A Momentary Taste of Being

Let me start out the review by saying that I enjoyed this book very much.  I found some of the incidents and thoughts enlightening, some aggravating; some of the characters endearing, some annoying; in short, it was a good blend of event and person.  While nothing much really happens in the book, everything possible important happens.  And that is, perhaps, the source of my greatest disappointment--the ending.  I don't get Portrait of a Lady , which, it seems, is what I was heading for.  But nowadays, Portrait of a Lady is impossible because divorce is not so unthinkable--indeed, divorce appears to be the first recourse when anything gets to be a little difficult.  I did not get Anna Karenina (although I'm sure that Eugenides referred to it more than obliquely in more than one scene).  No, I got what seemed to me like a lame sort of Casablanca ending.  You know, "We'll always have Paris. . ." And that's a shame because otherwise this was a com...

from The Marriage Plot Jeffrey Eugenides For thirty-five years she'd been inspecting her corn with Mendelian patience, receiving no encouragement or feedback on her work, just showing up every day, involved in her own process of discovery, forgotten by the world and not caring. And now, finally, this , the Nobel, the vindication of her life's work, and though she seemed pleased enough, you could see that it hadn't been the Prize she was after at all. MacGregor's reward had been the work itself, the daily doing of it, the achievement made of a million unremarkable days. This is how a life means--not in the light of the expectation of others or of our own unreasonable expectations of ourselves, but through following a passion that allows us to BE in a way that no other thing can.  A million unremarkable days that may lead to an overwhelming question--or it may lead to silence. We fail to understand that meaning isn't something you make by willing to make it, b...

The tyrrany of the deconstructionists/semioticians as evinced by Jeffrey Eugenides: from The Marriage Plot Jeffrey Eugenides      He flipped the pages until he found the one he wanted.  The he returned to the bed and handed the book to her. I Love You je-t'aime /I-love-you As she read these words, Madeleine was flooded with happiness.  She glanced up at Leonard, smiling.  With his finger he motioned for her to keep going.   The figure refers not to the declaration of love, to the avowal, but to the repeated utterance of the love cry.  Sudeenly Madeliens happiness diminished, usurped by the feeling of peril. She wished she weren't naked. She narrowed her shoulders and overde herself with the bed-sheet as she obediently read on.      Once the first avowal has been made, "I love you" has no meaning whatever. . .       Leonard, squatting, had a smirk on his face. Utter foulness.  Those who would s...

Foster and Ellis together again not for the last time I truly wish I could get through Foster's longer works.  I've managed two short stories--but I am so put off by post-modern games in literature that I find it impossible to read.  On the other hand Ellis created a sort of sick tour de force in Less than Zero and has not since equaled that early work. Of the two, I would like to like Foster and find Ellis unreadable, but for me, it is exactly the reverse.  And because Ellis is readable but had nothing of interest to say--I find that I cannot read either. By the way, the blogpost referenced above is an elegant consideration of the two writers well worth your attention if you are interested in either of them.

Eliot's Wasteland hits the media age

"The Hollow Men"

"An Interview with Jennifer Egan."

"The Shore Haunter" by Loren Eisley Talk about cultivating a sense of wonder--the thought of the lake shores on which mammoths once wandered.

"Gems from George Eliot"

One way of reading one of T. S. Eliot's great poems.

Silence by Shusaku Endo reviewed If you're anything like I was, I had heard about the necessity of this book for years before I picked it up.  Having picked it up, I feel like I will never put it down.  It has become emblematic for me.  I push it upon anyone who will listen long enough for me to get through my spiel. But, I do know, if you want to split a roomful of Catholics faster than lightning--toss this book in the room and then ask them whether what the protagonists does at the end was right or wrong.  Guaranteed, you'll split that room--perhaps not right down the middle--but there will be at least two groups each adamantly holding to their point.  I know, been there, done that.  I'm with the group that agrees with the Priest and with the voice from the fumie .  But to quote an American Literary Figure recently in the news, "without you having read it, you ain't gonna know what I'm talking about."  If you haven't done so, this is one...

A Visit from the Goon Squad- -this review nicely sums up my own experience with it.  Not riveting, for me, so much so that I didn't bother to finish

Einstein--Seven Quotes

Losing a fond memory revisiting childhood reading.

Particularly notable is the then-royal-family's view of Eliot's masterwork.

e. e. cummings The Enormous Room

An interesting quotation from T. S. Eliot about Baudelaire considering Baudelaire's life and all.

Eliot and Bellow are distracting us

"Another Kind of Autumn" I have to admit to not caring much for Eisley--poetry or prose; however, the Fred's comments cast an interesting light on the poem and this poem is certainly among the better.

An interview on I  Remember Nothing