tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2183830168341365102024-02-18T22:12:08.045-08:00The World's Least Popular Book ClubUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger40125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-218383016834136510.post-54990491018871128482011-08-03T07:00:00.000-07:002011-08-03T07:07:07.152-07:00Page 16Who of us knows the theory and practice best suited to the life we are destined to believe we choose while destined to disbelieve the destiny that chooses, wheels within wheels, frantic little rings whirring as the great planet slowly swings through its track that the slow swing alone makes.Damionhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05148641559745098018noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-218383016834136510.post-4294245962388516642011-08-03T06:55:00.000-07:002011-08-03T07:00:03.328-07:00the most complete descriptions imaginable<blockquote>She had given to him the most complete descriptions imaginable of the furnishings and of the ancient upholstery, the silk pillows, faded yellow and rose and gold with long gold tassels, the tapestry chairs, the wall measurements, the fountains and the shadows of the fountains, the Gothic arches, the illusive distance between one object and another, the number of feet between a divan and a chair, between a dynasty and a dynasty, the immobility of the furniture, the floors wavering like water, and she had told him of the absolute stratagem that would be necessary if he should find himself, that it was the morning tower, that he should not make the mistake of trying to walk through the thin partition of glass that separated him from eternal space, the morning sea like the twilight sea, the circling far white sands at the water's milky edge, a grey, twisted tree licked by the surf's tongue, its branches gleaming with red lichen, a white bird with a white comb roosting at the top, some bird of passage pausing for a moment here, everything arranged for convenience.</blockquote>Damionhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05148641559745098018noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-218383016834136510.post-82692123535405233682011-08-03T06:51:00.000-07:002011-08-03T06:54:50.328-07:00Purple lace, ctd.; Dreams, ctd.; Recursion, ctd.From the same sentence as the purple lace Brooklyn Bridge (p. 24): "tenements crowded with discrowned kings, rabbit warrens and the rabbits dreaming of the rabbit god, his nostrils twinkling in the polar sky..." Aren't we all? That's what I now aspire for my writing to do, twinkle in the polar sky.Damionhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05148641559745098018noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-218383016834136510.post-378188233701830192011-08-03T06:48:00.000-07:002011-08-03T06:51:20.134-07:00The shortest sentence"Oblivion was his brother." (p. 20 -- very moving in context, I thought)<br /><br />Any other contenders? Comments...Damionhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05148641559745098018noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-218383016834136510.post-28678588299554092402011-08-02T07:13:00.001-07:002011-08-02T07:16:27.008-07:00World's Least Active Book Club?Fellow members! How far are you all? I am on p. 38, first page of ch. 3, feeling a sense of (I suspect intended and well-planned) relief at the re-emergence of solid, stolid Miss MacIntosh from the haze of opium dreams. Anyway, leave comments where you're up to?<br /><br />Also, do we perhaps need a tidge more structure -- rotating group-leader question-asker, monthly "meetings," that sort of thing? Or just Keep Calm and Carry On as the Brits say?Damionhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05148641559745098018noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-218383016834136510.post-28464541810018004652011-07-19T20:05:00.000-07:002011-08-03T07:08:38.058-07:00Dream of the bed chamber<i>the rooms too many for mortal use, chambers within chambers...<br /></i><br />Did anyone get flashes of <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Huguette_M._Clark">Huguette Clark</a>?<br /><br />From Wikipedia:<br /><br /><blockquote>In February 2010, Clark became the subject of a series of reports on msnbc.com, which said caretakers at her three residences had not seen her in decades, and that her palatial estates in Santa Barbara, California, and New Canaan, Connecticut, had lain empty throughout that time, although the houses and their extensive grounds were meticulously maintained by their staff.</blockquote>Edhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16017371953361964015noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-218383016834136510.post-37743541523363356942011-07-18T17:11:00.000-07:002011-07-18T17:17:25.287-07:00marcelled hair<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjce68AdBl-MHp-E3chzdT9MY8tGkJaLEhhmlyCr3VoXxPACPtlQNQUPzngXP18byGhOVOxSGJz-rnphotLy3TeoYduNIWB7oXiRfLol9O-zCe5cGmnWbYpX6olBFhLWt2USD5S16khH3g/s1600/marcel2.jpg"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 270px; height: 244px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjce68AdBl-MHp-E3chzdT9MY8tGkJaLEhhmlyCr3VoXxPACPtlQNQUPzngXP18byGhOVOxSGJz-rnphotLy3TeoYduNIWB7oXiRfLol9O-zCe5cGmnWbYpX6olBFhLWt2USD5S16khH3g/s320/marcel2.