A PLACE FOR SIDEWAYS TRAINS OF THOUGHT
I have always found Henry James to be a difficult writer to read. I have often tried but, honestly , apart from the Turn of the Screw, which is riveting, and Daisy Miller, I have never managed to get past any of his prologues. This is probably due to the fact that, being an interpreter... Continue Reading →
"Aesthetics is to artists as ornithology is to birds" Barnett Newman
Flann O’Brien was a pen name of Brian O’Nolan, an Irish author who is most famous for three novels, At Swim Two Birds, The Third Policeman and the Dalkey Archive. He also wrote a column for the Irish Times from 1940 to 1966 full of wild imaginings. I once read an anthology of his Irish... Continue Reading →
In his book on Australia, Down Under, (entitled In a Sunburned Country in the USA and Canada), there is a moment when Bill Bryson is trying to find something to listen to on the radio while driving towards, if I recall properly, Adelaide. Nothing seems to be on the air. But, eventually, he comes across... Continue Reading →
When the British assembled their empire, they took their games and sports and moustaches with them, even to the hottest places. Some people were bemused, as in this anecdote, relayed by Jan Morris in her book Hong Kong, when discussing the early days of the colony. An old tale tells of the Chinese gentleman who,... Continue Reading →
When I look at of the books in my library, the only thing I can remember in most cases is whether I have read them or not. Books in the second-largest category trigger one single anecdote or image and nothing else. One image which has been in my head for decades now comes from a book by Alberto... Continue Reading →
“One commonly notices the unruly independence of this member, interjecting itself so inopportunely when we have no need for it and failing us so inopportunely when we most need it, and contending so imperiously for authority with our will, so haughtily and stubbornly rejecting our urgings, both... Continue Reading →
After a moment, I heard Baron Pips laugh quietly and asked why. He said : " You sound just like Count Sternberg." He was ancient and rather simple-minded Austrian nobleman, he explained. When he was on his death-bed his confessor said the time had come to make a general confession. The Count, after racking his... Continue Reading →
Nabokov's most beautiful passage of prose
(This is a passage from Bill Bryson's "Notes from a Big Country" which makes me laugh every time I think about it. It is the start of a chapter entitled "Drowning in Red Tape".) I'm not even going to begin to tell you about the frustration of trying to get a foreign-born spouse or other... Continue Reading →