Archive for March, 2007

A poem by Wislawa Szymborska

27th March 2007 with 8 Comments

Possibilities
I prefer movies.
I prefer cats.
I prefer the oaks along the Warta.
I prefer Dickens to Dostoyevsky.
I prefer myself liking people
to myself loving mankind.
I prefer keeping a needle and thread on hand, just in case.
I prefer the color green.
I prefer not to maintain
that reason is to blame for everything.
I prefer exceptions.
I prefer to leave early.
I prefer talking [...]

Filed under literature, quotations, writing
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The Flowering Dream

26th March 2007 with 3 Comments

A writer’s main asset is intuition; too many facts impede intuition. A writer needs to know so many things, but there are so many things he doesn’t need to know — he needs to know human things [...]

Filed under literature, quotations, writing
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Dad is Baghdad

25th March 2007 with 0 Comments

Dad’s in a bad mood, Dad’s got the blues
It’s someone else’s mess that I didn’t choose
At least we’re winning on the Fox Evening News
Nobody loves me here
Dad’s Gonna Kill Me
Dad’s Gonna Kill Me
Richard Thompson makes extensive use of military slang in this new song about Baghdad. Go here for the full lyric of Dad’s Gonna [...]

Filed under politics, quotations
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Most Borrowed Authors

24th March 2007 with 0 Comments

The most borrowed authors of Adult Fiction, from British Libraries July 2005 - June 2006
01 James Patterson
02 Josephine Cox
03 Danielle Steel
04 Ian Rankin
05 John Grisham
06 Nora Roberts
07 Agatha Christie
08 Bernard Cornwell
09 [...]

Filed under literature, reading
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About Writing:

Let's say you're writing the story from Della's point of view. You can say, "Della looked up into Rodney's adoring face," but you can't say, "Della raised her incredibly beautiful violet eyes to Rodney's adoring face." Why not? Because although Della may be aware she's incredibly beautiful and has violet eyes, that's not what Della sees when she looks up. That's what Rodney sees. And Della is the person whose mind you're in. Only Della's perceptions are perceptible. Rodney's aren't. And if Della really is thinking about the color of her own eyes, instead of how adorably adoring Rodney looks, you have to explain why: "She raised her eyes, knowing the effect their violet beauty would have on him." If this still seems mysterious, consider that the limited third person is very like the first person in some ways; and you know that when you write as "I" you can tell only what "I" see and know. — "I raised my incredibly beautiful violet eyes to Rodney's adoring face." I'm sure you see that you wouldn't write that. Ursula K. Le Guin

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