“What is it like to be a Spokane Indian without wild salmon? It is like being a Christian if Jesus had never rolled back the stone and risen from his tomb.” I wasn’t a huge fan of The Absolutely True Diary of a Part Time Indian but I heard such wonderful things about Sherman Alexie’s memoir for his mother that I had to give it a read. It took me a long time to read this one, partly because I kept getting distracted by other things but […]
We are shaped and fashioned by what we love
Over the last five years, I’ve made a renewed effort at writing, something I loved as a kid but let slip in favor of more practical pursuits. [Translation: I gave up what I really wanted in favor of what others wanted for me.] Having no idea what I’m doing, I’ve read a lot of books on writing and creativity, trying to avoid specifics on writing and storytelling mechanics in favor of tips and tricks on the creative process. This book caught my eye on Amazon, […]
Epic translation of The Odyssey
It has been many a year since I’ve read any of the Greek classics. I remember reading some plays back in high school (early 1980s), but I’m not sure I ever read the entirety of Homer’s Odyssey, and if I did, I most likely didn’t find much enjoyment in it. A classic of western literature and a staple of both literature and western civilization courses, The Odyssey tells the epic tale of a heroic Greek warrior’s 20-year quest to get home after the Trojan War. […]
“I am the least difficult of men. All I want is boundless love.”
My first exposure to Frank O’Hara’s poetry was on season two of Mad Men. Don Draper mails a book of poems to someone, and over the scene Jon Hamm’s smoky gravel recites a few lines from “Mayakovsky”: Now I am quietly waiting for the catastrophe of my personality to seem beautiful again, and interesting, and modern. What gorgeous brooding was this? I looked up the book, drove to Barnes & Noble, and bought Meditations immediately. I skimmed it once and let it sit on my shelves for […]
Black girl poetic magic
Electric Arches is collection of poetry by Eve L. Ewing. Her poems muse on the black experience. She reveals painful moments of racism she encounters and add in handwritten font her imagined replies to the N-word. She writes odes to her musical heroes in “Appletree [on black womanhood, from and to Erykah Badu] and “On Prince”. Each poem describes how their music touched her soul. She uplifts the ordinary with her words adding a fantastical gloss of wonder. “so in this world, grease is a compliment, no […]
Mama’s real upset now.
In the first country I lived in we had these small packets of liquorice called GaJol. They were my favourite, because I like liquorice, but also because on the back of each packet was a small joke, a word play or a fancy quote. Sometimes I would tear one off and keep them, but most of the time I just read them and threw them away, and the ones I kept would disappear as well – into the cracks of furniture and pockets and books. […]
- « Previous Page
- 1
- …
- 158
- 159
- 160
- 161
- 162
- …
- 168
- Next Page »