dual personalities

Tag: reading

November 26, 2012

Happy birthday, Marilynne Robinson

by chuckofish

“…I’ve developed a great reputation for wisdom by ordering more books than I ever had time to read, and reading more books, by far, than I learned anything useful from, except, of course, that some very tedious gentlemen have written books. This is not a new insight, but the truth of it is something you have to experience to fully grasp.

Thank God for them all, of course, and for that strange interval, which was most of my life, when I read out of loneliness, and when bad company was much better than no company. You can love a bad book for its haplessness or pomposity or gall, if you have that starveling appetite for things human, which I devoutly hope you never will have. ‘The full soul loatheth an honeycomb; but to the hungry soul every bitter thing is sweet.’ There are pleasures to be found where you would never look for them. That’s a bit of fatherly wisdom, but it’s also the Lord’s truth, and a thing I know from my own long experience.”

from Gilead by Marilynne Robinson

Have you read any Marilynne Robinson? She is so great! She has written three highly-acclaimed novels plus several books of essays. She has been writer-in-residence or visiting professor at many universities and currently teaches at the Iowa Writers’ Workshop and lives in Iowa City. If you are not acquainted with Marilynne, you are in for a treat. She is wonderful.

Hope you had a wonderful Thanksgiving weekend with lots of good food:

family:

maybe a little Christmas decorating:

The boy puts up the Christmas lights

and even a little estate saling:

Estate-rescued angel choir

And, of course, some Marilynne Robinson!

7 Comments
October 23, 2012

Who would you choose?

by chuckofish

If you read a variety of blogs, you have certainly come across more than one of those posts where the writer asks the question: Who would you choose if you could have lunch with anyone? Usually they go on to tell you how they would love to get together with Audrey Hepburn, Princess Diana, Thomas Jefferson, Mother Theresa, Steven Spielberg and so on. Blah, blah, blah, boring celebrities. And, yes, I include Thomas Jefferson in that company. He would probably choose to have lunch with Marilyn Monroe.

Not that I’m judging anyone for their choices. Everyone is free to choose whom they want to choose. This is America after all! Come on.

Anyway, I’m sure you can guess who I would choose. Just in the last few days I’ve talked about Bob Dylan and Hilary Mantel and Marty Stuart–all would be charming companions at a meal. And you know how I feel about Frederick Buechner and Raymond Chandler. A conversation with them–to die for! As for movie stars, we’d need a big table to accommodate all my favorites.

But if we’re really talking about conversation, let’s invite:


Thomas Cranmer. He wrote the book.


General Sherman. He had Grant’s back.


U.S. Grant. He epitomized humility and courage. He had Lincoln’s back. And he was a really good writer.


Dorothy Rabinowitz. She tells it like it is in the WSJ.


T.E. Lawrence. He would be awesome, but we’d need someone to come along with us who could make him feel comfortable and draw him out of his shell–like Mrs. George Bernard Shaw.


Mary Prowers Hough, my great-great grandmother and the classiest lady to ever set foot in Colorado. I’d have a million questions for her.


J.D. Salinger. We could talk about Jesus over a glass of ginger ale in the kitchen.


Eudora Welty. We’d talk about stories and the art of writing them. I think I would like to invite


Shirley Jackson to come along too. The three of us would get along famously.


Saint Timothy. He received letters from Saint Paul containing personal advice which I take very personally: God did not give you a spirit of timidity!

Well, I’m sure I’ve left out some obvious choices. Who would you want to share a meal with? Alexander? Sargon the Great? Thomas Cromwell? Oliver Cromwell? Johnny Depp?

12 Comments
September 24, 2012

Tout va bien

by chuckofish

How was your weekend? I kept remembering where I was last weekend and what I was doing. (Last Saturday I was in Brooklyn having a bagel and coffee–you know how it goes.) Sigh. My response was to get busy.

I got my hair cut, went to an estate sale, checked out one of my favorite antique malls, caught up with my far-flung family members on the phone, scrubbed a shower, opened windows to let in the wonderful fresh air, went to Target, washed the kick plate on the refrigerator, changed sheets and did laundry, trimmed the ivy in front of the house, took a couple of walks, and finished the Anne Tyler book I was re-reading.

You get the idea. I find that the best thing for when you are sad or depressed is to clean and/or organize. Even if you don’t feel better afterward, you have a clean(er) house!

The Anne Tyler book, by the way, was Earthly Possessions, an early novel written in 1977, which is not (in my opinion) one of her best. But you know, any Anne Tyler book is much better than most, so I still enjoyed it. She always supplies a few golden nuggets. Here is one of them:

“Sometimes,” he said, “I believe we’re given the same lessons to learn, over and over, exactly the same experiences, till we get them right. Things keep circling past us.”

Maybe so. Food for thought anyway.

6 Comments
September 20, 2012

This and that

by chuckofish

Last night for the first time in a long time it was cool enough to take a walk after dinner. I walked past my favorite magnolia tree.

And I checked out the flora that had weathered our hot, dry summer.

