This is how modern writing should be. In single phrases, Calvino uncovers deep insights. Example: Kublai Khan says “I too am not sure I’m here.� AlludThis is how modern writing should be. In single phrases, Calvino uncovers deep insights. Example: Kublai Khan says “I too am not sure I’m here.� Alluding to maybe he is not in his garden but on his horse leading his men in battle. It opens up the possibility that though we are here now we are also everywhere we’ve been before. We live in memory, in present and in our dreams of the future. The choices are: We live today in everyday life. Or, we live in whatever state our minds are in, like memory. Or, we live everywhere all at once. Now. ...more
I ravage Shakespeare to signify what this book meant to me:
today, today and today, Creeps in this petty pace from the unispired beginning To the last syI ravage Shakespeare to signify what this book meant to me:
today, today and today, Creeps in this petty pace from the unispired beginning To the last syllable of of daily mind, And all her words have lighted fools The way to gentle death. In, in moth candle! Life’s but a lilting shadow, a musing mistress That sleeps and dreams upon a mattress And then is heard no more: it is a tale Told by an angel, full of rumination and self reflection, Signifying nothing.
Act 5, Scene 5
You will probably not agree so I warn you that this review is personal. Annie Dillard is a great writer. But for me her book is the problem with writing. She answers "why are we reading?" with the goal of most authors who try to uncover the mysteries of life. "beauty laid bare, life heightened..." That's not why I read. I read to discover what lies just outside life. The space in between sentences on a page. Or to learn something I didn't previously know, usually from non-fiction books. I think most of us understand life. We don't need it heightened. there is no real mystery to probe, at least in life.
Old fashioned painters, like Rembrandt, Durer, painted life with great emotion, beauty and detail. But painting moved on. Mondrian painted squares. What was that?? Picasso explored the underpinnings, the interconnections of life and form. Pollock painted all of life at once. Their art stretches our minds beyond our ability to relate and opens up new life, new ways of thinking. Why can't writers do that also? Beckett did it. Murakami does it, Kawabata did it. Faulkner did it. Gao Xingjian did it in "Soul Mountain." I know, you and Dillard would say, few would read such art. But then why do we write? to sell books? might as well sell insurance. the pay is better. Life is just what it is. It's the space just beyond life we should explore. She misses the point of her story about Rahm, the stunt pilot. The question is not how heightened, intense or beautiful can life be. The question is what's life all about after you've died and are now living? The best analogy in the book is Paul's telling of the Ferrar story where this guy is rowing home, a log he's towing gets him caught in a current but he overcomes and makes it home. Sweet. Chris Reeves did it better. It's a comfortable, happy ending with perseverance as the lesson. Try, Try. Try and you will succeed. I would have preferred Ferrar to get lost in some unknown part of the channel and explore that. That would have made an interesting story. Cut the rope and look around....more
Self indulgent. I really don't like memoirs unless they're by people I can learn from. And she is not one of them. Maybe because i'm male and cannot rSelf indulgent. I really don't like memoirs unless they're by people I can learn from. And she is not one of them. Maybe because i'm male and cannot relate to her love of Woolf and obsession with feminism. Feminism is like race. it just is. It's a respect for women as they are. it doesn't need to be defended. It's really not under attack anymore, just as being black or gay is no longer under attack. So why defend them? The defense puts the defender into the "other" camp where they no longer need to be. Also, the protagonist doesn't seem to be so independent. She relies on KIt. She is at the affect of her Mother. She defers to her teachers, judges her "friends" in relation to herself... Her portrait is more like a person with no center, no moral compass who is drifting around in life trying to find herself. Not a role model for any gender. Sorry. I just didn't relate....more
It's Hemingway with a hammer. the story is so amazingly simple, a father and son wandering a road during the Apocalypse. the horror blazes. The empathIt's Hemingway with a hammer. the story is so amazingly simple, a father and son wandering a road during the Apocalypse. the horror blazes. The empathy cuts into you. The fatherness - concern, selflessness, protectiveness soars. The novel is mesmerizing and inspiring. This is how I feel as a father and, even more so, as a grandfather....more
An emersion into chicano life. She puts you in the streets, rocks you with rhythm and language interspersing chicano slang with english so the lines bAn emersion into chicano life. She puts you in the streets, rocks you with rhythm and language interspersing chicano slang with english so the lines bounce and roll and you feel like you're there. You read the poems over and over. Each time they're different. A fun ride, Cholita....more
Well written and decently argued but, in only a few years, his argument is startlingly outdated: Trump, Orban, Putin, Maduro, (arguably) Netanyahu, ErWell written and decently argued but, in only a few years, his argument is startlingly outdated: Trump, Orban, Putin, Maduro, (arguably) Netanyahu, Erdogan, Modi, Ji - more than 1/2 world population. Musk, the mag 7 tech corporations - 20% of world economy in just 7 companies.
