Don’t let the plot get in the way of the story.”
— Anon.
Tag: reviews
Critiques answer the question, “Is it art?” Reviews answer, “Is it good?”
First Graf: Torah
(BE HONEST — YOU MUST HAVE known I’d get around to this one eventually, right?) I make no rigid claims of authenticity, accuracy, or authorship for this work. As far as I’m concerned, this is “simply” a collection of ancient…
First Graf: The Dharma Bums
IN MANY WAYS, THIS 1958 book is better than the earlier On the Road. Kerouac’s signature stream-of-consciousness narrative style is more flowy, and the novel’s lionized centerperson (poet Gary Snyder, or “Japhy Ryder” as tDB calls him) a more noble…
First Graf (well, page): Harold and the Purple Crayon
THE FIRST BOOK I EVER read from cover to cover was Crockett Johnson’s 1955 work, Harold and the Purple Crayon. If you’re not familiar with it, it goes like this: A small boy in one-piece pajamas draws with, well, purple…
Metaphoraging Roundup: 2019
AND SO THE CIRCLE TURNS again, one more orbit of the Earth ’round the Sun; meaning it’s time for the media’s year-end lookbacks — a conceit from which The Metaphorager is not immune. As of this writing (two weeks ago),…
First Graf: The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes
ACTUALLY, SINCE T.A.o.S.H. IS THE first published collection of all Sherlock Holmes stories, here is (also) the First Graf of “A Scandal In Bohemia,” being the first of the tales in said collection. It’s unfortunate that Sherlock Holmes has become…
Why I Hate Jay Michaelson
IT’S THAT ANYTHING I CAN do, he can do better. It’s his unaffected, artless prose. It’s his vast non-dualist scholarship and experience. It’s his light touch. It’s his unpretentiousness. It’s that he neither talks down to or over the heads…
5 Thoughts: Informed Appreciation
1. IT’S ONE THING TO LIKE something. It’s something quite else to know why you like it — and how it came to be. 2. “Informed appreciation” is the key to that knowing. Only when you can comprehend the effort,…
“It’s Just That…”
THERE’S A THING — WELL, LET’S call it a verbal placeholder-prefix — used by writers of audiovisual entertainments when they want a character to segue away from or into an awkward conversation. My friends, meet: “It’s just that…” You’ve heard…
First Graf: On the Road
HAVING FIRST (AND LAST) READ this shortly before a 1985-6 cross-country hitchhiking-and-bus-adventure, I’d forgotten how good it was until beginning to read it aloud to The Partner recently. A rollicking, crying-out-for-emulation 1957 work, what strikes me about it now is…
Why I Love: Robert Anton Wilson
IT’S THE WAY HE BLOWS my mind. It’s the way he mixes conviction with doubt. It’s his searingly funny prose. It’s his search for Ultimate Relativity. It’s that he taught me some important Latin phrases, like “Cui bono?” and “Non…
First Graf(s): The Fellowship of the Ring
IF YOU HAVE ONLY SEEN the movie version of The Lord of the Rings trilogy, you are missing out on an extraordinary literary work. Granted, it takes a while to get into — a criticism also (and often) leveled against…