January 2012
21 posts
1 tag
Jan 27th
2 notes
1 tag
ListenSpiritualized - “200 Bars” Lazer...
Jan 26th
1 tag
Jan 25th
1 tag
Jan 25th
2 notes
1 tag
“If a man have neither wife nor other to rule his household, know you how it is...”
– St. Bernardino
Jan 24th
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Sent from F. Scott Fitzgerald to his young... →
Things to worry about: Worry about courage Worry about cleanliness Worry about efficiency Worry about horsemanship Things not to worry about: Don’t worry about popular opinion Don’t worry about dolls
Jan 23rd
1 tag
“He who does not turn up the earth with the plough ought to write the parchment...”
– St. Ferreol
Jan 21st
1 tag
Jan 21st
1 tag
Jan 21st
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ListenThe Beatles - “I Feel Fine...
Jan 20th
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Jan 19th
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“He made no pretentions to botany, and knew nothing of groups or classification;...”
– Les Miserables
Jan 17th
1 tag
The Food of the Gods (H.G. Wells, 1904)
One of Wells’ lesser-known works, The Food of the Gods is an enjoyable but perplexing book. The premise is simple enough: a pair of scientists invent a substance that causes life to grow much larger than normal, the explanation being that growth is naturally punctuated because of the sporadic presence of this substance, which if supplied artificially causes continual expansion. A neat and...
Jan 15th
1 tag
“For conduct which to clearer minds seems merely sane, was in those days to be...”
– Olaf Stapledon, Last and First Men
Jan 6th
1 tag
ListenClams Casino - “What You Doin”...
Jan 5th
1 note
1 tag
Vocabulary: Kimmering Clachan Edition
Scots words and phrases from The Private Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified Sinner braird: the early shoots of a crop of grain like wheat or barley luckpenny: a sort of discount given to a buyer for luck windelstrae: a stalk of dry grass bicker: wooden drinking vessel wynd: a narrow alley (i.e. wind) aumuse: a cap worn by clergy ayont: beside or adjacent to bourock: a hovel or shelter...
Jan 5th
1 tag
Jan 4th
1 tag
The Private Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified...
This interesting book was put in my hands by a good friend whose literary suggestions are sound without exception. It is not, as the title may suggest, a tell-all like Pepys’ diaries, or even, really, a private memoir at all. It’s a striking early example of nontraditional narrative structure, predating many other adventurous novels and reportedly inspiring Stevenson’s Jekyll...
Jan 4th
1 tag
“Did I exist before my birth? No. Shall I, after my death? No. What am I? A...”
– Les Miserables
Jan 4th
1 tag
Jan 4th
1 tag
Jan 4th
1 note
December 2011
20 posts
1 tag
Dec 21st
1 tag
“One generation abandons the enterprises of another like stranded vessels.”
– Thoreau, Walden
Dec 18th
1 tag
Dec 17th
1 tag
Dec 17th
1 note
1 tag
“Human thought has no limit. At its risk and peril, it analyses and dissects its...”
– Les Miserables
Dec 17th
2 notes
1 tag
Dec 16th
1 tag
“Set not thy foot to make the blind to fall;   Nor wilfully offend thy weaker...”
– Pybrac, Quatrains (17th c.)
Dec 16th
1 tag
Dec 15th
1 note
1 tag
Dec 12th
1 note
1 tag
“Then he asked himself: If he were the only one who had done wrong in the course...”
– Les Miserables
Dec 9th
1 tag
mowing the lawn: stories and photos of low-level... →
This was way more interesting than I thought it would be.
Dec 6th
1 tag
Vocabulary: Corporeal Grandiloquence Edition
perorate: to speak formally or at great length, or to conclude a speech in such a way irredenta: a region allied by race or history to one country but ruled by another naometer: apparently a title given in secret societies. Possibly a fabrication. abnegation: self-denial, or the relinquishment of a right or property anchylosis: the adhesion or growing together of bones in a joint tendentious:...
Dec 6th
2 notes
1 tag
“The guillotine is the concretion of the law; it is called the Avenger: it is not...”
– Victor Hugo, Les Miserables
Dec 6th
1 tag
Dec 6th
1 tag
The City & The City (China Mieville, 2009)
This book has been recommended by many a shelf tag in book stores, and won a number of prizes last year, or maybe the year before. At any rate, like The Wind-Up Girl, it was showered with praise and I looked forward to being pleasantly surprised by one of the more critically-acclaimed sci-fi books out there. Alas, I have been deceived again, and while the book is certainly not bad, it’s...
Dec 6th
1 note
1 tag
“So parents often err, many fond mothers especially, doat so much upon their...”
– Anatomy of Melancholy
Dec 5th
1 tag
chromatic typewriter →
Dec 4th
1 tag
ListenAu Revoir Borealis - “Bella Ballerina”...
Dec 2nd
1 tag
“Many mortal men came to see fair Psyche, the glory of her age, they did admire...”
– Anatomy of Melancholy (paraphrasing Apuleius)
Dec 2nd
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Dec 2nd
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Extracts from Olaf Stapledon's "Last and First...
The following was originally published in 1931. I found it remarkably prescient.In the Far West, the United States of America openly claimed to be custodians of the whole planet. Universally feared and envied, universally respected for their enterprise, yet for their complacency very widely despised, the Americans were rapidly changing the whole character of man’s existence. By this time...
Dec 1st
November 2011
18 posts
1 tag
Nov 30th
1 tag
“Meanwhile, Bramanti went on: “Sublime Hierogam of the Chemical Wedding,...”
– Umberto Eco, Foucault’s Pendulum
Nov 25th
1 tag
An Instance of the Fingerpost (Iain Pears, 1997)
The full-immersion historical novel isn’t an easy one to get right. It’s easy to get bogged down in irrelevant contemporary details, info-dumps in the form of history lessons, archaic speech. Or it can be a failure of overarching style, as novels written in the 18th and 19th centuries in particular (popular periods for period books) are for the most part extremely well-structured, a...
Nov 25th
1 tag
Nov 23rd
1 note
1 tag
“If anyone can achieve power, then all will try and government becomes a mere...”
– Iain Pears, An Instance of the Fingerpost
Nov 23rd
1 tag
Nov 19th
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“When Sir Philip Sidney was making the grand tour, three centuries ago, he came...”
– Harper’s (1871)
Nov 18th
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Nov 18th