f God exists, then no doubt I’ve sinned and I’ll answer for it; but if there is no God, then I didn’t offend them nearly enough, those holy fathers of yours. — Fyodor Dostoevsky, The Brothers Karamazov Read more →
EppsNet Archive: Literature
A Grain of Faith
“It says in the Scriptures that if you have as much as a grain of faith and if you ask a mountain to move into the sea. it will do so at once and without delay, the second you ask it. So, Mr. Gregory, since you’re a believer and I’m an unbeliever — for which you keep reproaching me — why don’t you try asking the mountain to slide not even all the way into the sea (because there’s no sea anywhere near here) but just down into our stinking little river, the one that runs behind our garden. If you do, you’ll see for yourself that nothing will move, that everything will remain where it is, even though you shout all you want, and that should prove that you too, Mr. Gregory, do not have the true faith, which you like to reproach others for lacking.” — Fyodor Dostoevsky,… Read more →
I Twisted Things a Little
ctually, I believe that, in telling you all about the struggle that took place in me, I twisted things a little, to make myself look a little better. But I don’t care if I did. The hell with all this spying on the human heart! — Fyodor Dostoevsky, The Brothers Karamazov Read more →
Favorite Poem of the Week
My favorite poem of the week — again from Modern & Contemporary American Poetry — was “Invasion of the Body Snatchers” by Bernadette Mayer, especially the final image of the stressed-out new mother reading The Wild Boy of Aveyron, about a feral child raised by wolves. Read more →
Poems I’ve Read Recently and Liked
I’ve been reading a lot of poetry as part of the Modern & Contemporary American Poetry class on Coursera. One of the things I like about the class is that the video lessons are done a little differently than other Coursera classes I’ve taken. Rather than recorded lectures, the videos consist of the instructor, Al Filreis, leading a small group of Penn students in close readings of selected poems. Anyway, here are a few of my favorites so far: I dwell in Possibility by Emily Dickinson Tell all the Truth but tell it slant by Emily Dickinson The Brain within its Groove by Emily Dickinson Danse Russe by William Carlos Williams This Is Just To Say by Willim Carlos Williams A Supermarket in California by Allen Ginsburg Lines for an Abortionist’s Office by Ruth Lechlitner Incident by Countee Cullen These next two, both by Richard Wilbur, I want to single out as being particularly… Read more →
I Have Heard What the Talkers Were Talking
I have heard what the talkers were talking, the talk of the beginning and the end, But I do not talk of the beginning or the end. There was never any more inception than there is now, Nor any more youth or age than there is now, And will never be any more perfection than there is now, Nor any more heaven or hell than there is now. — Walt Whitman, “Song of Myself” Read more →
Poetry Slam: Whitman vs Dickinson
Emily Dickinson was good but Walt Whitman would have kicked her ass in a poetry slam. Read more →
The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoevsky
The author, a Russian, displays great heart and insight in this philosophical novel, but at 900+ pages, he needs to learn how to get to the point. I look forward to his next project, perhaps with a better editor. Read more →
What’s on Your Bookshelf?
Bookman, my favorite local used bookstore, had a 25-percent-off sale this weekend and here’s what I got: Read more →
Gore Vidal, Lifelong Bachelor
The Economic Times here in Bangalore has a great obituary of Gore Vidal. It includes an anecdote in which Vidal skewers Saul Bellow and his multiple wives, followed by the sentence Never married himself, Gore . . . Probably, like Liberace, just never found the right girl. Read more →
I Dont No Why Im Dumb Agen
Via Best of the Web Today: Read more →
Ernest Hemingway on Symbolism
There isn’t any symbolysm [sic]. The sea is the sea. The old man is an old man. The boy is a boy and the fish is a fish. The sharks are all sharks no better and no worse. All the symbolism that people say is shit. What goes beyond is what you see beyond when you know. Read more →
A Visit from the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan
“Time’s a goon, right? Isn’t that the expression?” Jules had drifted over from across the room. “I’ve never heard that,” he said. “‘Time is a goon’?” “Would you disagree?” Bosco said, a little challengingly. There was a pause. “No,” Jules said. — Jennifer Egan, A Visit from the Goon Squad It’s not easy in a book to communicate the passage of time . . . you can write a book that takes place over a long period of time, but what I mean is to communicate the passage of time so the reader feels it rushing by, which Jennifer Egan has done. Highly recommended! Read more →
Television
Not once during those months did there emanate from the screen a genuine idea or emotion, and I came to understand the medium as subversive. In its deceit, its outright lies, its spinelessness, its weak-mindedness, its pointless violence, in the disgusting personalities it holds up to our youth to emulate, in its endless and groveling deference to our fantasies, television undermines strength of character, saps vigor, and irreparably perverts notions of reality. But it is a tender, loving medium; and when it has done its savage job completely and reduced one to a prattling, salivating infant, like a buxom mother it stands always poised to take one back to the shelter of its brown-nippled bosom. — Frederick Exley, A Fan’s Notes Read more →
David Foster Wallace’s Last House
Via Curbed LA on the occasion of what would have been DFW’s 50th birthday today. What a depressing abode! I’m ready to drive out there right now and hang myself . . . Read more →
Love is Fleeting
I recently bought a collection of short novels by Marguerite Duras from my favorite used book store. Inside the front cover is this inscription: To M—, Because her work influences me so much, and you inspire me so much. Please read and think about me!! Love Always, G— P.S. Merry Xmas XOXO I bought the book for $3.95, so M—- couldn’t have gotten more than a buck, maybe two, for unloading it. Read more →
Is it I, God, or who, that lifts this arm? — Captain Ahab
2011: The Year in Books
These are the books I read in 2011, roughly in the order listed. The ratings and tags are mine. They don’t represent a consensus of opinion. Best Novel of the Year: A Fan’s Notes by Frederick Exley Best Non-Fiction of the Year: Fooled by Randomness by Nassim Nicholas Taleb My Library at LibraryThing Read more →
You Are Not Alone
Many people need desperately to receive this message: “I feel and think much as you do, care about many of the things you care about, although most people don’t care about them. You are not alone.” — Kurt Vonnegut, Timequake Read more →
Like so many Americans, she was trying to construct a life that made sense from things she found in gift shops. — Kurt Vonnegut, Slaughterhouse-Five