James, Norvik published Soderberg's "Martin Birck's Youth" iirc but that's the only other novel of his I've seen in English.― Tim, Wednesday, 19 August 2015 Bookmark Flag Post Permalink
― Tim, Wednesday, 19 August 2015 Bookmark Flag Post Permalink
iirc the intro said there were only a couple of other novels bar what's mentioned - and of course Gertrud can't go w/out a mention. Imagine the play is knocking around somewhere although Dreyer's versh makes for one of the best films of the 60s.
― xyzzzz__, Wednesday, 19 August 2015 09:56 (eight years ago) link
close to the end of to the lighthouse, i found it really powerful. that chasmic drop from the dinner scene into this grim post-war future is heartbreaking.― doing my Objectives, handling some intense stuff (LocalGarda), Wednesday, August 19, 2015 3:51 AM (7 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink
― doing my Objectives, handling some intense stuff (LocalGarda), Wednesday, August 19, 2015 3:51 AM (7 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink
Yeah, "Time Passes" is maybe the most striking thing in all of Woolf for me.
― one way street, Wednesday, 19 August 2015 15:59 (eight years ago) link
yeah, the way she just suddenly hurtles through all the deaths is both really wrenching but also technically brilliant.
like for the opening section it's just incredibly slow and meandering, almost cryptic, then all of a sudden it's years later and these children are dead and this engaged couple have a rotten marriage. this was my first woolf so i look forward to more.
― doing my Objectives, handling some intense stuff (LocalGarda), Wednesday, 19 August 2015 16:04 (eight years ago) link
Right, am ordering "Martin Birck's Youth"
― as verbose and purple as a Peter Ustinov made of plums (James Morrison), Thursday, 20 August 2015 00:50 (eight years ago) link
Bordwell - Ozu and the Poetics of CinemaSome more 1001 Nights
― jmm, Thursday, 20 August 2015 00:53 (eight years ago) link
Some Jack London short stories. He was a clever writer all right.
― Aimless, Thursday, 20 August 2015 00:54 (eight years ago) link
Yeah good writer, shame he was an ardent racist though. Not sure if I've read him since I saw that outlined.Guess I still read Lovecraft and he was too.
― Stevolende, Thursday, 20 August 2015 07:57 (eight years ago) link
So was virginia woolf, ditto
― as verbose and purple as a Peter Ustinov made of plums (James Morrison), Thursday, 20 August 2015 10:41 (eight years ago) link
Didn't come up in the Library of America editions I read (long ago), or not that I recall---though maybe he ambivalently shaded the obvious baddie, Nietzche-reading, Ozymandian ahole Cap'n of The Sea Wolf. I mainly retain an impression of methodically mesmerizing detail, in "To Build A Fire," and his experiences working in a laundry, finally getting so sick that he ended up in the hospital--briefly, but still it was a rare achievement, and a holiday! Also "The Open Road" and other tales of hoboing, occasionally with time in jails here and there, comparisons of conditions, etc. Even more of a likely influence on Orwell via The Iron Heel, his pre-1984, and People of the Abyss, which seems like it may have led to Down And Out In Paris and London. Crick's bio mentions that Orwell's story is fiction, which I hadn't thought of, because it's presented with a lot of London-Orwell-type low-key clarity, good camera recording all shades of grey. So then I thought People.. was a novel too, until I worked in a bookstore and sold a limited edition incl. pictures the author took with a camera concealed in his rags: people looking like miners who just emerged from a cave-in, but they're walking around a marketplace, on just another day in London.
― dow, Thursday, 20 August 2015 14:35 (eight years ago) link
Just finished The First Bad Man, Miranda July's first novel. Will have to check her short storiesm considering how involving this is, chapter by chapter, although the seems too carefully, obtrusively contrived--would rather she just through the cards up in the air than keep shuffling and counting--but as a chapter, it does win me over, as the obsesso characters continue on their journeys, in their spells, exploring new-to-me worlds and ages of passive-aggression, paying dues in funny money and other currencies, having real sex while imaging they, not (necessarily, although sometimes also) their partners, are other people--yadda yadda: it starts out like "Portlandia" meets chick lit, and other pop elements appear, but characterization goes deeper, and finds its own surprising plausibility, which reasserts its boundaries, as the floodwaters recede, or settle in. I found myself caring about, sometimes moved by, even relating to the characters, however obscurely: most of it has nothing at all to do with people, places, or events in my own life, so not much dependence on familiarity (although if I lived in middle-class suburban California ca. 2013, who knows).