Progressive policies, like DEI, perfectly reasonable by themselves, but not when we are forced to adhere to them.
Brussels colonizing sovereign countries with stifling regulation and forced mediocrity, imposing fines up to 10% of global revenues for companies doing business there own way. Forcing all of Europe's people to act, buy and think in a certain way - "for their own good."
Power in the social, political and corporate world controls us. ...more
This is about the whole series. How many books/ authors have I read that stayed with me? Becket. Murakami. Dostoevsky. Kafka. Cormac McCarthy. HemingwThis is about the whole series. How many books/ authors have I read that stayed with me? Becket. Murakami. Dostoevsky. Kafka. Cormac McCarthy. Hemingway. Morrison. Walker. Not many more except Ferrante. I read the series years ago and Naples. The characters. The events. The despair. Hope. Fragile love. Surprises. Mind boggling twists. All are with me still. Ferrante forces me face first into her characters like my head in a bucket of snakes. Naples is alive in my blood. I still feel that Injustice and hope can grow out of impossible chaos. She should be considered for a Nobel. ...more
I didn’t like this book. But then the author doesn’t want me to like it. She wants me to feel it and that I did. She scrubs the wound of adolescence sI didn’t like this book. But then the author doesn’t want me to like it. She wants me to feel it and that I did. She scrubs the wound of adolescence so that is raw and bleeding on every page. I kept asking myself,”is this what teenage girls think? Want? Feel?� I think the answer is irrelevant. It’s about how Ferrante’s writing lays them bare. Maybe it’s more about the writing then what it depicts. That said. I’d recommend reading it. Ferrante is one of the best writers alive. ...more
The good news is the author includes enough mundane daily detail to make the novel appear as real life, like a memoir. The bad news is that daiyly lifThe good news is the author includes enough mundane daily detail to make the novel appear as real life, like a memoir. The bad news is that daiyly life is not only mundane but boring. Most of this was. Zach, protagonist, is detached - leaves his sick daughter and despairing wife to be alone - but commits to a Don Quixote save at the end. For what reason? Maybe to prove we are all supermen underneath it all? Even the detached can be compassionate??? I didn't get the sidebar with His fellow professor????? And DeLois also seemed lie a dead end though she blended into the rescue. The author's writing is very believable, even when tackling unbelievable subjects. Not a Cormac McCarthy or a Murakami or even an Atwood, but an easy author to read. I loved James. Super book with a distinct purpose. Red it to redeem your belief in Percival Everett....more
Who knew you could write dialogue only covering well-deep subjects with psychojargon way over our heads questioning reality questioning if hallucinatiWho knew you could write dialogue only covering well-deep subjects with psychojargon way over our heads questioning reality questioning if hallucinations are dreams? Real? Or lunacy. Questioning the notion of sanity be sexy without sex And still be fascinating???????...more
I hated this book! (You can tell by the five stars.) It's all that author's fault. Drawing a character so impact-fully mundane. So living in the middlI hated this book! (You can tell by the five stars.) It's all that author's fault. Drawing a character so impact-fully mundane. So living in the middle of life. So not living but existing. And all those people who were never really there, more like faded pictures in a photo album. The only time one of them came to life was in Douglas letter to her. But then we never got to find out if he survived the war. He at least could have given us that. some closure for Christ's sake. There is no life here. No joy. Joy? No redemption. No recovery. It is despair unheralded, only felt so deeply that you just gotta hate this book. I kept thinking, What about the Buddhist middle way? That's where Mrs'Bridge lives. It's supposed to be such a content path. Instead it sucks. Life sucks. I've never felt more depressed. Thanks Connell....more
