December 3, 2009
The Poor Mouth by Flann O’Brien Publisher: Hart-Davis MacGibbon - London Date: 1973 The Poor Mouth was originally published, in Gaelic in 1941, as An Béal Bocht. O’Brien gives us Corkadoragh, a small Gaelic village struggling with extreme poverty. The people have nothing.  They sleep amongst their pigs.  They occasionally dine on sod.  When they see bootprints in the mud for the first time, they track them thinking they were left by some terrifying beast.  The less comprehensible they are, the more beautiful and pure their Gaelic is thought to be.  It is a funny, funny book.  O’Brien sets up jokes for pages just to slip in a sharp one-liner. There is an overall gloom throughout, enhanced by Steadman’s illustrations.  The kind of gloom that comes from living in the muck, being constantly wet from the ceaseless rain, having no food in your stomach, and having no outlet for hope.  I have to say that I don’t know a whole lot about Irish history and I am certain I missed out on some of the jokes in here, but at just over 125 pages it is a quick, easy read and well worthwhile.

The Poor Mouth by Flann O’Brien

Publisher: Hart-Davis MacGibbon - London

Date: 1973

The Poor Mouth was originally published, in Gaelic in 1941, as An Béal Bocht.

O’Brien gives us Corkadoragh, a small Gaelic village struggling with extreme poverty. The people have nothing.  They sleep amongst their pigs.  They occasionally dine on sod.  When they see bootprints in the mud for the first time, they track them thinking they were left by some terrifying beast.  The less comprehensible they are, the more beautiful and pure their Gaelic is thought to be.  It is a funny, funny book.  O’Brien sets up jokes for pages just to slip in a sharp one-liner.

There is an overall gloom throughout, enhanced by Steadman’s illustrations.  The kind of gloom that comes from living in the muck, being constantly wet from the ceaseless rain, having no food in your stomach, and having no outlet for hope.  I have to say that I don’t know a whole lot about Irish history and I am certain I missed out on some of the jokes in here, but at just over 125 pages it is a quick, easy read and well worthwhile.

2:27pm  |   URL: http://printedandbound.tumblr.com/post/268142572/the-poor-mouth-by-flann-obrien-publisher
(No. OF NOTES: 1)
  
Sent this morning to NY State Senator Kenneth LaValle, letting him know I am very very disappointed in him...

thebronzemedal:

Kenneth P. LaValle

Dear Mr. LaValle, or whichever of your staffers is assigned today to read through emails from constituents. I hope this message finds you well.

I was heartbreakingly disappointed to learn that you had cast a “no” vote on the marriage equality bill before the New York State Senate on Wednesday, December 2nd 2009. I find such a vote to be at odds both with the views I and many other residents of your senate district hold, as well as with a basic understanding of human decency. You are, whether I like it or not, my proxy up there in the Albany wilderness, and as such I realize there will be times when your views differ with my mine on matters of policy, but I would hope that your votes would always keep in line with my fundamental ideals of love and compassion for others, and as such to make it a priority to protect and expand the rights of the New Yorkers you are charged with representing. I hope there was at least a slight hesitation somewhere inside you before you decided to voice that “no” which helped to snatch away a right so many of your constituents have been denied for far too long.

I would like you to remember that the motto of our state is Excelsior, meaning “ever upward”. New York is a progressive state, and as such is at its best when moving forward, when making every effort to open up new possibilities of happiness and creating the possibility of fuller and more rewarding lives for its many citizens, be they gay or straight. You and the other Senators who voted “no” on this bill made our fine state unworthy of that motto when you did so, as you held us back in the muck of historical ignorance and fear, and you prevented us from walking alongside our gay neighbors and relatives, friends and coworkers, towards the bright landscape of equality which stands open before us. And I assure you that one day, not far off from today, legal and accepted gay marriages will seem as everyday and normal and non-threatening as any other, and that future New Yorkers will look back at the actions and words of you and others and find them as strange and bizarre and incomprehensible as we today find those of the segregationist south. I hope that you will keep this in mind if you ever happen to once again be voting on legislation that could expand or contract the rights of many of your constituents.

Of course it goes without saying that you never had and never will have my vote. And in 2010 I will do my absolute best to persuade as many residents of our district as I can to pull the lever for your opponent.

