Monthly Archives: September 2006

Atmosphere: RomanticChill factor: Definitely pelerine weather Is gothic the original chick-lit? This speculation occurred to me after finishing Anya Seton’s Dragonwyck. The whole RIP Challenge has awakened an interest in gothic literature: how the genre started, what constitutes gothic, the … Continue reading →

Last night. The most awful thing. Well, not most awful. But pretty darn awful. I could not read. I got into bed, snuggled in for my usual read, opened a book and–gibberish. Couldn’t focus on one sentence. Put that down … Continue reading →

Cross-posted at A Curious Singularity I’ve been enjoying everyone’s comments on this story, and plink-plink, here are my two cents: The Dead is simply a superb short story, one of the best in the English language. Joyce realizes near perfection … Continue reading →

In my last (thankfully) look at The Turn of the Screw, I wanted to review James’s device of word repetition. He repeats a number of words or phrases, and I wonder if the repetition adds layers to the meaning. One … Continue reading →

It’s Friday. The end of a truly noxious week here in an anonymous cubicle somewhere in the heart of San Francisco. I’m ready for a bit of nonsense… Don’t know why, except the synapses are starting to fray at the … Continue reading →

Before I begin, let me say, before I’m accused of crankiness, that I admire James’s prose; let’s face it, the guy knows his way around a sentence. The book I purchased with Turn of the Screw also includes other shorter … Continue reading →

Atmosphere: Ambiguous Chill Factor: A sprinkle of hair-raising with intermittent goosebumpsI was hampered in this reading by two things: Henry James’s prose and the fact that I’ve seen the Deborah Kerr movie. Therefore, I read this novella twice. Reading James … Continue reading →

Just when I thought I was busy, things amped up about 100%. I intend to catch up on my blog reading and posting soon. (I finished “The Turn of the Screw,” “The Dead,” and “In the Eye of the Sun.” … Continue reading →

If you’re bored with the books you have and looking for a new title, check out Salon’s Literary Guide to the World. I think I’ll do my own version soon…

I figured it out! The answer to the central question of my existence: Why write? All my life people have told me, “You have a really unusual way of looking at things.” A pretty cool trait, if you’re a writer … Continue reading →