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5630850582554066754" border="0" /></a><br />Miss MacIntosh's "marcelled hair" (gleaming like the sand streaked with sunset when the sandpipers wade in the glassy surf as the last light fades, in case you were wondering, p. 11): what is it?<br /><br />A style, a.k.a. "the marcel wave," named after Francois Marcel, the French hairdresser who invented the process in 1872.<br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhxABQ3DGy0Q5bqwXeoRpqahbOT9Ia2XjIoHnbugpnEoUdFPvfUYciaNgU6CeMft62DrKtLOsg-RGo3lOvzzkS0qra8E2TB3wKjIBSLkzBz5DsmBC8apHeb9nn23IN5iQ2UfJEfBXs-xpc/s1600/marcel.jpg"><img style="cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 138px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhxABQ3DGy0Q5bqwXeoRpqahbOT9Ia2XjIoHnbugpnEoUdFPvfUYciaNgU6CeMft62DrKtLOsg-RGo3lOvzzkS0qra8E2TB3wKjIBSLkzBz5DsmBC8apHeb9nn23IN5iQ2UfJEfBXs-xpc/s200/marcel.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5630850756985980002" border="0" /></a>Damionhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05148641559745098018noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-218383016834136510.post-47636410493905584432011-07-18T17:04:00.000-07:002011-07-18T17:11:57.104-07:00Chambers within chambersI had thought my page 2 sentence would be a description of a house trying to be as wild as the pregnant woman's clothes, but she beat me to it (to that too):<br /><blockquote></blockquote><blockquote>The great, sea-blackened house with golden spires and cornices and towers peeled by the salt air, dark allees, hidden interiors, the empty drawing rooms where the hostess had not set foot for many years, as many drawing rooms as tideless years, the rooms too many for mortal use, chambers within chambers, the gilded, mirroring ballrooms where no one danced, the hangings of scaly gold and rain-stained velvet, the heathen monsters everywhere, the painted, clouded ceilings illuminated by partial apparitions of the gods, the silken, padded walls, the ropes of rusted bells, the angels and the cherubim and the immortal rose, the dream of heaven, the lily-breasted virgins sporting in fields of asphodel, the water-gurgling gargoyles or those coated by dust, the interior and exterior fountains, the broken marble statues in ruined gardens sloping towards the sea, the disc throwers, the fat cupids, the thin psyches with flowing curls, the mute Apollo Belvedere, the king's horsemen, the life-sized chessmen seeming to move against the moving clouds that moved above the moving waters, the sea light lighting their wooden eyes, the seagulls perched like drifts of snow upon their heads.</blockquote><br />Wows:<br />scaly gold and rain-stained velvet<br />water-gurgling gargoyles<br />seeming to move against the moving clouds that moved above the moving watersDamionhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05148641559745098018noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-218383016834136510.post-14056377093220208982011-07-18T17:00:00.000-07:002011-07-18T17:03:53.808-07:00tipIf you're writing an 1,198-page book that's all fustian and monument, explain the title by the top of page 6. (I love her appearance there!)Damionhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05148641559745098018noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-218383016834136510.post-51832868802121023752011-07-18T12:50:00.000-07:002011-07-18T12:59:01.292-07:00Blake's footOn my page 18 (do we all have the same pagination?) there is Mr. Spitzer covering the mother's foot when he arrived each evening.<br /><br /><blockquote>Mr. Spitzer . . . would lean forward to cover my mother's dimpled foot with a purple drapery . . .</blockquote><br /><br />In Blake's <span style="font-style:italic;">Milton</span>, Milton enters the poet through his foot.<br /><br /><blockquote>With thunders loud and terrible: so Milton's shadow fell <br />Precipitant loud thund'ring into the Sea of Time & Space. <br />Then first I saw him in the Zenith as a falling star, <br />Descending perpendicular, swift as the swallow or swift : <br />And on my left foot falling on the tarsus, enter'd there,</blockquote><br /><br />I'm not all that familiar with Blake, but he loved his angels as much as the mother here and there could be something going on.<br /><br />I like the idea that Mr. Spitzer has to cover the foot to prevent Milton from entering while he's in the room.<br /><br />Actually, the more I think about it, there's probably a lot more Blake going on here than Bob Dylan!<br /><br />Also, does she only have one foot?adriennehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15734876620311269317noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-218383016834136510.post-24399368936834659012011-07-15T17:46:00.000-07:002011-07-15T17:52:22.483-07:00Found! The only good MMMD cover!