( No longer ) Anxious Swann

"... knights all, titled and untitled - the great knights-errant" (Joseph Conrad)

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Cormac McCarthy: "The Road" (2(

April 28, 2009

American Novel Ben Shahn Cormac McCarthy Favourites of the author of the blog Novel The Kinks

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"If You Would be a Poet...

... You are Whitman, you are Poe, you are Mark Twain, you are Emily Dickinson and Edna St. Vincent Millay, you are Neruda and Mayakovsky and Pasolini, you are an American or a non-American, you can conquer the conquerors with words..."
— lawrence ferlinghetti — from "poetry as insurgent art " my opinions are not those of my firm -- they are my nan's

Frank O'Hara: "You are gorgeous and I am coming"

" Vaguely I hear the purple roar of the torn-down Third Avenue El It sways slightly but firmly like a hand or a golden-downed thigh normally I don’t think of sounds as colored unless I’m feeling corrupt concrete Rimbaud obscurity of emotion which is simple and very definite even lasting, yes it may be that dark and purifying wave, the death of boredom nearing the heights themselves may destroy you in the pure air to be further complicated, confused, empty but refilling, exposed to light With the past falling away as an acceleration of nerves thundering and shaking aims its aggregating force like the Metro towards a realm of encircled travel rending the sound of adventure and becoming ultimately local and intimate repeating the phrases of an old romance which is constantly renewed by the endless originality of human loss the air the stumbling quiet of breathing newly the heavens’ stars all out we are all for the captured time of our being . "

Groucho Marx (from the film "Animal Crackers")

" Honorable Charles H. Hungadunga c/o Hungadunga, Hungadunga, Hungadunga, Hungadunga, & McCormack , Gentlemen? In re yours of the 5th inst., yours to hand and beg to rep., brackets, that we have gone over the ground carefully and we seem to believe, i.e., to wit., e.g., in lieu, that despite all our precautionary measures which have been involved, we seem to believe that it is hardly necessary for us to proceed unless we receive an ipso facto that is not neglible at this moment, quotes, unquotes, and quotes. Hoping this finds you, I beg to remain, as of June 9, cordially yours, Regards, " (letter to his lawyer, dictated by captain spaulding -groucho marx- to his secretary horatio jamison -zeppo marx-, in the film animal Crackers -1930)

Franquin: "Idées Noires"

John Ashbery: "City Afternoon"

" A veil of haze protects this Long-ago afternoon forgotten by everybody In this photograph, most of them now Sucked screaming through old age and death. If one could seize America Or at least a fine forgetfulness That seeps into our outline Defining our volumes with a stain That is fleeting too But commemorates Because it does define, after all: Gray garlands, that threesome Waiting for the light to change, Air lifting the hair of one Upside down in the reflecting pool . "

Wallace Stevens: "Ghosts as Cocoons"

" The grass is in seed. The young birds are flying. Yet the house is not built, not even begun. The vetch has turned purple. But where is the bride? It is easy to say to those bidden--But where, Where, butcher, seducer, bloodman, reveller, Where is the sun and music and highest heaven's lust? For which more than any words cries deeplier? This mangled, smutted semi-world hacked out Of dirt . . . It is not possible for the moon To blot this with its dove-winged blendings, She must come now. The grass is in seed and high. Come now. Those to be born have need Of the bride, love being a birth, have need to see And to touch her, have need to say to her, "The fly on the rose prevents us, O season Excelling in summer, ghost of fragrance falling On dung." Come now, pearled and pasted, bloomy-leafed, While the domes resound with chant involving chant. "

John Ashbery: "The Picture of Little J.A. in a Prospect of Flowers (*1)"

he was spoilt from childhood by the future, which he mastered rather early and apparently without great difficulty. —boris pasternak " Darkness falls like a wet sponge And Dick gives Genevieve a swift punch In the pajamas. “Aroint thee, witch.” Her tongue from previous ecstasy Releases thoughts like little hats. “He clap’d me first during the eclipse. Afterwards I noted his manner Much altered. But he sending At that time certain handsome jewels I durst not seem to take offence.” In a far recess of summer Monks are playing soccer. "

J. R. R. Tolkien; "Leaf by Niggle"

" There was once a little man called Niggle, who had a long journey to make. He did not want to go, indeed the whole idea was distasteful to him; but he could not get out of it. He knew he would have to start some time, but he did not hurry with his preparations. Niggle was a painter. Not a very successful one, partly because he had many other things to do. Most of these things he thought were a nuisance; but he did them fairly well, when he could not get out of them: which (in his opinion) was far too often. The laws in his country were rather strict. There were other hindrances, too. For one thing, he was sometimes just idle, and did nothing at all. For another, he was kind-hearted, in a way. You know the sort of kind heart: it made him uncomfortable more often than it made him do anything; and even when he did anything, it did not prevent him from grumbling, losing his temper, and swearing (mostly to himself). All the same, it did land him in a good many odd jobs for hi...

Chet Baker: "Let's Get Lost"

" Let's get lost, lost in each other's arms Let's get lost, let them send out alarms And though they'll think us rather rude Let's tell the world we're in that crazy mood. Let's defrost in a romantic mist Let's get crossed off everybody's list To celebrate this night we found each other, mmm, let's get lost [horn solo] [piano solo] Let's defrost in a romantic mist Let's get crossed off everybody's list To celebrate this night we found each other, mm, let's get lost oh oh, let's get lost "

Karl Ove Knausgaard: "A Death in the Family"

( t hus i spoke, when faster than i could imagine a spirit led me forth from my own home to a place i thought i'd never go. -- holderlin " patmos " ) " There is, in London, a painting that moves me as much every time I go and see it. It is a self-portrait painted by the late Rembrandt. His later paintings are usually characterized by an extreme coarseness of stroke, rendering everything subordinate to the expression of the moment, at once shining and sacred, and still unsurpassed in art, with the possible exception of Hölderlin’s later poems, however dissimilar and incomparable they may be—for where Hölderlin’s light, evoked through language, is ethereal and celestial, Rembrandt’s light, evoked through color, is earthy, metallic, and material —but this one painting which hangs in the National Gallery was painted in a slightly more classically realistic, lifelike style, more in the manner of the younger Rembrandt. Old age. All th...

E.E. Cummings: "35"

( nobody, not even the rain, has such small hands) " somewhere i have never travelled,gladly beyond any experience,your eyes have their silence: in your most frail gesture are things which enclose me, or which i cannot touch because they are too near your slightest look easily will unclose me though i have closed myself as fingers, you open always petal by petal myself as Spring opens (touching skilfully,mysteriously)her first rose or if your wish be to close me, i and my life will shut very beautifully ,suddenly, as when the heart of this flower imagines the snow carefully everywhere descending; nothing which we are to perceive in this world equals the power of your intense fragility:whose texture compels me with the color of its countries, rendering death and forever with each breathing (i do not know what it is about you that closes and opens;only something in me understands the voice of your eyes is deeper than all roses) nobody,not even the rain,has such small...