Tuesday, October 25, 2005
Between the Sheets (Part 1)
Of a book, that is. Since I've finished ye olde exams, I've had some time to do some non-school reading, and much of it has been very enjoyable. Since I'm into lists at the moment, here's a little list of some of the items, and comments and suggestions are welcome--always looking for interesting stuff.
Flannery O'Connor, Wise Blood. This is the first book I've read by O'Connor. Stylistically, it was of a high-order. I'm not sure I understand what she is trying to say--my only assistance in that regard comes from a prefatory note (written in 1962) from O'Connor herself, which reads:
In spite of my failure to fully grasp the work, it was engaging and thought-provoking reading nonetheless.
Agatha Christie, The Mysterious Affair at Styles and Murder in Mesopotamia. The wiffle and I read these two aloud on the drive from PA to MI and in various other phases of transit. They're like episodes of Law and Order with a bigger vocabulary, gratuitous use of French phrases, and sometime awkward diction. They are page turners par excellence (to gratuitously throw in a little French myself). I found that I like the 'mystery' genre immensely.
P.G. Wodehouse, Stiff Upper Lip, Jeeves. This was also my first encounter with Wodehouse, and I must say that this is the most entertaining book I have read in a long, long time. I suppose that by O'Connor's definition mentioned above, Stiff Upper Lip cannot count as a 'comic novel', because it is not serious, and it certainly is not about matters of life and death. Still, even if this stringent standard is applied and the novel is not comic, at the very least it is decidedly comical, and Wodehouse's mastery of the English language is stunning. Again, there are a lot of French phrases in it, so the French gives a nice consistency to the first three entries on this list! For those interested, I think I first became interested in reading Wodehouse from this essay by Roger Kimball.
Flannery O'Connor, Wise Blood. This is the first book I've read by O'Connor. Stylistically, it was of a high-order. I'm not sure I understand what she is trying to say--my only assistance in that regard comes from a prefatory note (written in 1962) from O'Connor herself, which reads:
Wise Blood has reached the age of ten and is still alive. My critical powers are just sufficient to determine this, and I am gratified to be able to say it. The book was written with zest and, if possible, it should be read that way. It is a comic novel about a Christian malgre lui, and as such, very serious, for all comic novels that are any good must be about matters of life and death. Wise Blood was written by an author congenitally innocent of theory, but one with certain preoccupations. That belief in Christ is to some a matter of life and death has been a stumbling block for readers who would prefer to think it a matter of no great consequence. For them Hazel Motes' integrity lies in his trying with such vigor to get rid of the ragged figure who moves from tree to tree in the back of his mind. For the author Hazel's integrity lies in his not being able to. Does one's integrity ever lie in what he is not able to do? I think that usually it does, for free will does not mean one will, but many wills conflicting in one man. Freedom cannot be conceived simply. It is a mystery and one which a novel, even a comic novel, can only be asked to deepen.
In spite of my failure to fully grasp the work, it was engaging and thought-provoking reading nonetheless.
Agatha Christie, The Mysterious Affair at Styles and Murder in Mesopotamia. The wiffle and I read these two aloud on the drive from PA to MI and in various other phases of transit. They're like episodes of Law and Order with a bigger vocabulary, gratuitous use of French phrases, and sometime awkward diction. They are page turners par excellence (to gratuitously throw in a little French myself). I found that I like the 'mystery' genre immensely.
P.G. Wodehouse, Stiff Upper Lip, Jeeves. This was also my first encounter with Wodehouse, and I must say that this is the most entertaining book I have read in a long, long time. I suppose that by O'Connor's definition mentioned above, Stiff Upper Lip cannot count as a 'comic novel', because it is not serious, and it certainly is not about matters of life and death. Still, even if this stringent standard is applied and the novel is not comic, at the very least it is decidedly comical, and Wodehouse's mastery of the English language is stunning. Again, there are a lot of French phrases in it, so the French gives a nice consistency to the first three entries on this list! For those interested, I think I first became interested in reading Wodehouse from this essay by Roger Kimball.
Monday, October 24, 2005
'Is Autonomous Choice Required for a Good Life?'