<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg5fMtUwaBVV3M6oFSAm5rPmetcJWrE5qE_hugevVsyVz6E10I12nHz0-pKFSy6Qrs2WLh6vihEqp-e2-x8qRhtbt9pxGqc__9bBYGsD01Aym3CEXCnNjl3tk0IDLeZHt2Rp7M4r_Wc8icT/s1600/511wQrtG0pL._SL500_.jpg" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 284px; height: 400px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg5fMtUwaBVV3M6oFSAm5rPmetcJWrE5qE_hugevVsyVz6E10I12nHz0-pKFSy6Qrs2WLh6vihEqp-e2-x8qRhtbt9pxGqc__9bBYGsD01Aym3CEXCnNjl3tk0IDLeZHt2Rp7M4r_Wc8icT/s400/511wQrtG0pL._SL500_.jpg" border="0" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5629745303481433026" /></a><br /><div>I did an image search and landed on this Goodreads page.* It's a 1966 edition, pub. Peter Owen.</div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div>________</div><div>*<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">I see that one of the reviewers is </span><a href="http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/59205.Dustin_Long"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Dustin Long</span></a><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> (who gave it five stars). He's the author of the novel Icelander and the co-perpetrator of this very funny video series, </span><a href="http://www.americanfictioneer.com/"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">American Fictioneer</span></a><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">, about James Tuktu Jones.</span></div>Edhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16017371953361964015noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-218383016834136510.post-36357377682305128592011-07-15T07:19:00.000-07:002011-07-15T07:30:31.852-07:00Some notes on Chapter 2To bounce off Señor Sparks's questions in his last post: "Any thoughts on this? Are we left to drown on our own? Will we need to wipe an oily residue from our skin upon completion?"<br /><br />I think our page-a-day (or chapter-a-week) pace helps us not drown. Reading only as much as I want each evening, closing the book when I feel "full" (or sense my brain's getting overloaded), I've reached the end of chapter 2, and I can say that I've thoroughly relished every page of the book so far—yup, all 37 of 1198 of 'em!<div><br /></div><div>The "I" of chapter 1 recedes in chapter 2, and what we get is a wonderfully focused account of the narrator's invalided, opium-befogged mother and her loyal visitor, Mr. Spitzer. The prose is like a dream, and it describes a life that is largely indistinguishable from dreams. </div><div><br /></div><div>Dreams are dangerous, of course; any fiction is like a dream already, and to have a dream contain a dream is to compound your challenges as a writer. Yet chapter 2 proves tremendously exciting. Its labyrinthine sentences packed with invention; every reiteration of the life-is-a-dream motif ("My mother pretended that the real was the dream, that the dream was the real," "My mother slept for years, her eyes protected from the vulgar sunlight because already her visions were too many, the mirages, the maelstroms...") had the strange (and good) effect of keeping me focused. And—best of all—the whole thing comes to a very satisfying conclusion. I felt like I'd read an entire novella within the novel. Will every chapter be such an exquisite adventure?</div>Edhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16017371953361964015noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-218383016834136510.post-80579547322840980342011-07-15T00:29:00.000-07:002011-07-15T00:45:54.544-07:00<blockquote></blockquote>I borrowed a copy of <i>Marguerite Young, Our Darling</i>, the festschrift Dalkey published to coincide with the reprinting of MM, MD. In it Miriam Fuchs, in an essay entitled "Marguerite Young's MM, MD: Liquescence as Form," writes of a reviewer (Bernard Bergonzi, Nov. 1965) in the NYRB who apparently made the following conversion:<div><blockquote><i>Miss Macintosh</i>... weighs somewhat less than half a gallon of water and a little less than somewhat less than a half a gallon of oil--identical volumes of different liquids of varying weights.</blockquote>Fuchs goes on to claim that</div><div><blockquote>The conversion of text to page numbers, page numbers to pounds, pounds to gallons, and gallons to corresponding volumes of water and oil is an appropriate start for examining the structure and stylistics of MM, a novel in which things appear in equivalent or corresponding forms.</blockquote>Because, to complete the chain of thought:</div><div><blockquote>Oil mixed in water will diffuse, divide into smaller parts, and the particles will suspend in the liquid before they rise to the surface.