literary jukebox

One who tries to stand on tiptoe cannot stand still. One who...

Thu, 23 May 2013 21:58:00 -0400

One who tries to stand on tiptoe cannot stand still. One who stretches his legs too far cannot walk. One who advertises himself too much is ignored. One who is too insistent on his own view finds few to agree with him. One who claims too much credit does not get even what he deserves. One who is too proud is soon humiliated. These are condemned as extremes of greediness and self-destructive activity. Therefore, one who acts naturally avoids such extremes.

Those who know do not speak;

Those who speak do not know.

Stop your senses: Let sharp things be blunted,

Tangles resolved, The light tempered

And turmoil subdued;

For this mystic unity in which the wise man is moved

Neither by affection,

Nor yet be estrangement

Or profit or loss

Or honor or shame.

Accordingly, by all the world,

He is held highest.

Lao Tzu in The Way of Life: Tao Te Ching

Song: “I Wasn’t Born to Follow” by Beth Orton

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The world is the closed door. It is a barrier. And at the same...

Wed, 22 May 2013 00:08:26 -0400

The world is the closed door. It is a barrier. And at the same time it is the way through.

Two prisoners whose cells adjoin communicate with each other by knocking on the wall. The wall is the thing which separates them but it is also their means of communication. … Every separation is a link.

Simone Weil in Gravity and Grace

Song: “Concrete Walls” by Fever Ray

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The inferno of the living is not something that will be; if...

Tue, 21 May 2013 08:37:00 -0400

The inferno of the living is not something that will be; if there is one, it is what is already here, the inferno where we live every day, that we form by being together. There are two ways to escape suffering it. The first is easy for many: accept the inferno and become such a part of it that you can no longer see it. The second is risky and demands constant vigilance and apprehension: seek and learn to recognize who and what, in the midst of inferno, are not inferno, then make them endure, give them space.

Italo Calvino in Invisible Cities

Song: “Living Hell” by Morcheeba

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The grand scheme of a life, maybe (just maybe), is not about...

Fri, 17 May 2013 11:51:00 -0400

The grand scheme of a life, maybe (just maybe), is not about knowing or not knowing, choosing or not choosing. Perhaps what is truly known can’t be described or articulated by creativity or logic, science or art — but perhaps it can be described by the most authentic and meaningful combination of the two: poetry: As Robert Frost wrote, a poem “begins as a lump in the throat, a sense of wrong, a homesickness, a lovesickness. It is never a thought to begin with.”

I recommend the following course of action for those who are just beginning their careers or for those like me, who may be reconfiguring midway through: heed the words of Robert Frost. Start with a big, fat lump in your throat, start with a profound sense of wrong, a deep homesickness, or a crazy lovesickness, and run with it.

Debbie Millman in Look Both Ways: Illustrated Essays on the Intersection of Life and Design

Song: “Satisfy Your Soul” by Jamie Leonhart

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Poetry is above all a concentration of the power of language,...

Thu, 16 May 2013 16:40:57 -0400

Poetry is above all a concentration of the power of language, which is the power of our ultimate relationship to everything in the universe.

Adrienne Rich (May 16, 1929 — March 27, 2012) in Language and Liberation: Feminism, Philosophy, and Language

Song: “Find Me the Pulse of the Universe” by Laetitia Sadier

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The relation of art to life is of the first importance...

Tue, 14 May 2013 09:42:56 -0400

The relation of art to life is of the first importance especially in a skeptical age since, in the absence of a belief in God, the mind turns to its own creations and examines them, not alone from the aesthetic point of view, but for what they reveal, for what they validate and invalidate, for the support that they give.

Wallace Stevens in Opus Posthumous: Poems, Plays, Prose (1957)

Song: “Faith” by Room Eleven

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We absolutely must leave room for doubt or there is no progress...

