The cherry knows, the oak, the pine, the walnut; the shore, the tide, the moon; all embody the art of taking the long view, and each is a stirring example of how to live and let live. Whatever comes, goes; whatever rises, falls; whatever breathes, thrives for a time, then dies. The sun burns away. The storm ends. The ones we hated, condemned, and feared go crying to their graves, […]
John Barrymore. See, among others, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1920, silent); When a Man Loves (1927, silent); The Beloved Rogue (1927, silent, in the part of François Villon); and Svengali (1931). . Read Bees and Their Keepers, by Lotte Möller, Pages 135-146. For the month of October: Brother Adam Remembered and the Scandal He Managed to Avoid, with a note about Saint Ambrose, patron saint of beekeepers. Read J.I.M. […]
A short dream: Without questioning its odd location, I realize that the bookshelf outside on our front step would be more useful inside. There are only a few books on it, while in the house there are enough scattered and stacked about to fill it and more. What strikes me most, though, is the near absence of dust. Why is there so much more dust on the other shelves inside, […]
One might write as well as, or better than, Emerson or Montaigne, and the sum of that writing be nothing more than an echo or derivative shadow. In any given moment, all it needs is a leap to be skyward or hell-bound. Either will do, as long as the sky and the hell are one’s own. November 19, 2020 . [ 934 ]
Having fortunately lived long enough to finish reading all three volumes of Vincent’s letters, I have moved on to Dostoevsky’s Diary of a Writer, in Boris Brasol’s English translation, published in two volumes by Charles Scribner’s Sons in 1949. After years of being away from Dostoevsky’s great novels and stories, coming upon him in the somewhat more casual, conversational mode of his periodical writings is much like having coffee with […]
Yesterday afternoon, while I was out in a windstorm, picking up debris from a windstorm the day before that, I was so impressed by the spread of deep, thick moss everywhere that I vowed to spend a lot more time outdoors with my shoes off — after the weather warms just a bit. This morning, though, I wonder if I should wait at all. The uncovered part of my face […]
On any given day — and all days are given, and never to be taken for granted — what I think, what I know, and whatever conclusions I reach are of such a temporary nature that I can hardly see how they might be useful to another. They are born of what I might call the Montaigneity of the moment, and serve as matches held up in the darkness of […]
All of Herman Melville’s poetry, complete in a beautiful, one thousand-page book — the new Library of America edition, out just days ago, is already in this reader’s hands. This is another of those projects I enjoy so well, like the slow and careful reading aloud of Thoreau’s fourteen-volume journal, which I have currently under way, Joyce’s Ulysses and Finnegans Wake, and the complete works of other writers I have […]
All too often, those of us who call ourselves writers speak of the books we read as if their very mention were an indication of our learning, depth, and worth. I speak about them because I love them, knowing full well that even after they are read, I will be at a loss to explain the profound or mean effect they have had on me, my understanding, and my thinking. […]
At the moment there’s scarcely room here to sit, leave alone exercise free movement of my elbows. And while this is only a slight exaggeration, I’d best make no sudden moves, or I might topple the tall stacks of books everywhere around me, as the room is in a state of turmoil brought on by my decision to add two more tall bookcases, despite the fact that there’s no obvious […]
William Michaelian 