Uncomprehendingly,
Ryan

Note: Senator LaValle’s contact information can be found here, in case you wanted to send him your thoughts on his shameful vote yesterday.

Great letter Ryan.  I wouldn’t want to be on the receiving end of this.

8:45am  |   URL: http://printedandbound.tumblr.com/post/267828113/sent-this-morning-to-ny-state-senator-kenneth-lavalle
(No. OF NOTES: 27)
  
December 2, 2009
My Books by Jorge Luis Borges My Books (which do not know that I exist) Are as much a part of me as this visage With its grey hair at the temples and grey eyes That I look for vainly in glass surfaces And wonderingly run my curved hand over. And not without some logical bitterness It occurs to me that the essential words That most express me are not in my own writings But in those books that don’t know who I am. Better that way.  The voices of the dead Will utter me forever. [Corbis]

My Books by Jorge Luis Borges

My Books (which do not know that I exist)

Are as much a part of me as this visage

With its grey hair at the temples and grey eyes

That I look for vainly in glass surfaces

And wonderingly run my curved hand over.

And not without some logical bitterness

It occurs to me that the essential words

That most express me are not in my own writings

But in those books that don’t know who I am.

Better that way.  The voices of the dead

Will utter me forever.

[Corbis]

1:03pm  |   URL: http://printedandbound.tumblr.com/post/266655833/my-books-by-jorge-luis-borges-my-books-which-do
(No. OF NOTES: 17)
  
Who We Are

bibliotheque:

lightafire:

It came to our attention that most of you have no idea who we are. You should just know this stuff! We’re making it easier for you to get to know us and we’ve come up with some short bios that will start us off.

Anaïs \ Non-Fiction Editor

Anaïs’s parents named her after Anaïs Nin and yet were shocked when she told them she wanted to be a writer. She is currently working on her B.A. in Writing & Rhetoric/Comparative Literature at Florida Atlantic University and freaking about grad school constantly. She listens to a lot of Talking Heads and Ella Fitzgerald, starts perpetual knitting projects, sees movies alone in the afternoon, walks her dog infrequently, writes constantly, and reads even more.

You can find Anaïs on tumblr under the name bibliotheque.

Caitlin \ Poetry Editor

Caitlin is currently working towards an M.F.A. in Poetry after completing a B.A. in Cultural Studies and Comparative Literature. She knits, drinks too much tea, rides horses, loves fiercely, and writes feverishly.

You can find her on tumblr under the name thefranticsearch.

Josh \ Fiction Editor

Josh was born and raised in a rural town in New York State. At the ripe age of 18, he left for a four month European adventure where he discovered his love for writing and traveling. Upon his return to the States, he ventured out West where he attended the University of California at San Diego where he majored in Literature. While there, he led numerous workshops focusing on the art of writing fiction. He has many interests including music, movies, books, libraries, poetry, my dog, hiking, surfing, shenanigans, flannel, writing, sounding pretentious, particle and nuclear physics, cooking, but mostly just shenanigans.

You can find Josh on tumblr under the name joshisinfinite.

Lisa \ Review Editor

Lisa is a graduate of CSU, Chico with a Bachelors Degree in English, and a Certificate in Editing and Publishing, along with being the 2009 winner of the Walker Prize for excellence within the publishing program. She has previously worked for Flume Press, Watershed Literary Magazine, and has freelanced for such publishers as Naturegraph. She writes a little and knits a lot, and can be found online through her blog, Unsympathetic.

8:45am  |   URL: http://printedandbound.tumblr.com/post/266432315/who-we-are
(No. OF NOTES: 20)
  
November 30, 2009
Cormac McCarthy is selling his typewriter.  Got an extra $15-$20K lying around Casey?  Patricia Cohen of the New York Times writes: “Cormac McCarthy has written more than a dozen novels, several screenplays, two plays, two short stories, countless drafts, letters and more — and nearly every one of them was tapped out on a portable Olivetti manual typewriter he bought in a Knoxville, Tenn., pawnshop around 1963 for $50.  Lately this dependable machine has been showing irrevocable signs of age.” Read on here

Cormac McCarthy is selling his typewriter.  Got an extra $15-$20K lying around Casey? 

