11.29.08
Posted in Life Betwixt Book Covers at 8:57 pm by Miracle ♪♫
Tobias Wolff, winner of the PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction for The Barracks Thief, is indeed “part storyteller, part philosopher” and Old School is well on its way to becoming a classic. It made me see American literature and literature itself in a new light and left me in a state of profound reflection. Also a finalist of the PEN/Faulkner Award, this novel is a tribute to every writer’s life, truths, and ambitions, and it deserves its reputation as a “celebration of literature”. I believe it claims its importance on the shelf of any aspiring or professional writer.
“…and why would Caesar fear Ovid, except for knowing that neither his divinity nor all his legions could protect him from a good line of poetry.”
Tobias Wolff, Old School
Words are powerful. So is this book.
.
¤ ¤ ¤
.
The predominant topic of last night’s Bible study was the current condition of reduced hunger for God’s Word among Christians nowadays, and it was once again a silent exhortation on my part. I have been guilty of burrowing my nose into brilliant books lately, but brilliant only in the worldly sense, and when I come to think of it, these are all but excess baggage in God’s grander scheme of things, and because I have already read the Bible from Genesis to Revelation does not mean that I should stop there. I remember a particular blog entry that spoke to me on this same matter over a year ago, but it seems that I have to be constantly admonished. (Stubborn much? hehe =S)
Another friend encouraged me with his reading habits on accomplishing one page of Dostoevsky daily, and I thought of adapting his disciplined custom by reading one Chekov short story a day. Ingesting Chekhov is the best writing tip, they say. But, alas! On the last day, Chekhov will not be required of me! These are all vanity, and I cannot feign unawareness of the One True Book that holds real and incomparable Power.
.
Permalink
11.28.08
Posted in Uncategorized at 1:09 pm by Miracle ♪♫
…and why not why?
Do not journalists feed on this exact word? Oh, journalism! Would it have been better working for the media and granted the beauty of language to be trampled on by daily demands and the mass-manufacturing of commercial clichés? The words people want to read and crumple afterwards, or better yet, wrap tuyo with? Or even remove doggie poop with. Why not the truth that speaks inside – the truth that I myself would have the honor of crumpling afterwards, or better still, wipe glass windows with! Or should I have chosen that path over what seems like a heap of aborted pasts, premature presents, overdue futures, thoughts turned triteness, exhausted music, withered flowers, not even poems but mere fragments of a life, verses without forms, rules without rules, without rhymes, you, you, you, you, girlish prose, espresso analogies, ad nauseum?
Yes, I should have been heroic and moved others to discover themselves. I should have had a worthier cause other than the attempt to discover myself and allow words to become the sorry outlet of a somewhat multiple-personality malady because I am too shy to converse the way I write. I should have known the perils of syllables, consonants and vowels. I should have known they would defeat me like an overpowering doppelgänger.
I should have known the truths beneath were capable of transforming a life, that they would transform mine. But I found myself, my other self! Sweet defeat! I should have known… and would have embraced this destiny still. I write. Why not?
.
Permalink
11.26.08
Posted in Life Betwixt Book Covers at 2:38 am by Miracle ♪♫
“I believed in love. I believed in bookstore miracles. Anything could happen.”
Jeremy Mercer, from Time Was Soft There (A Paris Sojourn at Shakespeare & Co.)
.
A name that embraced the last one hundred years of great literary figures but probably holds the entire literary history in its shelves, this magical world of literature, this legend, once a haven for radical socialists, living quarters to significant bohemians, every serious bookworm’s dream destination, the place to pursue literary dreams, but only known to some of us as the bookstore where Ethan Hawke and Julie Delpy found each other again: Shakespeare & Co.
The bookstore at 37 rue de la Bucherie, Paris, France, is basically what Time Was Soft There is all about, its rich annals, its peculiar owner and furthermore peculiar inhabitants, and journalist Jeremy Mercer’s firsthand experiences with all of these and so much more. This is a book any writer or bookworm would relish.
The author’s note summarizes that “What follows is the story of how I found refuge at a peculiar old bookstore in Paris and the remarkable events that occurred there during my stay. In writing a memoir such as this, the truth becomes liquid. The true volume of all that brought me to France and all that happened at this bookstore would require a far greater capacity than these pages allow. Thus, the events have been distilled and condensed and then distilled again. Minor liberties have been taken with chronology… Otherwise, this is as true a story as can be told at this time.”
Needless to declare, I enjoyed reading this book very much. Not only did it present Parisian activity in all its glory where the author was awed by its consistent beauty, but it is also a truthful depiction of a writer’s dazzling yet dark existence, and a vivid portrait of a booklover’s extraordinary devotion to literature and life.
