David Bentley Hart has a translation of the Tao Te Ching coming out in May. I may have to add that to my collection of translations. Interview with Hart about the book here.
One evening, several days ago, a squirrel was eating at the feeder outside the window, the golden light on its fur. I decided against photographing it because I knew squirrels don’t stay anywhere long. Now I sit here remembering it. The image isn’t as clear as a photograph but the feeling remains.
What is a writer?
After coming across that “writers against AI” image, I decided to put it into my micro.blog newsletter’s footer. Then, inevitably, I wondered “is that presumptuous to consider myself a writer?” I quickly concluded, “Who cares? You’re being tiresome.” That’s the proper response and I am satisfied with it. Later, though, I came across this line from Caspar David Friedrich quoted in The Romantic Revolution: bring to the light of day what you have seen in the darkness, so that it can work on others, from the outside inwards
Kingsnorth: Writers against AI
"Don't take yourself so seriously!"
I always hated it when people told me not to take myself so seriously. Hated it. I’ve always been a painfully sincere person who wants to do the right thing. I heard that advice as suggesting that I was ridiculous for taking life seriously. And, to be fair, some people did mean that. But now, as fifty approaches, maybe I begin to understand. Over the past ten years I can see more clearly the ways I pose and cope—and how others do the same.
Tara Couture on the other side of pleasure
In Radiance of the Ordinary, Tara Couture opens the chapter “The Dance” with a truly cozy (there’s that word again) description of an early winter morning on their farm. Waking up, starting a fire, reading on the couch, standing barefoot in the grass to greet the sun. She continues: It’s all lovely, yes? It’s as lovely as we’ve crafted it to be. And as much as I’d like to leave us there, cozied up by the hearth, I cannot.
I love this Robert S. Duncanson painting “Landscape with Cows Watering in a Stream.” It caught my eye as the cover image for Radiance of the Ordinary.
Since reading a great quote shared by @ReaderJohn earlier today, ordinariness has been on my mind and I thought I’d share a couple of books. Coincidentally, I received this in the mail today: Radiance of the Ordinary: Essays on Life, Death, and the Sinews that Bind. Another book I came across a few years ago but still haven’t read: The Tao of Ordinariness: Humility and Simplicity in a Narcissitic Age.
One of our senators is talking about a new national crisis: Americans being killed by illegal immigrant drivers. Dang straight! I’m surrounded by red-blooded American drivers who can do that job just fine, thank you very much.
Hooray! It’s woodland crocus time! Always the first thing to pop up in our yard.