A remarkable story. Is it science fiction? fantasy? It's certainly different than any other novel. Keiko stands out like Jean Valjean, like Jane Eyre,A remarkable story. Is it science fiction? fantasy? It's certainly different than any other novel. Keiko stands out like Jean Valjean, like Jane Eyre, like The Cat in the Hat. and as different from us as all these characters are to each other. Gotta be one of the best books written - short, simple, repetitive yet deep in its depiction of Japanese and maybe most society and how we both expect and conform to what people around us expect of us. Thanks, Sayaka...more
i guarantee you will not understand this book. You will notget lost in its neighborly story. You will not relate to the characters or feel warm and fui guarantee you will not understand this book. You will notget lost in its neighborly story. You will not relate to the characters or feel warm and fuzzy after putting it down. And that's the charm of reading this, probably the furthest out of Beckett's works. If you keep an open mind it will take you to places in your brain you didn't know existed. Just read it, don't think about it. Let the genius come through - or not....more
I admit, I'm not a Stephen King reader but this got glowing reviews and I'm shocked at how poorly it's written. A bit wise-cracky, not funny. A lot ofI admit, I'm not a Stephen King reader but this got glowing reviews and I'm shocked at how poorly it's written. A bit wise-cracky, not funny. A lot of he did this then did that boring detail. Repetition inside sentences. one foot before another, one word before another. On and on with nothing happening, no intelligence and zero insights into the human condition. I found myself running over paragraphs then pages. Missed nothing. Like turning blank pages.
Deeply moving. Ishiguro writes in a way that brings you far into the character's personality and emotions. You feel those emotions with them. You knowDeeply moving. Ishiguro writes in a way that brings you far into the character's personality and emotions. You feel those emotions with them. You know these people. the landscape depictions add to a sense of being in the place where Ono (protagonist) takes us. The effect is an immersioninto the scenes and lives of the characters. That said, I give it 4 instead of 5 stars because it's a bit like a literary romance novel, so focused on the interaction of characters without a lot of deeper meanings. One thing I did get that was under the surface was the analogy of the floating world itself and the ephemeral nature of a man's life. Ono is not aware of who he was. He thinks maybe good, maybe not, sometimes both. He's not sure whether his life had any meaning. But he moves on. Life is not all that serious anyway. Par Zen. Part confusion. Always ephemeral. Feels like my life. You ride the roller coaster, up, down, twists and turns. When you get off, you die. By-the-way, I don't mean this as a bad thing :) ...more
A classic. Maybe the best play ever written. You're either gonna hate it or love it. Read it while suspending belief in anything. It will take you intA classic. Maybe the best play ever written. You're either gonna hate it or love it. Read it while suspending belief in anything. It will take you into some deep state of mind that you will not understand but hopefully will allow you to understand more of everything....more
Kafka, the protaganist, Nakata, the librarian who may or may not be his mother but with whom he has an affair, the library itself, the landscape woodsKafka, the protaganist, Nakata, the librarian who may or may not be his mother but with whom he has an affair, the library itself, the landscape woods, small towns, all are characters in this unforgettable story. The best of Murakami who can be brilliant as here and in "Hard - Boiled Wonderland..." and "Norwegian Wood" or boring as in 1Q84. You don't really know what's going on until it comes together at the end but you know you are on an alternate universe unbound by conventional possibility....more
Read this twice. last time a few months ago and it still stays with me like very few books. The theme is simple and pounded into you with such intensiRead this twice. last time a few months ago and it still stays with me like very few books. The theme is simple and pounded into you with such intensity it's hard to believe the author is capable of affecting us this way. Saramago keeps taking us deeper and deeper into the abyss he's created then lets us out slowly, like pulling on a thin fishing line. Very few authors affect me this way, Dostoevsky, Jennifer Egan, Sartre, Joyce, Kafka, Beckett, Elena Ferrante, McCarthy. Some Murakami, like "Kafka on the Shore"...more
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