¤ ¤ ¤
“People all tell me they work too much, that they need to make more money…
What’s the point? Why not live on as little as possible and then spend your time with your family or reading Tolstoy or running a bookstore?”
George Whitman, owner of Shakespeare & Co.
This quote from George Whitman sums up a rather extensive fraction of my family’s philosophy. In spite of the fact that Shakespeare & Co. teemed with eccentricities, this book also reminded me that life need not be so complicated. (With the exception of my “lavish” dreams, of course. Haha)
Switching to daydreaming mode, I am even more enamoured to the idea of opening a bookstore after reading Jeremy Mercer’s memoir. Although it is not only I who fancies the undertaking of a library that also happens to be a hummock for musicians, writers, and all sorts of artists, and where profit is not its main purpose, what makes my concept for a bookstore different will not be the free espresso nor complimentary food, and it will not be the sort of meeting place for bohemians to unleash their immoralities, nor will it be where lost intellectuals enter and come out even more lost. It should be a warm place where God’s light shines, where His Word is shared, where its nooks are filled with not only mountains of books and walls of paintings but of love, hope, joy, and music… and I know it would be difficult to venture on this alone. Perhaps it will be realized with my future husband?
Switching back to reality mode and scrolling back up…“A library with free espresso… complimentary food… artists… musicians… paintings… music… love… joy… where God’s Word is shared…” I was suddenly made aware that I had been unconsciously describing my surroundings, my own home – but only with imagined bigger spaces and a “less-distressed” appearance. This environment is what my parents have already built except that it is not exactly a bookstore but a library in its own way. Blame it on our love for books, and our varying ideas of organization and bookish preferences, what might seem as an odd practice concerning our books is how each member of our family have our own separate shelves. Papa’s shelf in his studio serves as the library’s art section, Mama’s music room holds the inspirational and “motherly” books, Dandi’s stacks of books in his bedroom will attend to the very masculine literary taste, Misha’s own shelf make for the Children’s section, and there’s my little personal library – a hodgepodge of genres.
I must confess about my weakness for having too luxurious dreams - envisioning a bigger library perhaps run by my future husband and I despite what I’ve already been blessed with. But while my dreams wait for me, I will be content with my cozy humble home and my wee library… for in here, where I am surrounded by books, love, music, and the aroma of espresso, time is soft, too.
I believe in love. I believe in bookstore miracles. Anything could happen. =)
.
(Note for Franz: These are the photos I promised. Look at what you’re missing. =P)
.
Permalink
11.24.08
Posted in Uncategorized at 2:57 pm by Miracle ♪♫
Bronze mystic ink cascading eloquently through my sentience,
Verity resembling a half reminisced dream.
Its fluid nature evaluating and siezing the most vulnerable places,
Seeping into my unpeopled crannies where it takes pleasure in lingering –
caught in the infusion of existing as a habit or to inhabit.
So it goes when coffee creeps down my throat,
but in truth what I swallow, what arrests me,
is every word he wrote.
.
Permalink
11.22.08
Posted in Life Betwixt Book Covers at 8:15 pm by Miracle ♪♫
From the author and achiever of the National Book Critics Circle Prize in 1998 for The Blue Flower, and winner of the Booker Prize in 1979 for Offshore, comes this little treasure – itself a Booker Prize nominee; The Bookshop.
In this novel, Penelope Fitzgerald tells the tale of Florence Green, a widow who dared establish the first and only bookshop in the provincial district of Hardborough bearing in mind John Milton’s line on how a good book is “the precious lifeblood of a master spirit, embalmed and treasured up on purpose to a life beyond life.” Nevertheless, to her chagrin, her enthusiastic intentions for the community were not warmly welcomed.
The story illustrating her desire and the scheming cruelty of her neighbours result in a comic tragedy which details the truth of insular ideology and resonates with the shadowy yet witty narration for which the author is known.
¤ ¤ ¤
Ironically, this book gave me the idea of opening a little bookstore here in Dipolog one day – the only one and the first of its sort. But hailing from a small town myself and very familiar with all manners of short-sightedness, I could very well understand the situation in which Florence Green was placed.
This kind of provincial mentality not only concerns literature, but classical music as well. One moment you feel so confident in doing your community a big favour, the next thing you know, they are either complaining about you, pulling you down, or completely ignoring you.
Then it struck me… is our country adhered to this small-town state of mind?
.
