Second Sex and Death
Henri Cartier-Bresson, Magnum Photos
Simone de Beauvoir, Paris, 1945
A good article titled “The Second ‘Second Sex'” about translation, specifically of Simone de Beauvoir’s The Second Sex, in The Chronicle of Higher Ed. Have you translated? What are your problems/concerns with translating?
Another interesting one in The Chronicle about vampires and dead people in general: “All the Dead Are Vampires.”
A + B = C. de Beauvoir plus dead people = A Very Easy Death. I haven’t read this memoir of de Beauvoir’s mother’s death in a long time, but I remember it being a powerful meditation on death. Describing her mother’s fears after a fall in the bathroom that breaks her femur, de Beauvoir writes, READ MORE >
Another one might bite the dust…
This Ain’t Rosedale Library is one of Canada coolest bookstores. Seriously: even the Guardian thinks so. (They said it was #8 in the world!!) I found the bookstore on accident. I was in Toronto to give a reading and had some time to pass, so I walked around until I found this little bookstore, there were hipsters hanging outside (and in), which would usually be a deterrent (I find them intimidating), but then, I saw a glimmer, yes, I saw Rikki Ducornet’s One Marvelous Thing displayed in the window. Next to it, wow, Jesse Ball, and suddenly, like magic, I was inside the store, only it wasn’t a store, it was like looking at the bookshelves I always wanted. The whole store was filled with beautiful indie books, both from the States and Canada. It was a candy store, or maybe one of those medicinal marijuana stores they’re rumored to have in California, or maybe it was like getting to heaven and finding yourself with 72 beautiful virgins: that was This Ain’t Rosedale Library to me.
The rise of pants
Circa 1800 Goya painted “La Maja Desnuda”; three years later, in 1803, perhaps feeling a little guilty, he does another, this time with clothes on her. This was before feminism, so let’s just say ol’ Goya was a little pensive about the Inquisition. (The paintings were owned by Spanish prime minister Manuel de Godoy, who preferred to go by “Manual” while gazing at the former painting.) Maja’s fate is ours as well — to start off naked, then end up clothed as some apology. Don’t blame eve, but Ross dress for less.
So Watson Going To Happen When They Startson Writing The Great American Novel?
Turns out, making time to read the Times was totally worth it, although this article is free online.
Basically, computer scientists have programed a supercomputer named Watson (not yr dad’s supercomputer, a new one – so you can chew on what that means) to interpret English syntax well enough to answer Jeopardy! questions using a shitload of data uploaded from books, magazines, and newspapers (all the stuff we don’t have time to read ((yet))).
While it’s far from perfect, there’s definitely some potential here for the same sort of freakish synapse connections we make when we play with language and such and !
Ignorant Proclamation +2
1. At The Observer, another stockbroker says another dumb thing about the state of fiction.
Dear Lee: When your weathervane is James Wood, you might as well be covering the World Cup. Where have all the Mailers gone? I only ever knew of one, and he’s dead. Try actually investigating something. Open your eyes.
2. At the Guardian, Jeremy Kay reports from the set of the new Herzog/Lynch collaboration.
3. At Pop Damage, an interview with James Grauerholz, the executor of the William S. Burroughs estate.
Blake Butler—
One week from today, Wednesday, June 30th, Zachary Schomburg will read for the 6th installment of the Live Giants reading series, via live feed here at 9 PM EASTERN. More info and RSVP here.
Books Concerning Friendship
Alec Niedenthal spent the weekend here in NYC, and we got into a conversation about Bellow’s Ravelstein, which I recently read and loved very much. Among its other signal virtues, it is one of the best books on friendship I think I’ve ever read. This got us talking about books about friendship as a literary subject, and we decided to see how quickly we could think of a dozen books that treat it as the (or a) major theme. Here’s what we came up with, in the order we came up with it–a highly non-exhaustive, non-hierarchical list off the top of our heads. Annotations indicate which of us has read the book in question. Interestingly, the final tally was four books only he’d read, four books only I’d read, and four books we’d both read.
Ravelstein – Saul Bellow (J + A)
The Waves – Virginia Woolf (J + A)
Humboldt’s Gift – Saul Bellow (A)
Pale Fire – Vladimir Nabokov (J + A)
Try – Dennis Cooper (J)
Hey Jack! – Barry Hannah (J + A)
A Sentimental Education – Gustave Flaubert (A)
It – Stephen King (J)
Veronica – Mary Gaitskill (J)
Chilly Scenes of Winter – Ann Beattie (A)
David Copperfield – Charles Dickens (J)
Correction – Thomas Bernhard (A)
Anyone got further recommendations or thoughts about these books? You know what to do.
Interview with Lee Rourke
Lee Rouke’s debut novel, The Canal has just been released in the the States and will be hitting the UK in less than a month. I’ve already said good things about it & so have Shane Jones & John Wray . I conducted this little interview with Lee over email.
First, an excerpt, then another after the interview:
She addressed him only.
“Do you remember me?”
There was a long pause.
He looked at the woman next to him, then back at her, then back at the woman. He looked nervous, rubbing his thumb into the palm of his hand. The woman’s eyes began to narrow and her whole face started to contort. He looked back up at her.
“Er . . . I’m . . . afraid . . . I’m afraid I don’t, sorry. Er . . . Have we . . . Should I?”
“You tell me.”
“I’m sorry, I’ve never seen you before in my life. I fear you may have mistaken me for another person, someone else in your life . . . I’m sorry.”
“You’re sorry?”
“Yes.”
“You’re sorry? That’s all you can say? Sorry? Don’t you remember me at all?”