Books

Yo. In anticipation of the many hours I will be spending in a rocking chair this year, I’ve been raiding Project Gutenberg for free plain text downloads. To fill in some of my personal deficiencies, I’ve so far grabbed some Ibsen, Gogol, and Joyce’s Dubliners.

Last year I was deep in “Modern,” Harlem Renaissance, and even some Russian short stories. I just grabbed some more Russian shorts, but I’m also looking for advice on which Russian novels to start with. Ideas?

I’m really, really weak in fiction of the last 70 years. I’ve read like ten novels I can think of from the last two decades. It’s lame. Help?

Do you have suggestions of places to start with Saul Bellow and Flannery O’Connor? And, really, should I read Gabriel García Márquez? I’ve always resisted, but I just read an article by Rushdie about how GGM’s novels are grotesquely mangled when turned into movies, so I can’t even cheat and watch the adaptations.

And any other suggestions you have are welcome. Maybe we can negotiate a lending trade … how very recession-minded.

Arcticle

I can’t sleep. So this post will probably just make you crinkle your nose, particularly if you’re sober. No worries.

This is a chapter of a book, Sound Unbound, edited by DJ Spooky (who besides being a most interesting musician working with the broadest imaginable range of artists, majored in French lit and philo and is a long-time friend of Shepard Fairey). I recommend that you read the chapter; don’t be a-skeerd of it even though it looks dense. That just means you’ll get through more coolness in less time.

The essay’s like a series of TED talks on speed for people who are in to technology and art and architecture and geography and music and film and the all-consuming fastness of the speed of life in which all of these things articulate … it pulls together a plethora of things, people, and ideas I’m interested in at absolute warp speed.

But that’s the point. He’s sampling history and books and philosophers and programmer-speak and art exhibits. He’s filtering them, finding the patterns, trying to decipher a system that makes sense in his (and, since I know who’s reading this, it’s safe to say our) world. And the common denominator for him is the archive as the dominant form. The web as an archive, his music collection as archive, ftp having the potential to be the ultimate communication tool so far.

He tells a story of how a clock maker invented the modern system of latitute (as in longitude and latitude), and the moral of the story is that time is the archival system for the measurement (and thus understanding) of space, and that time is also the archival system for the measurement (and thus the understanding) of music (rhythm). Presence and absence of material. Well … I take it back. It may not have a moral. That’s okay, though. It gets me worked up, and that’s about all anyone can ask for from ideas.

So this is basically the scariest thing i’ve ever seen relating to copyright laws and their abuse.

Happy Monday!

http://www.bestofartists.com/creative-sculpture/2008/7/7/you-could-lose-your-rights.html

When I was in grade school, probably third or forth grade, my sister was reading IT by Stephen King. She had about 50 or so pages left in the book, but had left her copy at school. Now, my parents were out on the town. I don’t know what the date was, but I can tell you it was winter, it was dark and cold.

So my sister convinces me to ride my bike to Wal-mart. Brilliant. It is probably about 5-6 (looking at the map it is probably 4-5) miles and most likely the furthest I had ridden my bike at that time. And this was on a little bastard of a bike, right? She gets me all bundled up, she gives me a scarf and puts the ten bucks or so in a velcro wallet that we strap around one of my extremities, time has taken that detail from me.

I arrive at Wal-Mart freezing, walking around in an awesome jean-jacket and sweater, hat, scarf and everything else. Now, this is critical, the one instruction I was given was to inspect the book. Apparently some of the books had a section of the book that was miscut and I was to peruse the volume to make sure that it was indeed readable. I have no idea what the cashier must have been thinking, this kid buying It, late at night, obviously alone–I bought some candy as well.

Having finished my first carbo-load for the ride home, I returned for a second helping. As I sit by the entrance to make sure I am sufficiently rested for the return trip my father comes running through the door. I was, I suppose, thankful and surprised to be rescued as my father showered me with somewhat confusing adoration.

I wonder what he said to her when she told him where I was. I wonder how long I wandered the aisles not wanting to go back outside.

A couple of weeks ago I was up late online and came across a list of King’s works and I realized how much of his work I had read. I thought it would be cool to read all of his books from Carrie to whatever is published when I finish adventure, so I ordered Carrie and Night Shift.