</blockquote></div><div>Any thoughts on this? Are we left to drown on our own? Will we need to wipe an oily residue from our skin upon completion? </div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-218383016834136510.post-81214269688861157192011-07-13T11:48:00.001-07:002011-07-13T12:02:16.603-07:00An aviaryI picked up a copy of <em>Moderate Fable</em>, Marguerite Young's second book of poetry, published in 1944. It's short – 50 pages – and comes across as a more rococo version of Wallace Stevens. There isn't quite the full-on exuberance of language that seeps through Young's prose, but it's clearly in development here. The word "lorn" comes up twice in fifty pages, as do "moose," which I'd somehow imagined lived outside the world of poetry until Elizabeth Bishop came along. The word "mental" recurs, and there's a preponderance of the color red. There are a strange number of parachutes as well as angels, although Young makes it clear that she lives in a secular universe. Although there's only one poem specifically about them ("Death by Rarity"), there are also enough birds to convert Jonathan Franzen to her poetry. Leaving aside angels and insects and edge cases, here's a list of all of them, which might give a good idea of the flavor of this book:<br /><br /><ul><li>the lean crow</li><br /><li>Wayfarer loon</li><br /><li>humming birds lost</li><br /><li>the wild cockatoo</li><br /><li>partridge eyes</li><br /><li>seraphim blue heron</li><br /><li>the nest abandoned by orioles</li><br /><li>nighthawk, swift, ruby throat</li><br /><li>roseate spoonbill</li><br /><li>snowy egret slain</li><br /><li>the flamingo</li><br /><li>the heath hen</li><br /><li>wild / Trumpeter swan</li><br /><li>the perfect bird</li><br /><li>Names of birds whose names are poems</li><br /><li>ashen swallows</li><br /><li>starlings</li><br /><li>white sea birds</li><br /><li>long-legged plover</li><br /><li>white cockatoo</li><br /><li>the robin redbreast</li><br /><li>a sparrow lost</li><br /><li>burrowing birds</li><br /><li>burrowing bird</li><br /><li>the snow goose</li><br /><li>the albino crow</li><br /><li>oily sea gulls woefully emergent</li><br /><li>orioles in a purely mental snow</li><br /><li>long-tailed birds with soft bills</li><br /><li>The scarlet ibis</li><br /><li>the whooping crane</li><br /><li>The propaganda of a bird</li><br /><li>the crested auklets</li><br /><li>the rose-breasted / Grosbeak</li><br /><li>the migratory redwing</li><br /><li>the golden plover</li><br /><li>The beautiful birds</li><br /><li>the rare / Loon</li><br /><li>the lone shearwater</li><br /><li>the laughing gull</li><br /><li>no grebe and gold-eye</li><br /><li>no bird remember</li><br /><li>the ravens</li><br /><li>the three pacific doves</li><br /><li>The meek sparrows</li><br /><li>the ostriches light-eyed</li><br /><li>the rain crow's crying</li><br /><li>a grey-cheeked thrush's being</li><br /><li>Ibis was ibis intangible</li><br /><li>snow-colored ibis</li><br /><li>the transparent bird</li><br /><li>Leda's swans</li><br /><li>peacock thousand-eyed</li><br /><li>The mournful cry of ass-birds</li><br /><li>the hemisphereless bird</li><br /><li>burrowing owls</li><br /><li>the grey horned geese</li><br /><li>the fickle birds</li><br /><li>wild rock goose</li><br /><li>hoary owls</li><br /><li>white swan</li><br /><li>black swan</li><br /><li>glassy sparrows</li><br /><li>the daylight owl</li><br /><li>the white heron</li><br /><li>the red-veined birds</li><br /><li>the mute swans</li><br /><li>a bird in the storm</li><br /><li>the bird in the rain</li><br /><li>every snow-greaved swan</li><br /><li>the whirling geese</li><br /><li>both man and his swan</li><br /><li>the lorn hawk</li><br /><li>sparrows homeless in the air</li><br /><li>the white swan</li><br /><li>pigeons decoy the steeple and bells</li><br /><li>extra-terrestrial raven</li><br /><li>any cynic bird</li><br /><li>the raven's nest</li><br /><li>the dog-faced owl</li><br /><li>the white ptarmigan</li></ul><br /><br />Are there so many birds in <em>Miss MacIntosh</em>?dan viselhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13123725075329735300noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-218383016834136510.post-91386884686068675722011-07-11T18:53:00.000-07:002011-07-11T18:56:02.552-07:00Purple<i>...Brooklyn Bridge like a purple lace glove reaching through the darkness...</i>Edhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16017371953361964015noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-218383016834136510.post-43077742313420700432011-07-10T12:43:00.000-07:002011-07-10T14:45:50.186-07:001965Having just read the first chapter, I am struck by the similarity of the rhythm, word-choice, sentence structure, etc. to many of the songs on Bob Dylan's 1965 album, Bringing It All Back Home; 1965 was a poetic year. <br /><br />From page six: "had stopped at all the corners where street preachers preached of the golden tides of the future world and harvests of dragons' teeth and reaping the whirlwind, had gone to baseball games in those packed stadiums, watching pitchers pitch the moons, the suns, the stars"<br /><br />From "It's Alright Ma, I'm Only Bleeding" : "While preachers preach of evil fates / Teachers teach that knowledge waits"<br /><br />Mr. Tambourine Man and Gates of Eden are also on that album, and have similar hallucinatory imagery.<br /><br />In my "rigorous dream" (p. 2) where there is "no landscape but the soul's" (p. 4), Bob Dylan sat at Marguerite Young's feet in Greenwich Village and honed his craft.