Claire McNeill
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Lately: 10

9/3/2013

 
Picture
Vase of white lilacs roses (detail), Édouard Manet
I am so, so, so tired.

Here are some things I’ve been reading and thinking about.

11 untranslatable words from other cultures, illustrated. Mangata: the roadlike reflection of the moon on water.

“Kim can fish and fight and spit as well as any man on any boat, and she knows it and so do they.” A short, terrifically written and powerful profile of a tough, tough woman.

Gorgeous, gorgeous photos of London and other cities by Andrew Ridley.

“To invent your own life’s meaning is not easy, but it’s still allowed, and I think you’ll be happier for the trouble.” — Bill Watterson, who made his own life, is honored in this lovely short comic.

“People that tell you dreams and goals are worthless are plagues of the mind and spirit.“ A Twitter essay.

Why a three-second exposure made our ancestors seem more stern than they really were.

How strange to feel so happy for the perfect moments of people you’ll never know.

“Sometimes in London I felt stupidly enthusiastic, like a Labrador puppy let loose in an antique store, or overly loud and gauche, like a guest who shows up at a memorial service wearing a Hawaiian shirt and traumatizes the mourners with intrusive personal questions.” Yes! Me too!

Postscript by Seamus Heaney.

bell hooks explains the problem with demanding everyone think without regard to race, gender, etc.

Dream home.

“Toyota: You need a fucking car unfortunately.”

Mapping an invented country.

“I’m reading works that, not so long ago, used to make me feel connected and intellectual. Transcendentalists, the old white New England guys, Emerson and Whitman and Thoreau: the cast of a 19th-century Wes Anderson movie. This time around, I’m irritated at their Manifest Destinies and their blind surrender to wild Nature. Where did Thoreau get his money, hmm? How did Papa Walt have such a flexible schedule? Nothing they wrote tells that story.”


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    Lately:

    My collection of the best things to read & think about in the last month or so, but usually less often than that

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