic at the New Yorker and professor of the practice of literary criticism at Harvard. It is a life of satisfying intellectual endeavour and no small public acclaim, but even as a boy, says Wood – the son of two teachers who struggled, in an act of what he has called “financial insanity”, to send Wood to Eton – he displayed an essential cheerfulness that others in his family decisively lacked; it’s a concern of Upstate, his second novel and seventh book, to consider where the roots of these variants lie.
Something to think on …
And, as I have said, it's made me think twice about the imagination. If the spirits aren't external, how astonishing the mediums become! Victor Hugo said of his voices that they were like his own mental powers multiplied by five.
— James Merrill, born on this date in 1926
Friday, March 02, 2018
David Cornwell on writing and as John Le Carre
STEVE KROFT: Well, I take the fact that you're still giving interviews that you're aging better than you thought you would.
JOHN LE CARRÉ: I think that's perfectly true. Each book feels like my last book. And then I think, like a dedicated alcoholic, that one more won't do me any harm.
David Cornwell's not a functioning alcoholic but he's created a stable full of imperfect characters over the years as John le Carré, a name he does not answer to. It's an abstraction that exists in his writing studio, and on the cover of his books, like a spy's name on a phony passport.
Blogging note …
I am off to attend a memorial service for an old friend. Blogging on my part will resume sometime later.
Appreciation …
… In Praise of Anita Brookner - The New York Times. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
The prevailing criticism of Brookner is that her work is repetitive. There are concerns she returns to: the single woman who wishes not to be, the dutiful daughter overwhelmed by filial obligation, the family that is not unhappy but not quite happy. I find such intelligence and vitality in her books that it does not bother me that they amount to variations on a theme. Repetition is part of the particular pleasure; the books’ familiarity, as well as the cunning with which the author pushes herself to reinvent the form she’s chosen as her own.
Something to think on …
Attack another's rights and you destroy your own.
— John Jay Chapman, born on this date in 1862
Thursday, March 01, 2018
A review ...
Of A Primer for Poets and Readers of Poetry. By Gregory Orr. From The WaPo:
Poems are “turbulently alive with the disorder that plagues or exalts us,” and when we order our words, we create an expressive but stable structure.
Orr, who has published a dozen books of poems and has taught for more than 40 years at the University of Virginia, guides readers through classic poems and writing exercises he has used with his own students. The implication is clear: Anyone can learn to understand poetry because the impulse to engage with it has been passed down through generations.
But Orr addresses the experienced writer, too. As the book progresses, he explains the necessity of writing to the “threshold” where disorder and order meet, intensifying the sense of being alive and placing lyric poetry under the pressure of telling a story. He also shows how writers can use various poetic tools and determine where their poems begin and end as part of the revision process.
Trapping Bears
By now, he's used to the hitch schedule (10 days on, four off), knows all the trap site safety protocols (truck always pointed toward the way out, the doors always wide open in case you need a quick getaway), and can stand the smell of bear bait (mostly roadkill). He's used to horseback rides into Yellowstone's backcountry, long drives up rough forest roads and bear encounters don't scare him as much as the average person — he called it a "controlled fear."By the way the dictionary has both bear and bears as the plural, and the linked article has both interchangeably.
Getting at the pith of things …
… A Man Of Many Masks: La Rochefoucauld's Maxims. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
La Rochefoucauld is a clever, careful writer. But before one can understand him rationally, I think, one must feel him viscerally; or rather, strive to experience and judge the veracity of his observations as they reflect against one's own soul.
Q&A …
… No Longer With Us | Naim Attallah Online. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
Are there any objective, or at least non-subjective, criteria for beauty?
Yes, I think there are. The French, after all, have Versailles, and they have so many marvelous buildings which are perfectly proportioned in every sort of style. They have the classical tradition of remarkable taste, but unfortunately, as soon as the petite bourgeoisie takes over, then it becomes grotesque. French taste has gone down the drain. Even their painting is now very poor. Only think what they used to be in the eighteenth century. The whole question of taste is very difficult because taste is so personal, so private a thing, but I think that a person who has a certain classical education is entitled to some say in matters of taste. Classical education is the background. I’m afraid there is also natural bad taste, and bad taste is more general than good taste. When I see the garish, the obvious, the bright, the sexy, all of that appals, alas.
Roundup …
… Poetry by Evie Shockley, Nicole Sealey, James Crews - San Francisco Chronicle. (Hat tip, Rus Bowden,.)
Grim anniversary …
… Informal Inquiries (2nd edition): Witch hunting begins in Salem in 1692.
Once you accept the theory of Original Sin this sort of thing — and much else besides — makes sense.
In case you wondered …
… Joy veh | David Baddiel on the history of Jewish comedy. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
To come back, then, to what appeared to be a passing, but was not, point about the afterlife: Christianity, and most other religions, are all in the clouds, in the great hereafter – Judaism tends to concentrate on the here and now, and indeed its rules. But in minutiae, there is humanity: it is in reaching after the grandiose things in life that civilization gets skewed. To be microscopic, comically, is to create engagement: these people, the joke says, are like you, because like you, they sweat the small stuff.I guess Don Adams makes it, because his father was Jewish, But he was raised in his mother's Catholic faith and had a Catholic funeral.
Unusual …
… Man stabbed and bit neighbour over 'incessantly' reciting poetry - Independent.ie. (Hat tip, Rus Bowden.)
Something to think on …
America is woven of many strands. I would recognise them and let it so remain. Our fate is to become one, and yet many. This is not prophecy, but description.
— Ralph Ellison, born on this date in 1914
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