<br /><br />P.S. Thanks for inviting me to the book club, I hope this kind of post is fine by y'all.adriennehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15734876620311269317noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-218383016834136510.post-36125469953951122742011-07-10T07:39:00.000-07:002011-07-10T07:56:00.490-07:00An Alternate Marguerite YoungI went to Bookfinder to see what was available for Marguerite Young, and came up with this book, entitled <em>Pacific Transport</em>:<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiBGJ5eeIxKq3hfXm5I2b7E8rqF8o7DhceOH767ufq_BOhHDuCA2ytB2vTXm8xKDKgN270MG9whOT7NgMVyNJl7gg72YV2R3hVJdonwhbBNq7MlnX4yPeqQ3BSb1gxcVjHnXbbPCgUxnHtj/s1600/pacifictransportsmall.png"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 214px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiBGJ5eeIxKq3hfXm5I2b7E8rqF8o7DhceOH767ufq_BOhHDuCA2ytB2vTXm8xKDKgN270MG9whOT7NgMVyNJl7gg72YV2R3hVJdonwhbBNq7MlnX4yPeqQ3BSb1gxcVjHnXbbPCgUxnHtj/s320/pacifictransportsmall.png" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5627734324494672450" /></a><br /><br />Here's the back cover, which makes it clear that this is not our Marguerite Young:<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiH1vPTVcePu4xe96tryEMBJOwzgXaqtJTDxmObNRlvGrW7XRoZaxVjRFfhIkGEnk0_tU8DNiHehTM19qvVb7bkeglkEltxxhNVMEsIA4Y7kkLuSaKgB16FtZYNn2DUAOKmUtAD1ow9WB8I/s1600/pacifictransportback.png"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 207px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiH1vPTVcePu4xe96tryEMBJOwzgXaqtJTDxmObNRlvGrW7XRoZaxVjRFfhIkGEnk0_tU8DNiHehTM19qvVb7bkeglkEltxxhNVMEsIA4Y7kkLuSaKgB16FtZYNn2DUAOKmUtAD1ow9WB8I/s320/pacifictransportback.png" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5627734829478299826" /></a><br /><br />It was published by Vantage Press in 1976; I assume that then as now Vantage was a vanity publisher. I do wonder why no one there pointed out that there was already a Marguerite Young, though maybe ours had already fallen into neglect by then? Here's the jacket copy:<br /><br /><blockquote>At once a detailed map of the mind and heart of a sensitive, intelligent, loving woman, and a dazzling meditation on the inexorable forces of history and destiny, <em>Pacific Transport</em> is a novel that sends one into literature's Hall of Fame in search of comparable experiences with the printed word. In its focus on woman's sensibility and its portrayal of human thought processes, it is reminiscent of Virginia Woolf's <em>To the Lighthouse</em> and <em>Mrs. Dalloway</em>; in the breadth and depth of its observations on the tide of human affairs and and its comprehensiveness, it is the fictional equal of Edmund Wilson's magnificent exercise in the philosophy of history, <em>To the Finland Station</em>. It is possible to go on and on with a list of giants whose work is in some degree echoed by <em>Pacific Transport</em>, but only at the cost of minimizing author Marguerite Young's prodigious originality and ingenuity.<br /><br />Her protagonist, a woman of middle years named Aimee, is portrayed from within and without at various stops along a journey with her husband Henry, a brilliant physician. In the manner of a picaresque novel, the places and people encountered, and the ideas, memories, hopes, and fears they inspire in Aimee are portrayed with great insight and virtuosity. Aimee looks back – into her own past as a newspaper reporter, and into the American nation's historical and artistic past – and ahead – up to the Moon, across the Pacific to China – to her own, and our, destiny.<br /><br />Brilliant in both conception and execution, Marguerite Young's <em>Pacific Transport</em> is a Bicentennial book that will be pertinent at the time of the Tricentennial.</blockquote><br /><br />I have not read this book yet, though with jacket copy like that I wonder if I can afford not to.dan viselhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13123725075329735300noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-218383016834136510.post-45038767447863451382011-07-08T21:54:00.000-07:002011-07-08T21:55:51.846-07:00A close callFrom the dustjacket: <div><br /></div><div><i>At one time in the Gare Lazare in Paris, seven suitcases of the manuscript were lost—but were retrieved by seven men from Cook's with seven wheelbarrows. </i></div>Edhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16017371953361964015noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-218383016834136510.post-42950040511863612402011-07-07T17:32:00.000-07:002011-07-07T18:04:24.344-07:00Loomings<div style="text-align: justify;">Although <i>MM, MD</i> has been peripherally in my consciousness the past several years, I never went any further than flipping through a copy of the first volume one winter afternoon while I was working at Dalkey. The emphatic and discouraging thud it made when I put it back on the shelf in the stock room dissuaded me entirely from any reckless attempts at taming the thing.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">The only thing I know for certain is that while going through the archives in the office there, I was astounded by her completely haphazard style of correspondence. Her notes to Steven Moore (whose brief reminiscence of MY is worth reading: it's the topmost post in the <a href="http://home.earthlink.net/~eichfr/youngweb.htm">Message Board Archive</a>--no direct link) were illegibly scrawled on torn and stained sheets of paper and the photographs in her folders spoke of a certain touching vanity. