Tag Archives: H.D.

“Omissions are not accidents.” — poet Marianne Moore

“I disliked the term “poetry” for any but Chaucer’s or Shakespeare’s or Dante’s.” — Marianne Moore T.S. Eliot felt Moore’s poetry was probably the “most durable” of all the greats writing at the time. Sadly, I have no idea how … Continue reading

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“I never said, ‘I want to be alone.’ I only said, ‘I want to be left alone.’ There is all the difference.” — Greta Garbo

It’s her birthday today. She is a difficult subject, not just because she was a private woman, but because her onscreen persona was so fluid, mercurial, hard to grasp. Her gestures could be operatic and swanlike (watch Grand Hotel), but … Continue reading

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“Writing. Love is writing.” — poet H.D., HERmione

“Words were her plague and words were her redemption.” — H.D. HERmione It’s H.D.’s birthday today. First up: I wrote a gigantic piece about H.D.’s film criticism for Film Comment. Turns out, it was the final piece I wrote for … Continue reading

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“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

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“All creative art must rise out of a specific soil and flicker with the spirit of place.” — D.H. Lawrence

“Whoever reads me will be in the thick of the scrimmage, and if he doesn’t like it – if he wants a safe seat in the audience – let him read somebody else.” — D.H. Lawrence, 1925 D.H. Lawrence was … Continue reading

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It’s Ezra Pound’s Birthday: “Do not retell in mediocre verse what has already been done in good prose.”

And give up verse, my boy, There’s nothing in it. — Ezra Pound I grew up hearing stories of Ezra Pound. Not the stories of his fascism or his relaxing time in a cage in Italy, or being indicted for … Continue reading

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Things that got me through 2020. In no particular order.

Elvis mask, made for me by Jill Blake who was like “I just happened to have this Elvis 68 Comeback Special fabric lying around … do you want a mask?” Do you have to ask? There were so many great … Continue reading

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2020 Books Read

What a year, huh. What a dumpster-fire year. I read a lot, mostly in the mornings, and it helped create rituals for the days, which often seemed endlessly the same, interchangeable. I read a lot of long and challenging books … Continue reading

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Year in Review: Shooting My Mouth Off in 2020, Part 1

What a year. Hard to say “the worst” because I was at least somewhat mentally stable during 2020, but this year was an assault. An assault after a couple of years of exhausting assault. It was an assault on us … Continue reading

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For Film Comment: on H.D. and the film journal Close Up

The piece I referenced a while back, the one I had been working on for about 4 months, researching from this towering stack of books, has finally gone live over on Film Comment. It’s a doozy. Get a cup of … Continue reading

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