ART & Thoughts
Literature
The Beat Generation – Jack Kerouac
Now it’s jazz, the place is roaring, all beautiful girls in there, one mad brunette at the bar drunk with her boys. One strange chick I remember from somewhere, wearing a simple skirt with pockets, her hands in there, short haircut, slouched, talking to everybody. Up and down the stairs they come. The bartenders are … Continue reading
Éloge du lointain: Paul Celan
Dans la source de tes yeux vivent les nasses des pêcheurs de la mer délirante. Dans la source de tes yeux la mer tient sa parole. J’y jette, cœur qui a séjourné chez des humains, les vêtements que je portais et l’éclat d’un serment : Plus noir au fond du noir, je suis plus nu. … Continue reading
Glass with Rose: Julio Cortázar
Glass with Rose The state that we describe with the word distractions is perhaps only another form of attention, its symmetrical and more profound manifestation located in another region of the psyche: an attention directed from or through or even toward that more profound region. It is not unusual for the subjects of such distraction … Continue reading
Illicit Love Letters: Albert Camus and Maria Casares
The romance of Camus and Casares is richer, if not sadder, when considered alongside the narratives of each of their work. There is an eerie doubling of life and art. Absurdity is the only certainty, and this is confirmed over and over again by coincidence and chance. The two first met on June 6, 1944, the storied … Continue reading
“For Sile” Wei Wu Wei / Saul Leiter
When the beetle sees, it is I that am looking, When the nightingale sings, it is I that am singing, When the lion roars, it is I that am roaring. But when I look for myself, I can see nothing — for no thing is there to be seen. Síle cannot see me either, for when … Continue reading
Return to My Native Land: Aimé Césaire
My far distant happiness which makes me aware of my true misery: a lumpy road plunging into a hollow where it scatters a handful of huts: a tireless road charging at full speed towards a hill at whose top it is brutally drowned in a stagnant pool of dwarfish houses, a road madly climbing, recklessly … Continue reading
By the River Piedra I Sat Down and Wept : Paulo Coelho
But he went on. “For the past two weeks, I haven’t been able to stand the sadness in my soul. I went to my superior and told him what was happening to me. I told him about my love for you and what had begun when we were taking the inventory.” A light rain began … Continue reading
The Meek One: Fyodor Dostoyevsky / Ian Webb
Only five minutes too late But is it really? is it really probable? Can one really say that it was possible? Why, for what reason did this woman die? oh, believe me, I understand; but why she died is still a question. She was frightened of my love, she asked herself seriously whether she should … Continue reading
The unbearable lightness of being – Milan Kundera
The priest intoned words in a singsong voice, and the people repeated them after him in unison. It was a litany. The same words kept coming back, like a wanderer who cannot tear his eyes away from the countryside or like a man who cannot take leave of life. She sat in one of the … Continue reading
Apollinaire Guillaume – Pont Mirabeau / Jean Louis Trintignant
Sous le pont Mirabeau coule la Seine Et nos amours Faut-il qu’il m’en souvienne La joie venait toujours après la peine Vienne la nuit sonne l’heure Les jours s’en vont je demeure Les mains dans les mains restons face à face Tandis que sous Le pont de nos bras passe Des éternels regards l’onde si … Continue reading
Georges Bataille: The Impossible
“After all, the moment of ruin, when you don’t know if you’re going to laugh or cry, if it weren’t for the fatigue, the sensation of musty eyes and mouth, of nerves slowly worn out, has the greatest leaping power. Later at the window (at the moment when the unpredictable light of a lightning flash … Continue reading
A dream within a dream: Edgar Allan Poe
Take this kiss upon the brow! And, in parting from you now, Thus much let me avow — You are not wrong, who deem That my days have been a dream; Yet if hope has flown away In a night, or in a day, In a vision, or in none, Is it therefore the … Continue reading
Blues by Elizabeth Alexander / Jean Mannheim
I am lazy, the laziest girl in the world. I sleep during the day when I want to, ‘til my face is creased and swollen, ‘til my lips are dry and hot. I eat as I please: cookies and milk after lunch, butter and sour cream on my baked potato, foods that slothful people eat, … Continue reading
Commision: Ezra Pound / HR Bell
Go, my songs, to the lonely and the unsatisfied, Go also to the nerve-racked, go to the enslaved-by-convention, Bear to them my contempt for their oppressors. Go as a great wave of cool water, Bear my contempt of oppressors. Speak against unconscious oppression, Speak against the tyranny of the unimaginative, Speak against bonds. Go to … Continue reading
Still I Rise – Maya Angelou / Marc Chalmé
You may write me down in history With your bitter, twisted lies, You may tread me in the very dirt But still, like dust, I’ll rise. Does my sassiness upset you? Why are you beset with gloom? ‘Cause I walk like I’ve got oil wells Pumping in my living room. Just like moons and like … Continue reading
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