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Beyond that small bit of firsthand knowledge, I've only grown more intrigued the past few days, as much by MY as by MM, MD. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">My only other experience with a book club was an ill-fated attempt a friend and I started, under the auspices of Green Apple Books (my employer), of reading <i>Anti-Oedipus</i>. To the first meeting a man who, as far as I could tell, looked uncomfortably like Vincent Schiavelli showed up wearing a gas mask. So, the online forum really suits me. </div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-218383016834136510.post-34718968838643945842011-07-07T14:37:00.000-07:002011-07-07T14:37:35.032-07:00More beginningsAnd here's Dan's post on Young from April with my comment:<br />
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<a href="http://withhiddennoise.net/2011/04/23/the-truth-about-the-opium-lady/">http://withhiddennoise.net/2011/04/23/the-truth-about-the-opium-lady/</a><br />
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The truth about the opium lady!<br />
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I need to figure out when exactly I first tried to read MMMD and why. I think it had something to do with William Goyen (<i><a href="http://www.amazon.com/House-Breath-William-Goyen/dp/0810150670">The House of Breath</a></i> is a favorite book). Post TK.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-218383016834136510.post-64232456614257528092011-07-07T14:28:00.000-07:002011-07-07T14:28:23.420-07:00BeginningsI tracked down the comment thread which explains how this started.<br />
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From <a href="http://thedizzies.blogspot.com/2011/06/entire-field-of-outdoor-sports.html">http://thedizzies.blogspot.com/2011/06/entire-field-of-outdoor-sports.html</a>:<br />
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<dt class="comment-poster" id="c929662944870341175" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: initial; background-image: url(http://www.blogblog.com/dots_dark/icon_comment.gif); background-origin: initial; background-position: 2px 0.35em; background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; color: #99aabb; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-weight: bold; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0.5em; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 20px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><span class="comment-icon blogger-comment-icon" style="line-height: 16px;"><img alt="Blogger" src="http://img2.blogblog.com/img/b16-rounded.gif" style="display: inline;" /></span> <a href="http://www.blogger.com/profile/13123725075329735300" rel="nofollow" style="color: #ddaa77;">dan visel</a> said...</dt><br />
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<dd class="comment-body" style="color: #aabbcc; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 20px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><div style="margin-bottom: 0.5em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">I really feel like a good use of my summer would be reading that - kind of embarrassing how long it's sat on my shelf.</div></dd><dd class="comment-timestamp" style="color: #999966; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 0.5em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0.75em; padding-left: 20px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><a href="http://thedizzies.blogspot.com/2011/06/entire-field-of-outdoor-sports.html#c929662944870341175" style="color: #999966;" title="comment permalink">11:30 PM</a></dd><br />
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<dt class="comment-poster" id="c7513111390835364110" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: initial; background-image: url(http://www.blogblog.com/dots_dark/icon_comment.gif); background-origin: initial; background-position: 2px 0.35em; background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; color: #99aabb; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-weight: bold; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0.5em; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 20px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><a href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.g?blogID=218383016834136510" name="c7513111390835364110"></a><span class="comment-icon blogger-comment-icon" style="line-height: 16px;"><img alt="Blogger" src="http://img2.blogblog.com/img/b16-rounded.gif" style="display: inline;" /></span> <a href="http://www.blogger.com/profile/06968478096142741974" rel="nofollow" style="color: #ddaa77;">Ed Park</a> said...</dt><br />
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<dd class="comment-body" style="color: #aabbcc; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 20px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><div style="margin-bottom: 0.5em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">Agreed...Let's organize a MMMD book club. (It will be the least popular club ever devised.)</div></dd><dd class="comment-timestamp" style="color: #999966; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 0.5em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0.75em; padding-left: 20px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><a href="http://thedizzies.blogspot.com/2011/06/entire-field-of-outdoor-sports.html#c7513111390835364110" style="color: #999966;" title="comment permalink">1:44 PM</a></dd><br />
