what I’ve been reading lately:
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How They Met, And Other Stories by David LevithanKnopf, 2009 (originally 2008)
This collection of stories about love isn’t my favorite of Levithan’s books—I think his particular explorations of emotion and connection work best for me when they’re novel-length. But because I already like his work, I’m glad I read this book, which does have its share of excellent moments. The eighteen stories collected here (most of
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The rest of Psychogeography
In “South Downs Way,” Will Self writes about how he has “taken to long-distance walking as a means of dissolving the mechanised matrix which compresses the space-time continuum, and decouples human from physical geography” (69). Which is a mouthful, and perhaps a bit tongue-in-cheek, but also kind of excellent: he’s walking, in part, to remind
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Psychogeography: Words by Will Self, Pictures by Ralph SteadmanBloomsbury, 2007
Though I didn’t go to any events at the Conflux Festival this year, it nevertheless seemed like the weekend of the festival would be an apt weekend to start reading this book, which I checked out from the library a while ago. The festival, which used to be called Psy.Geo.Conflux, is centered on psychogeography, a
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Zen Shorts, Zen Ties, and Zen Ghosts by Jon J MuthScholastic Press, 2005, 2008, and 2010
I hadn’t heard that Jon J Muth had a new “Zen ___” book out, but then last month I read the first installment of the Book-Scout Autumn Reading List, and immediately put Zen Shorts, Zen Ties, and Zen Ghosts on hold at the library. Zen Shorts, which came out in 2005, was a Caldecott Honor
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Escape from Combray by Rick SnyderUgly Duckling Presse, 2009
I picked this book out from the “new books” shelf at the library based on its title (I do like Proust!) and its cover, which is letterpress-printed and lovely, an old street map with great type. I flipped the book open and whatever poem I saw (I don’t remember which one it was) was good
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In Utopia by J.C. HallmanSt. Martin’s Press, 2010
“Utopia is in a bad way,” this book starts, then follows with this definition: “Utopia can be broadly defined as any exuberant plan or philosophy intended to perfect life lived collectively” (3). Not many pages later, Hallman lets us know where he stands, which is in favor of this exuberance: “the utopian flame should not
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“Chester” by Henry James(in English Hours, Oxford University Press, 1982, originally Houghton Mifflin & Co., 1905)
James doesn’t only write, in the essays in English Hours, about the physicalities of a place: he’s also writing about culture and history, about the American temperament and the English temperament (or at least, about an American’s impression of them), about the majesty of Anglican services and American twinges of jealousy at all the richness
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“London” by Henry James(in English Hours, Oxford University Press, 1982, originally Houghton Mifflin & Co., 1905)
Henry James is one of my favorite writers: I love his long sentences, the way the make me slow down when reading: both in the sense that I often have to slow down, because of their length and twistiness, and in the sense that I want to slow down, to better savor the way they’re
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Norwegian Wood by Haruki MurakamiTranslated by Jay RubinVintage Books, 2000
Picking a book to bring along on vacation—especially a vacation where I was traveling alone and traveling light—was tricky: I was busy making a packing list and rolling up my clothes to make them fit in my backpack, and I wasn’t finding the process very conducive to reflecting on what I wanted to read next.