acommonreader.st
Mikhail Shishkin signing a copy of Maidenhair (sorry for the poor lighting)I wanted to post an initial impression on tonight’s event “Mikhail Shishkin’s Amazing Maidenhair” before I went to bed. I plan to post more about the event…maybe an extended post with a transcription. I thoroughly enjoyed the event and it turned out to be […]
Demosthenes of Athens and the Fall of Classical Greece by Ian Worthington Oxford University Press, 2013 ISBN: 9780199931958 Demosthenes (384-322 BC) profoundly shaped one of the most eventful epochs in antiquity. His political career spanned three decades, during which time Greece fell victim to Macedonian control, first under Philip II and then Alexander the Great. […]
Another post from the Institute of Contemporary Arts recordings (link is dead). This one is from April 18, 1986 with Primo Levi, timed to coincide with the release of the English translation of If Not Now, When? in Great Britain. I didn’t take too many notes since his answers didn’t really lend themselves to a […]
Three Percent has published Mikhail Shishkin’s April tour in the U.S. As I mentioned in a previous post, I’m attending the April 4 event at the Hotel Rex in San Francisco, which will include translator Marian Schwartz, too. If anyone would like to meet up before the event just drop me a line. From the […]
Another post from the Institute of Contemporary Arts recordings. This one is from May 17, 1990, with Julian Barnes introducing and conversing (through a translator) with Bohumil Hrabal (unfortunately the link to the conversation no longer works). The “conversation” is a little disjointed at times because of the need for translation, changes in plans on […]
I have enjoyed listening to some of the Institute of Contemporary Arts talks and wanted to share some notes on some of these recordings over the next few weeks. In this case it is William Gaddis talking with Malcolm Bradbury on February 20, 1986, soon after the release of Carpenter’s Gothic (unfortunately all the links […]
Diary of a Humiliated Man by Félix de Azúa Translated from the Spanish by Julie Jones Cambridge: Brookline Books, 1996 (Spanish publication – 1987) ISBN: 157129029X / 978-1571290298 At present I’m living here like a stranger, in spite of the fact that I’ve been an inhabitant of this city ever since I’ve had use of […]
Opening of De rerum natura, 1483 copy by Girolamo di Matteo de Tauris for Pope Sixtus IV Picture source Thanks to David Meadows at rogueclassicism for pointing to the series of articles at The Guardian on Lucretius and his De rerum natura. I enjoyed many parts of Stephen Greenblatt’s The Swerve: How the World Became […]
After both boys got the stomach crud it’s my turn and the last thing I feel like doing is reading or posting. I will add a few notes, though. I won’t get to posting about the Introduction of Paideia: the Ideals of Greek Culture (Volume 1) by Werner Jaeger for a few days. In the […]
The Flower Show / The Toth Family by István Örkény (New York City: New Directions, 1982) Matraszentanna is a small mountain town, so small, in fact, that it has no indoor plumbing. Anyone wishing an inside flush toilet has to install his own private pump. Only Professor Cipriani, the proud owner of the town’s one […]