Patricia Cohen of the New York Times writes:

“Cormac McCarthy has written more than a dozen novels, several screenplays, two plays, two short stories, countless drafts, letters and more — and nearly every one of them was tapped out on a portable Olivetti manual typewriter he bought in a Knoxville, Tenn., pawnshop around 1963 for $50.  Lately this dependable machine has been showing irrevocable signs of age.”

Read on here

11:07pm  |   URL: http://printedandbound.tumblr.com/post/264612946/cormac-mccarthy-is-selling-his-typewriter-got-an
(No. OF NOTES: 7)
  
Happy Birthday Mr. Churchill. [Life]

Happy Birthday Mr. Churchill.

[Life]

8:39am  |   URL: http://printedandbound.tumblr.com/post/263624095/happy-birthday-mr-churchill-life
(No. OF NOTES: 18)
  
November 27, 2009
John Ryan, Anthony Cronin, Flann O’Brien (Brian O’Nolan), Patrick Kavanagh and Tom Joyce on Sandymount Beach, Dublin. “The day was 16 June, 1954, and though it was only mid-morning, Brian O’Nolan was already drunk.  This day was the fiftieth anniversary of Mr. Leopold Bloom’s wanderings through Dublin, which James Joyce had immortalized in Ulysses . To mark this occasion a small group of Dublin literati had gathered at the Sandycove home of Michael Scott, a well-known architect, just below the Martello tower in which the opening scene of Joyce’s novel is set. They planned to travel round the city through the day, visiting in turn the scenes of the novel, ending at night in what had once been the brothel quarter of the city, the area which Joyce had called Nighttown.  Sadly, no-one expected O’Nolan to be sober.” Read on here… [photo-Irish Times]

John Ryan, Anthony Cronin, Flann O’Brien (Brian O’Nolan), Patrick Kavanagh and Tom Joyce on Sandymount Beach, Dublin.

“The day was 16 June, 1954, and though it was only mid-morning, Brian O’Nolan was already drunk.  This day was the fiftieth anniversary of Mr. Leopold Bloom’s wanderings through Dublin, which James Joyce had immortalized in Ulysses .

To mark this occasion a small group of Dublin literati had gathered at the Sandycove home of Michael Scott, a well-known architect, just below the Martello tower in which the opening scene of Joyce’s novel is set. They planned to travel round the city through the day, visiting in turn the scenes of the novel, ending at night in what had once been the brothel quarter of the city, the area which Joyce had called Nighttown.  Sadly, no-one expected O’Nolan to be sober.”

Read on here…

[photo-Irish Times]

11:04am  |   URL: http://printedandbound.tumblr.com/post/259738413/john-ryan-anthony-cronin-flann-obrien-brian
(No. OF NOTES: 12)
  
The Poor Mouth by Flann O’Brien Currently reading.

The Poor Mouth by Flann O’Brien

Currently reading.

9:13am  |   URL: http://printedandbound.tumblr.com/post/259639800/the-poor-mouth-by-flann-obrien-currently
(No. OF NOTES: 2)
  
November 26, 2009
Rabbit, Run by John Updike Publisher: Alfred A. Knopf - New York Date: November 12, 1960 You know, Casey and I are really echoing each other again here, but I had the same experience to start with this book.  I thought Rabbit was a low-life.  I wondered why he was doing the things he did.  Updike kept me with him through his beautiful language alone for the first 50 pages.  I may not have known where it was going, but it didn’t necessarily matter.  Soon enough the story started to worm into my head and I was hooked. Updike gives us Rabbit Angstrom, a man already past his prime at 26.  He is juvenile and foolish, yet I still found him sympathetic in a way.  He kept talking about being cornered, having limited options in his life, he felt stuck .  David Foster Wallace made a commencement address a few years ago discussing how to avoid just that kind of life and how to think your way out of the mire.  He says: “The really important kind of freedom involves attention and awareness and discipline, and being able truly to care about other people and to sacrifice for them over and over in myriad petty, unsexy ways every day.  That is real freedom…The alternative is unconsciousness, the default setting, the rat race, the constant gnawing sense of having had, and lost, some infinite thing.” Angstrom is on the “default setting” and he’s had enough.  As good as he is at basketball, he is equally poor in dealing with, and explaining his own emotions to others.  I can understand the frustrations that come along with being a new father and feeling stuck in a job that is rarely satisfying.  Updike has made Rabbit an extreme case of that everyday mild discontentment we all have.  He makes him act out on it and we meet him as he’s had enough, when he runs. This is a great book.  I’m glad Casey picked it, even though he is right when he said Updike put him through the ringer.  I’m feeling that way too right now.  We were worried about choosing this book and having the Rabbit Omnibus take over our lives for the next year.  I don’t think that will happen.  I’ll be taking a break from Rabbit Angstrom for a bit, but since his whole life is out there ready and waiting to be read, I’m sure we’ll get back to him soon enough. - Jon

