Literature – Scripturient

Ars Poetica

Horace’s Ars Poetica, or the Art of Poetry, was written as a 476-line poem in a letter to his friend, the Roman senator Lucius Calpurnius Piso (Lucius) and his two sons, around 19 BCE. It was known for a time as the “Epistle to the Pisos” until 95CE when the critic Marcus Fabius Quintilianus (Quintilian) called it the Ars Poetica in his a twelve-volume textbook on rhetoric, the Institutio Oratoria. The name stuck. Horace (Quintus Horatius Flaccus) was popular during the Renaissance when Latin was still taught in schools. Some of his poems were among the works students had to … click below for more ↓

Kerouac’s Haikus

2022-03-30 2026-03-23 Books & Reviews / Literature / Musings / Poetry / Poetry & Lyrics / What I'm Reading Now2 Comments

Haiku is like a razor blade: small, light, but yet strong and incredibly sharp. Haiku says “Look over there!” and then smacks you from the other side. Haiku is the neutron star of poetry: stunning density combined with astounding brightness. Haiku swims in a sea of metaphor, darting like quick, bright fish among the forest of words. Haiku has a formal definition: “an unrhymed verse form of Japanese origin having three lines containing usually five, seven, and five syllables respectively. It is also described as “a Japanese poem of seventeen syllables, in three lines of five, seven, and five, traditionally evoking … click below for more ↓

More Musings on Shakespeare

2021-05-07 2021-05-08 Literature / Shakespeare / ShakespeareOne Comment

The Complete Pelican Shakespeare (edited by Stephen Orgel and A. R. Braunmuller, Penguin Books, 2002) has a short but insightful essay on the texts of Shakespeare that illustrates the choices editors have made when dealing with the texts they want to present their version to the public. It uses a single, well-known verse from Romeo and Juliet (Act 2, Sc.2, lines 40-44 in the Pelican and many other editions) in which Juliet speaks: What’s Montague? it is nor hand, nor foot, Nor arm, nor face, nor any other part Belonging to a man. O, be some other name! What’s in … click below for more ↓

Killing Commendatore

2021-04-21 2021-04-21 Books & Reviews / Literature / What I'm Reading NowLeave a comment

I’ve been a fan of Haruki Murakami’s novels for several, recent years, and have read nine or ten of them already. Those I’ve read have all fit into the category of “magical realism”; a style of fiction that was made famous by Latin American authors like Gabriel García Márquez (you would have encountered this in his bestselling book, 100 years of Solitude).* It’s a technique of writing where the imagined, or the fantastic enters the mundane world and is treated as natural. Or as Britannica notes: … the matter-of-fact inclusion of fantastic or mythical elements into seemingly realistic fiction. I … click below for more ↓

The Penguin Classics Book

2020-08-22 2020-08-22 Books & Reviews / Books about books / Literature / What I'm Reading NowLeave a comment

Did you know there is a card game played in Japan at the New Year, called uta-garuta, where 100 cards have a full poem on each — traditionally taken from their classical poets — and another 100 have just the final line. Players take turn reading the poem from the deck, while the others race to find its concluding line from the cards with the final lines. I didn’t until I read about it on page 111 of The Penguin Classics Book, by Henry Eliot. (I think that’s a wonderful game idea and wish someone would do a similar game … click below for more ↓

The Long Read part 2

2020-05-10 2020-05-10 Books & Reviews / Classics / Literature / What I'm Reading NowLeave a comment

In my previous post I wrote about reading during the lockdown, particularly delving into some longer reads like War and Peace. This time gives us ample opportunity to tackle books that may have daunted us before. And, as I previously wrote, some of these are my ‘books-to-read-upon-retirement’ titles. Well, I recently finished War and Peace and still think it’s worth tackling, although I also believe Tolstoy could have benefitted from a more parsimonious editor (speaking as a former book, magazine, and newspaper editor) The story is full of drama, passion, war, and romance, but he all-too-often meandered from the plot … click below for more ↓

Thoreau and Buddhism

2019-07-04 2019-07-04 Buddhism / Classics / Classics / Literature / Philosophy2 Comments

In his introduction to Thoreau: Walden and Other Writings (Bantam Books, 1962-1981), Joseph Wood Krutch described Henry David Thoreau’s writings as having four “distinct subjects”, which I paraphrase somewhat as: The life of quiet desperation most men live; The economic fallacy that is responsible for their condition The delights yielded from a simple life close to Nature, and The higher laws which people intuitively realize from a gentle life in Nature. These appear similar in form to the ‘Four Noble Truths’ of Buddhist philosophy: Life means suffering The origin of suffering is attachment. The cessation of suffering is attainable. The … click below for more ↓

