Borges on the will
‘You have spoken of the will,’ I said. ‘In the tales of the Mabinogion, two kings play chess on the summit of a hill, while below them their warriors fight.…
Category: commonplace book
“Sleeping, as we all know, is the most secret of our acts.”
Sleeping, as we all know, is the most secret of our acts. We devote a third of our lives to it, and yet do not understand it. For some, it…
Betty Corrigall
From First Known When Lost Betty Corrigall lived on the island of Hoy in Orkney in the 18th century. When she was in her late twenties, she was abandoned by her…
From “LA*HWI*NE*SKI: Career of an Eccentric Naturalist” by John Jeremiah Sullivan
That’s what’s so terrifying but also heroic in Rafinesque, to know he could see that far, function at that outer-orbital a level intellectually, yet still wind up viciously hobbled by…
From “The Mark of the Horse Lord”, Rosemary Sutcliff
At first he had been wild with loathing of his new life, but in four years it had become part of him, so that whether he hated or loved it…
From “The Spire”, William Golding
So he sat, watching the armies of sparks that wandered through the fire. He spoke sometimes, but not to Father Adam. ‘Yet it still stands.’ Then he moaned and rocked…
Thor Hanson on cultural perception of time
Living in Africa, I soon came to realise that impatience may be an entirely Western phenomenon. Ugandans approach time from a fundamentally different perspective, not as a commodity to be…
“The sea that is always counting.”
And her Achilles went to make amends, Walking alone beside the broken lace that hung Over the sea’s green fist. The sea that is always counting. Christopher Logue, “Pax”, from War…
Séamus Sweeney 