Rabbit, Run by John Updike

Publisher: Alfred A. Knopf - New York

Date: November 12, 1960

You know, Casey and I are really echoing each other again here, but I had the same experience to start with this book.  I thought Rabbit was a low-life.  I wondered why he was doing the things he did.  Updike kept me with him through his beautiful language alone for the first 50 pages.  I may not have known where it was going, but it didn’t necessarily matter.  Soon enough the story started to worm into my head and I was hooked.

Updike gives us Rabbit Angstrom, a man already past his prime at 26.  He is juvenile and foolish, yet I still found him sympathetic in a way.  He kept talking about being cornered, having limited options in his life, he felt stuck .  David Foster Wallace made a commencement address a few years ago discussing how to avoid just that kind of life and how to think your way out of the mire.  He says:

“The really important kind of freedom involves attention and awareness and discipline, and being able truly to care about other people and to sacrifice for them over and over in myriad petty, unsexy ways every day.  That is real freedom…The alternative is unconsciousness, the default setting, the rat race, the constant gnawing sense of having had, and lost, some infinite thing.”

Angstrom is on the “default setting” and he’s had enough.  As good as he is at basketball, he is equally poor in dealing with, and explaining his own emotions to others.  I can understand the frustrations that come along with being a new father and feeling stuck in a job that is rarely satisfying.  Updike has made Rabbit an extreme case of that everyday mild discontentment we all have.  He makes him act out on it and we meet him as he’s had enough, when he runs.

This is a great book.  I’m glad Casey picked it, even though he is right when he said Updike put him through the ringer.  I’m feeling that way too right now.  We were worried about choosing this book and having the Rabbit Omnibus take over our lives for the next year.  I don’t think that will happen.  I’ll be taking a break from Rabbit Angstrom for a bit, but since his whole life is out there ready and waiting to be read, I’m sure we’ll get back to him soon enough.

- Jon

8:21am  |   URL: http://printedandbound.tumblr.com/post/258374659/rabbit-run-by-john-updike-publisher-alfred-a
November 25, 2009
Mishima related apparel.  How to Seppuku t-shirt from the now defunct Dirty Microbe.

Mishima related apparel.  How to Seppuku t-shirt from the now defunct Dirty Microbe.

11:26am  |   URL: http://printedandbound.tumblr.com/post/257224430/mishima-related-apparel-how-to-seppuku-t-shirt
(No. OF NOTES: 6)
  
Yukio Mishima committed seppuku this day in 1970. I had my first experience with Mishima recently when I read The Sound of Waves.  It was a calm and gentle book about young love on a quiet Japanese fishing island.  It is hard for me to mesh the two images of Mishima in my head - the author of that wonderful, subdued book, and the militant, bodybuilding nationalist shown above. Original NYT article about the suicide here.

Yukio Mishima committed seppuku this day in 1970.

I had my first experience with Mishima recently when I read The Sound of Waves.  It was a calm and gentle book about young love on a quiet Japanese fishing island.  It is hard for me to mesh the two images of Mishima in my head - the author of that wonderful, subdued book, and the militant, bodybuilding nationalist shown above.

Original NYT article about the suicide here.

9:02am  |   URL: http://printedandbound.tumblr.com/post/257086391/yukio-mishima-committed-seppuku-this-day-in-1970
(No. OF NOTES: 13)
  
November 24, 2009
The Pearl by John Steinbeck was published by The Viking Press today in 1947. [via]

The Pearl by John Steinbeck was published by The Viking Press today in 1947.

