This new political moment, featuring candidates who are not angry, mean-spirited hacks spewing fear and loathing (Although Mitt Romney’s “Marching Forward into the Future” speech is its own brand of totalitarian gibberish) brings to mind an observation that I came across by Friedrich Nietzsche in Don Lee’s
From The Once and Future King by T.H. White: The best thing for being sad…is to learn something. That is the only thing that never fails. You may grow old and trembling in your anatomies, you may lie awake listening to the disorder in your veins, you may
As Dec. 31 approaches, the year-end lists and other media devices for taking up space and time remind me that there is, of course, something useful to be said about the recent past. And that something useful will find itself in this space, when and if I resolve what
Not that I expect anything for such efforts, but a trickle of perspiration did break out as I pondered the pros and cons of participating in the year-end list frenzy. Faithful readers may recall I offered a best-of-the-year-so-far list in July to alleviate this
From Norman Mailer’s “The White Negro: Superficial Reflections on the Hipster”: A totalitarian society makes enormous demands in the courage of men and a partially totalitarian society makes even greater demands, for the general anxiety is greater. Indeed, if one is to be a man, almost any kind of
From Joseph O’Connor’s yet-unheralded new opus, Redemption Falls, as his protagonist is escaping exile in Tasmania: not freedom at allancien regime Breaking It Down by Rusty Barnes Rusty Barnes edits the journal Night Train, one of those sparkling stars that complete the literary constellation. He has a
Norman Mailer died this weekend. I was a fan of Mailer’s and think I be may one of the few people who read his massive stinker Harlot’s Ghost. Nonetheless, I remember vividly the brilliance of Armies of the Night and how much it moved me. I remember seeing
Last week I made reference to Nobel Laureate Wislawa Szymborska—and once pointed out that her small volume Nonrequired Reading is my inspiration for this column. In that book, she notes the disparity between what was reviewed in many literary journals and what was happening in bookstores: “Most, if not
From Wislawa Szymborska’s 1996 Nobel Lecture: The world—whatever we might think when terrified by its vastness and our own impotence, or embittered by its indifference to individual suffering, of people, animals, and perhaps even plants, for why are we so sure that plants feel no pain; whatever we
You've stocked up on bookmarks, ordered the bookplates, and now you're ready to fill the shelves. Next time you're shopping, pass over the fiction and pick up something with an index. The writers offer a selection.