An interesting post from John Kekes here regarding the question in the subject line. One tantalizing excerpt:
Autonomy is thought to be necessary but not sufficient for a good life because reasonable understanding and evaluation may turn out to be mistaken and because adverse external conditions, such as injustice, accident, or illness, may stand in the way. Autonomy is also claimed to be necessary for being a responsible moral agent because only such agents are capable of evaluating their actions and understanding the significance of the choices they make. So understood, autonomy is held to be the ideal that reasonable and morally committed people ought to aim at.
There is no doubt that this is an attractive ideal and that countless people in contemporary Western societies passionately believe in it. Many philosophers aim to give a precise account of what autonomy involves and with specifying the social conditions that must be met to enable individuals to exercise their autonomy. They regard autonomy as the pivot on which morality and politics turn. The ideal of autonomy is nevertheless a shibboleth because the central moral and political importance attributed to it is based on a passionate but obviously false belief.
Sunday, October 16, 2005
Wilde
Today is the birthday of Oscar Wilde, born 1854, who wrote,
"The soul is a terrible reality. It can be bought, and sold, and bartered away. It can be poisoned, or made perfect. There is a soul in each one of us. I know it."
Joseph Pearce, in his excellent biography of Wilde noted, "Despair was, after all, a religious concept. It was not a physical but a metaphysical reality. It was the denial of hope. Furthermore, despair was distinct from desolation. The former was the denial of hope; the latter the hunger for it. A desolate soul does not seek suicide; it seeks consolation. Ultimately, the hunger for hope engenders a hunger for faith. This was the deeper reality at the heart of the decadent movement in France."
----------------------------------------------
The Ballad of Reading Gaol
by Oscar Wilde
And thus we rust Life's iron chain
Degraded and alone:
And some men curse, and some men weep,
And some men make no moan:
But God's eternal Laws are kind
And break the heart of stone
And every human heart that breaks,
In prison-cell or yard,
Is as the broken box that gave
Its treasure to the Lord,
And filled the unclean leper's house
With the scent of costliest nard.
Ah! happy they whose hearts can break
And peace of pardon win!
How else may man make straight his plan
And cleanse his soul from sin?
How else but through a broken heart
May Lord Christ enter in?
"The soul is a terrible reality. It can be bought, and sold, and bartered away. It can be poisoned, or made perfect. There is a soul in each one of us. I know it."
Joseph Pearce, in his excellent biography of Wilde noted, "Despair was, after all, a religious concept. It was not a physical but a metaphysical reality. It was the denial of hope. Furthermore, despair was distinct from desolation. The former was the denial of hope; the latter the hunger for it. A desolate soul does not seek suicide; it seeks consolation. Ultimately, the hunger for hope engenders a hunger for faith. This was the deeper reality at the heart of the decadent movement in France."
----------------------------------------------
The Ballad of Reading Gaol
by Oscar Wilde
And thus we rust Life's iron chain
Degraded and alone:
And some men curse, and some men weep,
And some men make no moan:
But God's eternal Laws are kind
And break the heart of stone
And every human heart that breaks,
In prison-cell or yard,
Is as the broken box that gave
Its treasure to the Lord,
And filled the unclean leper's house
With the scent of costliest nard.
Ah! happy they whose hearts can break
And peace of pardon win!
How else may man make straight his plan
And cleanse his soul from sin?
How else but through a broken heart
May Lord Christ enter in?
If the Nobel committee had only remembered to read this.......
Contrast this speech, by Faulkner, with the mockery that is Pinter.
On Receiving the Nobel Prize
By William Faulkner
1950
I feel that this award was not made to me as a man but to my work- a life’s work in the agony and sweat of the human spirit, not for glory and least of all for profit, but to create out of the materials of the human spirit something which did not exist there before. So this award is only mine in trust. It will not be difficult to find a dedication for the money part of it commensurate with the purpose and significance of its origin. But I would like to do the same with the acclaim, too, by using this moment as a pinnacle from which I might be listened to by the young men and women already dedicated to the same anguish and travail, among whom is already that one who will some day stand here where I am standing.