Permalink
11.21.08
Posted in Uncategorized at 6:28 am by Miracle ♪♫
Dear Sofia,
…because the clock of my age struck one year more, you would regard me to have matured or to have outgrown extravagant thoughts that are considered childish to those who cannot afford to love, dream, and wish. Perhaps you assume that I have learned to ignore you and yearn less – that I have stashed you away beneath my consciousness because of how meagerly I write to you nowadays. But more and more these days, on solitary walks and lonely byways, when I drive past fields on rainy mornings, or see the sky come alive with stars’ twinklings, when the blazing sunset engulfs me, and my soul takes off and inhabits neither land nor sea, I discover myself thinking about him and you, and no other,
believing that each of us belonged to no one
but each other.
But I’ll wait a little longer.
.
To read all Letters to a Future Daughter, Click Here.
.
Permalink
11.19.08
Posted in Life Betwixt Book Covers at 7:07 am by Miracle ♪♫
“Judge not a book… by its reviews,” is a metaphor I created to bear out my attitude regarding the event of hearing initial gossip about a person I have not been acquainted with personally. It eventually became my perspective towards books regardless of whether the commentaries were positive or negative.
Some are in the habit of Googling reviews and critiques of a book they are about to read. While this may also be advantageous, I prefer not to betray a book’s contents prematurely so I may approach it with unbiased expectations and avoid conventional spoilers. This is perhaps one of the reasons why I am not able to write book reviews adeptly and tend to become a tad obscure or revealing and never quite competent on my reviewing attempts.
Friends’ reviews are welcome however; I do not indulge in them for the sake of finding out about a book per se, but to know more about the reviewer. Nevertheless, there are those affirmative blatant reviews on book covers that I cannot possibly bypass… and I can only try to remain unaffected by them.
So when Time’s description of Kazuo Ishiguro’s Never Let Me Go as a “tour de force” and a “page-turner” – two clichés plastered on hundreds of book jackets – blazed on its cover, it was only natural to mutter “we’ll see about that”, because despite Ishiguro’s prodigious reputation (he is best known for Remains of the Day), Never Let Me Go did not seem to be a very convincing title. But from its first page to the last, I could only nod in agreement at the precision of Time’s review.
On what primarily seems to be a utopian setting where creativity is highly valued turns out to be a dystopia as the story unfolds. The novel reflects on man’s very existence and is a naked punctuation on mortality. While it may come as a scrutiny of art, emotions, friendship, forgiveness, and life itself, it is a harrowing tale for those who do not have hope of an afterlife.
If one should wonder about this book’s narrative, imagine the espresso freak that I am, and yet while I read this, a coffee break was not even a welcome interruption… and hours after putting it down, I am still haunted.
Never Let Me Go was short-listed from the 2005 Booker Prize, it was Time’s best fiction novel of 2005 and is among their 100 Best English-language Novels from 1923 to 2005.
Kazuo Ishiguro’s literary awards include the Whitbread Prize in 1986 for An Artist of the Floating World, the Booker Prize in 1989 for The Remains of the Day, and the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres by the French Ministry of Culture in 1998.
.
Permalink
11.17.08
Posted in 2008 Potpourri at 4:34 am by Miracle ♪♫
Happy Birthday
By Poet Laureate, Ted Kooser
This evening, I sat by an open window
and read till the light was gone and the book
was no more than a part of the darkness.
I could have easily switched on the lamp,
but I wanted to ride this day down into night,
to sit alone and smooth the unreadable page
with the pale gray ghost of my hand.
¤ ¤ ¤
This is how I envisioned my 24th birthday; I, the imagined grande dame of my elegantly constructed kingdom, alone, by the window of my territory – my library, with book in hand at the day’s dissolution, riding this day down into the night. Precisely like any other day.
¤ ¤ ¤
But no, loved ones had to celebrate my 24th anniversary of being evacuated from my mother’s womb in their own marvelous ways! Please excuse the jesting tone. I am striving to be un-sappy despite being extremely moved by what friends and family have done for me. For some reason, my birthday gaiety began as early as November 11 and I have so much to be thankful for:
- The pretty bouquet of floral balloons which added colour to an already prismatic friendship.
- The excellent reading lamp (for times when I would prefer to switch on a lamp).
- Two utterly touching leaves of yellow pad paper delivered by a profoundly philosophical duo who go by the familiar names of Calvin and Hobbes.
- The angelic art nouveau brass figurine that splendidly matches my bookshelf.
- The newfangled towel to wrap my Rapunzel hair with, after baths.
- The ambrosial walnut and coffee cake.
- The books!
- For the person who walks under the heat of the sun, clambers up branches, and goes through back-breaking feats just to find signal so we could talk.
- The heartening call from Brunei and the miracle of a friend responsible for it.