― dow, Thursday, 20 August 2015 16:52 (eight years ago) link
the *ending* seems too carefully, obtrusively contrived. Would rather she just *threw* her cards up in the air...
― dow, Thursday, 20 August 2015 16:55 (eight years ago) link
Older and younger people using and used by, sometimes maybe even for the better, while they all keep getting older, of course: yeah, that part's relatable, as the kids say.
― dow, Thursday, 20 August 2015 17:05 (eight years ago) link
using and used by *each other* ffs
― dow, Thursday, 20 August 2015 17:07 (eight years ago) link
I forgot that July has a novel out. I'll have to remember to check that out. I quite enjoyed No One Belongs Here More Than You. Some might find her a little cutesy, but several of her improbable deadpan twists had me laughing out loud.
― o. nate, Friday, 21 August 2015 01:54 (eight years ago) link
Jessica Hopper - The First Collection of Criticism From a Living Female Rock CriticMary Gaitskill - Bad Behavior
― The New Gay Sadness (cryptosicko), Saturday, 22 August 2015 15:04 (eight years ago) link
thomas Bernhard: My Prizes -- hilariously bad-tempered
― as verbose and purple as a Peter Ustinov made of plums (James Morrison), Sunday, 23 August 2015 02:27 (eight years ago) link
That's his thing, no?
― Is It POLLING, Bob? (James Redd and the Blecchs), Sunday, 23 August 2015 02:33 (eight years ago) link
Definitely, but this is a collection of recollections of various prizes he was given (plus some of the acceptance speeches) and how for the most part he hated winning them, or the prizegiving went wrong, or the thing he bought with the money got trashed. Rather touchingly, he seems to go everywhere with his aunt.
― as verbose and purple as a Peter Ustinov made of plums (James Morrison), Sunday, 23 August 2015 07:58 (eight years ago) link
just started reading "a late dinner - the food and culture of spain" by paul richardson. very interesting. also been flicking through the irish journal, stinging fly, the london issue. bought that new granta anthology yesterday and my in-tray also has the new musil collection and portnoy's complaint.
― doing my Objectives, handling some intense stuff (LocalGarda), Sunday, 23 August 2015 09:11 (eight years ago) link
Ishiguro, THE BURIED GIANT
Chandler, THE BIG SLEEP
then I started on Kafka, AMERIKA
― the pinefox, Sunday, 23 August 2015 09:55 (eight years ago) link
Tony Fletcher All Hopped Up But Got No Place to GoHistory of 50 years of music from the streets in NYC. So far I've got as far as Chan Pozo getting murdered over his reaction to a bad weed deal on returning to NYC from a tour where his congas had been stolen. It's good so far. & has me wanting to get hold of some material by Machito who has already been talked about.I think what negative criticism I've read of the book has been over omissions he has actually consciously made to fit his self designed rubrick which is about that music from the streets thing, so he drops things when they get commercial recognition. it means he looks at Latin music about a decade before Fania nut none of the Nu Yorica era stuff. He also drops hip hop just as its beginning to get really interesting. He cuts off in 1977, so I think he has the birth of that but none of the latter developments which he might dismiss the street level of because of major label involvement, which doesn't sound quite like the reality of the situation but does seem to be his approach. Anyway looking forward to reading the rest of this and hopefully having the soundtrack as I go. Writing ids pretty good anyway.
― Stevolende, Sunday, 23 August 2015 11:53 (eight years ago) link
Or alternatively actual title is All Hopped Up and Ready To Go. As in the Ramones line,
― Stevolende, Sunday, 23 August 2015 11:55 (eight years ago) link
readin TEH TRACTATUS in german so lese LOGISCH-PHILOSOPHISCHE ABHANDLUNG, it's nifty
― j., Sunday, 23 August 2015 14:06 (eight years ago) link
Die Welt ist alles, was der Fall ist. In German it rhymes, do u see?
