On May 14, 2014 Paul Cartledge and James Romm talked about Herodotus and the two new translations of his Histories. It’s well worth the hour to listen to the salon sponsored by Reading Odyssey, which can be found here. I asked about other recent books on Herodotus they have enjoyed and they provided some books […]
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Picture from Amazon.comPaideia: the Ideals of Greek Culture (Volume 1) by Werner Jaeger (2nd edition), translation by Gilbert Highet (New York: Oxford University Press) I had planned on posting on Werner Jaeger’s monumental work Paideia: the Ideals of Greek Culture last year and didn’t get very far before other things came up. I intend to […]
I had more quotes from the recently released Rambling on: An Apprentice’s Guide to the Gift of Gab by Bohumil Hrabal that I didn’t mention, but I didn’t want the post to run too long. I stumbled across a copy of Hrabal’s 1966 story collection The Death of Mr. Baltisberger (sometimes titled The World Cafeteria) […]
Rambling on: An Apprentice’s Guide to the Gift of the Gab by Bohumil Hrabal English translation by David Short Afterword by Václav Kadlec Illustrations by Jiří Grus Charles University in Prague, Karolinum Press ISBN: 978-80-246-2316-0 Dear colleagues and friends, On the occasion of 100th anniversary of Bohumil Hrabal’s birth, we would like to present two […]
Dying Every Day: Seneca at the Court of Nero by James Romm Alfred A. Knopf (March 2014) ISBN: 978-0-307-59687-1 Seneca was born in 4 B.C. on the Iberian peninsula to the son of a accomplished rhetorician (Seneca the Elder). The young Seneca moved to Rome to study rhetoric and was introduced to Stoic philosophy. Entering […]
The Expedition to the Baobab Tree By Wilma Stockenström Translated from the Afrikaans by J. M. Coetzee Archipelago Books (April 2014) ISBN: 978-1-935744-92-4 The insult of not being allowed to be human that I have overcome. All ugly visions too, of hairy huts and skew door openings that try to entice me in and lock […]
I realize things have been rather quiet here the past couple of months, but I’ve got a nice backlog of posts ready to write. Time will be freeing up soon to do so. One reason things have been quiet is that I was helping my wife with her book proposal, which I’m happy to announce, […]
Regular posting will resume soon, but I wanted to provide a link to this wonderful resource, covering plenty of children’s books, that any parent can use (whether you’re homeschooling or not): LitWits Workshops Pinterest boards. I’ve posted before on how much my oldest boy likes their workshops, and we are taking advantage of the many […]
California Bookstore Day, May 3, 2014 Hopefully there’s a store near you… California Bookstore Day is a statewide party on May 3, 2014 as big and varied as the state itself. It’s more than 90 stores in more than 80 zip codes putting their bells on and throwing out the welcome mat. Think Record Store […]
I have not had a chance to listen to this yet but wanted to pass on this information because of the time limit… On Sunday BBC Radio 3 aired a production of Antony and Cleopatra and has it available this week for listening. Kenneth Branagh and Alex Kingston are in the title roles, directed by […]
I rarely have many new books in my ‘to be read’ stack so I had to commemorate this occasion. You’ll be seeing these titles over the next several weeks, here and elsewhere. The Expedition to the Baobab Tree by Wilma Stockenström, translated by J. M. Coetzee (Archipelago Books) Harlequin’s Millions by Bohumil Hrabal, translated by […]
In a unique series of six films, Shakespeare Uncovered combines history, biography, iconic performances, new analysis, and the personal passions of its celebrated hosts — Ethan Hawke, Jeremy Irons, Derek Jacobi, Trevor Nunn, Joely Richardson, and David Tennant — to tell the stories behind the stories of Shakespeare’s greatest plays. Produced by Blakeway Productions, 116 […]
I stumbled across this film on Netflix’s instant viewing and decided to watch it since I was familiar with Robert Louis Stevenson’s book, although it’s been quite a while since I’ve read it. I not sure why I wasn’t expecting much, especially since I thought it would be a solid cast, but I think I […]
Pardon the interruption…my wife’s book proposal was close to the deadline so that has been about our only focus for the past week. I have had to continually deal with my arch-nemisis ‘that/which’ too many times for me to care right now. Anyway, back to reading books. My oldest son went to a LitWits Workshop […]
The cover of the first edition of Prae (1934) Continuing on with articles from the current Hyperion issue (mentioned here, there is a lengthy excerpt of the third chapter of Contra Mundum Press’ upcoming release of Miklós Szentkuthy’s Prae, translated by Tim Willkinson. In a post last fall I highlighted another Hyperion article by Filip […]
Cover of Hyperion Volume VIII, No. 1 (spring 2014)Contra Mundum Press’ online magazine, Hyperion, has a new issue available! I’ll post on a few of the articles over the next week. The first article I want to mention is three short pieces by Robert Musil, all translated by Genese Grill. The first piece is “The […]
Yeah!!! Thanks to Mookse for the heads up on the upcoming Margaret Jull Costa translation of Galdós’ Tristana (see his picture for more details). I have several posts on the novel and one on the movie…see the summary post for a starting point. It’s a troubling novel, full of the usual ambiguity and irony of […]
André Prah and some of his artwork from “The Ice Horses of Ladoga” A couple of things related to Curzio Malaparte’s chapter in Kaputt related to the ice horses of Ladoga… André Prah “started to make his own visual representation of the tragedy. In wood from the shores of the Baltic Sea.” The quote is […]
Continuing with discussion of Angel Guerra by Benito Pérez Galdós, done mostly through footnotes so far. I’ll continue the trend in this post, but first a note about the story… In the previous post on the book I ended with the death of Angel’s daughter, Ción. By the end of Part One of the novel […]
I’m happy to pass along the following information from Reading Odyssey, Inc: Herodotus Salon – With Professors Paul Cartledge and James Romm Wednesday, May 14 7pm (New York time) via toll-free conference call. Reading Odyssey is proud to host a conversation with two top classicists discussing two new translations of the wonderful Herodotus. We will […]