Thursday, August 07, 2008
Quote of the Month/Summer: Holy the Firm
"And that is why I believe those hollow crisps on the bathroom floor are moths. I think I know moths, and fragments of moths, and chips and tatters of utterly empty moths, in any state. How many of you, I asked the people in my class, which of you want to give your lives and be writers? I was trembling from coffee, or cigarettes, or the closeness of faces all around me. (Is this what we live for? I thought: is light, and living, human eyes?) All hands rose to the question. (You, Nick? Will you? Margaret? Randy? Why do I want them to mean it?) And then I tried to tell them what the choice must mean: you can't be anything else. You must go at your life with a broadax....They had no idea what I was saying. (I have two hands, don't I? And all this energy, for as long as I can remember. I'll do it in the evenings, after skiing, or on the way home from the bank, or after the children are asleep.....)They thought I was raving again. It's just as well."
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1 comment:
See--I knew you'd love this book. "Holy The Firm" is one of the most compelling little books I've ever read--and you MUST try reading it aloud, because the way the words wrap around your tongue, slip between your teeth and intertwine with your own breath until they escape your mouth and reach your own ears is an entirely different experience of the book--like watching a 3-D movie for the first time, it just brings it all to life in a whole new way--try it soon, read a few pages aloud and you'll see what I mean. This is how language was meant to be experienced--audibly.
Glenn
Glenn
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