I’m telling you, there were times this summer when we thought it would never cool off and that the rain would never come. But…It’s getting dark earlier. Sunrise comes later. Autumn approaches. Sweaters are necessary–not just a fashion accessory! Can pumpkins be far behind? This is my favorite time of year.

Best of all, I have a whole pile of new (and used) books to read.

A couple of these are replacements that I bought at The Strand because members of my family had borrowed them permanently (Dylan, Banks), but the rest are new reads! How good is that?

5 Comments
September 6, 2012

Why study literature?

by chuckofish

Why study literature?

College books from the 1970s

M. H. Abrams, founding editor emeritus of The Norton Anthology of English Literature, answered this way: “Ha — Why live? Life without literature is a life reduced to penury. It expands you in every way. It illuminates what you’re doing. It shows you possibilities you haven’t thought of. It enables you to live the lives of other people than yourself. It broadens you, it makes you more human. It makes life enjoyable. There’s no end to the response you can make to that question Why study literature…”

Here’s the whole interview.

Henry Beetle Hough, the celebrated editor of the Vineyard Gazette, put it this way: “Any one person’s life is inexperienced and narrow, straight through to the end–poorly informed, too. Books are the only hope.”

And then, as we’ve mentioned before, there’s C.S. Lewis, who said, “We read in order to know we are not alone.” We are always looking for spiritual kin. And the amazing thing is, we find them, don’t you?

7 Comments
August 9, 2012

Note to self

by chuckofish

I was casting about recently, as I am wont to do, trying to find something to read. I have plenty of books at home and usually can come up with something rather easily. And I did.

I started re-reading Civil to Strangers by Barbara Pym, which I had read back in the 1980s when I went through a Pym period. She had recently been re-discovered by the English-speaking world after the biographer David Cecil and the poet Philip Larkin both nominated her as the most underrated writer of the century.

Anyway, I thoroughly enjoyed my re-introduction to Pym.

Her books are very English, full of very English characters.

‘I suppose every author gets stuck occasionally,’ said Mrs. Gower.

‘The inspiration flows less easily,’ interposed Mrs. Wilmot, thinking that it was a more suitable phrase.

Cassandra smiled at both of them. ‘That’s just it,’ she said, making each woman feel that she had said exactly the right thing. ‘It’s so nice of you to ask after Adam’s book,’ she said, turning to Janie. ‘People are so kind,’ she added vaguely, almost as if her husband were an invalid who needed sympathetic enquiries.

I’m sure you know what I mean. Alexander McCall Smith even likens her to Jane Austen: “Like Jane Austen, Pym painted her pictures on a small square of ivory, and covered much the same territory as did her better-known predecessor: the details of smallish lives led to places that could only be in England. Neither used a megaphone; neither said much about the great issues of their time.”

So I have ordered Excellent Women, her most well-known novel, from Amazon and am eagerly awaiting its arrival.

‘I wonder, when you are working here, have you ever given a thought to all those who have died in Bodley’s Library, or as a result of working there?’

Adam was forced to admit that he had not.

‘You should, you know, it is quite an education.’

‘It would surely do one more good to concentrate on one’s work,’ said Adam austerely.

‘That is my work,’ said the clergyman simply. ’I am writing a thesis on that subject for the degree of Bachelor of Letters.’

Adam said nothing, but looked at him in some surprise.

‘Since my wife died,’ said the clergyman, ‘I have thought much of death. And your wife?’ He looked suddenly at Adam. ’You have a wife?’

‘She is not with me here,’ said Adam, hypnotised by the old man.

‘No, she is not with you here. But,’ his voice rose, ‘you must believe that you will meet again, that she will be waiting for you, in that other life, perhaps?’

‘She is in Budapest,’ said Adam shortly.

‘Oh, well, that’s another pair of shoes, isn’t it?’ said the clergyman surprisingly.

— Civil to Strangers

So if you are casting about for something to read, and the thought of the London Olympics ending makes you sad, I suggest you try Barbara Pym. You’ll be glad you did.

4 Comments
July 31, 2012

Why I love Raymond Chandler

by chuckofish

“So you got yourself in another jam.”

“Oh, you heard about it.”

“Brother I sit here all day on my fanny and I don’t look as if I had a brain in my head. But you’d be surprised what I hear…”

(The Big Sleep)

BTW, I heard from a couple of people at the wedding festivities that they were reading Moby Dick after reading our blog. Also someone told me she had gone out and bought Matterhorn and read it after reading about it on the blog. This warms my heart. Keep up the good work, readers! And let us know what you are reading.

2 Comments
May 23, 2012

Odds and ends and St. Elmo’s Fire

by chuckofish

It was a big weekend. Daughter #2, as you know, graduated.

Hoops and YoYo talking card

I bought this vintage 1970s needlepoint pillow at an estate sale.

And I finished Moby-Dick.

