Orpheus, Eurydice, Hermes (IV)
Now Eurydice walked at the hand of a god, her steps, constricted by the winding sheets, uncertain, meek, without impatience. She was deep within herself like a woman full with child, and gave no...
View ArticleOrpheus, Eurydice, Hermes (V)
Eurydice was no longer the fair beauty celebrated in Orpheus’ singing, no longer the fragrance and landscape of the bed, no more the property of any man. She was already unbound, like loosened hair,...
View ArticlePeriphery!
For it is true that the most vivid and enduring occurrences in our lives are often those that occur at the periphery of our awareness. — David Foster Wallace, “The Soul is Not a Smithy”
View ArticlePointing at shadows
For no, if the therapist really wanted the truth, the actual “gut”-level truth underneath all her childishly defensive anger and shame, the depressed person had shared from a hunched and near-fetal...
View ArticleLife has time to flash like neon
One clue that there’s something not quite real about sequential time and the way you experience it is the various paradoxes of time supposedly passing and of a so-called ‘present’ that’s always...
View ArticleA matter of perspective
But it wouldn’t have made you a fraud to change your mind. It would be sad to do it because you think you somehow have to. It won’t hurt, though. It will be loud, and you’ll feel things, but they’ll go...
View ArticleWrite for the gladiators
Three in the morning. I realize this second, then this one, then the next: I draw up the balance sheet for each minute. And why all this? Because I was born. It is a special type of sleeplessness that...
View ArticleNot really thinking
By using stale metaphors, similes, and idioms, you save much mental effort, at the cost of leaving your meaning vague, not only for your reader but for yourself. This is the significance of mixed...
View ArticleEnter Death
We know nothing of this going. It excludes us. Faced with death, what cause have we to respond with the fear and grief or even hatred that twist the features to a mask of tragedy? On this side of death...
View ArticleDo you feel it too?
‘This thing I feel, I can’t name it straight out but it seems important, do you feel it too?’ — this sort of direct question is not for the squeamish. — David Foster Wallace, “Octet”
View ArticleParty
Imagine you’ve gone to a party where you know very few people there, and then on your way home afterwards you suddenly realize that you just spent the whole party so concerned about whether the people...
View ArticleMy lesson
Under the skies, on the roads, in the towns, in the woods, in the hills, in the plains, by the shores, on the seas, behind my mannikins, I was not always sad, I wasted time, abjured my rights, suffered...
View ArticleSpeak of me
Ah yes, all lies, God and man, nature and the light of day, the heart’s outpourings and the means of understanding, all invented, basely, by me alone, with the help of no one, since there is no one, to...
View ArticleThe Library Remains Open for Browsing & Commentary
Better pass boldly into that other world, in full glory of some passion, than fade and wither dismally with age. — James Joyce, Dubliners
View Article50 Of The Most Beautiful Sentences In Literature
1. “At any rate, that is happiness; to be dissolved into something complete and great” —Willa Cather, My Antonia 2. “In our village, folks say God crumbles up the old moon into stars.” —Alexander...
View ArticleOut of the Darkness Ann Arbor Walk
“When you walk in the Out of the Darkness Walks, you join the effort with hundreds of thousands of people to raise awareness and funds that allow the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention (AFSP)...
View ArticleA Proust-Apocalyptic Story – via WSJ
The French writer pondered the end of the world in 1922. By Andrew Schmiege When Hawaiians were accidentally warned of impending nuclear destruction two weeks ago, I wonder how many reacted the way...
View ArticleWhy ‘getting lost in a book’ is so good for you, according to science
– Read original article here – “Transportation” — or the act of losing yourself in a book — makes you more empathetic, more creative and (hello!) it’s an escape. Whether you’re the reader who rips...
View ArticleKetamine offers lifeline for people with severe depression, suicidal thoughts
– Read full CNN article here – Mount Horeb, Wisconsin (CNN)A few months ago, Alan Ferguson decided he was ready to die — for the third time. In 2014, he attempted suicide twice, and the persistent...
View ArticleOne Bookstore Finds the Secret to Succeeding in the Amazon Age
Read full WSJ article here By Susan Kitchens Frank Reiss’s business spent 10 years on the edge of collapse. During the late 1990s and 2000s, his independent bookstore—like so many of its peers—faced...
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