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Another historical drama, but this one is less like a soap opera than last week’s recommendation. A Royal Affair, directed by Nikolaj Arcel, is “set in the 18th century, at the court of the mentally ill King Christian VII of Denmark, and focuses on the romance between his wife, Caroline Matilda of Great Britain, and […]
Dr. Patrick Hunt, Stanford University, speaks. Hannibal, a Carthaginian commander who lived ca. 200 BCE, is considered one of the greatest military commanders in history. His use of the environment in his warfare against Rome in the Second Punic War—often called the Hannibalic War—set precedents in military history, utilizing nature and weather conditions as weapons […]
Edmund Kean by James Northcote (1819) Picture source at the National Portrait GalleryEdmund Kean (1787 – 1833), an English actor noted for his leading roles in Shakespeare, was as famous for his personal life as for his professional one. His messy divorce, many affairs, adultery trial, and riotous excesses were fodder for gossip. His stage […]
A link to my post on the novel IMDb.com link From The New York Times: a review of the movie and an article on Kertész and the movie (both of which I’ll reference in the post) Since I posted so much about the book in the link above I’ll try and keep this post short. […]
“But who can judge what is possible or believable in a concentration camp? Who could explore, exhaust all those countless ideas, inventions, games, jokes, and ponderable theories, which are easily accessible and transferable from a make-believe world of fantasy into a concentration-camp reality? You couldn’t, even if you mustered the totality of your knowledge.” (148) […]
This 2008 TV miniseries covers parts of the English Civil War, using the fictional Angelica Fanshawe and historical Edward Sexby as focal points (although there is some historical basis for her character). Peter Flannery wrote the screenplay. Parts of the series are cartoonish and skip over major events, but overall I enjoyed it. I wish […]
So I went the WorldCat route in trying to obtain a copy of the BBC performance of Jean-Paul Sartre’s “Kean” with Anthony Hopkins in the title role. There are only two libraries listed with copies and neither loan audio-visual material. So I’m out of luck with that approach. If anyone has a copy or knows […]
Here’s an excerpt from The Paris Review’s interview with Imre Kertész. One quote from it: To me, there were three phases, in a literary sense. The first phase is the one just before the Holocaust. Times were tough, but you could get through somehow. The second phase, described by writers like Primo Levi, takes place […]
Or an update to the state of the blog. So I think by announcing a November read-along it’s clear I plan on continuing the blog. I needed some time away (despite erratic posting) to think about what I wanted to do with the blog. There were many issues leading to the earlier post on continuing […]
I’ve been reading Truth’s Ragged Edge: The Rise of the American Novel by Philip F. Gura and while it’s been enjoyable (more posts on that later) it has highlighted a huge gap in my reading. For anyone interested in the topic I highly recommend it, and for a taste of it go to one of […]
The summer issue of The Paris Review will be out soon (according to this announcement). While there are several interesting articles/reviews/interviews mentioned, the one that caught my eye was an interview (supposedly the last one he’ll give) with Imre Kertész. I just started reading Fateless and needless to say I’m impressed. From the teaser in […]
Director André Klotzel successfully keeps the playful nature of Machado de Assis’ novel The Posthumous Memoirs of Brás Cubas in this 2001 movie (IMDb.com page). The movie plays off the abundant irony in the book, touching on many of the same subjects. While it avoids the literary references that provide depth to the novel, Klotzel […]
Character list for “Kozma: A Tragedy” by Mihály Kornis A Mirror to the Cage: Three Contemporary Hungarian Plays Edited and Translated by Clara Györgyey Introduction by Ervin C. Brody Fayetteville: The University of Arkansas Press, 1993 ISBN 1557282676 The final play in A Mirror to the Cage: Three Contemporary Hungarian Play, Mihály Kornis’ “Kozma: A […]
Thanks to Michael Stein at literalab for his notice that Twisted Spoon Press’ tumblr had published an excerpt from their forthcoming release The Legs of Izolda Morgan. (Note: excerpt has been changed to “Polish Futurism (an Accounting)”) The Hungarian Electronic Library may no longer be active but it still has several translated works available online, including […]
Character list for “The Imposter” by György Spiró A Mirror to the Cage: Three Contemporary Hungarian Plays Edited and Translated by Clara Györgyey Introduction by Ervin C. Brody Fayetteville: The University of Arkansas Press, 1993 ISBN 1557282676 This is one of my favorite plays I have read lately and one I would love to see […]
Character list for “Stevie in the Bloodbath: A Grotesque Play in Two Parts” by István Örkény A Mirror to the Cage: Three Contemporary Hungarian Plays Edited and Translated by Clara Györgyey Introduction by Ervin C. Brody Fayetteville: The University of Arkansas Press, 1993 ISBN 1557282676 Motto: This age, our parent—executioner provisioned us with a bitter […]
Poison-Damsels and Other Essays in Folklore and Anthropology by N. M. Penzer London: Chas. J. Sawyer, 1952 The present four Essays are based on Appendixes originally published in my edition of C. H. Tawney’s Kathā-Sarit-Sāgara, which I called The Ocean of Story. Somewhat hidden in such a large work—it ran to ten volumes—and in view […]
After Thermopylae: The Oath of Plataea and the End of the Graeco-Persian Wars by Paul Cartledge Emblems of Antiquity series Oxford University Press, 2013 ISBN: 9780199747320 Paul Cartledge’s name has been mentioned on this blog several times—he is the A. G. Leventis Professor of Greek Culture in the Faculty of Classics at the University of […]
Here’s a note from Scott Esposito: I’d like to invite you all the come to this party on May 22 to celebrate the launch of Two Lines Press, San Francisco’s only (so far as I know) translation-only literary press. We just published our first two books! Even if literature isn’t you thing, this’ll still be […]
I recently discovered the Chief of U.K. Defence Staff’s Recommended Reading [Note: link not currently working] site and have been browsing through it. One book stood out since it addresses one of my favorites: Thucydides on Strategy [ditto] by Athanassios G. Platias and Konstantinos Koliopoulos. This slim volume shows that the theory of grand strategy […]