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Category Archives: writers
“Fear urged him to go back, but growth drove him on.” — White Fang, by Jack London
“The proper function of man is to live, not to exist. I shall not waste my days in trying to prolong them. I shall use my time.” — Jack London Jack London was born on this day, January 12, 1876. … Continue reading
Colm Tóibín, Gary Indiana, and Los Angeles
I took this in 2009. I am naturally heartbroken about what is going on. Friends have lost everything. I am in a constant state of worry about my friends and family who are there, and devastated for everyone who has … Continue reading
Posted in writers
7 Comments
“Carelessness on the part of revolutionaries has always been the best aid the police have.” — Victor Serge
Ever since my late-in-the-day discovery of Victor Serge (whose birthday it is today), a man I should have discovered much MUCH earlier, considering my interest in totalitarian regimes / dissident voices / revolution / Russia – I have read as … Continue reading
“Cane was a swan-song. It was a song of an end.” — poet/novelist Jean Toomer
Jean Toomer was born in 1894 on this day and died in 1967. Toomer’s family tree encompasses all of pre-and-post-Civil War South: slaves, freemen, black, white. His father, Nathan Toomer, was born into slavery. After the war he continued working … Continue reading
Posted in Books, On This Day, writers
Tagged Camille Paglia, Harlem Renaissance, Langston Hughes, poetry
1 Comment
“It is a pity that the poet should be compelled to impart interest and force to his subject, instead of receiving them from it.” — poet and critic Matthew Arnold
“My poems represent, on the whole, the main movement of mind of the last quarter of a century, and thus they will probably have their day as people become conscious to themselves of what that movement of mind is, and … Continue reading
“The people must grant a hearing to the best poets they have, else they will never have better.” — Harriet Monroe
“I started in early with Shakespeare, Byron, Shelley, with Dickens and Thackeray; and always the book-lined library gave me a friendly assurance of companionship with lively and interesting people, gave me friends of the spirit to ease my loneliness.” – … Continue reading
“I only know that people call me a feminist whenever I express sentiments that differentiate me from a doormat or a prostitute.” — Rebecca West
It’s her birthday today. It is hard to talk about her without referencing the generations of writers she inspired, all of whom admit their debt. Robert Kaplan is the most open about it (in Balkan Ghosts, which launched his career, … Continue reading
Posted in Books, On This Day, writers
Tagged Austria, Balkans, D.H. Lawrence, Ford Madox Ford, France, George Bernard Shaw, Germany, Katherine Mansfield, Leo Tolstoy, Mark Twain, politics, Rebecca West, Roman empire, Russia, Serbia, W.B. Yeats, war, Yugoslavia
21 Comments
“Beside her Joyce seems innocent as grass.” — W.H. Auden on Jane Austen
“The little bit (two Inches wide) of Ivory on which I work with so fine a Brush.” — Jane Austen on her writing In 2020 – which feels like it was 1,000 years ago, I reviewed the new film adaptation … Continue reading
Posted in Books, On This Day, writers
Tagged Camille Paglia, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Jane Austen, Sir Walter Scott, Truman Capote, W.H. Auden
6 Comments
“The vote means nothing to women. We should be armed.” — Edna O’Brien
Today is the birthday of the great Irish writer Edna O’Brien, who just died this past summer at the age of 93. I came to her Country Girls trilogy fairly young. I was in college. I think that might be … Continue reading
Posted in On This Day, writers
Tagged documentary, Edna O'Brien, Ireland, women directors
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“Here I was, stuck in the middle of a dying nation with all these funny looking children who didn’t even realize the world was coming to an end, and now on top of everything else they expected me to turn my room into a hippie crash pad!” — Lester Bangs
It’s his birthday today. A lot of ink has been spilled on Lester Bangs, including on this site. My feelings for him are as chaotic as his writing style. There are times I read him and I think, almost wildly, … Continue reading
Posted in Books, Music, On This Day, writers
Tagged David Bowie, Lester Bangs, The Beatles, The Rolling Stones
6 Comments