A Momentary Taste of Being

A comment from the blogkeeper at Underbelly (thank you Buce) inspired me to look this up.  I was fairly certain that I had reviewed the book in the recent past, and so I discovered this.  a good book is worth appreciation--over and over and over again. Also, while you are appreciating, you might want to take in Underbelly's look at Helena as well.    La Belle Hélène on March 18, 2005 8:11 AM In reading Helena last night I stumbled across a large number of passages I would like to share. But I thought the more important thing to share was an observation. Evelyn Waugh liked this best among his books. There are a good many reasons why this might be so: it is splendidly written--both the prose and the coherence are several notches above some of his earlier, more frenetic work. It is tightly done, with just the right strokes and exactly the right selection of detail. But I suspect the reason Waugh prized this above all the other works is that in t...

Christ Altogether Lovely  on November 2, 2003 7:34 AM   From the sermons of John Flavel from "Christ Altogether Lovely" John Flavel "Yes, He is altogether lovely." Song of Songs 5:16. At the ninth verse of this chapter, you have a question put forth by the daughters of Jerusalem, "What is your beloved more than another beloved?" The spouse answers, "He is the chief among ten thousand." She then recounts many of the things she finds so excellent in her beloved and then concludes with these words that I have read: "Yes, he is altogether lovely." The words set forth the transcendent loveliness of the Lord Jesus Christ, and naturally resolve themselves into three parts: 1. Who he is. 2. What he is. 3. What he is like. First, Who he is: the Lord Jesus Christ, after whom she had been seeking, for whom she was overcome by love; concerning whom these daughters of Jerusalem had enquired: whom she had struggled to describe in his particul...

I reprint this from my previous blog because I truly feel that this book should be getting much more attention than it is likely to have done.  It was a wonderful book, superbly executed, thoughtful and insightful and. . . well, read below: Raising a Child with Soul by Slovie Jungreis-Wolff  on November 25, 2008 7:52 AM This is going to be a very difficult book to review. I'd rather just quote the entire thing to you--it is simply THAT good. Ostensibly a book on child-rearing, Ms. Jungreis-Wolff uses the occasion to teach all of us some solid Torah wisdom that we would be wise to incorporate into our own lives. Let's start somewhere: from Raising a Child with Soul Slovie Jungreis-Wolff [Speaking to parents who are concerned about taking their daughters to the funeral of their grandfather] "I appreciate your concerns," I told them, "but life is not Disneyland. Besides the proper honor that is required to be given to their grandfather, your girls must ...

A series in which I treat The Unvanquished (as fine and simple an introduction to the main lines of Faulkner as one could hope for) and Absalom, Absalom! (a book that rose almost to the heights of Ulysses in my estimation). The Unvanquished  on November 28, 2007 7:25 AM   Having already begun the inextricably intertwined premier book of this civil war diptych ( Absalom, Absalom ), gives some perspective on this work of William Faulkner. This is, by far and away one of the most accessible of Faulkner's works. While there are some subtleties and complexities in the prose, the stream of consciousness approach is filtered through the mind of a highly educated adult, even in the early parts of the book which are told from the point of view of a child between the ages of 10 and 12. The novel originated as a chain of short stories published during the time Faulkner was writing Absalom, Absalom, and people more knowledgeable about Faulkner as a writer and a person might say t...

By Way of Comment on My Present Read  on April 25, 2008 1:30 PM I have, of late, had the sometime pleasure of the company of a young American woman of my acquaintance at luncheon. While the venues, cuisines, and surroundings of our après-midi repast were variable and dependent upon the circumstances and opportunities available to us, they have always been of the greatest pleasure and entertainment to me. Miss Archer is at once a very determined young lady, but one also tinged with the streak of independence set firmly in the ground of a graceful and enhancing naiveté, which conduces to my enjoyment of our conversational aperitifs.   I've grown somewhat concerned because whereas her talk was mostly of the many men who saw her and implored her favors while she remained on the Touchett family estate, more and more I am hearing of a person of interest who seems to have netted our pretty little bird without her own knowledge. And the more I hear of Osmond, the more concern...

It is a great pleasure to me to witness a revival of interest in and printing of the novels of Georgette Heyer.  The last time there was such a revival, I was too young to take notice or too arrogant to think that it had anything to do with me.  However, there are few better ways to pass than time than in the company of the perceptive, witty, and charming Ms. Heyer. Georgette Heyer  on June 30, 2008 7:57 AM It is a shame that Mrs. Heyer's novels have always been marketed as "Romances," indeed, that she is considered the founder of that most infamous of romantic genres "the Regency romance," not because her stories are not romances, but because we no longer truly understand what is meant by the term and many potential readers are alienated both by the genre and its marketing. How many young men are likely to pick up a book with a bright yellow cover showing a young woman as though filmed through cheesecloth accepting a yellow rose from a young man in a rat...

For the Hyperrationalists   on February 17, 2009 7:40 AM    One of the things that most disturbs me about some of the arguments and statements I have read regarding reason and the Church is that were one to take them at face value, they would seem to imply no place whatsoever for the emotional life. As a result, I found the following interesting: from Proust Was a Neuroscientist Jonah Lehrer One of Damasio's most surprising discoveries is that the feelings generated by the body are an essential element of rational thought. Although we typically assume that our emotions interfere with reason, Damasio's emotionless patients proved incapable of making reasonable decisions. After suffering their brain injuries, all began displaying disturbing changes in behavior. Some made terrible investments and ended up bankrupt; others became dishonest and antisocial; most just spent hours deliberating over irrelevant details. According to Damasio, th...