Our tragedy today is a general and universal physical fear so long sustained by now that we can even bear it. There are no longer problems of the spirit. There is only one question: When will I be blown up? Because of this, the young man or woman writing today has forgotten the problems of the human heart in conflict with itself which alone can make good writing because only that is worth writing about, worth the agony and the sweat.
He must learn them again. He must teach himself that the basest of all things is to be afraid; and, teaching himself that, forget it forever, leaving no room in his workshop for anything but the old verities and truths of the heart, the old universal truths lacking which any story is ephemeral and doomed- love and honor and pity and pride and compassion and sacrifice. Until he does so he labors under a curse. He writes not of love, but of lust, of defeats in which nothing loses anything of value, of victories without hope and worst of all without pity or compassion. His griefs grieve on no universal bones, leaving no scars. He writes not of the heart but of the glands.
Until he relearns these things he will write as though he stood among and watched the end of man. I decline to accept the end of man. It is easy enough to say that man is immortal simply because he will endure; that when the last ding-dong of doom has clanged and faded from the last worthless rock hanging tideless in the last red and dying evening, that even then there will still be one more sound: that of his puny and inexhaustible voice still talking. I refuse to accept this. I believe man will not merely endure, he will prevail. He is immortal, not because he along among creatures has an inexhaustible voice, but because he has a soul, a spirit capable of compassion and sacrifice and endurance. The poet’s, the writer’s, duty is to write about these things. It is his privilege to help man endure by lifting his heart, by reminding him of the courage and honor and hope and pride and compassion and pity and sacrifice which have been the glory of his past. The poet’s voice need not be merely the record of man, it can be one of the props, the pillars to help him endure and prevail.
On Receiving the Nobel Prize
By William Faulkner
1950
I feel that this award was not made to me as a man but to my work- a life’s work in the agony and sweat of the human spirit, not for glory and least of all for profit, but to create out of the materials of the human spirit something which did not exist there before. So this award is only mine in trust. It will not be difficult to find a dedication for the money part of it commensurate with the purpose and significance of its origin. But I would like to do the same with the acclaim, too, by using this moment as a pinnacle from which I might be listened to by the young men and women already dedicated to the same anguish and travail, among whom is already that one who will some day stand here where I am standing.
Our tragedy today is a general and universal physical fear so long sustained by now that we can even bear it. There are no longer problems of the spirit. There is only one question: When will I be blown up? Because of this, the young man or woman writing today has forgotten the problems of the human heart in conflict with itself which alone can make good writing because only that is worth writing about, worth the agony and the sweat.
He must learn them again. He must teach himself that the basest of all things is to be afraid; and, teaching himself that, forget it forever, leaving no room in his workshop for anything but the old verities and truths of the heart, the old universal truths lacking which any story is ephemeral and doomed- love and honor and pity and pride and compassion and sacrifice. Until he does so he labors under a curse. He writes not of love, but of lust, of defeats in which nothing loses anything of value, of victories without hope and worst of all without pity or compassion. His griefs grieve on no universal bones, leaving no scars. He writes not of the heart but of the glands.
Until he relearns these things he will write as though he stood among and watched the end of man. I decline to accept the end of man. It is easy enough to say that man is immortal simply because he will endure; that when the last ding-dong of doom has clanged and faded from the last worthless rock hanging tideless in the last red and dying evening, that even then there will still be one more sound: that of his puny and inexhaustible voice still talking. I refuse to accept this. I believe man will not merely endure, he will prevail. He is immortal, not because he along among creatures has an inexhaustible voice, but because he has a soul, a spirit capable of compassion and sacrifice and endurance. The poet’s, the writer’s, duty is to write about these things. It is his privilege to help man endure by lifting his heart, by reminding him of the courage and honor and hope and pride and compassion and pity and sacrifice which have been the glory of his past. The poet’s voice need not be merely the record of man, it can be one of the props, the pillars to help him endure and prevail.
A Strange Service? For Sherpa!
