The READIN Family Album
Me and a lorikeet (February 24, 2008)

READIN

Jeremy's journal

The peculiar evil of silencing the expression of an opinion is, that it is robbing the human race; posterity as well as the existing generation; those who dissent from the opinion, still more than those who hold it. If the opinion is right, they are deprived of the opportunity of exchanging error for truth: if wrong, they lose, what is almost as great a benefit, the clearer perception and livelier impression of truth, produced by its collision with error.

John Stuart Mill


(This is a page from my archives)
Front page
More recent posts
Older posts
More posts about:
Senselessness
Horacio Castellanos Moya
Readings

Archives index
Subscribe to RSS

This page renders best in Firefox (or Safari, or Chrome)

🦋 Life and Death

Today I started reading Senselessness -- you can read the first two chapters online at Words without Borders to get a taste of Castellanos Moya's writing style. I am drawn in quickly and easily to his narrator's world.

Castellanos Moya uses a similar style to Saramago's Baroque sentences -- the rhythm and pacing are distinct from Saramago, but I'm not sure yet how to describe the difference beyond saying the author's voice is his own. Chapter II closes with a reference to Quevedo's poem "Prevención para la Vida y para la Muerte":

Si no temo perder lo que poseo,
ni deseo tener lo que no gozo,
poco de la Fortuna en mí el destrozo
valdrá, cuando me elija actor o reo.

Ya su familia reformó el deseo;
no palidez al susto, o risa al gozo
le debe de mi edad el postrer trozo,
ni anhelar a la Parca su rodeo.

Sólo ya el no querer es lo que quiero;
prendas de la alma son las prendas mías;
cobre el puesto la muerte, y el dinero.

A las promesas miro como a espías;
morir al paso de la edad espero:
pues me trujeron, llévenme los días.

posted evening of Friday, January 30th, 2009
➳ More posts about Senselessness
➳ More posts about Horacio Castellanos Moya
➳ More posts about Readings

Respond:

Name:
E-mail:
(will not be displayed)
Link:
Remember info

Drop me a line! or, sign my Guestbook.
    •
Check out Ellen's writing at Patch.com.

What's of interest:

(Other links of interest at my Google+ page. It's recommended!)

Where to go from here...

Friends and Family
Programming
Texts
Music
Woodworking
Comix
Blogs
South Orange
readinsinglepost