“One often hears of writers that rise and swell with their subject, though it may seem but an ordinary one. How, then, with me, writing of this Leviathan? Unconsciously my chirography expands into placard capitals. Give me a condor’s quill! Give me Vesuvius’ crater for an inkstand! Friends, hold my arms! For in the mere act of penning my thoughts of this Leviathan, they weary me, and make me faint with their outreaching comprehensiveness of sweep, as if to include the whole circle of the sciences, and all the generations of whales, and men, and mastodons, past, present, and to come, with all the revolving panoramas of empire on earth, and throughout the whole universe, not excluding its suburbs. Such, and so magnifying, is the virtue of a large and liberal theme! We expand to its bulk. To produce a mighty book, you must choose a mighty theme. No great and enduring volume can ever be written on the flea, though many there be who have tried it.” (The Fossil Whale, chapter 104)

A mighty book indeed! You’ll hear more about this book in the days to come. If you are looking for something to read, I can make no stronger a recommendation–read this book!

3 Comments
May 21, 2012

The art of (not) mincing words

by chuckofish

Sylvia Beach, American ex-patriot, minister’s daughter and owner of “Shakespeare and Company”, a bookstore in Paris, decided to rescue Ulysses which had been banned in English-speaking countries, by publishing it herself in France. A prospectus was printed announcing that Ulysses by James Joyce would be published “complete as written” by Shakespeare and Company Paris, in the autumn of 1921. The edition was to be limited to 1000 copies. On the back of the prospectus was a blank form to be filled with the subscriber’s name and his choice of the kind of copy he wanted (there were 3 choices).

Sylvia sent a prospectus to George Bernard Shaw, even though Joyce said he would never subscribe. They made a bet. She received the following reply:

Dear Madam,

I have read fragments of Ulysses in the serial form. It is a revolting record of a disgusting phase of civilization, but it is a truthful one; and I should like to put a cordon around Dublin, round up every male person in it between the ages of 15 and 30; force them to read all the foul mouthed, foul minded derision and obscenity. To you possibly it may appeal as art; you are probably (you see I don’t know you) a young barbarian beglamoured by the excitements and enthusiasms that art stirs up in passionate material; but to me it is all hideously real: I have walked those streets and know those shops and have heard and taken part in those conversations. I escaped from them to England at the age of twenty; and forty years later have learnt from the books of Mr. Joyce that Dublin is still what it was, and young men are still drivelling in slack-jawed blackguardism just as they were in 1870. It is, however, some consolation to find that at last somebody has felt deeply enough about it to face the horror of writing it all down and using his literary genius to force people to face it. In Ireland they try to make a cat cleanly by rubbing its face in its own filth. Mr. Joyce has tried the same treatment on the human subject. I hope it may prove successful.

…I must add, as the prospectus implies an invitation to purchase, that I am an elderly Irish gentleman, and if you imagine that any Irishman, much less an elderly one, would pay 150 francs for such a book, you know little of my countryman.

Faithfully,

G. Bernard Shaw

Sylvia was amused by being called “A young barbarian beglamoured”, but she lost the bet all right.

5 Comments
May 2, 2012

Happy 401st birthday

by chuckofish

…to the King James Version of the Bible. Time flies, doesn’t it? In 1611 the King James Bible was published for the first time in London, England, by printer Robert Barker. It molded the English language, “buttressed by ‘the powers that be’–one of its famous phrases–and yet enshrined a gospel of individual freedom. No other book has given more to the English-speaking world.”

Phrases that originated in the KJV:

From time to time
The root of the matter
As a lamb to the slaughter
Stand in awe
Turned the world upside down
To every thing there is a season
Unto the pure all things are pure
A thorn in the flesh
A still small voice
Suffer the little children
Pour out your heart
No small stir
Know for a certainty
The skin of my teeth
Fell flat on his face
Set thine house in order

(Thank you to the National Geographic, December 2011, for this information)

Let’s all take a break today and read a chapter from the KJV. Here’s one to start with (I Corinthians 13):

1Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not charity, I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal.

2And though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries, and all knowledge; and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity, I am nothing.

3And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned, and have not charity, it profiteth me nothing.

4Charity suffereth long, and is kind; charity envieth not; charity vaunteth not itself, is not puffed up,

5Doth not behave itself unseemly, seeketh not her own, is not easily provoked, thinketh no evil;

6Rejoiceth not in iniquity, but rejoiceth in the truth;

7Beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things.

8Charity never faileth: but whether there be prophecies, they shall fail; whether there be tongues, they shall cease; whether there be knowledge, it shall vanish away.

9For we know in part, and we prophesy in part.

10But when that which is perfect is come, then that which is in part shall be done away.

11When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things.

12For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known.

13And now abideth faith, hope, charity, these three; but the greatest of these is charity.

And while we’re at it, Happy birthday, David Beckham!

David Robert Joseph Beckham, OBE (born 2 May 1975) is an English association footballer who plays for the Los Angeles Galaxy. He has played for Manchester United, Preston North End, Real Madrid, Milan, and the England national team for which he holds the appearance record for an outfield player. And, for the record, he is perfect.

3 Comments