Reflection on a year of books

I read thousands of pages this year.

I was exposed to the true meaning of the term chivalry, and discovered in context what it meant in the Medieval period. I read pages of books that were written by a scribe, because the true author couldn't read or write.

My impression of Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics developed from important ancient text to an expression of human nature that is still relevant today, and I learned that Aristotle's two ethical works were never meant to be read, but instead listened to in an ancient philosophy lecture. The word for lecture in Greek, by the way, means "a listening".

Victorian literature was daunting, but I have realized that it is the literature corpus of an era that was afraid of a new century, a new science, a changing human nature, and new morals.

Richard Brautigan is still crazy- that didn't change. But I do still love him.

William Faulkner's The Sound and the Fury is the most intimidating, morally challenging, and most beautiful book ever written. I learned how to maneuver around stream-of-consciousness and experienced the sadness of a family in ruins.

It's not "I think, therefore I am", it's "I doubt therefore I am".

I approached Kant, and respectfully backed away. But not before I wrote an essay on Pure Mathematics. After all, he said that there are those, "for which the present Prolegomena is not written".

I doubted whether I am the same person every instant of my life thanks to multiple modern metaphysicians.

Leibniz's account of metaphysics made the most sense. The material world doesn't exist.

My only A+ essay was on Huckleberry Finn and Emerson's Self Reliance. The funny thing is, Mark Twain said that anyone attempting to take a message out of Huckleberry Finn will be shot. Well, that's a problem.

Refreshing...

http://outofprintapparel.com/blog/2010/found-britains-smallest-library/

This is a really great idea. I hope that more people realize the significance of community-centered education facilities like this one... even if it is just a phone booth.

My mom is currently trying to restore the library that used to be a block away from the house where I grew up. It was one of the reasons my parents chose the house, as they had two young children who would benefit from such close access to so many books. The building is called the Carnegie Center, and was initially set up to be a library because of funding donated from the legacy of Andrew Carnegie.

Soon after we moved there, however, the center was turned into part children's museum, part art museum... also an important community asset, but less popular. Now, almost 15 years later, a committee, including my devoted mother, is working to give the center back its original function.

Seeing as how our current city library is located in a strip mall, with hours that don't accommodate anyone, due to a lack of funding, a library in an old, beautiful building that was supposed to be a library in the first place would be extraordinarily refreshing.

Self Control

After my Aristotle class this morning, I forced myself not to go buy a copy of Joyce's Ulysses. It was hard... so very, very hard.

After having had approximately 2.5 classes on Aristotle's theory of self-control in the Nicomachean Ethics, I felt it was time to use some of that newly acquired knowledge. But... why did it have to be for a book!?

If I don't have Ulysses by the end of the week, I'll be surprised... and really quite proud of myself.

Islands by The XX

Islands by The XX

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This is a perfect song to have on low volume while reading... Add it to a "reading" playlist. Beautiful lyrics.

Brief memory from the Beautiful City of Portland... Starring: BOOKS! What Else?

Last year, when browsing Powell's City of Books in downtown Portland, OR, I was in the position of hearing a humorous but enlightening conversation between an employee and a fellow browser making an inquiry at the literature section information booth.

"Uh, I'm having trouble finding The DaVinci Code here"

The employee could not have given a more scornful reply. "That's because that book, isn't in literature", she said. "It's in mystery".

Interesting photos of some really fascinating texts....

The one in fragments is a poem found from the poet, Sappho, a Greek poet from the island of Lesbos. Her poetry is mostly quoted in other ancient Greek authors, but is still vastly important to the history of female authors, and to poetry in general.

The second document is a letter of Rene Descartes, originally stolen from France, and found this past week at Haverford College in Pennsylvania. The head of the college is returning it to France. Sometimes the true thoughts of an author may lie in their letters...

On completion of Eliot's Wasteland and Pound's Cantos...

So... The summary of this literary experience is as follows: I must, must, must prove that The Wasteland is not solely about despair, since that seems to be the general sentiment. This is my new occupation, and final essay for American Literature.

Regarding Ezra Pound:

He definitely was not crazy. There's no way someone could write the Cantos while actually crazy... or is it the only way someone could write it?.... hmm...

Also, I only read excerpts of the Cantos, and so feel that I have not experienced the text enough to make any sense... yet. Reading an authors lifelong work takes time... obviously.

Le Vin Des Amants (Lover's Wine)

Aujourd'hui l'espace est splendide!

Sans mors, sans eperons, sans bride,

Partons a cheval sur le vin

Pour un ciel feerique et divin!

Comme deux anges que torture

Une implacable calenture,

Dans le bleu cristal du matin

Suivons le mirage lointain!

Mollement balances sur l'aile

Du tourbillon intelligent,

Dans un delire parallele,

Ma soeur, cote a cote nageant,

Nous furions sans repos ni treves

Vers le paradis de mes reves!

the importance of books

"When he saw that this slender resource was failing him, he gave up his garden and left it uncultivated. Before that, long before he had given up the two eggs and bit of beef he occasionally used to eat. He dined on bread and potatoes. He had sold his last furniture, then all his spare bedding and clothing, then his collections of plants and his prints; but he still had his most precious books..."

-Les Miserables, p.1044

Victor Hugo

A Bookstore Experience: Starring Emerson (Ralph Waldo)

I went to a local bookstore last fall to pick up my copy of Emerson's essays for an American Lit class I had signed up for. I had walked into the store with three important American classics on a small blue sticky note. Realizing that the bookstore's enormity and layout may jeopardize my keen book-finding sense, I approached the cashier for some advice, asking him where I could find Emerson.

"You mean, Ralph Waldo?" He asked. I tried not to show the surprised look on my face, which was plainly inquiring how and why he was on a first name basis with this great American author... now dead, some 130 years.

"Yes," I replied, patiently paying attention as he directed me first to the literature section, then changing his mind, telling me that I would most likely find this author in the small shelf in the corner marked, PHILOSOPHY. "Okay," I said, confirming that I had watched him point to various parts of the bookstore. Before I could walk away, however, he decided to confirm his hypothesis with a fellow bookstore employee.

"Oh no! Definitely not philosophy," she said, with more emphasis than was probably necessary. 'You should look in literature... or maybe essays... Or," she nodded towards yet another rack of books, "you could check anthologies".

She then proceeded to walk me through each of these sections, directing me through row upon row of books, despite the big, black plastic signs adorning each shelf.

"Thanks," I said, as she resumed her job of shelving various literary classics, Melville, Tolstoy, and Bronte--or maybe I should say, Herman, Leo, and Charlotte.

"No problem," she replied, "that's what I'm here for".