The wiffle and I had a rather distressing experience this morning. Via our friend Bill, we had learned of some Protestant churches in the area with English-language services. So we picked one and decided to try it today: St. Andrew's Church (Church of Scotland). Since its denomination is Church of Scotland, it is Presbyterian, and I for one was looking forward to a Presbyterian service in English in the solidly Biblical tradition to which I've become accustomed.
We entered the small building and got bulletins. On the back of the bulletin was this statement:
So far, so good, I thought. A church that keeps the Word of God in its rightful place.
One can perhaps imagine my surprise, then, during the 'Readings' segment of the service. In between a reading from Isaiah and a reading from Matthew, both done by a member of the congregation, the minister stood to do a reading. He prefaced it by saying that we didn't have a Psalm this week, but that he would instead read something by Sherpa Tenzing, who accompanied Sir Edmund Hillary in climbing Mt. Everest. I thought this was rather odd; my Bible still includes 150 Psalms, and there was plenty to choose from. But instead, sandwiched between two passages from the Bible was an extra-Biblical--and not only extra-Biblical, but non-Christian--reading, de facto elevated to the status of God's Holy Revelation by its placement in the service. If you think I'm overstating the strategic importance of the positioning of this travesty, perhaps it will also be useful to know that he followed the reading from Sherpa Tenzing with an 'Amen', and that it was the only reading that the minister himself did.
One of the main points of the Sherpa reading seemed to me to be the 'validity of all faiths' shtick, which, for one thing, flies in the face of orthodox Christian doctrine in general and, for another, flies in the face of God's exclucivist pronouncement in the Isaiah passage that had just been read (45:1-7):
At any rate, the cognitive dissonance caused by this Sherpa reading vis-a-vis Scripture, and its incongruity with the church's own statement in the bulletin, was more than a little distracting.
Harumph.
We entered the small building and got bulletins. On the back of the bulletin was this statement:
From the Church of Scotland have developed the English-speaking Presbyterian and Reformed Churches throughout the world. The supreme rule of faith and life of the Church, which is both Catholic and Reformed, is the Word of God contained in the Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments.
So far, so good, I thought. A church that keeps the Word of God in its rightful place.
One can perhaps imagine my surprise, then, during the 'Readings' segment of the service. In between a reading from Isaiah and a reading from Matthew, both done by a member of the congregation, the minister stood to do a reading. He prefaced it by saying that we didn't have a Psalm this week, but that he would instead read something by Sherpa Tenzing, who accompanied Sir Edmund Hillary in climbing Mt. Everest. I thought this was rather odd; my Bible still includes 150 Psalms, and there was plenty to choose from. But instead, sandwiched between two passages from the Bible was an extra-Biblical--and not only extra-Biblical, but non-Christian--reading, de facto elevated to the status of God's Holy Revelation by its placement in the service. If you think I'm overstating the strategic importance of the positioning of this travesty, perhaps it will also be useful to know that he followed the reading from Sherpa Tenzing with an 'Amen', and that it was the only reading that the minister himself did.
One of the main points of the Sherpa reading seemed to me to be the 'validity of all faiths' shtick, which, for one thing, flies in the face of orthodox Christian doctrine in general and, for another, flies in the face of God's exclucivist pronouncement in the Isaiah passage that had just been read (45:1-7):
1 "This is what the LORD says to his anointed,
to Cyrus, whose right hand I take hold of
to subdue nations before him
and to strip kings of their armor,
to open doors before him
so that gates will not be shut:
2 I will go before you
and will level the mountains [a] ;
I will break down gates of bronze
and cut through bars of iron.
3 I will give you the treasures of darkness,
riches stored in secret places,
so that you may know that I am the LORD,
the God of Israel, who summons you by name.
4 For the sake of Jacob my servant,
of Israel my chosen,
I summon you by name
and bestow on you a title of honor,
though you do not acknowledge me.
5 I am the LORD, and there is no other;
apart from me there is no God.
I will strengthen you,
though you have not acknowledged me,
6 so that from the rising of the sun
to the place of its setting
men may know there is none besides me.
I am the LORD, and there is no other.
7 I form the light and create darkness,
I bring prosperity and create disaster;
I, the LORD, do all these things.
