thirteenth september, nineteen forty

“In the case of liquor--the stuff doesn’t taste good, it has no real attraction whatever except for the oblivion which comes to those poor devils who do not have the guts to face their own reality. And the feeling afterwards is a little worse than anything you have experienced, once you have been properly “plastered” and develop a real honest-to-God hangover.”

My great-grandfather’s well-meaning warning didn’t work on his son, any better than his similar injunctions against smoking and sex did, at least in the long run. I suppose my grandfather may have made it through his years at Amherst unscathed by those delightful vices, but in truth, I doubt it. He wasn’t exactly the type to listen to that sort of warning. Plus, there’s a clear flaw in the premise: liquor tastes damn good.

But this is all digression. Packing up some old papers to move today, I came across this packed of letters, all from the fall of 1940 and spring of 1941, sent by my great-grandfather to my grandfather. So I started reading. After my old Hum notes they were fascinating, after the crazy lists an ex-boyfriend used to write for me in Genetics class, they were pretty dry. But plenty compelling either way, because even the most mundane questions gain a certain gravity in this particular context, and the personality conflicts are so clear from this distance.

The real morals here have, of course, nothing to do with drink or smoke or “very innocent-looking, sweetly appealing filthy harpies.” Instead, they are pretty simple: letters are worth saving, and fathers are always awkward about telling you how thrilled they are with you.

poets laureate

Watching Kay Ryan talk, I get the sense our new poet laureate would be a lot of fun to hang out with.

There's also a video of Louise Glück, which opens with her admitting to a problem that I share: the sense that because I want to do something, everyone else must want to do the same. Of course everyone wants to be a poet, because it is such a wonderful, fulfilling, necessary thing to be. Of course everyone wants to study the writers that I love, because they are so endlessly fascinating. I've gotten better about this over the last few years, to the point where I do recognize that there are people for whom the avant-garde holds no charm, who wouldn't want to spend all their time reading, and who even think i'm the nutty one. But it's still nice to hear someone I respect so much describe my problem so precisely.

orangedrink

I want to do this to everything I write from now on. Click the image to see it bigger and try it yourself.

cover art

There are even more now. Always a sucker for interesting cover art, I was pretty much delighted when I found this collection of fake book covers a month or two ago (maybe via Maud Newton? I'm not sure), and am delighted again to have revisited it (via Bookslut this time, for sure) today.

Of course the covers are by turns gorgeous and silly and wonderful, but I think the thing I like most about them is the fact that they (by virtue of being imitations but not quite parodies or even derivative works) do such a wonderful job of illustrating and commenting on the conventions of cover art.

Only sort of related: There's nothing quite like finding a blog you love long after its owner has stopped updating. Judge a book is gorgeous, but I'm pretty sure it's over.

the future is now

"Tang is futurist orange. Tang is orange designed by astronauts. Tang is from a time when we all thought we’d be wearing unitards and eating freeze-dried soy extrudate by now. Tang is Eisenhower food. It goes very well with jello salads and a scoop of cottage cheese on a lettuce leaf with a ring of pineapple. Tang represents that pure thought that food is safer and better for you if no part of it ever touches dirt."

That's from an email my mom sent me a while ago. That kind of brilliance is just one more reason that I'm entirely comfortable with the inevitable fact that I'm going to grow up someday and be just like my mother.

delightful things happen

I just (last night) finished reading Kelly Link's Stranger Things Happen, and, having fallen quite a bit in love with it, was thinking about ordering another of her books today, and investigating Small Beer Press a little further.

I hadn't gotten around to it yet when I found this link (on bookslut) to a free download of a whole book from Small Beer Press. Nicely timed, magic internets.

Also, it turns out you can download the Kelly Link book, too. And you should. Because it's excellent.

clueless

Yet another reason to love xkcd.

Found this on Feministe this morning, which is a lovely example of the way that all my favorite corners of the internet connect.

While reading through the post, I kept trying to think of major moneymaking films coming out in the next year that might reinforce or undermine the statistics. The only one I could think of off the top of my head (and I admit, I don't really follow mainstream movies) is the Sex and the City movie. And while I'm not really a fan of the show, it did make me pause and consider the fact that (despite its many, many flaws), it is pretty damn cool that a show primarily about the friendship between women was so successful and has spawned one of the year's most anticipated movies.

I'd like to think it's progress, but I'll wait to pass judgment until the thing is out. After all, there's probably still time for Hollywood to find a male lead to shoehorn into top billing.