― Is It POLLING, Bob? (James Redd and the Blecchs), Sunday, 23 August 2015 18:36 (eight years ago) link
hör
― j., Sunday, 23 August 2015 18:53 (eight years ago) link
hör auf!
― Is It POLLING, Bob? (James Redd and the Blecchs), Sunday, 23 August 2015 19:41 (eight years ago) link
:O
― j., Sunday, 23 August 2015 20:24 (eight years ago) link
"music from the streets in NYC"
can one really play music in the street?
maybe as a one-man-band or busker or something
but music more often made in a studio or concert venue or similar
― the pinefox, Wednesday, 26 August 2015 09:01 (eight years ago) link
interesting
― doing my Objectives, handling some intense stuff (LocalGarda), Wednesday, 26 August 2015 09:05 (eight years ago) link
Time was a child could play a kick-drum in the street.
― ledge, Wednesday, 26 August 2015 10:35 (eight years ago) link
Read some in Cassius Dio's History last night, but I think I will move over to reading Roumeli, Patrick Leigh Fermor.
I last read Roumeli in 1980 and have fond memories of it. I was a bit of a Grecophile back then, which tendency has abated somewhat in the intervening decades, but I would still jump at a chance to return to Greece and spend a few weeks in one of the less-touristy backwater towns, preferably near the sea (and most of Greece qualifies on that head), drinking retsina, eating whatever the taverna served and palavering with the locals.
― Aimless, Wednesday, 26 August 2015 18:26 (eight years ago) link
I think Fletcher's idea is that the music is organically directed rather than shaped by commerce. As in it comes directly from the artist and he gives up on whatever the music scene is when its established enough that labels are directing the music. Anyway its an interesting read. I've just got through doo wop.
― Stevolende, Wednesday, 26 August 2015 18:39 (eight years ago) link
Kurt Tucholsky: Berlin! Berlin! -- collection of Weimar Germany-era journalism/poems/satiresRandolph Stow: The Visitants -- Papua New Guinea, Australian ex-pats, madness, colonialism, suicide, aliens?
― as verbose and purple as a Peter Ustinov made of plums (James Morrison), Wednesday, 26 August 2015 23:58 (eight years ago) link
Nadezhda Mandelstam - Hope Abandoned. One of the great books - with the caveat that you'll get more out of it if you know enough about the Russian poets and literature in general of the 20s and 30s (and then a dollop of Soviet history on top) but its by turns critical, gossipy, chatty, funny, and she never feels sorry for herself. At least in print, she remarkably keeps her cool at what life throws at her. And the Soviet regime of the 30s had thrown a lot at her!
― xyzzzz__, Saturday, 29 August 2015 12:29 (eight years ago) link
the preceding volume of that i remember being pretty great
― ♛ LIL UNIT ♛ (thomp), Saturday, 29 August 2015 12:44 (eight years ago) link
i am reading gene wolfe, oyy, and working through the library of america james baldwin
― ♛ LIL UNIT ♛ (thomp), Saturday, 29 August 2015 12:45 (eight years ago) link
Yeah - have a 'classic' 70s penguin paperbk of both.
― xyzzzz__, Saturday, 29 August 2015 13:45 (eight years ago) link
reading this. 2nd book in a trilogy. 3rd book hasn't come out yet. i like it. about a weird fussy race of space conquerors. they really love tea, so you know they are evil.
http://i.kinja-img.com/gawker-media/image/upload/vxkfj6hqbqknpmwt7ur9.jpg
― scott seward, Saturday, 29 August 2015 14:08 (eight years ago) link
The Tailor of Panama and Edmund White's States of Desire: Travels in Gay America.
― The burrito of ennui (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Saturday, 29 August 2015 14:25 (eight years ago) link
in the 80's i remember chickening out and not buying states of desire when i saw it in a bookstore after totally loving a boy's own story and the beautiful room is empty. i would read it now!
― scott seward, Saturday, 29 August 2015 15:27 (eight years ago) link
I've been reading Chris Kraus's Torpor, which is just brutal, the last book in Kraus's "failing marriage to Sylvere Lotringer" trilogy, not as manic and colorful as "I Love Dick" but impressive in its ability to balance the playful flexibility of the narrative voice with the crushing sadness of the subject matter. Also going slowly through Brandon Stosuy's anthology of New York Downtown writing in the seventies and eighties, Up is Up But So is Down, and starting Cynthia Carr's biography of David Wojnarowicz, Fire in the Belly.