Gilgamesh four thousand years later

2019-01-02 2019-01-02 Classics / Culture / Fables / Legends & Myths / Literature / Translations & translatingOne Comment

Gilgamesh continues to enthrall us, even after more than 100 years of translations and interpretations. The story continues to be told and retold and even re-imagined. There’s even a children’s version of the tale. You can read a version here, in PDF format or an online version here.Translations and transliterations (if you know your Akkadian…) are here. There was likely an oral version shared even before writing was invented – if you really want to know what that might have sounded like, listen to some modern recordings of old Babylonian poetry here. Gilgamesh is not simply humankind’s earliest written legend … click below for more ↓

Dictionary vs Dictionary.com

2018-12-01 2018-12-01 Books & Reviews / Daily life / Internet & Social Media / Literature / Musings / Personal Reminiscences / Reading & Literacy / Style & usage / TV / What I'm Reading Now / Words & etymologyLeave a comment

Did you know that doxastic is a philosophical adjective relating to an individual’s beliefs? Or that doxorubicin was an antibiotic used in treating leukemia? Or that doxy is a 16th century word for mistress and prostitute? That drack is Australian slang for unattractive or dreary? Drabble means to make wet and dirty in muddy water? A downwarp is a broad depression in the earth’s surface? Drail is a weighted fish hook? Dragonnade means quartering troops on a population while dragonet is a small fish but a dragoman is an interpreter? That a dramaturge is a literary editor on a theatre … click below for more ↓

Found in translation

2018-03-21 2023-02-21 Books & Reviews / Literature / Poetry & Lyrics / What I'm Reading Now3 Comments

Language translation fascinates me. It’s a mix of language skill, art, interpretation, science and, apparently, divination. Maybe even magic. Going from one language into another is far from a simple step of swapping words in dictionary manner – Flaubert’s le mot juste. Any fool can do that. Hell, even Google can. A single word can be a fulcrum, and the decision to use one word instead of another can utterly change the meaning. I wrote about this in The Municipal Machiavelli. The translator’s choice of even a single word – in that case the choice between the English words ruin … click below for more ↓

Malory then and now

2018-03-01 2018-06-24 Books & Reviews / Language & Grammar / Literature / Translations & translating / Typography / What I'm Reading Now / Words & etymologyLeave a comment

I recently started reading Malory in the original – that is, the language that Caxton printed in. Not the typeface Caxton used, since that would be harder to read, but rendered in a modern serif face. Caxton initially used black letter type (aka gothic) – pretty much all the early printers used it, although each printer had his own dies and styles. However, he did move to a more easily-read, more-rounded typeface by around 1490, a few years after he printed Malory’s book. Still, the early typefaces used in all incunabula take a bit more mental effort to decipher because … click below for more ↓

Reading as a forgotten art

2018-02-21 2018-02-21 Books & Reviews / Culture / Literature / Media / Reading & Literacy / TV / What I'm Reading NowLeave a comment

Earlier this month (February, 2018), the Globe & Mail published an essay by author Michael Harris titled, “I have forgotten how to read.” In it, he recounted how he recently tried to read a single chapter of a book, but failed. Frustrated, instead turned to TV: Paragraphs swirled; sentences snapped like twigs; and sentiments bled out. The usual, these days. I drag my vision across the page and process little. Half an hour later, I throw down the book and watch some Netflix. Which, I think, is the poor choice of alternatives. Giving up doesn’t improve the skill set or … click below for more ↓

Does poetry make things happen in 2018?

2018-01-18 2018-02-06 Arts / Culture / Literature / Poetry & Lyrics / PoliticsLeave a comment

I was thinking about how little poets seem to matter to modern political administrations. Maybe to modern society as a whole. Their light has, it seems, been waning for several decades as our collective attention shifts. I was thinking about what an odd, awkward fit it would be for a poet to be invited to today’s anti-literacy White House. Would he or she have to start each conversation with the question “Have you read…” dreading the answer would be a blank stare, a silent shake of the head and the turning of eyes to smartphones and TVs blaring Faux News. … click below for more ↓

Collingwood’s first post-literate council

2017-10-05 2017-10-05 Collingwood / Council / Ethics and behaviour / Literature / Planning & Policies / Poetry & Lyrics / Political fads / Reading & Literacy2 Comments

At the Corporate & Community Services standing committee meeting this week, the committee discussed the Art on the Street festival, its operation and management to be taken over by the BIA. That’s probably a good thing because any affinity to culture and cultural events at the council table evaporated early this term. A cup of yogurt has more culture in it than The Block has. The whole ‘cultural economy’ thing and all the benefits that cultural tourism can bring has simply flown away this term.* That report led to a discussion of a local Word on the Street festival, a … click below for more ↓