Tom Waits: “The world Is a hellish place, and bad writing is destroying the quality of our suffering.”

Still the best argument I’ve heard for arts education.

One of my all-time favourite books.

Makes no sense to redo those then! Should focus on bringing out as many of the romans durs as possible — many of which are either out of print or have never been translated.

Also surprised to learn that the recent Penguin Maigret reissues (I have all of them) are not widely available in the U.S.!

Curious to know *which* of the romans durs will be in this series… there are a lot of them, after all.

Opens wallet: just take it all

Mea culpa! Thanks for spotting that. Cornish trilogy is on my tbr pile, I must’ve had it on the brain.

I've just realized there are some other translated Matsumoto books out there that I haven't yet read — and a new translation of Tokyo Express forthcoming this fall. Things to look out for in next year's list!

Keith Bresnahan’s Year in Reading, 2024 Pleased to once again present reading reviews from some of my favourite readers. Today’s installment, his third, is by my longtime friend Keith Bresnahan. He is a self-described harrumphing scriven…

On some things I read in 2024:
eigermonchjungfrau.blog/2025/02/19/k...

Thank you!

Looks great. Congrats, Richard!

Have had this on my shelf for a while, keep meaning to start it! Someday….

RIP David Lodge (1935-2025). I read his campus novels in my teens and surprisingly later pursued a career in academia, which turned out to be just as ridiculous a place as he made it seem.

Wrote this with you in mind, obvs

Anyone who brings a drum to parents of a newborn is clearly deranged

This is *always* the way.

Sent via email!

sitting man shaping stone with riffler; the carving depicts a woman falling from the sky, carried by winged animals to the back of a turtle in the water below

Great pic of Haudenosaunee sculptor Joseph Jacobs carving the left-most panel of ‘Creation’, 1986; the piece depicts the origin of the world and the genesis of the Haudenosaunee Confederacy

2nd photo, the full piece in place on the west wall of the House of Commons entry

Reading this description like I'm a CanLit author, ca. 1976:
"Hear me out, what if the coworker is a bear"

I put it on my list, so we’ll see…

Stone carving: an angel touches a sleeping wise man’s hand and he wakes up.

Perhaps a bit early in the season yet, but I’m feeling festive, so here’s my all-time fave piece of medieval sculpture: Gislebertus’s “dream of the Magi” at Saint-Lazare cathedral in Autun, ça. 1130. Look at these guys, all snuggled together. And the face of the one who just woke up, aww.

😍 One of my alma maters!

Shout out to @artcrimeprof.bsky.social‘s Smashing Statues, which has a lot to say about Stone Mountain and Mount Rushmore (and others besides these).

Good reminder here: spatial violence/vandalism/destruction of cultural heritage is not only about erasure; imposing new forms on the landscape absolutely counts.

Thank heavens for spontaneous combustion

(opens wallet) just take it all

Moomin! 🥰

Newspaper text that implies through a lack of an Oxford comma that the “first lady” of France, Brigitte Macron, is also the archbishop of Paris and the head of the cathedral’s reconstruction task force

Also, I had no idea Brigitte Macron wore so many different hats 😉
#oxfordcomma

Photograph looking down the nave at restored Notre-Dame cathedral in Paris, Nov. 29/2024

Emmanuel Macron and others tour the restored Notre-Dame cathedral in Paris, Nov. 29/2024

Emmanuel Macron touches a restored roof beam in Notre-Dame cathedral in Paris, Nov. 29/2024

As someone currently writing a book about the remaking of Parisian space after the fires of 1871, I’m following all the Notre-Dame unveiling news today with interest. So many parallels, not least of which is the way these projects get mobilized for political capital.

This was my first thought as well.