SHIELD
What I bought – 14 December 2011
“Truth, Vinicius, dwells somewhere so high that the gods themselves cannot see it from the top of Olympus. To you, carissime, your Olympus seems higher still, and, standing there, you call to me, ‘Come, you will see such sights as you have not seen yet!’ I might. But I answer, ‘I do not have feet [...]
What I bought – 12 October 2011
But novelists write for countless reasons: for money, for fame, for reviewers, for parents, for friends, for loved ones; for vanity, for pride, for curiosity, for amusement: as skilled furniture makers enjoy making furniture, as drunkards like drinking, as judges like judging, as Sicilians like emptying a shotgun into an enemy’s back. I could fill [...]
What I bought – 3 August 2011
“Sometimes I ask myself,” Emmerich said. “What is the function of a murderer? Is he the person you go to in order to confess?” (Don DeLillo, from The Names)
What I bought – May and June 2011
Hey, look at that! I’m back in Arizona and I picked up almost two months’ worth of comics! Yeah, I’m not going to review them properly here – that would take waaaaaaaay too long. This is more of a “What I bought and the random thoughts I have about the issues and, why not, what [...]
What I bought – 13 April 2011
“Am I ever going to be told what you really think you’re doing?” “You have been told.” “Lie upon lie.” “Perhaps that’s our way of telling the truth.” But then, as if she knew she had smiled once too often, she looked down and added quickly, “Maurice once said to me – when I had [...]
What I bought – 16 February 2011
She didn’t realize that it was in the blood and not on the skin; she didn’t see that there could be nothing more suburban than suburbanites repudiating themselves. (Hanif Kureishi, from The Buddha of Suburbia)
What I bought – 29 December 2010
“We met long ago,” said Galip. “When we first met, your legs looked so thin and so delicate that I was afraid they would break. Your skin was rough when you were a kid, but as you got older, after we graduated from middle school, your complexion became rosy and incredibly fine. If they took [...]
What I bought – 6 October 2010
“It’s like blue light when you touch me,” she’d say. “Electric blue light sparking between us.” She’d cry softly into my shoulder, tears of passion, because she couldn’t get close enough to me. (W. P. Kinsella, from The Iowa Baseball Confederacy)
What I bought – 4 August 2010
“When you wake up in the morning, Pooh,” said Piglet at last, “what’s the first thing you say to yourself?” “What’s for breakfast?” said Pooh. “What do you say, Piglet?” “I say, I wonder what’s going to happen exciting today?” said Piglet. Pooh nodded thoughtfully. “It’s the same thing,” he said. (A. A. Milne, from [...]
What I bought – 9 June 2010
That woman was the closest thing to himself Achilles had ever come across. But he didn’t find out until a moment after he had killed her. She was hostile, and dead: everything Achilles loved in a woman. (Roberto Calasso, from The Marriage of Cadmus and Harmony)
What I bought – 7 April 2010
“Today’s lesson is, if someone puts poison in your tea, don’t drink it.” (Christopher Moore, from Lamb)