I spoke with my sister the next day about some other random topic and I mentioned this to her and I asked her if she was interested and she mentioned she was already considering whether she was going to check the books out or buy them outright.

So that’s my story, my sister and I are going to read all of Stephen King’s books, in order. I find it very comforting that we have something like this planned that will undoubtedly take longer than any estimate I would give it. We’ll see how it goes, and if we make it, but I have started Carrie.

That’s my story. Oh yeah, I bought a miscut book, and she couldn’t even read it.

I just read an article http://tls.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,25341-2647599,00.html about being able to talk about books we haven’t read. Though the article was written about people in an academic world, I found the following to be wrong:

“We live in a society . . . in which reading still remains the object of a form of sacralization”, particularly where certain “canonical texts” are concerned: it is practically forbidden not to have read these.”

I don’t think any of us probably expect each other to have read anything. Is there any common denominator book? I might risk the assumption that everyone who went to college read Gatsby, but almost certainly that doesn’t apply to the American population at large. Maybe everyone read The Telltale Heart in grade or high school?

Is it useful to have a common cultural “home base”? What do you think it is for our generation? (And will it be The House on Mango Street for some other generation?)

I won’t spoil the new Harry Potter for anyone – I imagine quite a few of us are fans. But is anyone else done?

I was feeling pretty anxious on Friday that it wouldn’t be good enough, after all of the waiting and hype — and I think it actually exceeded my expectations. But now I’m sad that it’s over.

For those of you reading it, any thoughts so far…

"There is nothing political in American Literature." -Laura Bush

What does that quote first make you think of?

An author?

A teacher?

A glass of wine and a front porch?

Song lyrics?

A wadded-up copy of The Jungle with a yellow

"used" sticker on the spine and three kinds

of highlighter throughout?

Did words on a page ever activate you?

Seeing how this community was founded out of the ashes of a book club, I thought I would invite you all to read a book with me. A sort of impromptu book club. The book I am reading, while not necessarily inspired by Mark’s post about the generalization of male emotion, is related to Mark’s post. The book I am reading is “Emotional Intelligence” by Danial Goleman (ISBN-13: 978-0553383713). Lawrencians, I think there is another copy at the library.

The title of this post is “linear non-linear book club,” because I don’t expect us all to read it at the same time or pace. If you decide to read it and find something noteworthy, please share. It doesn’t matter if the discussion follows the order of the book. Nor does it matter if you comments are timely and “in order” of the commenting. It only matters that we are communicating. (Does this make sense? Sometimes I think I am too geeky for my own good. Sheesh.)

Let the LNL Book Club begin. Woo (can I get a “hoo?”)

Hi! I like words. Your mission, should you chose to accept it, is to read this:

www.nytimes.com/2007/03/11/books/chapters/0311-1st-yago.html?_r=3&ref=firstchapters&oref=slogin&oref=slogin

If you make it this far…I commend you. While I find linguistics fascinating, I remember dozing in many a semantics class. I will never forget the week we spent debating the true meaning of certain prepositions. “Is the fly ‘on’ the wall or ‘at’ the wall?”
Anyhoo, I find word-usage to be most interesting. The English language is pretty neat-o all by itself. Many of our rules don’t make a lot of sense and don’t have much consistency. However, it is the way we choose to string words together to convey a thought that is intriguing.
One doesn’t have to speak in mechanically accurate English to be understood. I employ silly English rules to make up my own words all the time (see previous posts). How about Mary Poppins, people for whom English is a second language, and three-year-old children? What about gangsta-rap…did i spell that right? Then there’s Bush with “I’m the decider.” You get the idea.
In reference to the article, I enjoy when authors use obscure words to enhance the description of their work. Yes, I keep Webster’s handy as I am not the brightest crayon in the public school system. I much prefer interesting and new words to monotonous and overused ones
.
1) How is our word-usage a reflection of our culture, our society? Is it a reflection at all?
2) What are some of your favorite words (any part of speech)
3) What word do you wish wasn’t so popular?

Ok, if this is too lame, I won’t hold it against you for not posting:)

disclaimer: linguistics permanently impaired my ability to spell.