At any rate, the cognitive dissonance caused by this Sherpa reading vis-a-vis Scripture, and its incongruity with the church's own statement in the bulletin, was more than a little distracting.
Harumph.
Saturday, October 15, 2005
My Thoughts Exactly
'Whatever the case, it wasn't that I was anti-popular culture or anything and I had no ambitions to stir things up. I just thought of mainstream culture as lame as hell and a big trick. It was like the unbroken sea of frost that lay outside the window and you had to have awkward footgear to walk on it.'
(Bob Dylan, Chronicles: Volume One, p. 35)
(Bob Dylan, Chronicles: Volume One, p. 35)
Why Roy Orbison Was Intriguing When No One Else Was
'Orbison, though, transcended all the genres--folk, country, rock and roll or just about anything. His stuff mixed all the styles and some that hadn't even been invented yet. He could sound mean and nasty on one line and then sing in a falsetto voice like Frankie Valli in the next. With Roy, you didn't know if you were listening to mariachi or opera. He kept you on your toes. With him, it was all about fat and blood. He sounded like he was singing from an Olympian mountaintop and he meant business. One of his early songs, "Ooby Dooby," had been popular previously, but this new song of his was nothing like that. "Ooby Dooby" was deceptively simple, but Roy had progressed. He was now singing his compositions in three or four octaves that made you want to drive your car over a cliff. He sang like a professional criminal. Typically, he'd start out in some low, barely audible range, stay there a while and then astonishingly slip into histrionics. His voice could jar a corpse, always leave you mutter to yourself something like, "Man, I don't believe it." His songs had songs withing songs. They shifted from major to minor key without any logic. Orbison was deadly serious--no pollywog and no fledgling juvenile. There wasn't anything else on the radio like him. I'd listen and wait for another song, but next to Roy the playlist was strictly dullsville...gutless and flabby. It all came at you like you didn't have a brain.'
(Bob Dylan, Chronicles: Volume One, p. 33)
(Bob Dylan, Chronicles: Volume One, p. 33)
Why We Trust Not in the Arm of Man
'I was born in the spring of 1941. The Second World War was already raging in Europe, and America would soon be in it. The world was being blown apart and chaos was already driving its fist into the face of all new visitors. If you were born around this time or were living and alive, you could feel the old world go and the new one beginning. It was like putting the clock back to when B.C. became A.D. Everybody born around my time was a part of both. Hitler, Churchill, Mussolini, Stalin, Roosevelt--towering figures that the world would never see the likes of again, men who relied on their own resolve, for better or worse, every one of them prepared to act alone, indifferent to approval--indifferent to wealth or love, all presiding over the destiny of mankind and reducing the world to rubble. Coming from a long line of Alexanders and Julius Caesars, Genghis Khans, Charlemagnes and Napoleons, they carved up the world like a really dainty dinner. Whether they parted their hair in the middle or wore a Viking helmet, they would not be denied and were impossible to reckon with--rude barbarians stampeding across the earth and hammering out their own ideas of geography.'
(Bob Dylan, Chronicles: Volume One, pp. 28-9)
(Bob Dylan, Chronicles: Volume One, pp. 28-9)
Thursday, October 13, 2005
Nobel Prize...not a Noble Prize
from The New Criterion (a fine site you should visit, and visit often):
www.newcriterion.com
10.13.2005
The Nobel Prize for what?
[Posted 7:57 AM by Roger Kimball]
Last year it was Elfriede Jelinek, the Austrian pornographer and anti-American fantasist. This year it is Harold Pinter. "The Nobel Prize for Literature." Right. I mean Left. What is with Swedes? Günter Grass (1999), José Saramago (1998), and Dario Fo (1997): have they ever encountered a Communist or anti-American scribbler they don't adore? Mark Steyn once defined the "Pinteresque" as "a pause followed by a non sequitur." That's good, as far as it goes, but it is important to note that with Pinter the "sequitur" is always trailing in one direction: leftward. Consider Pinter's acceptance speech on the occasion of being given an honorary degree from the University of Turin a couple of years ago. Referring to the terrorist attacks of Septmber 11, Pinter had this to say:
The atrocity in New York was predictable and inevitable. It was an act of retaliation against constant and systematic manifestations of state terrorism on the part of the United States over many years, in all parts of the world.