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<dt class="comment-poster" id="c6697621976571895485" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: initial; background-image: url(http://www.blogblog.com/dots_dark/icon_comment.gif); background-origin: initial; background-position: 2px 0.35em; background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; color: #99aabb; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-weight: bold; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0.5em; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 20px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><a href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.g?blogID=218383016834136510" name="c6697621976571895485"></a><span class="comment-icon blogger-comment-icon" style="line-height: 16px;"><img alt="Blogger" src="http://img2.blogblog.com/img/b16-rounded.gif" style="display: inline;" /></span> <a href="http://www.blogger.com/profile/05799869059793681283" rel="nofollow" style="color: #ddaa77;">Will</a> said...</dt><br />
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<dd class="comment-body" style="color: #aabbcc; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 20px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><div style="margin-bottom: 0.5em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">I still have a hideous 2-volume 80s paperback in a slipcase (now that I say that I bet it's by someone famous). Can a book club have just three people?</div></dd><dd class="comment-timestamp" style="color: #999966; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 0.5em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0.75em; padding-left: 20px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><a href="http://thedizzies.blogspot.com/2011/06/entire-field-of-outdoor-sports.html#c6697621976571895485" style="color: #999966;" title="comment permalink">1:25 PM</a></dd><br />
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<dt class="comment-poster" id="c6465875865852708906" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: initial; background-image: url(http://www.blogblog.com/dots_dark/icon_comment.gif); background-origin: initial; background-position: 2px 0.35em; background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; color: #99aabb; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-weight: bold; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0.5em; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 20px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><a href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.g?blogID=218383016834136510" name="c6465875865852708906"></a><span class="comment-icon blogger-comment-icon" style="line-height: 16px;"><img alt="Blogger" src="http://img2.blogblog.com/img/b16-rounded.gif" style="display: inline;" /></span> <a href="http://www.blogger.com/profile/06968478096142741974" rel="nofollow" style="color: #ddaa77;">Ed Park</a> said...</dt><br />
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<dd class="comment-body" style="color: #aabbcc; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 20px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><div style="margin-bottom: 0.5em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">Yes! Three. This would actually be the best book club in the history of book clubs. I'm going to nominate Levi Stahl (though he doesn't know it yet), and Damion Searls expressed interest...<br />
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Anyone else?<br />
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Let's take it one page at a time (I'm kind of serious)...</div></dd><dd class="comment-timestamp" style="color: #999966; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 0.5em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0.75em; padding-left: 20px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><a href="http://thedizzies.blogspot.com/2011/06/entire-field-of-outdoor-sports.html#c6465875865852708906" style="color: #999966;" title="comment permalink">3:00 PM</a></dd><br />
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<dt class="comment-poster" id="c6039677937313299168" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: initial; background-image: url(http://www.blogblog.com/dots_dark/icon_comment.gif); background-origin: initial; background-position: 2px 0.35em; background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; color: #99aabb; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-weight: bold; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0.5em; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 20px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><a href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.g?blogID=218383016834136510" name="c6039677937313299168"></a><span class="comment-icon blogger-comment-icon" style="line-height: 16px;"><img alt="Blogger" src="http://img2.blogblog.com/img/b16-rounded.gif" style="display: inline;" /></span> <a href="http://www.blogger.com/profile/05799869059793681283" rel="nofollow" style="color: #ddaa77;">Will</a> said...</dt><br />
