I wonder if Ashbery’s quote “Simply the best we have” on the back of The Banquet was said about Koch. Ashbery is quoted saying the same exact thing on the back of James Schuylers collected poems. WHO DOES HE MEAN
Seeing that particular edition of the Portable Shakespeare brought back memories! The Portables from the 80s were a major introduction to literature for me. Seeing the close up color cover photos reminds me of how I first encountered famous writers. I read Chekhov, Tolstoy, D.H. Lawrence, and Joseph Conrad's short stories in those tomes. Plus the first volume of Nietzsche I had was a Viking Portable. Thanks for that! The appearance of Alan Watts on the back of the music book shows how old it is.
I also have the original paperback of "McGlue". I picked it up when it came out because I had been following her short story output in literary magazines, and had also subscribed to Fence when it first started up its quarterly. I picked up "McGlue" the day it came out, and have followed Moshfegh's novels ever since, but "McGlue" is without question her best book. My first Billy Collins was the volume "Ballistics" and I really liked it; I especially thought the poem "Tension" was clever . . . you make me want to upload a reading of it. Does Billy Collins fulfill my aesthetic hunger fully the way more ambitious poets do? Not usually: they're all very short, not terribly dense, nor verbose. But Collins is very skilled in the craft-oriented mindset. And Many of his volumes are well-conceived, and most of his poems are thoroughly enjoyable.
@@TheBookedEscapePlan you say it very well. Yes, Billy Collins is like that. Those poems have a place. “Aesthetic hunger” is a new phrase to me that seems useful.
Tamarisk Row is pretty good. It reminded me a lot of A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, but that may have just been because I read them around the same time.
Very interesting! It’s like “is that really the dream or am I making that up?” A lot of novels I read in high school have this quality of seeming similar just cuz I read them at a similar time and in a similar way (finding symbolic stuff for a high school English essay) - maybe they were practically the same because your reading brain tended to digest books into similar-looking broken-down structures when they were past your eyes and in your brain!
I don't have a book twitter. Should I make one? I don't have a goodreads either. I think I had one a long time ago but I don't log into it or use it anymore. Do you recommend I have a goodreads?
@@leafyconcern personally, i love goodreads because i can see what my friends are reading and what they like, finding new books and keeping track of ur reading. some ppl don't like it cause they think it's kind of perverse to let everyone know what ur reading all the time or something, but yeah i would reccommend. as for twitter that's good for finding ppl with similar taste too and kind of fun, but goodreads is less effort.
Your enthusiasm for literature is contagious
What a lovely comment to wake up and read! Thank you for watching.
I wonder if Ashbery’s quote “Simply the best we have” on the back of The Banquet was said about Koch. Ashbery is quoted saying the same exact thing on the back of James Schuylers collected poems.
WHO DOES HE MEAN
Wow! Yeah, I assume he just means "my friends are just the best, aren't they?"
Seeing that particular edition of the Portable Shakespeare brought back memories!
The Portables from the 80s were a major introduction to literature for me. Seeing the close up color cover photos reminds me of how I first encountered famous writers.
I read Chekhov, Tolstoy, D.H. Lawrence, and Joseph Conrad's short stories in those tomes. Plus the first volume of Nietzsche I had was a Viking Portable.
Thanks for that!
The appearance of Alan Watts on the back of the music book shows how old it is.
Yeah, come to think of it, it doesn't seem like Alan Watts is a very trendy person to quote as of late
“They are both the giantest fly I’ve ever seen” was a good line of yours with lots to contemplate in a mere nine words
I’m glad you appreciate that line. It feels like the two giantest were planted on my walls for the purpose of inspiring weird sentences about them.
I also have the original paperback of "McGlue". I picked it up when it came out because I had been following her short story output in literary magazines, and had also subscribed to Fence when it first started up its quarterly. I picked up "McGlue" the day it came out, and have followed Moshfegh's novels ever since, but "McGlue" is without question her best book.
My first Billy Collins was the volume "Ballistics" and I really liked it; I especially thought the poem "Tension" was clever . . . you make me want to upload a reading of it.
Does Billy Collins fulfill my aesthetic hunger fully the way more ambitious poets do? Not usually: they're all very short, not terribly dense, nor verbose. But Collins is very skilled in the craft-oriented mindset. And Many of his volumes are well-conceived, and most of his poems are thoroughly enjoyable.
@@TheBookedEscapePlan you say it very well. Yes, Billy Collins is like that. Those poems have a place. “Aesthetic hunger” is a new phrase to me that seems useful.
Tamarisk Row is pretty good. It reminded me a lot of A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, but that may have just been because I read them around the same time.
Very interesting! It’s like “is that really the dream or am I making that up?” A lot of novels I read in high school have this quality of seeming similar just cuz I read them at a similar time and in a similar way (finding symbolic stuff for a high school English essay) - maybe they were practically the same because your reading brain tended to digest books into similar-looking broken-down structures when they were past your eyes and in your brain!
Where do you find all these literary friends???
Mostly college, and also around the music scene in my town
may have asked this before, but do you have a goodreads or a book twitter?
I don't have a book twitter. Should I make one?
I don't have a goodreads either. I think I had one a long time ago but I don't log into it or use it anymore. Do you recommend I have a goodreads?
@@leafyconcern personally, i love goodreads because i can see what my friends are reading and what they like, finding new books and keeping track of ur reading. some ppl don't like it cause they think it's kind of perverse to let everyone know what ur reading all the time or something, but yeah i would reccommend. as for twitter that's good for finding ppl with similar taste too and kind of fun, but goodreads is less effort.