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Doris Lessing (1919 – 2013): A Tribute…of Sorts
“These women are insufferable!” Every day for about two weeks, the same refrain. Before October of 2007 neither Sam nor I had read a word of Doris Lessing. We knew her by reputation only: a minor...
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Claude Simon: We missed his centenary — don’t miss his books!
On October 10, 2013, the very day Alice Munro was busy winning the Nobel Prize, an altogether different kind of author was busy accruing general obscurity. Eight years after his death, in spite of...
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On the Meaning of Books
A Facebook friend recently posted a picture contrasting a formidably stocked bookshelf with a Kindle. The caption read “This (meaning the books) will always be more impressive to own than this (the...
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The Solitude of Octavio Paz: Centenary of a Mexican Giant
I. A house, a garden, are not places: they spin, they come and go. Their apparitions open another space in space, another time in time. ( from “A Tale of Two Gardens”) An early indication of Octavio...
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Gabriel Garcia Marquez: In Memoriam
Gabriel Garcia Marquez, March 6 1927 – April 17, 2014 “He allowed himself to be swayed by his conviction that human beings are not born once and for all on the day their mothers give birth to them, but...
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In Memoriam: Nadine Gordimer — who subversively wrote as well as she could
Nadine Gordimer 1923 – 2014 In repressive regimes everywhere – whether in what was the Soviet block, Latin America, Africa, China – most imprisoned writers have been shut away for their activities as...
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French Novelist Patrick Modiano Wins the 2014 Nobel Prize for Literature
Patrick Modiano, 2014 Nobel Laureate Almost as good as when those crazy Swedes choose to honor one of my cherished writers is when they choose to honor someone I’ve never heard of. Ignorance becomes a...
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THE TROLLEY: Claude Simon’s Elegiac Artifice
The American composer and voluminous diarist, Ned Rorem, made the following entry in his Nantucket Diary, dated 17 October, 1985: “When it comes to prizes there is no right choice, although with...
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Pär Lagerkvist’s Irrevocable Divide
I. I try to imagine them meeting in Paris: the young Pär Lagerkvist and Gertrude Stein. He, a Swede of peasant stock, shock of blond hair, taciturn not even the word for his humming inwardness. She,...
View ArticleTo Read or To Write? – An Update
Always the tradeoff: If I’m reading copiously, I have less time to write. In lieu of a proper post, here is a rundown on what I’ve been reading, and a teaser for the posts I hope it will produce. 1. In...
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From BELOVED to GOD HELP THE CHILD: Toni Morrison’s Busybody Daemon
Toni Morrison (b. 1931) was awarded the Nobel Prize in 1993, after the publication of her sixth novel, JAZZ. In April of 2015, she published GOD HELP THE CHILD, her eleventh. At some point during the...
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Belorusian Journalist Svetlana Alexievich Wins the 2015 Nobel Prize for...
SVETLANA ALEXIEVICH – A BOLD CHOICE FOR THE NOBEL…OR IS IT? Svetlana Alexievich, 2015 Nobel Laureate Nobel laureates Theodor Mommsen, Rudolph Eucken, Henri Bergson, Bertrand Russell, and Winston...
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