If you are looking for something to read this morning check on Dan Wickett’s LitBlogger E-Panel. I always find these panels interesting as you learn the who, what, when, where kind of stuff about LitBloggers.
The Passion of Writing
Once in a while it’s good to step back from the edge and perform a ritual cleansing of the mind. Writing, like all passions, is an enterprise of risk. I’m not talking about rejection. Rejection and acceptance take place long after the words are written; after work is out the door, those words become someone else’s. The risk I’m referring to is writing in the first place, because writing moves you toward the center of things, that void between the crowded coastlines of consensus, wisdom, and security.
The center of things is an uncomfortable place, the empty quarter, a place without markers or features. This is fly over country, but writers walk toward it without knowing what they might find. The great fear is that we’ll find nothing, wander in circles, die of thirst. Very few books find their way into this terrain, but all the great ones do, or die trying. Commercial success is a pale measure; no one is uncomfortable in its company, or uneasy with its message. That’s like a ride on the coast highway, pleasant, beautiful, crowded.
At the center of things rocks shine like diamonds, the air bites the tongue, the wind brings the scent of the ancient earth. This is where we started from, a place few ever find. The source of memories we all share but have forgotten, stark, wild, and unchanging. This is where we’re trying to get to whenever we write, the place we strive to describe and bring to life.
The Passion of Writing
Once in a while it’s good to step back from the edge and perform a ritual cleansing of the mind. Writing, like all passions, is an enterprise of risk. I’m not talking about rejection. Rejection and acceptance take place long after the words are written; after work is out the door, those words become someone else’s. The risk I’m referring to is writing in the first place, because writing moves you toward the center of things, that void between the crowded coastlines of consensus, wisdom, and security.
The center of things is an uncomfortable place, the empty quarter, a place without markers or features. This is fly over country, but writers walk toward it without knowing what they might find. The great fear is that we’ll find nothing, wander in circles, die of thirst. Very few books find their way into this terrain, but all the great ones do, or die trying. Commercial success is a pale measure; no one is uncomfortable in its company, or uneasy with its message. That’s like a ride on the coast highway, pleasant, beautiful, crowded.
At the center of things rocks shine like diamonds, the air bites the tongue, the wind brings the scent of the ancient earth. This is where we started from, a place few ever find. The source of memories we all share but have forgotten, stark, wild, and unchanging. This is where we’re trying to get to whenever we write, the place we strive to describe and bring to life.
Bad Books. Very Bad.
[by way of WorldMagBlog.com] Human Events asked a 15 member panel to list the ten most harmful books from the past two centuries. The list includes “The Kinsey Report” by Alfred Kinsey, “Democracy and Education” by John Dewey, “The Feminine Mystique” by Betty Friedan, and “Beyond Good and Evil” by Friedrich Nietzsche. See also the many honorable mentions.
Deep Throat
[from CNSNews.com] Editor Susan Jones of CNS News passing on reporting from the Washington Post and other sources, saying Mark Felt, who has declared himself to be “Deep Throat” of the Watergate Scandal, has not acted out of concern for the truth primarily. In the 70s, The Post suggests Felt was the natural successor to FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover, but he was passed over for an outsider. This year, Vanity Fair suggests money for the family was the motivation.
Why did attorney John O’Connor tell Mark Felt’s story to Vanity Fair instead of the Washington Post? Ben Bradlee, the newspaper’s former executive editor, offered his speculation Wednesday morning. “It’s up to him,” Bradlee told a reporter in response to the question. “I suspect the (Vanity Fair) ‘quid’ was bigger than any ‘quo’ we could have given him.””
The family may be hoping for a book deal. Felt’s daughter told Vanity Fair her thinking: “Bob Woodward’s going to get all the glory for this (revealing Deep Throat’s identity), but we could make at least enough money to pay some bills, like the debt I’ve run up for the kids’ education.”
A couple high-profile officials from that time believe Felt mishandled his information. This morning, Henry Kissinger said, “My own view is that if you’re in a high government position or any government position and you disagree with the government, you ought to resign, and if you think you have seen a criminal act, you ought to go to the prosecutor.”
He said he believes Felt to be “troubled” and that Nixon’s appointment of an outsider to directed the FBI “must have jarred the established institution.”
Former presidential counselor Chuck Colson said Felt should have gone to the FBI Director with his charge of obstruction, and if nothing came of it, he should have resigned in order to bring attention to the crime. Colson had always considered Felt to be a “consummate professional,” but confiding in the Washington Post was breaking “the confidence of the president of the United States.”
Pat Buchanan, who was an advisor and speechwriter for President Nixon, put a little perspective on Felt’s breach of confidence. He said J. Edgar Hoover “knew all of the lurid secrets of Jack Kennedy, but thank God, he didn’t go out and give them to the Chicago Tribune. That would have been an awful thing to do.” Talking to NBC’s Matt Lauer, Buchanan said, “As Chuck says, the FBI knows every secret almost about everybody they’ve ever investigated… if you want the FBI putting this material out on the record when somebody wants to – what kind of country do you want?”
Missing by Michelle Herman
To kick off what might be called Michelle Herman week here at Collected Miscellany (as regular readers know, I have an interview to finish transcribing and reviews of her other books planned) I thought it would be appropriate to start off with her first novel.
Missing tells the story of Rivke Vasilevsky an eighty-nine-year-old Jewish widow who finds herself alone in her New York (Brighton Beach)apartment to ponder the ravages of time. Her husband’s death creates a void and her children (and grandchildren) are caught up in their own lives and visit less and less. Rivke, who in the not too distant past never had a moment to her self, begins to reflect on what has brought her to this point when a set of beads turns up missing.
This is the title’s literal reference but as the story unwinds much more is missing than mere beads. Rivke wrestles with the complex and often strained relationships that have made up her life: her parents, her husband, her children, and even her grandchildren (in fact, the person she feels closest to is her granddaughter). She also wrestles with the slippery nature of memory and communication. Through the fog of emotion and time she is trying to piece together the truth about her life; not so much the mere circumstances of the past but the emotional and relational truth.