[via]

8:38am  |   URL: http://printedandbound.tumblr.com/post/255776842/the-pearl-by-john-steinbeck-was-published-by-the
(No. OF NOTES: 6)
  
November 23, 2009
Boxer from Ralph Steadman’s Animal Farm

Boxer from Ralph Steadman’s Animal Farm

1:51pm  |   URL: http://printedandbound.tumblr.com/post/254747973/boxer-from-ralph-steadmans-animal-farm
(No. OF NOTES: 8)
  
How Books Got Their Titles is a blog by Gary Dexter about, well, how books get their titles.  Full of interesting, well written little reviews and great internet candy for literature geeks. Index here

How Books Got Their Titles is a blog by Gary Dexter about, well, how books get their titles.  Full of interesting, well written little reviews and great internet candy for literature geeks.

Index here

10:02am  |   URL: http://printedandbound.tumblr.com/post/254542085/how-books-got-their-titles-is-a-blog-by-gary
(No. OF NOTES: 29)
  
November 22, 2009
thebloomsburytwo: Book Review Rabbit, Run by John Updike When I read a novel I’m looking for a sense of attachment, be it good or bad I want to feel something. I’ve always been a stronger believer if you’re not moved by a book then what’s the point. You can tell the minute you start reading Rabbit, Run you’re going to feel something by the end of it. In the beginning I couldn’t help but feel frustrated. I remember texting Jon early on saying something along the lines of “What the hell is this book all about, Rabbit just drove to West Virginia and back. What the hell for?” Updike can’t help but test the reader. Urging them to develop their own ideas about its main character. Harry “Rabbit” Angstrom is someone you want to hate. He has a young son and a wife who is expecting. He walks out on them. Rabbit was a high school basketball star in his youth he now sells the MagiPeel Peeler in department stores. After leaving his wife and child he looks for his old coach, who he finds. Through the coach he is introduced to Ruth (my favorite character) a prostitute of sorts. He spends weeks with her before returning back to the life he left to be with his wife while she gives birth to their daughter. Going any further would ruin the book for others. During the entire reading of Rabbit, Run you feel uncomfortable, pulled down, drained. Although the story is about a husband feeling trapped in a life he didn’t expect for himself. Updike pins you down with with this sense of gloom a darkness that won’t go away. I put this book down last night and exhaled. I had begged for it to be over and I now understand why. Updike you put me through the ringer. Where this piece of work came from in you is scary, but I understand it. You’re missed. Rest in Peace. -Casey

thebloomsburytwo:

Book Review

Rabbit, Run by John Updike

When I read a novel I’m looking for a sense of attachment, be it good or bad I want to feel something. I’ve always been a stronger believer if you’re not moved by a book then what’s the point.

You can tell the minute you start reading Rabbit, Run you’re going to feel something by the end of it. In the beginning I couldn’t help but feel frustrated. I remember texting Jon early on saying something along the lines of “What the hell is this book all about, Rabbit just drove to West Virginia and back. What the hell for?” Updike can’t help but test the reader. Urging them to develop their own ideas about its main character.

Harry “Rabbit” Angstrom is someone you want to hate. He has a young son and a wife who is expecting. He walks out on them. Rabbit was a high school basketball star in his youth he now sells the MagiPeel Peeler in department stores. After leaving his wife and child he looks for his old coach, who he finds. Through the coach he is introduced to Ruth (my favorite character) a prostitute of sorts. He spends weeks with her before returning back to the life he left to be with his wife while she gives birth to their daughter. Going any further would ruin the book for others.

During the entire reading of Rabbit, Run you feel uncomfortable, pulled down, drained. Although the story is about a husband feeling trapped in a life he didn’t expect for himself. Updike pins you down with with this sense of gloom a darkness that won’t go away.

I put this book down last night and exhaled. I had begged for it to be over and I now understand why. Updike you put me through the ringer. Where this piece of work came from in you is scary, but I understand it. You’re missed. Rest in Peace.

-Casey

1:48pm  |   URL: http://printedandbound.tumblr.com/post/253468544/thebloomsburytwo-book-review-rabbit-run-by
(No. OF NOTES: 4)