The Nobel Prize committee long ago demonstrated that its prizes for the arts were exercises in politically correct sermonizing. By choosing Harold Pinter, they have demonstrated that their sermons are ridiculous as well as repellent.
www.newcriterion.com
10.13.2005
The Nobel Prize for what?
[Posted 7:57 AM by Roger Kimball]
Last year it was Elfriede Jelinek, the Austrian pornographer and anti-American fantasist. This year it is Harold Pinter. "The Nobel Prize for Literature." Right. I mean Left. What is with Swedes? Günter Grass (1999), José Saramago (1998), and Dario Fo (1997): have they ever encountered a Communist or anti-American scribbler they don't adore? Mark Steyn once defined the "Pinteresque" as "a pause followed by a non sequitur." That's good, as far as it goes, but it is important to note that with Pinter the "sequitur" is always trailing in one direction: leftward. Consider Pinter's acceptance speech on the occasion of being given an honorary degree from the University of Turin a couple of years ago. Referring to the terrorist attacks of Septmber 11, Pinter had this to say:
The atrocity in New York was predictable and inevitable. It was an act of retaliation against constant and systematic manifestations of state terrorism on the part of the United States over many years, in all parts of the world.
The Nobel Prize committee long ago demonstrated that its prizes for the arts were exercises in politically correct sermonizing. By choosing Harold Pinter, they have demonstrated that their sermons are ridiculous as well as repellent.
Go You Pistons!
the pistons had their first pre-season game on tuesday night in grand rapids, and were victorious over the chicago bulls with an 87-76 victory. 'sheed led the team with 15 points and 8 rebounds, and ben wallace contributed 11 points and 7 rebounds. i'm pretty sure one of our loyal readers was at the game, so perhaps she can tell us more about it!
Tuesday, October 11, 2005
A Dylan Moment
before coming over here, i picked up the new scorsese dylan documentary. when it aired on PBS, i only caught a few minutes of it and wanted to see the whole thing. i started watching it with my brother and the wiffle the other day, and i think i was most of the way through part 1, and that's as far as i've gotten so far. it's really good so far, and if there's one thing i've learned, it is that allen ginsberg really was WEIRD. there's some interesting stuff on how driven dylan was to get heard and become famous (to the point of fabricating his past at times), and there is some awesome live footage of 60s performances, including the 1966 breakout show in newcastle, which got him dubbed a judas and a traitor by those not quite ready to trade in their folk for rock 'n roll. there is also some really cool footage of odetta, whose voice will knock your socks off; in my bro's opinion, she had the best voice of all the performers in the part of the documentary we watched.
and speaking of dylan, the wiffle and i just had 'blonde on blonde' on while playing cribbage. it doesn't matter how many times i listen to that album--i still think it is great, except that i still don't understand how 'rainy day women #12 and 35' fits in with the rest of the album. but it is my opinion that that album and 'highway 61 revisited' are the two peaks of his genius, lyrically and musically.
and speaking of listening to an album lots and lots of times and 'highway 61', on the plane ride over here one of the airplane radio stations was playing 'highway 61' and the beatles' 'rubber soul' in turn throughout the plane ride. i listened for a long time.
and speaking of dylan, the wiffle and i just had 'blonde on blonde' on while playing cribbage. it doesn't matter how many times i listen to that album--i still think it is great, except that i still don't understand how 'rainy day women #12 and 35' fits in with the rest of the album. but it is my opinion that that album and 'highway 61 revisited' are the two peaks of his genius, lyrically and musically.
and speaking of listening to an album lots and lots of times and 'highway 61', on the plane ride over here one of the airplane radio stations was playing 'highway 61' and the beatles' 'rubber soul' in turn throughout the plane ride. i listened for a long time.
smoke 'em if ya got 'em
Postcard from Harmony Parking Lot
by Wyn Cooper
by Wyn Cooper
The teens have gathered, because they are teens.
