This is a collection of three short stories from Melville that I listened to last night. I was telling a colleague at school how seniors in the second semester remind me so much of Bartleby that I felt like I should reread and revisit the story, as it’s been almost ten years since I last saw it. High school seniors in their final semester are often energetic and intense and so ready for the next steps. I know I was (not by my own virtues […]
It’s not a fish, dammit! (Sorry, I needed to get that off my chest.)
I honestly didn’t know what to expect when I started reading Moby Dick. Of course everyone is familiar with Ahab and the Pequod and “Call me Ishmael,” possibly the most famous opening line in American literature. I knew that Starbuck was more than a source for satisfying my frappuccino craving and, thanks to Dana Scully’s ill-fated pomeranian, I knew there was a character called Queequeg, but that was about it. Opening to page 1 of this 135-chapter behemoth, I was pretty much a blank slate. My […]
In which I show once again that I’m probably better suited to popular fiction
I knew a Holly Golightly once. We met in an art class in high school, and went on to be friends in college, before I fell in love with someone else. We would spend time together after class: she taught me that putting my loofah in with the laundry extended its life and kept it cleaner. I accompanied her on a modeling gig, where the artist she posed for belittled me for pronouncing Jean Auguste Dominique Ingres’s name without a proper French accent. She ended […]
Moby-Dick, ten years later
Fun story: I read Moby-Dick for the very first time after I had jaw surgery in the summer of 2004. I was taking an American Literature survey that fall, and I wanted to prepare, especially because I would be pretty much confined to no strenuous physical activity with lots of free time (and sure enough, the most workout I could muster was carrying a stack of books from the library. I read 40-some books that summer alone, and watched countless movies in between my mom […]