― one way street, Saturday, 29 August 2015 18:52 (eight years ago) link
― scott seward
As a unknowing time capsule of an era decimated in a couple of years, it's poignant.
― The burrito of ennui (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Saturday, 29 August 2015 19:10 (eight years ago) link
yeah, that's one of the reasons i'd be interested in reading it now. forgotten worlds appeal to me.
― scott seward, Saturday, 29 August 2015 19:14 (eight years ago) link
It's also (iirc) p hot, and I'm p much straight, so that's kinda cool. Reading Daphne du Maurier's The Parasites and up to The Auroras of Autumn in Wallace Stevens' Collected Poems.
― It empowers them, he jokes (albvivertine), Sunday, 30 August 2015 00:14 (eight years ago) link
finished Kafka, AMERIKA - less sinister and dark than the other novels but can still be distressing the way the innocent hero is abused by others.
odd how it finishes with such a separate chapter which introduces a brand new character (Fanny) we're supposed to have met before but whose previous appearance must not have made the cut at least in the version I have.
then finished another PKD novel.
― the pinefox, Sunday, 30 August 2015 09:09 (eight years ago) link
Also going slowly through Brandon Stosuy's anthology of New York Downtown writing in the seventies and eighties, Up is Up But So is Down
I just spent some time w/this too, researching my own memoir-ish project. Ended up skimming, frankly. Didn't get Kathy Acker then, don't now. Miguel Pinero's poem "scatter my ashes on the lower east side" >>>>> everything else in the book put together, in my not so humble. Cynthia Carr's David Wojnarowicz bio was fascinating if a little overlong and ultimately shattering, tragic. Gives a sharp, detailed inside view of the 80s EV art scene.
― got the club going UP on a tuesday (m coleman), Sunday, 30 August 2015 12:11 (eight years ago) link
Pinero's thing is called A Lower East Side Poem.
― got the club going UP on a tuesday (m coleman), Sunday, 30 August 2015 12:14 (eight years ago) link
That sounds good! I would like to read that poem.
I am going to read Franco Moretti a bit.
― the pinefox, Sunday, 30 August 2015 13:49 (eight years ago) link
A Lower East Side Poem by Miguel Pinero
Just once before I dieI want to climb up on atenement skyto dream my lungs out tillI crythen scatter my ashes thruthe Lower East Side.
So let me sing my song tonightlet me feel out of sightand let all eyes be drywhen they scatter my ashes thruthe Lower East Side.
From Houston to 14th Streetfrom Second Avenue to the mighty Dhere the hustlers & suckers meetthe faggots & freaks will all gethighon the ashes that have been scatteredthru the Lower East Side.
There's no other place for me to bethere's no other place that I can seethere's no other town around thatbrings you up or keeps you downno food little heat sweeps byfancy cars & pimps' bars & juke saloons& greasy spoons make my spirits flywith my ashes scattered thru theLower East Side . . .
A thief, a junkie I've beencommitted every known sinJews and Gentiles . . . Bums & Menof style . . . run away childpolice shooting wild . . .mother's futile wails . . . pushersmaking sales . . . dope wheelers& cocaine dealers . . . smoking potstreets are hot & feed off those who bleed to death . . .
all that's trueall that's trueall that is truebut this ain't no liewhen I ask that my ashes be scattered thruthe Lower East Side.
So here I am, look at meI stand proud as you can seepleased to be from the Lower Easta street fighting mana problem of this landI am the Philosopher of the Criminal Minda dweller of prison timea cancer of Rockefeller's ghettocidethis concrete tomb is my hometo belong to survive you gotta be strongyou can't be shy less without requestsomeone will scatter your ashes thruthe Lower East Side.
I don't wanna be buried in Puerto RicoI don't wanna rest in Long Island CemeteryI wanna be near the stabbing shootinggambling fighting & unnatural dying& new birth cryingso please when I die . . .don't take me far awaykeep me near bytake my ashes and scatter them thru outthe Lower East Side . . .
― got the club going UP on a tuesday (m coleman), Sunday, 30 August 2015 15:37 (eight years ago) link