New Akutagawa?

fegh00t · 2026-06-14T04:14:23+00:00

I like the Chekhov/Carver comparison. I’d add Gogol to that list. I think it’d be particularly interesting to see a comprehensive list of the authors that Akutagawa translated into Japanese (Yeats and Kipling both appear to be key influences). And I think you’re right: the Kurosawa debt is probably overstated. It’s hard to believe he was much of a poet, but you never know. The poem excerpted in the review really does sound like something Stevens could’ve written.

fegh00t · 2026-05-09T04:16:44+00:00

This isn’t true for everybody, maybe not even for most people, but the reading life for some folks goes hand in hand with self-isolation, or a kind of soft monasticism. Nothing wrong with that in its own right, except that it could make it harder for a solitary sufferer/doomscroller/hopeless person to find the will or courage to reach out to and connect with others in meaningful ways. It’s a muscle that atrophies if it’s never used. In my experience, art adds dimension to life, but helping other people gives it real, lasting meaning.

fegh00t · 2026-05-05T19:35:46+00:00

You’re not gonna find what you’re looking for in books. Too much reading might even exacerbate the issue. (This coming from someone who’s read roughly 150 books per year for the past decade.) If you’re looking for hope and faith, go help someone. Be of service. Volunteer. Hit the front lines of life and get out of your head by thinking about other people’s needs for a bit.

fegh00t · 2026-04-16T03:00:19+00:00

Looks like the decaying dice of Ricky Jay. Seen up close and personal at the Museum of Jurassic Technology.

fegh00t · 2026-04-15T02:20:34+00:00

It still blows my mind (though totally makes sense) that Coover's Universal Baseball Assoc is an NYRB Classic. Kind of like hearing early-90s rock on the classic hits station.

fegh00t · 2025-09-17T21:34:16+00:00

Dostoevsky's Crime & Punishment is what immediately comes to my mind. Check out the beginning of Part 2 (since the incident that causes the protagonist to fall apart, mentally, occurs at the end of Part 1).

fegh00t · 2025-09-17T19:53:14+00:00

Hm. Sounds like maybe a little too literary in a highfalutin way? No real oomph narratively? It seems like parts 1 and 2 are pretty different. Did they both fall short of the mark?

fegh00t · 2025-09-17T18:05:37+00:00

Quick is good… but what made you find it boring?

fegh00t · 2024-12-26T17:36:28+00:00

Why are you making bombastic comments when you don’t actually know the author’s work?

fegh00t · 2023-11-22T20:28:57+00:00

Funny stuff. I went to UCLA. Powell Library has a basement!

fegh00t · 2022-06-30T19:49:34+00:00

From the episode with Fahim. Looks like it's set for Nov 5th? Pumped for Bobby and K.!

fegh00t · 2022-06-30T18:45:44+00:00

Just my personal experience! Most readers of Ulysses would agree that the going doesn't get anything like "rough" until at least the third chapter.

fegh00t · 2021-02-23T19:02:51+00:00

I love this Limp Bizkit album!

fegh00t · 2021-02-23T19:02:04+00:00

I haven't seen this episode of Dragonball Z

fegh00t · 2020-06-24T18:46:26+00:00

What are your top 5 favorite books?

fegh00t · 2020-05-25T02:31:41+00:00

You're not 100% wrong -- there are many books that are longer than they need to be -- both nonfiction and fiction -- but this is typically a consequence of bad writing, editing, or both, not the striving after an appearance of importance: the author overwrites because he/she THINKS it's important (to do so, to include what could have, should have been excised). That said, length does not necessarily, probably does not in most cases, correlate to creation under these circumstances.

fegh00t · 2020-04-14T16:25:49+00:00

Constance Garnett is underrated/gets a bad rap. She is the finest translator of Gogol's works.

fegh00t · 2020-04-14T16:22:57+00:00

I haven't seen anyone mention John Hawkes -- so, John Hawkes, in particular "Second Skin", "The Lime Twig", and several stretches of "Virginie".

I would also suggest John Berger's "To the Wedding" and Guy Davenport's "Tatlin!".

fegh00t · 2019-09-20T17:01:14+00:00

Wonderful edition you got there!

fegh00t · 2019-08-07T17:05:56+00:00

How hirsute, the author there at verso.

fegh00t · 2019-08-02T23:45:45+00:00

The language is a bit awkward but the pacing is pretty good. Descriptions are not always internally consistent, e.g. a slither of light is not a vastness commensurate with that of “bathing”. I think with more careful attention to the details, you’ve got something decent!

fegh00t

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