Sat, 11 May 2013 13:10:00 -0400

We absolutely must leave room for doubt or there is no progress and there is no learning. There is no learning without having to pose a question. And a question requires doubt. People search for certainty. But there is no certainty. People are terrified — how can you live and not know? It is not odd at all. You only think you know, as a matter of fact. And most of your actions are based on incomplete knowledge and you really don’t know what it is all about, or what the purpose of the world is, or know a great deal of other things. It is possible to live and not know.

Richard Feynman (May 11, 1918 - February 15, 1988) in The Pleasure of Finding Things Out

Song: “Beauty of Uncertainty” by KT Tunstall

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I am a frayed and nibbled survivor in a fallen world, and I am...

Fri, 10 May 2013 08:26:00 -0400

I am a frayed and nibbled survivor in a fallen world, and I am getting along. I am aging and eaten and have done my share of eating too. I am not washed and beautiful, in control of a shining world in which everything fits, but instead am wandering awed about on a splintered wreck I’ve come to care for, whose gnawed trees breathe a delicate air, whose bloodied and scarred creatures are my dearest companions, and whose beauty beats and shines not in its imperfections but overwhelmingly in spite of them, under the wind-rent clouds, upstream and down.

Annie Dillard in Pilgrim at Tinker Creek

Song: “Ageless Beauty” by Stars

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Cyberspace. A consensual hallucination experienced daily by...

Tue, 07 May 2013 23:33:00 -0400

Cyberspace. A consensual hallucination experienced daily by billions of legitimate operators, in every nation, by children being taught mathematical concepts… A graphic representation of data abstracted from banks of every computer in the human system. Unthinkable complexity. Lines of light ranged in the nonspace of the mind, clusters and constellations of data. Like city lights, receding…

William Gibson, coining the term “cyberspace” in Neuromancer (1984)

Song: “Atlas” by Battles

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I wonder if the snow loves the trees and fields, that it kisses...

Mon, 06 May 2013 13:02:00 -0400

I wonder if the snow loves the trees and fields, that it kisses them so gently? And then it covers them up snug, you know, with a white quilt; and perhaps it says “Go to sleep, darlings, till the summer comes again.”

Lewis Carroll in Through the Looking-Glass, and What Alice Found There

Song: “Seasons Song” by KaiserCartel

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There is one old chum that never goes back on me, my other self,...

Fri, 03 May 2013 08:46:08 -0400

There is one old chum that never goes back on me, my other self, my friend — my work. How good it is to stand before the bench with a tool in my hand and then saw and cut, plane, shave, carve, put in a peg, file, twist and turn the strong fine stuff, which resists yet yields — soft smooth walnut, as soft to my fingers as fairy flesh; the rosy bodies or brown limbs of our wood-nymphs which the hatchet has stripped of their robe. There is no pleasure like the accurate hand, the clever big fingers which can turn out the most fragile works of art, no pleasure like the thought which rules over the forces of the world, and writes the ordered caprices of its rich imagination on wood, iron, and stone. … To serve my art the elves of sap push out the fair limbs of the trees, lengthen and fatten them until they are polished fit for my caresses. My hands are docile workmen, directed by their foreman, my old brain here, and he plays the game as I like it, for is he not my servant too? Was ever man better served than I?

Colas Breugnon, Dmitry Kabalevsky character cited in The Art of Helping People Out of Trouble (1924)

Song: “Master’s Hands” by Charlotte Gainsbourg

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We think of it as a sort of traffic accident of the heart. It is...

Wed, 01 May 2013 14:58:36 -0400

We think of it as a sort of traffic accident of the heart. It is an emotion that scares us more than cruelty, more than violence, more than hatred. We allow ourselves to be foiled by the vagueness of the word. After all, love requires the utmost vulnerability. We equip someone with freshly sharpened knives; strip naked; then invite him to stand close. What could be scarier?

Diane Ackerman in A Natural History of Love

Song: “Knife Going In” by Tegan & Sara

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Poetry is the breath and finer spirit of all knowledge; it is...

Tue, 30 Apr 2013 09:41:07 -0400

Poetry is the breath and finer spirit of all knowledge; it is the impassioned expression which is in the countenance of all Science.