They wear brown shirts faded to beige, black
boots, low-slung jeans. The way they stand
is called jaunty. Cigarettes burn through
their words, smoke blows through their hair,
and the way they stare at passersby blends
reptile with bird, spleen with wonder,
your past with their present to you.
Monday, October 10, 2005
heroes together in a past life
Poem: "Filling in the New Address Book," by B. J. Ward from Gravedigger's Birthday (North Atlanta Books).
Filling in the New Address Book
But rifling through the old one,
choosing whom to preserve
in your encyclopedia of associates,
whom to let become obsolete-
no room for them in your entire world.
You little god, you,
you puny pocket of omnipotence-
how you throw people off the side
of your dinghy-book,
a tiny captain thinking, "This is dead weight."
Old girlfriends-doubly gone now.
Old drinking buddies, married and laden
with responsibility, that grand soberer.
So you continue, you infinitesimal infinite one,
scratching out the names of the dead,
people you are coming from and never toward,
tearing down street signs, phone lines,
upheaving entire highways between you
as you leave them out,
their new and unfamiliar lives
not any less full than if you included them.
They are manning their own ships and,
sorry little god,no room for you on their voyage either.
It's understood, no? You've been heroes together
in the past lives within this life-
Ulysseses now full of uselessnesses-
and why threaten any miraculous history,
any great testament, with knowledge
of how empty your current book of stories is?
Happy Fat Pants
sorry i haven't posted anything here in a while--but the wiffle and i have been posting some things here.
thanks to matthew for keeping things going.
thanks to matthew for keeping things going.
Thursday, October 06, 2005
honesty in a dishonest age
Edward Abbey(1927-1989)
HONESTY IN A DISHONEST AGE
The following is one of the last entries in Abbey's diary,
written shortly before his death on March 2, 1989, in Tucson, Arizona.
"Why book reviewers hate my books:
"Because the books are really no good? Perhaps. But I think I've got a better explanation. Almost all reviewers, these days, are members of and adherents to some anxious particular sect or faction. I.e., they are lesbians and New Agers or fem-libbers or (even worse) male fem-libbers or technophiles or self-hating white liberals or right wing conservatives or Growth maniacs or Negroes or female Negroes or Third-World lesbian militant Negro poetesses or closet Marxists (Marxoids) or futurologists or academical specialists or Chicano idealogues or ballerinas or Kowboy Kultists or Kerouac Kultists or Henry James Minimalist Perfectionists or one-tenth Chippewa "Native American" Indians or at very least and all-inclusive Official Chickenshit Correct-Thinking Liberals etc. etc.
"As such, any member of any one of those majority minorities is going to find for certain a few remarks in any of my books that will offend/enrage "s/he" to the marrow, leading inevitably in turn, on the part of such sectarian book reviewers, to a denunciation not merely of the offending passage, but of the entire book, and not merely of the book, but of the author too."
HONESTY IN A DISHONEST AGE
The following is one of the last entries in Abbey's diary,
written shortly before his death on March 2, 1989, in Tucson, Arizona.
"Why book reviewers hate my books:
"Because the books are really no good? Perhaps. But I think I've got a better explanation. Almost all reviewers, these days, are members of and adherents to some anxious particular sect or faction. I.e., they are lesbians and New Agers or fem-libbers or (even worse) male fem-libbers or technophiles or self-hating white liberals or right wing conservatives or Growth maniacs or Negroes or female Negroes or Third-World lesbian militant Negro poetesses or closet Marxists (Marxoids) or futurologists or academical specialists or Chicano idealogues or ballerinas or Kowboy Kultists or Kerouac Kultists or Henry James Minimalist Perfectionists or one-tenth Chippewa "Native American" Indians or at very least and all-inclusive Official Chickenshit Correct-Thinking Liberals etc. etc.
"As such, any member of any one of those majority minorities is going to find for certain a few remarks in any of my books that will offend/enrage "s/he" to the marrow, leading inevitably in turn, on the part of such sectarian book reviewers, to a denunciation not merely of the offending passage, but of the entire book, and not merely of the book, but of the author too."
