tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2526736757651414061.post5054163095503141293..comments2024-03-29T10:02:55.374+00:00Comments on Nigeness: Brit's Back PagesNigehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13314891387515045404noreply@blogger.comBlogger11125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2526736757651414061.post-66301958188695360512009-04-28T07:29:00.000+01:002009-04-28T07:29:00.000+01:00Wonderful post, Nige. I find that, at age 50, I am...Wonderful post, Nige. I find that, at age 50, I am, for the first time, traveling back to my earlier reading (and looking - let's not forget the visual arts, which is after all my professional specialty) self and ruminating on the then vs. now. I remember thinking when I was 20 or so that the two greatest painters were Vermeer and Rothko. That the greatest novelists were Proust and Nabokov. So now, at my ripe age, I'm moved to go back and re-read, or re-look, just as an excercise in seeing how I've changed, or where I've been. And, actually, I'm slightly more charmed by my former than by my current self, but this is likely only because I am 50. By 51, it will pass. Self-acceptance and all that.Francis Morronehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08532514088583081142noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2526736757651414061.post-73404381907472537582009-04-27T19:55:00.000+01:002009-04-27T19:55:00.000+01:00i thought by the time i was 30 i'd read most of wh...i thought by the time i was 30 i'd read most of what was worth reading, and at least knew about the ones i hadn't yet got round to - one of the delights of Kurp's blog is coming across names i hadn't even heard of before, e.g. Guy Davenport, Cynthia Ozick, William Gass.<br /><br />i'm in the process of trying to massively cull my possessions. It is sobering to reflect how many of my books are carry-overs from when i was younger.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2526736757651414061.post-46534651613439772482009-04-27T16:44:00.000+01:002009-04-27T16:44:00.000+01:00Thanks for the link Dave (I'd love to have a Herbe...Thanks for the link Dave (I'd love to have a Herbert Spencer cigarette card! He was also popular enough to become a euphemism for hell, as in 'A Herbert Spencer of a day')... And for yr vision of Hell's library Will, an intriguing idea... And thanks veryone else.Nigehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13314891387515045404noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2526736757651414061.post-64800122793162777682009-04-27T15:05:00.000+01:002009-04-27T15:05:00.000+01:00Back in my drinking days I knew quite a few people...Back in my drinking days I knew quite a few people who seemed to read the same books they had always read over and over. Anything else you brought to their attention was judged by the standard of those few books - and of course found wanting.Frank Wilsonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/18410473158808750903noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2526736757651414061.post-20683958727916621652009-04-27T14:52:00.000+01:002009-04-27T14:52:00.000+01:00Your usual insightful commentary, Nige. Yes, the p...Your usual insightful commentary, Nige. Yes, the purpose of education should be to make the student an auto-didact. Once you know how to read and enjoy it, you'll begin hunting down your own interests, reinforcing some, discarding others, finding new ones. <br /><br />I read a lot of crap in grad school -- all of which (except maybe Foucault) can be happily thrown out. The theorese of the '80s was truly awful stuff. No Edmund Wilson or G.K. Chesterton in my generation, just a lot of hip Marxists who couldn't write a clear sentence to save their lives.<br /><br />Now reading the new Colm Toibin and much enjoying it. Makes me want to go to Ireland....Susan B.noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2526736757651414061.post-13864490017209041382009-04-27T14:01:00.000+01:002009-04-27T14:01:00.000+01:00"Once upon a time philosopher, psychologist, and s..."Once upon a time philosopher, psychologist, and sociologist Herbert Spencer (1823-1903) was popular and respectable enough to feature on <A HREF="http://wirkman.net/wordpress/?p=809" REL="nofollow">cigarette trading cards</A>."Dave Lullhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01053227199985293516noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2526736757651414061.post-72158493928898245512009-04-27T13:21:00.000+01:002009-04-27T13:21:00.000+01:00Imagine if you were forced by some ungodly law to ...Imagine if you were forced by some ungodly law to keep every book you had ever read on display.<br /><br />My library of horrors from my early years would begin with such gems as Willard Price, moving on to the literary wonders of James Herbert, Steven King, Eric Van Lustbader and the inestimable Sven Hassel to name but a few. Luckily at about the age of 14-15 I read an obscure but beautiful eco-philosophy book called 'The Worm Forgives the Plough' by John Stewart Collis and it set me on track to the love of great literature that I have today.<br /><br />If I was still reading Sven Hassel, you would have my full permission to try me for nazi book crimeswillhttp://www.ruminantics.blogspot.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2526736757651414061.post-61355138051771033322009-04-27T13:04:00.000+01:002009-04-27T13:04:00.000+01:00Most of the best things I've read since graduation...Most of the best things I've read since graduation have been blogs (including Nigeness) and blog commenters.Brithttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00390560583798960760noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2526736757651414061.post-59242675014509910022009-04-27T12:59:00.000+01:002009-04-27T12:59:00.000+01:00The best stuff I've read since graduation includes...The best stuff I've read since graduation includes:-<br />Orwell (essays and so on)<br />Larkin<br />Hayek<br />Darwin<br /><br />and three histories - Rackham on the Countryside, Rhodes on the Making of the Atom Bomb, and Rubinstein on The Myth of Rescue.deariemenoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2526736757651414061.post-87394973458582157002009-04-27T11:42:00.000+01:002009-04-27T11:42:00.000+01:00...and my lovingly crafted comment I made already ......and my lovingly crafted comment I made already has now disappeared :(willhttp://www.ruminantics.blogspot.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2526736757651414061.post-30674345205391803042009-04-27T10:09:00.000+01:002009-04-27T10:09:00.000+01:00By the way, to anyone wondering why this post appa...By the way, to anyone wondering why this post apparently made its first appearance 6 days ago - so am I. Something similar happened with another recent one, but that was worked up from an older draft, so I could understand that - this one, clearly, was new today, so how did that happen? A mystifying place, the blogosphere...Nigehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13314891387515045404noreply@blogger.com