The smell of ink is intoxicating to me – others may have wine, but I have poetry.
Terri Guillemets (via scribbledpoetry)
I had forgotten that time wasn’t fixed like concrete but in fact was fluid as sand, or water. I had forgotten that even misery can end.
Joyce Carol Oates, I Am No One You Know: Stories (via libraryland)
…the idea of going to your desk for existential comfort, or at least some sort of a reason to get up every day, and also a reason for why it’s okay to get up every day or even desirable to get up every day—that idea makes sense to me. And if you could actually communicate that sense to your reader—if your book convinced them somehow, even temporarily, that it’s perhaps overwhelmingly okay to get up every day—that would be, to say the least, pretty neat.
Looks like a ground hog ate my garden for breakfast.
Friendship is born at that moment when one person says to another: ‘What! You too? I thought I was the only one.’
C.S. Lewis (via libraryland)
Poet T.S. Eliot
Last night at the Kava Bar
I have seen the moment of my greatness flicker,
And I have seen the eternal Footman hold my coat, and snicker,
And in short, I was afraid.
T. S. Eliot. Quoted in “Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock.” (via ahistoryofquotes)
Open mic tribal jam session with the American Gonzos at the Kava Bar. #avlent
The American Gonzos setting up for their song ‘39 Steps’ at the Kava Bar. #avlent
Asher & Nick at the Kava Bar open mic. #avlent
River Rats setting up for a bluesy set called ‘Riverside’ at the Kava Bar.
Caleb reads a Lorca translation at the Kava Bar open mic.
I’m glad that sales of my books have dropped to where serious literary journals now take an interest in me.
I loathe blogs when I look at them. Blogs look to me illiterate, they look hasty, like someone babbling. To me writing is a considered act. It’s something which is a great labor of thought and consideration. A blog doesn’t seem to have any literary merit at all. It’s a chatty account of things that have happened to that particular person.
Paul Theroux discusses blogging, travel writing, “Three Cups of Tea,” and his new book “The Tao of Travel.” Read the whole interview at The Atlantic. (via theatlantic)
If you work with your hands, you’re a laborer.
If you work with your hands and your mind, you’re a craftsman.
If you work with your hands and your mind and your heart, you’re an artist.
Saint Francis of Assisi (via ftweeks)
The poet should speak to all men, for a moment, of that other life of theirs that they have smothered and forgotten.
Edith Sitwell (via nathanielstuart)
In spite of all the poetry, all the philosophy to the contrary, we are not really masters of our fate.
Good designers transform insights into inspiration
and inspiration into something tangible – Simon Rucker – Harvard Business Review (via gregmelander)
‘zoom r8’ portable recorder/interface/controller/sampler (via designboom)
The trap of ‘writing about yourself’
Rarely do I read anything published on Gawker, but this is a good read for writers using social media.
Writing about yourself as a character is a process that feeds on itself. If you set out with the intent of making yourself a “brand” with a certain image and persona, you are locking yourself in a prison of your own creation. (via gawker)1
NOTES:
1) Hamilton Nolan, “The Writing about yourself Trap,” May 24, 2011, Gawker, accessed June 6, 2011, https://gawker.com/5804980/the-writing-about-yourself-trap (page no longer available, web site deactivated in 2023)
Coffeehouse Junkie 