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From 1999-2001, while living in London, I would go on epic, overambitious book-buying sprees, telling myself I was heading into town to “write in a cafe” only to return with bags laden with books from the hipper end of the US literary canon, perhaps hoping that the sheer fact that I owned them would turn me into the writer I wanted to be. When I think of the way my book shelves looked when I was 23, I realise they perhaps were no more about me than they were about a stranger I subconsciously imagined would one day visit my house. This stranger was an uncommon combination of extremely tasteful, hugely judgmental and ridiculously attractive.
I waited very patiently for this stranger for quite a while, only for the finicky bastard not to show. Somewhere along the way, I became a more honest book owner: I now know that nine times out of 10 I’ll enjoy a book about a dysfunctional family or the comedies of small-town American life more than I will one about a drug addict or rock star. I don’t hold on to books I didn’t enjoy – even those that critical wisdom told me I “should” have – and I no longer keep a copy of Gravity’s Rainbow around the house for hypothetical purposes.
"- 1 month ago
- 9
"The main thing is to shun lies, all forms of lies, lies to yourself in particular. Keep a watch on your lies and study them every hour, every minute. Also shun disdain, both for others and for yourself; that which appears to you foul within yourself is cleansed by the very fact of your having noticed it in you. Also shun fear, although fear is only the consequence of any kind of lying. Never be daunted by your own lack of courage in the attainment of love, nor be over-daunted even by your bad actions in this regard. I regret I can say nothing more cheerful to you, for in comparison to fanciful love, active love is a cruel and frightening thing. Fanciful love thirsts for a quick deed, swiftly accomplished, and that everyone should gaze upon it. In such cases the point really is reached where people are even willing to give their lives just as long as the whole thing does not last an eternity but is swiftly achieved, as on the stage, and as long as everyone is watching and praising. Active love, on the other hand, involves work and self-mastery."
- 2 months ago
- 31
an interlude from the curator
“I’ve always had a soft spot for London, the patched and tattered cloak of its history, its dog-eared wisdom and inky humour. You know – you provincial British humans know – what it’s like when you crack under the weight of lost love or ingested desire and Move to London: the city’s ready for you. You take your precious miseries there and unpack them – only to find that the city’s already assimilated them, centuries ago, along with grand Elizabethan passions and mortal Victorian sins. The assimilation’s encoded now – in the chemistry lab colours of the Underground map, in Trafalgar’s punk pigeons, in the thousands of ticking stilettos and caffeine yawns and downed pints and adulterous snogs. You turn up on a rainy Monday afternoon proud of all your woeful particulars – and London humbles you with its wealth of generals. You’ve seen your life. London, it turns out, has seen Life.” – Glen Duncan, ‘I, Lucifer’.
As of yesterday naranzarian has, indeed, Moved to London. [For mirror-worlders, read: New York was taken.] A weekend spent marvelling at the diversity and architectural wonder of the city and the sudden impoverishment of the wallet has given way to curiosities in other directions. I am going to defy the assumption that Tumblr is populated solely by 15-year old Gaga-worshipping existentialist Mid-Westerners and imagine that at least some among you hundreds of captivating aesthetes hail from or are acquainted with this city of infinite regress. If you are so inclined, please do inundate with suggestions of accommodation, flâneurian insights, solicitations, fey warnings and recriminations, as I am at quite a loss as to what to do with the place: ask.
- 8 months ago
- 4