William Wordsworth in The Harvard Classics: Prefaces and Prologues to Famous Books

Song: “To a Poet” by First Aid Kit

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Diego: Nothing compares to your hands, nothing like the...

Fri, 26 Apr 2013 09:19:50 -0400

Diego:

Nothing compares to your hands, nothing like the green-gold of your eyes. My body is filled with you for days and days. you are the mirror of the night. the violent flash of lightning. the dampness of the earth. The hollow of your armpits is my shelter. my fingers touch your blood. All my joy is to feel life spring from your flower-fountain that mine keeps to fill all the paths of my nerves which are yours.

Frida Kahlo in The Diary of Frida Kahlo: An Intimate Self-Portrait

Song: “Nothing Compares 2 U” by Sinéad O’Connor

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A master in the art of living draws no sharp distinction between...

Tue, 23 Apr 2013 11:36:27 -0400

A master in the art of living draws no sharp distinction between his work and his play; his labor and his leisure; his mind and his body; his education and his recreation. He hardly knows which is which. He simply pursues his vision of excellence through whatever he is doing, and leaves others to determine whether he is working or playing. To himself, he always appears to be doing both.

François-René de Chateaubriand, quoted in Roman Krznaric’s How to Find Fulfilling Work

Song: “Play on Little Children” by Dan Dyer

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Often what we, looking at a life from without, may think is...

Sun, 21 Apr 2013 13:48:00 -0400

Often what we, looking at a life from without, may think is trouble may not be trouble at all, but only a different way of living from that which we prefer. … It may be that an individual may willingly endure handicaps in his personal life because other things are more important to him. That sometimes is the price of genius. It is frequently through the storm and the stress of unfulfilled emotion, through trouble and unhappiness, that the great achievements of art and science are attained.

Karl De Schweinitz in The Art of Helping People Out of Trouble (1924)

Song: “Genius” by Inara George

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The power of preserving silence is the very first requisite to...

Thu, 18 Apr 2013 09:59:29 -0400

The power of preserving silence is the very first requisite to all who wish to shine, or even please in discourse; and those who cannot preserve it, have really no business to speak. … The silence that, without any deferential air, listens with polite attention, is more flattering than compliments, and more frequently broken for the purpose of encouraging others to speak, than to display the listener’s own powers. This is the really eloquent silence. It requires great genius—more perhaps than speaking—and few are gifted with the talent.

Arthur Martine in Martine’s Hand-book of Etiquette, and Guide to True Politeness (1866)

Song: “Enjoy the Silence” by Scala & Kolacny Brothers

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The only real science is the knowledge of how a person should...

Tue, 16 Apr 2013 12:16:39 -0400

The only real science is the knowledge of how a person should live his life. And this knowledge is open to everyone.

Leo Tolstoy in A Calendar of Wisdom

Song: “Don’t Want to Know” by John Martyn

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CUSHION FIRST When all your days are dark with doubt; And...

Sun, 14 Apr 2013 13:14:51 -0400

CUSHION FIRST

When all your days are dark with doubt;

And drying hope is at its worst;

When all life’s balls are scattered wide,

With not a shot in sight, to left or right,

Don’t give it up;

Advance your cue and shut your eyes,

And take the cushion first.

Mark Twain in On the Poetry of Mark Twain with Selections from His Verse

Song: “Don’t Give Up The Fight” by The Magic Numbers

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We live in a society where romantic love is idealized: if we...

Fri, 12 Apr 2013 09:30:15 -0400

We live in a society where romantic love is idealized: if we search long enough, we will find “the one,” the soulmate who is perfect for us, who will grow and change at the exact same rate we do, who loves us exactly as we are and never expects us to change, who always wants us sexually, never has bad breath or gets grouchy, and is perfectly desirable in every way. We expect our partner to fully meet us on an intellectual, physical, sexual, and spiritual basis; to be our lover, best friend, a companion, confidante, confessor, therapist, and family, all rolled into one. This sets up monumental expectations which all of us invariably fall short of.

Laura Davis in Allies in Healing

Song: “Love Is Everything” by Jane Siberry

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