- Dandi’s gratifying culinary treat.
- The splendidly and musically designed bookstand from my parents.
- The lovely and creative piano cake by Mama that made me squeal in delight.
- The dozens of heart-stirring word play – the greetings and beautiful wishes!
- The kisses.
- The hugs.
- Music, music, music.
- The prayers.
- My exceptional friends.
- You.
- The incredibles – my family.
I am blessed beyond proportion and there is truly so much to be thankful for… and these, especially these… I thank God for giving me Love, so I may live, and for Life, so I may love.
.
Permalink
11.15.08
Posted in Life Betwixt Book Covers at 11:31 am by Miracle ♪♫
Halfway through this book, I had second thoughts about finishing it because primo, it is categorized as chick lit, secondly, the heroine’s being is morally flawed — but how could I resist the theme of literacy and longing? =P Eventually, I decided to follow bibliomaniac Dora (named after the writer Eudora Welty) until the conclusion.
What made this book so entertaining was the polybibliogamic (a term coined by MarieVic and I) truths that lonely-but-won’t-admit-it bibliophiles undergo and the witty manner that it is presented. Whenever Dora spoke of her bookish practices, I could not suppress the dozens of this-is-so-me giggles of acceptance.
Surprisingly, Attorney Karen Mack and multi award-winning journalist Jennifer Kaufman made this a delightful experience. It is light, but not shallow, brainy but not abysmal, and just what female bibliomaniacs would need as a breather in between physical, emotional, or intellectual challenges. In fact, some have disagreed on this book’s chick-lit status. Personally, I would place it a couple of notches above that genre.
“In any event, books still quell the longing one gets in this world and can tell a simple story that helps make sense of things.” ~ Literacy and Longing in L.A.
.
Permalink
11.13.08
Posted in Life Betwixt Book Covers at 12:49 pm by Miracle ♪♫
.
At last, a book from my “string-themed wish list”! Although this Pulitzer nominee is quite a facile novel to read, it is wonderfully thought-provoking and not as overemotional as Vikram Seth’s An Equal Music. (The comparison is induced since both books have classical musicians for central characters.) I blame the melodrama of An Equal Music on the theme of unrequited love and the fact that Seth himself was not a musician but supposedly fell in love with one, in real life – and we know how we tend to dramatize our loved-one’s line of interest by incorporating it in the stories of our lives. For The Soloist, we have bestselling author/cellist Mark Salzman as the writer who pours just the substantial amount of musicality in the novel. While it deals with child prodigies, courtroom drama, schizophrenia, mysticism, lust, and slight existentialism, it was the topic of acceptance and the power of music that I identified with.
The movie of the same title expected to premiere next year stars Robert Downey Jr and Jamie Foxx. Some say it’s based on Salzman’s novel. If it is, it is extremely roughly based since the synopsis seems very different from the book. Yet, it remains to be an interesting movie to watch.
Musicians and non-musicians would be able to appreciate this book, but I especially recommend it to music teachers. The protagonist’s recollections of the dialogues with his late German professor are beautiful revelations.
Here are morsels for the musicians.
On being consumed by the brilliance of a flower’s petals, Von Kempen, the professor, exclaimed, “Herr Sundheimer, look at all that color! Imagine the complexity of it, the perfection of the design! Isn’t it amazing that God produces such things? Herr Sundheimer, right now you are looking at something that has never existed before today, not in all the time since the beginning of the universe. When it fades, it will never exist again – it is absolutely unique in the world. Doesn’t it now seem more precious than when you first noticed it?
…and that is the way to approach music. Every piece, every time you play it, is unique and irreplaceable. You should open your ears and heart to every phrase, every note, and squeeze every drop of beauty you can from it. Take nothing for granted.”
Reinhart Sundheimer, on Bach:
“Each piece is like a finely cut diamond: clear, simple and almost mathematical in appearance, but underneath the surface what complexity and structural integrity! The possibilities for interpretation are limitless; just as there are countless ways to project light through a diamond, no two performances of Bach can be the same because each musician’s unique personality has its own spectrum of feelings that can be conveyed freely through Bach’s inventions. If two very different perform the same Liszt piece, for example, you will still hear primarily Liszt. But Bach’s musical personality was so expansive, so beautifully transparent, that when you interpret him, his ideas become your ideas, and you feel that he must have known you to have written a piece so close to your own heart.”
Sundheimer to his student Kyung-hee, on musicality:
“… the difference between truly great musicians and skilful musical technicians, I believe, is that the musician is able to bring more than just the sense of hearing to his interpretations. When he plays or listens to music, he sees it, feels it, tastes it, and is able to season his performance with memories and fantasies of his own that may have nothing to do with strictly aural harmony.”
