A Caricature

Daily Dose

From Mrs. Dalloway's Party, by Virginia Woolf

AGAIN NO

"'Have you seen the Tempest?'
then (for he had not seen the Tempest), had he read some book?  Again no, and then, putting her ice down, did he ever read poetry?'"

From Chapter 2, The Man Who Loved His Kind

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Daily Dose

From The Arrow of Gold, by Joseph Conrad

THIS AND THAT

"I suddenly felt that 'this sort of thing' would kill me.  The definition of the cause was vague but the thought itself was no mere morbid artificiality of sentiment but a genuine conviction.  'That sort of thing' was what I would have to die from."

From Part 4, Chapter 1

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Daily Dose

From Writings on the Wall: Searching for a New Equality Beyond Black and White, by Kareem Abdul-Jabbar

THE ROOT

"The root of all evil in this world is not the love of money but the addiction to illogical thinking.  Because with emotion-based decision-making comes the perpetuation of ignorance.  The person believes he or she already knows all that is needed to know through what he or she would call 'common sense' or 'spiritual guidance.'  That conveniently removes any responsibility for learning facts or applying logic."

From Chapter One, the Broom of the System

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Daily Dose

From The Complete Poems, by William Empson

JUST A SMACK AT AUDEN

Waiting for the end, boys, waiting for the end.
What is there to be or do?
What's become of me or you?
Are we kind or are we true?
Sitting two and two, boys, waiting for the end.

Shall I build a tower, boys, knowing it will rend
Crack upon the hour, boys, waiting for the end?
Shall I pluck a flower, boys, shall I save or spend?
All turns sour, boys, waiting for the end.

Shall I send a wire, boys? Where is there to send?
All are under fire, boys, waiting for the end.
Shall I turn a sire, boys? Shall I choose a friend?
The fat is in the pyre, boys, waiting for the end.

Shall I make it clear, boys, for all to apprehend,
Those that will not hear, boys, waiting for the end,
Knowing it is near, boys, trying to pretend,
Sitting in cold fear, boys, waiting for the end?

Shall we send a cable, boys, accurately penned,
Knowing we are able, boys, waiting for the end,
Via the Tower of Babel, boys? Christ will not ascend.
He's hiding in his stable, boys, waiting for the end.

Shall we blow a bubble, boys, glittering to distend,
Hiding from our trouble, boys, waiting for the end?
When you build on rubble, boys, Nature will append
Double and re-double, boys, waiting for the end.

Shall we make a tale, boys, that things are sure to mend,
Playing bluff and hale, boys, waiting for the end?
It will be born stale, boys, stinking to offend,
Dying ere it fail, boys, waiting for the end.

Shall we go all wild, boys, waste and make them lend,
Playing at the child, boys, waiting for the end?
It has all been filed, boys, history has a trend,
Each of us enisled, boys, waiting for the end.

What was said by Marx, boys, what did he perpend?
No good being sparks, boys, waiting for the end.
Treason of the clerks, boys, curtains that descend,
Lights becoming darks, boys, waiting for the end.

Waiting for the end, boys, waiting for the end.
Not a chance of blend, boys, things have got to tend.
Think of those who vend, boys, think of how we wend,
Waiting for the end, boys, waiting for the end.

A Caricature

Daily Dose

From Chance, by Joseph Conrad

WHAT

"What he was saying she did not quite follow.  He was speaking of comparatively indifferent things in a rather moody tone, but she felt it round her like a caress.  And when he stopped she could hear, alarming in the sudden silence, the precipitated beating of her heart."

From Part II, Chapter One

A Caricature

Daily Dose

From A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, by James Joyce

REIGN

"A cold lucid indifference reigned in his soul."

From Chapter III

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From The Trial, by Franz Kafka, translated by Willa and Edwin Muir

AND BESIDES

"And besides, how dreary such a task would be!  It would do well enough, perhaps, as an occupation for one's second childhood in years of retirement, when the long days needed filling up."

From Chapter Six

Bake Right Off

Daily Dose

From Youth and The End of the Tether, by Joseph Conrad

NO

"they had no professional reputation -- no examples, no praise.  It wasn't a sense of duty; they all knew well enough how to shirk, and laze, and dodge -- when they had a mind to it -- and mostly they had."

From Youth

A Caricature

breakfast at the Bookstore with Brad and Nick #90

Daily Dose

From A Gathering of Fugitives, by Lionel Trilling

MONCKTOM MILNES

"His wit was not of a malicious kind and so it was not feared; it was therefore despised, as was his pleasure in talk and his insatiable social curiosity."

From Profession: Man of the World

Zen of Trump

Daily Dose

From Fortunata and Jacinta, by Benito Perez Galdos, translated Agnes Moncy Gullon

SO CARRIED AWAY

"He got so carried away reading he looked as if he'd fallen into a well where his eyes -- and with them his soul --swam in a torrent of letters."

From Volume Four, Chapter One: On Ave Maria Street

Most Important Read of the Day

Daily Dose

From Spooner, by Pete Dexter

NOT

"Not for the first time Spooner was reminded that marriage was not the straightforward assembly the instruction book led you to believe."

From Chapter Fifty-Two

Patchwork Selfie

Daily Dose

From The Tender Shoot, by Colette, translated by Antonia White

THERE ARE

"There are things that are written down nowhere, except by clumsy hands in school exercise books, or in thin grey-squared paper, yellowed at the edges, folded and cut into pages and sewn together with red cotton..."

