1) On the essential hardship of travel in the ancient world As late as the end of the fourth century BC, travel in and around Greece was neither easy nor particularly pleasant. Those who went by sea depended on the sailings of merchant-men, put up with casual accommodations once abroad, and worried about pirate attacks…
1) A reader of books is a reader of himself Every reader, as he reads, is actually the reader of himself. The writer’s work is only a kind of optical instrument he provides the reader so he can discern what he might never have seen in himself without this book. The reader’s recognition in himself…
Sometimes the notes are ferocious, skirmishes against the author raging along the borders of every page in tiny black script. If I could just get my hands on you, Kierkegaard, or Conor Cruise O’Brien, they seem to say, I would bolt the door and beat some logic into your head. Other comments are more offhand,…
From The Guardian, September 19, 2009 (an excerpt) Last year, on a visit to the Mani in the Peloponnese, I went to visit the headland where Bruce Chatwin had asked for his ashes to be scattered. The hillside chapel where Chatwin’s widow, Elizabeth, brought his urn lies in rocky fields near the village of Exchori,…
Literature is created on both sides of the frontier that divides fact from fiction, and it is crossed by writers quite casually. But it is a border that should be defended. Orginally published in The Guardian, November 16, 2002 (an excerpt) For much of my life, I have worked on frontiers. Night, fog, armed guards,…
She comes on drenched in a perfume called Self Satisfaction from feather boa to silver pumps. She does not need to be loved by you though she’ll give you credit for good taste. Just because you say you love her she’s not throwing herself at your feet in gratitude. Every other star reveals how worthless…
1) On the notions of “success” that bind us to big cities Success and failure were the terms in which young people who had just moved into the city spoke. It was not a place to live as much as it was a test or a game. I despise both. “Why don’t you leave?” I…
One attempts to be significant on a grand scale in the knockdown battle of life but settles. It is clammy today, meaning wet and gray, not having a hard, calciniferous shell. I love the expression “happy as a clam,” how it imparts buoyant emotion to a rather, when you get down to it, nonexpressive creature.…
(an excerpt) Several weeks ago, as I was reflecting on what I might say at this occasion, I encountered a friendly colleague, whom I asked for ideas and suggestions. “What is the title of your lecture?” he asked. “Identity, Authority, and Freedom,” I replied. “Interesting,” he responded. “You mean, therefore, identity is the faculty, authority…
5 examples of primal desires in movie storytelling 1. The desire to save one’s family (Die Hard) 2. The desire to protect one’s home (Home Alone) 3. The desire to find a mate (Sleepless in Seattle) 4. The desire to exact revenge (Gladiator) 5. The desire to survive (Titanic) 9 rules for finding and fixing…
Your death, near now, is of an easy sort. So slow a fading out brings no real pain. Breath growing short Is just uncomfortable. You feel the drain Of energy, but thought and sight remain: Enhanced, in fact. When did you ever see So much sweet beauty as when fine rain falls On that small…