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<dd class="comment-body" style="color: #aabbcc; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 20px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><div style="margin-bottom: 0.5em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">Poor Levi.<br />
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Ok, I'm in. I love the one-page-at-a-time method. What do you think, group blog or group tumblr for discussion?</div></dd><dd class="comment-timestamp" style="color: #999966; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 0.5em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0.75em; padding-left: 20px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><a href="http://thedizzies.blogspot.com/2011/06/entire-field-of-outdoor-sports.html#c6039677937313299168" style="color: #999966;" title="comment permalink">1:49 PM</a></dd><br />
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<dt class="comment-poster" id="c4969515906182338108" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: initial; background-image: url(http://www.blogblog.com/dots_dark/icon_comment.gif); background-origin: initial; background-position: 2px 0.35em; background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; color: #99aabb; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-weight: bold; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0.5em; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 20px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><a href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.g?blogID=218383016834136510" name="c4969515906182338108"></a><span class="comment-icon blogger-comment-icon" style="line-height: 16px;"><img alt="Blogger" src="http://img2.blogblog.com/img/b16-rounded.gif" style="display: inline;" /></span> <a href="http://www.blogger.com/profile/11094919454842047688" rel="nofollow" style="color: #ddaa77;">Levi Stahl</a> said...</dt><br />
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<dd class="comment-body" style="color: #aabbcc; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 20px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><div style="margin-bottom: 0.5em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">I'm in. I have pretty much no idea what I'm in for, but it's not like Ed's ever led me astray (for 1100 pages) before, right?</div></dd>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-218383016834136510.post-25304705934325031012011-07-07T10:56:00.000-07:002011-07-07T10:57:25.629-07:00Marguerite Young Speaks!A <a href="http://anaisninblog.skybluepress.com/2011/05/marguerite-young-and-hugh-guiler-discuss-anais-nins-diary/">post on The Anais Nin Blog</a> offers an 11-minute MP3 of Marguerite Young talking with Nin's husband Hugh Guiler in 1964. <br /><br />There's also evidently an <a href="http://product.half.ebay.com/Marguerite-Young-Miss-Macintosh-Readings-by-Marguerite-Young-1987-Audio-Cassette/1728999&cpid=5163304">audio cassette</a> of Young reading; copies seem to be available, but they're <a href="http://www.bookfinder.com/search/?ac=sl&st=sl&qi=RMS6xQVSZoKXlI2buBoe0.YkBpw_5873596333_2:39:127&bq=author%3Dmarguerite%2520young%26title%3Dmarguerite%2520young%2520miss%2520macintosh%252Freadings">pricey</a> and I don't have a tape player. I wonder if this is floating around the Internet already?dan viselhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13123725075329735300noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-218383016834136510.post-22508320533360402112011-07-07T09:49:00.001-07:002011-07-07T09:51:19.964-07:00Page 1It is not always easy to tell the difference between the woman you plan to marry and the woman you have married.Damionhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05148641559745098018noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-218383016834136510.post-74973554456437415202011-07-07T09:44:00.000-07:002011-07-07T09:46:09.968-07:00Page 4The melody of this birdcall was one he had never heard before, or once, in his childhood, or his childhood's childhood, mistily unseen even then.Damionhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05148641559745098018noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-218383016834136510.post-36219034253924349162011-07-07T09:40:00.000-07:002011-07-07T09:43:40.458-07:00What was the organization of memory?"Yet he would remain forever engraved on memory's whirling disc" (p. 4)<br /><br />What do we think this image is? Were there floppy disks by 1965? Is it a circular saw, or a long-playing record; does 33 1/3 or even 78 rpm qualify as "whirling"? How "engraved"?<br /><br />If there are no answers to these questions, then this is a very interesting kind of image, made up of image-particles as it were that are concrete but never solidify.Damionhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05148641559745098018noreply@blogger.com1