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- “When I get into that studio, I’m in another world. I love it. When I’m performing, that’s the real me.” — Billy Lee Riley
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- “All my life I have been happiest when the folks watching me said to each other, `Look at the poor dope, wilya?” — Buster Keaton
- Temporary
- “The problem with taking amps to a shop is that they come back sounding like another amp.” — Stevie Ray Vaughan
- “That cat was royalty, man.” — Mick Jagger on Eddie Cochran
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- “I put my soul through the ink.” — Proof
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Tag Archives: nonfiction
“You can understand a lot about yourself by working out which fairytale you use to present your world to yourself in.” — A.S. Byatt
I didn’t mark the passing of A.S. Byatt last year when it happened. I was overwhelmed with work at the time. But I did take a moment … a very still and silent moment … to reflect on her, on … Continue reading
Posted in Books, On This Day, writers
Tagged A.S. Byatt, fiction, George Eliot, nonfiction, Possession
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2022 Books Read
Some re-reads this year, but a lot of new-to-me authors as well. New novels written by faves. Been a year of upheaval and transitions. I’ve managed to keep up my regular reading schedule. I just don’t feel right if I’m … Continue reading
Posted in Books
Tagged A.S. Byatt, Alfred Hitchcock, Anne Fadiman, art, Australia, Biography, books read, Canada, Christopher Hitchens, culture, Edmund Burke, Elinor Lipman, England, entertainment biography, essays, Eve Babitz, fiction, friends, Germany, Greece, history, Hitler, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Janet Malcolm, Joan Didion, Joseph Cornell, Lorrie Moore, Machiavelli, Master and Margarita, Memoirs, Michael Curtiz, Mikhail Bulgakov, Mitfords, nonfiction, novel, Paul Zindel, politics, Quentin Tarantino, Robert De Niro, Russia, Ryszard Kapuściński, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Shakespeare, The Beatles, Tom Wolfe, true crime, Victor Klemperer, Victor Serge, war, William Hazlitt, William Wordsworth, WWII, YA fiction
10 Comments
Stuff I’ve Been Reading
Been a while since I’ve done one of these. — The Collected Essays of Elizabeth Hardwick I had never read her before. I was familiar with her as “Robert Lowell’s wife” – she shows up repeatedly in his correspondence with … Continue reading
Posted in Books
Tagged essays, fiction, Mae West, nonfiction, Richard Bach, stuff I've been reading, The Bridge Across Forever
9 Comments
2021 Books Read
I lived at three addresses this year. I moved twice. In the middle of a pandemic. It’s been a year of upheaval, transition, as well as endurance. For most of this year, the majority of my stuff was in storage. … Continue reading
Posted in Books
Tagged Austria, Balkans, Billy Wilder, Biography, books read, Cary Grant, Croatia, Czeslaw Milosz, David McCullough, Dubravka Ugrešić, Edvard Radzinsky, Elinor Lipman, England, essays, Eve Babitz, Evelyn Waugh, fiction, Germany, Hitler, Howard Hawks, Ireland, Italy, Kirov, Liz Phair, Memoirs, Nancy Lemann, Nick Tosches, nonfiction, Olivia Laing, Poland, politics, Robert Conquest, Robert Kaplan, Russia, Stalin, Sweden, Thomas Mann, Tom Wolfe, Vladimir Nabokov, war, WWII, Yugoslavia
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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
Posted in Books
Tagged Austria, ballet, Ballets Russes, Belfast, Biography, books read, Croatia, culture, Czechoslovakia, Czeslaw Milosz, dance, Dubravka Ugrešić, Elinor Lipman, Elizabeth Bishop, Eminem, essays, Ezra Pound, fiction, H.D., Hannah Arendt, history, Hitler, Ireland, Jane Austen, Jean Arthur, Marcel Proust, Nick Tosches, nonfiction, Olivia Laing, poetry, Poland, politics, Rebecca West, Robert Kaplan, Robert Lowell, Roman empire, Russia, Ryszard Kapuściński, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Shirley Jackson, Stalin, true crime, Ukraine, war, WWII, Yugoslavia
38 Comments
Stuff I’ve Been Reading
Made Men: The Story of Goodfellas, by Glenn Kenny Glenn is a friend of mine and I’ve been looking forward to reading his book on the making-of Goodfellas. Glenn is an amazing writer (he blogs at Some Came Running: he … Continue reading
Posted in Books, Movies
Tagged Belfast, fiction, Ireland, Martin Scorsese, Memoirs, nonfiction, Russia, Stalin, stuff I've been reading, true crime, war, WWII
15 Comments
Stuff I’ve Been Reading
— Finally getting to Olivia Laing’s debut, To the River: A Journey Beneath the Surface (Canons). I fell in love with her because of the one-two punch of The Lonely City: Adventures in the Art of Being Alone (which I … Continue reading
Posted in Books
Tagged fiction, Jane Austen, Marcel Proust, nonfiction, Norman Rockwell, Olivia Laing, poetry, stuff I've been reading
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2018 Books Read
2018 Books Read 1. Tamburlaine, Part 1, by Christopher Marlowe I finished 2017 with Paradise Lost, in the mood to continue with rigorous challenging poetry. I decided to read the complete plays of Christopher Marlowe (re-read in most cases). The … Continue reading
Posted in Books, James Joyce
Tagged Annie Proulx, books read, Christopher Hitchens, Christopher Marlowe, Clifford Odets, Edgar Allan Poe, Evelyn Waugh, fiction, Finnegans Wake, friends, George Orwell, H.L. Mencken, Hunter S. Thompson, Ian McEwan, Jack Kerouac, Joan Didion, Kirov, nonfiction, Olivia Laing, Pauline Kael, poetry, Poland, politics, Robert Kaplan, Romania, Ron Chernow, Russia, Ryszard Kapuściński, Stalin, Tom Wolfe, true crime, Truman Capote, Victor Serge
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