Review: The Design of Books
Like with so many other technologies in our lives — computers, cars, bread machines, flushing toilets, DVD players, convection ovens — most consumers don’t know or appreciate how books are…
books about books
Why Jesus Won’t Answer Your Prayers
Christians pray to Jesus, but get no reply. They pray to Jesus for parking spaces closer to the mall, to win the lottery, to make their boss disappear, to lose…
Musings on Haiku
I can’t recall just when I first encountered haiku, that subtle, concise and often baffling Japanese poetry, but I suspect it was sometime in the late 1960s, not long after…
what i’m reading: nine nasty words by john mcwhorter
If you enjoy language, and history, and humour, you will probably enjoy Nine Nasty Words: English in the Gutter — Then, Now, and Forever by John McWhorter. A slim book…
The Book of Knowledge: 2
Last post I mentioned I had rescued a set of encyclopedias from the dumpster at the end of this year’s Mother Of All Yard Sales (MOAYS; an Optimist Club event).…
what i’m reading: the turning point: 1851: a year that changed charles dickens and the world
The Turning Point: 1851 — A Year That Changed Charles Dickens and the World was written for me. I love Dickens. He’s among the core writers whose work means the…
Milton Was Wrong
In 1644, the English poet and pamphleteer John Milton wrote an impassioned defence of free speech (or, more factually, against censorship of print and in favour of restriction-free publication) called…
Musings on the First Tercet of Dante’s Inferno
Back in December, before Godaddy broke my blog through technical incompetence, I had written a piece about the first stanza in Inferno, the first book of Dante’s trilogy, The Divine…
Midway Through This Life’s Journey V.2
For some inexplicably serendipitous reason, I pulled Mary Jo Bang’s translation of Dante’s Inferno (Graywolf, 2012) from my bookshelves this week and began re-reading it. I didn’t like her version…
Ammon Shea is My New Hero
Eyyyyyyy Wssup guys This was the entire first post that started a thread in a group I belonged to on Facebook. I think seeing it aged me a decade, and…
what i’m reading: you could look it up: the reference shelf from ancient babylon to wikipedia
This must be the book-nerd-iest post ever, and unless books are your profession, possibly the biggest book geek-out you’ll ever read. And I’m proud to bring it to you. You…
friends and family reunion road trip: day eight: long-distance friends meet up in san francisco
Yesterday, after we dropped the pups at daycare, Allan and I took the BART into the city, but got off at separate stops. Allan was meeting a blog-friend (someone we…
Musings on Shakespeare Guidebooks
Unless you’re an academic who has studied The Bard for your entire career, you really need a guide, a Virgil if you will, to enter the dark forest of Shakespeare…
what i’m reading: sometimes you have to lie: the life and times of louise fitzhugh, renegade author of harriet the spy
Until very recently, I didn’t know anything about Louise Fitzhugh and had not thought about her at all. Of course, as a child I read and loved Harriet the Spy,…
Musings on Poets and Poetry
For me, reading the American literary critic, Harold Bloom, is often like wading in molasses. Intellectual molasses, to be sure, but slow going nonetheless. His writing is thick with difficult…
The Penguin Classics Book
Did you know there is a card game played in Japan at the New Year, called uta-garuta, where 100 cards have a full poem on each — traditionally taken from…
what i’m reading: the library book by susan orlean
I’ve been on a “books about books” run lately, beginning with Syria’s Secret Library, then Robert Caro’s Working, and now I’m finishing the wonderful The Library Book by Susan Orlean.…
what i’m reading: the library book by susan orlean
I’ve been on a “books about books” run lately, beginning with Syria’s Secret Library, then Robert Caro’s Working, and now I’m finishing the wonderful The Library Book by Susan Orlean.…
what i’m reading: the library book by susan orlean
I’ve been on a “books about books” run lately, beginning with Syria’s Secret Library, then Robert Caro’s Working, and now I’m finishing the wonderful The Library Book by Susan Orlean.…