a point of no return

August 16, 2008

Keep it short

Filed under: Literature — Tags: , , — charly @ 3:58 am

Steel Ruler, taken from Wikipedia

Since I am off tomorrow morning to New York to visit my good friend Chris, I’ll do my best to follow the advice on my blog’s title.

Here are three  very short stories written by three writers that have mastered the art of “twittering” way before Twitter was even around.

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August 6, 2008

Facing West

Filed under: Literature — Tags: , — charly @ 4:10 am

Library of Congress

Walt Whitman (picture from the Library of Congress)

Borges begins his essay entitled “The Other Whitman” with the following lines:

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July 31, 2008

The Composer and the Lute

Filed under: Biography, Music — Tags: , , — charly @ 1:57 am
Stravinsky, picture from the Library of Congress

Stravinsky, picture from the Library of Congress

I have been thinking on sharing some of the hidden (or not so hidden) treasures I have seen on YouTube. My first one will be a video of the virtuoso guitar player, Julian Bream, playing the lute (1) for the Russian composer Igor Stravinsky

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July 17, 2008

Trivia answer

Filed under: Biography, Literature — Tags: , , , — charly @ 4:22 am

Aleister Crowley

Aleister Crowley

This is the answer to my previous trivia (What do Led Zeppelin’s guitar player (Jimmy Page), Fernando Pessoa and William Butler Yeats have in common?): (more…)

July 10, 2008

The manuscripts

Filed under: Literature, news — Tags: , — charly @ 4:59 pm

Kafka (right) with his friend and savior of his manuscripts Max Brod (left). It was Brod who left many of Kafka’s’ manuscripts to his secretary / lover Esther Hoffe. I don’t know who owns the copyright of this picture, so don’t tell anyone I am using it here!

More Kafka expected to come to your local bookstore soon , as Esther Hoffe, the zealous guardian of his never-before-seen manuscripts, dies at age 101. The articles I have read (predictably) hints on the story as being “Kafkaesque”, though it reads more like a thriller to me (come on, don’t force that adjective just because he is involved).

The Guardian runs a good article on this.

July 8, 2008

Trivia

Filed under: random — Tags: — charly @ 10:22 pm

What do Led Zeppelin’s guitar player (Jimmy Page), Fernando Pessoa and William Butler Yeats have in common?

The answer on my next blog (or someday)

The person that answers this wins a 13th century version of the Iliad with comments by Dante Alighieri. Just kidding.

July 3, 2008

Readers as Writers

Gabriel Metsu, The Writer

The Writer, by the Flemish painter Gabriel Metsu (1629-1667)

There are roughly two opposing views about writing (and art in general): One that deems that anyone should be able (and perhaps encouraged) to produce and show their art, and another one that considers this only promotes the creation of heaps of bad art.

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June 25, 2008

When fake is real and real is fake

Filed under: Biography, art — Tags: , , — charly @ 7:28 am

Salvador Dali with ocelot and cane, source: Library of Congress. New York World-Telegram & Sun Collection

One. A book that has already caused a lot of controversy (even before it came out) in many parts of the world will be published in the US on July the 8th: Dalí & I: The Surreal Story, by Stan Lauryssens. (more…)

June 6, 2008

Sex and the Village

Filed under: Literature — Tags: , , , — charly @ 8:58 pm

Now that the Carrie Bradshaw (the girl played by Sarah Jessica Parker in Sex and the City) copycats are writing down their straightforward, in-your-face sex columns everywhere you look at (school newspapers, magazines, blogs, etc) I thought I should say something on one of the few “erotic” writers worth reading: Ho Xuan Huong

chris noth and sarah jessica parker

Picture taken from Flickr of Chris Noth and Sarah Jessica Parker

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May 19, 2008

William Goyen

Filed under: Literature — Tags: , — charly @ 9:09 pm

Some writers are renowned for their witty use of a black or macabre type of humor, like Vonnegut, Saki and Boris Vian. A lesser known writer, William Goyen (1915-1983), masters such humor with an interesting twist; he can be satirical but extremely humane at the same time. (more…)

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