Sundheimer, on having perfect-pitch:
“I found a blender that mixes at F-sharp.”
There are also traces of the silly things our students utter that endear us to them even more:
“Why don’t you tell me what you know about scales, Kyung-hee?”
He fidgeted in his chair, then at last said in a tiny voice, “They’re all over fish.”
A few portions of the conclusion without plot-spoilers:
When you play music well, you are transported. However, my experience has been that you cannot make great music happen; you can only prepare yourself for it to happen. To a degree, your preparation determines what will happen, but once it starts happening you have to surrender yourself to it. Once you do so, you are free, except that you are free only within the boundaries you created through your preparation. When…I started trying to force great music to happen I ended up making awful music; in fact, it wasn’t even music anymore.
Mark Salzman
.
Permalink
11.09.08
Posted in 2008 Potpourri at 10:35 pm by Miracle ♪♫
Finally, Dipolog has a mall. No longer “s-mall” or “mall-i-it,” but a real mall with a grocery containing ingredients essential for mimicking Giada de Laurentiis, Ina Garten, and Bobby Flay. Weeeeeeeeee! BUT! To my chagrin, no bookstore yet. I earnestly hope they unveil one… for don’t they know, a mall without books is like a body without a soul?!
~~~
Milk for Misha, slices of pork steak for Espresso Barbecue, a kilo and a half of chicken wings for Chilli Wings, flour, sugar, cake ingredients, no beauty products; judging by the items in my cart, one would have easily mistook me for a housewife… and yet as I double-checked my calligraphed grocery list and lined up at the counter, the crude palavering of married women nearby, shocked me.
One was confessing to another that she married a foreigner “for the dollars,” while another chimed in dreamily and shifted the topic to genitalia sizes which perceptibly connoted that she, if not for money, married for sex – or both, and believe me, it sounded more nauseating in the Visayan dialect, and I refuse to elaborate.
“Has the world gone mad, or am I the only person in this line who thinks that marriage is supposed to be sacred and not looked upon as a means for lucre, convenience, or mere pleasure?” I thought. Rude as it may have seemed, they were worthy of the generous disapproving glare I gave them.
Even though romantic notions of love is not what marriages should consist of entirely, last time I checked, I still wished to marry not even for admiration, not for the benefits, not because I owe a person anything, not because I’m afraid I’ll end up shriveled and alone, but for good old love. And although I’ve conceptualized what my wedding cake should look like, marriage is certainly not a piece of tasteless cake the way those women (were they?) along the check out counter made it seem.
Return to Home Page
Permalink
11.02.08
Posted in Uncategorized at 11:44 pm by Miracle ♪♫
(The “emergency” messages I receive on my cellphone are usually orders for me to go out and gaze at the moon… and it is my duty to act forthwith! What sheer blessedness!) “Words are not enough. No language will be worthy to speak of it. Its beauty is beyond these mediums,” my informant, a fellow “lunatic” reminded me. Nevertheless, such an entrancing sight only persuades me to set forth a few words. Not so I could clutch the moonlight in my hands, but to at least hold traces of it.
.
¤ ¤ ¤
(11/02/08)
Waxing crescent moon,
fisherman’s cradle of fruitful prognosis,
did Osman really envision you in his dreams? I wonder.
The Boat of Light to the Babylonians,
representation of Isis to the Egyptians,
Tanit to the Phoenicians, Diana to the Greeks, a Tagore volume.
What other fables have they credited to your obliqueness?
Would they not have preferred humorous depictions,
you Croissant of the Sky, you Exaggerated Fingernail Trimming?
You may be Light, but you are more enigma.
Are you Beauty,
or are you merely
like me?
Drifting,
waiting,
a semicircle –
yet to be circumferred,
circumpleted.
.
¤ ¤ ¤
“Beauty, Light, it happens that people regard them as obsolete, as insignificant… Certainly, there is an enigma. Certainly, there is a mystery. But the mystery is not a stage piece turning to account the play of light and shadow only to impress us.It is what continues to be a mystery, even in bright light. It is only then that it acquires that refulgence that captivates and which we call Beauty. Beauty that is an open path - the only one perhaps - towards that unknown part of ourselves, towards that which surpasses us. There, this could be yet another definition of poetry: the art of approaching that which surpasses us. Innumerable secret signs, with which the universe is studded and which constitute so many syllables of an unknown language, urge us to compose words, and with words, phrases whose deciphering puts us at the threshold of the deepest truth.
~Odysseus Elytis Alepoudellis~
.
Return to Home Page
Permalink