From The Rainy Moon

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From Fortunate and Jacinta, by Benito Perez Galdos, translated by Agnes Gullon

END

"End of tangent and back to the subject."

From Volume Three, Chapter V: Another Restoration.

A Caricature

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From The Literary Works of Matthew Prior, edited by H. Bunker Wright and Monroe K. Spears

LIL'

The little Trojan, by the way,
By Hermes taught, play'd All the Play.

From Cupid and Ganymede 

A Caricature

Daily Dose

From Death Comes for the Archbishop, by Willa Cather

AVARICE

"Avarice, he assured them, was the one passion that grew stronger and sweeter in old age."

From Padre Martinez, Chapter 2, The Miser

Breakfast at the Bookstore with Brad and Nick #89

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From Three Philosophical Poets: Lucretius, Dante, Goethe, by George Santayana

INTERESTING

"His crimes and follies were blessings in disguise.  Did they not render his life interesting and fit to make a poem of?"

From Goethe's Faust

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Daily Dose

From The Poems, by Friedrich Schiller

FRIENDSHIP

Friend!--the Great Ruler, easily content,
Needs not the laws it has laborious been
The task of small professors to invent;
A single wheel impels the whole machine
Matter and spirit;--yea, that simple law,
Pervading nature, which our Newton saw.

This taught the spheres, slaves to one golden rein,
Their radiant labyrinths to weave around
Creation's mighty hearts: this made the chain,
Which into interwoven systems bound
All spirits streaming to the spiritual sun
As brooks that ever into ocean run!

Did not the same strong mainspring urge and guide
Our hearts to meet in love's eternal bond?
Linked to thine arm, O Raphael, by thy side
Might I aspire to reach to souls beyond
Our earth, and bid the bright ambition go
To that perfection which the angels know!

Happy, O happy--I have found thee--I
Have out of millions found thee, and embraced;
Thou, out of millions, mine!--Let earth and sky
Return to darkness, and the antique waste--
To chaos shocked, let warring atoms be,
Still shall each heart unto the other flee!

Do I not find within thy radiant eyes
Fairer reflections of all joys most fair?
In thee I marvel at myself--the dyes
Of lovely earth seem lovelier painted there,
And in the bright looks of the friend is given
A heavenlier mirror even of the heaven!

Sadness casts off its load, and gayly goes
From the intolerant storm to rest awhile,
In love's true heart, sure haven of repose;
Does not pain's veriest transports learn to smile
From that bright eloquence affection gave
To friendly looks?--there, finds not pain a grave?

In all creation did I stand alone,
Still to the rocks my dreams a soul should find,
Mine arms should wreathe themselves around the stone,
My griefs should feel a listener in the wind;
My joy--its echo in the caves should be!
Fool, if ye will--Fool, for sweet sympathy!

We are dead groups of matter when we hate;
But when we love we are as gods!--Unto
The gentle fetters yearning, through each state
And shade of being multiform, and through
All countless spirits (save of all the sire)--
Moves, breathes, and blends, the one divine desire.

Lo! arm in arm, through every upward grade,
From the rude mongrel to the starry Greek,
Who the fine link between the mortal made,
And heaven's last seraph--everywhere we seek
Union and bond--till in one sea sublime
Of love be merged all measure and all time!

Friendless ruled God His solitary sky;
He felt the want, and therefore souls were made,
The blessed mirrors of his bliss!--His eye
No equal in His loftiest works surveyed;
And from the source whence souls are quickened, He
Called His companion forth--ETERNITY!

A Caricature

Daily Dose

From The Elegant Universe, by Brian Greene

NOTHING

"To someone who knows only English, general relativity might not immediately be recognized as Einstein's theory if presented in Chinese.  A physicist fluent in both languages, though, can easily perform a translation from one to the other, establishing their equivalence.  We call this example 'trivial' because nothing is gained, from the point of view of physics, by such a translation."

From Chapter 12, Beyond Strings

Breakfast at the Bookstore with Brad and Nick #88

A Caricature

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From New Selected Poems, by Stevie Smith

THE PLEASURES OF FRIENDSHIP

The pleasures of friendship are exquisite,
How pleasant to go to a friend on a visit!
I go to my friend, we walk on the grass,
And the hours and moments like minutes pass.

A Caricature

Daily Dose

From Collected Tales, Sketches, Speeches, and Essays: 1852 - 1890, by Mark Twain

YES AND NO

"Yes, those among you who have not been in the penitentiary, if such there be, are better than your fathers and grandfathers were, but is that any sufficient reason for getting up annual dinners and celebrating you?  No, by no means -- by no means."

From Plymouth Rock and the Pilgrims

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From Maxims, by La Rochefoucauld, translated by Stuart D. Warner and Stephane Douard

#71

"One likes to see through others; but one does not like to be seen through."

From Withdrawn Maxims

A Caricature w/ Dog

Daily Dose

From An Autobiography, by Anthony Trollope

DISAPPOINTED AUTHORS

"The man, whether rightly or wrongly, feels that the world is using him with extreme injustice.  The more absolutely he fails, the higher, it is probable, he will reckon his own merits; and the keener will be the sense of injury in that he whose work is of so high a nature can't get bread, while they whose tasks are mean are lapped in luxury."

From Chapter XI