The Floating Library

“We must not inquire too curiously into motives,” he interposed, in his measured way. “Miss Brooke knows that they are apt to become feeble in the utterance: the aroma is mixed with the grosser air. We must keep the germinating grain away from the light.” – George Eliot, Middlemarch

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[Any book or work of art] which acts subversively on our future or strikes at the root of German thought, the German home and the driving forces of our people [should be destroyed]. – Joseph Goebbels   In an open square across from the University of Berlin, 20,000 books were burned in a huge bonfire. [...]

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by Francesca Mari theparisreview I knew a kid in college who wanted so desperately to produce a book that he couldn’t stand the sight of their spines. He stacked them—ten or so brown and black books, library hardcovers—in his dorm room, titles to the wall, lips facing forward. He didn’t really buy books, either—at least [...]

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There are three rules for writing a novel. Unfortunately, no one knows what they are. — W. Somerset Maugham That isn’t writing at all, it’s typing. — Truman Capote If the writing is honest it cannot be separated from the man who wrote it. — Tennessee Williams Sometimes when I think how good my book [...]

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There is a cult of ignorance in the United States, and there has always been. The strain of anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that “my ignorance is just as good as your knowledge”. –  Isaac Asimov

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Humor is laughing at what you haven’t got when you ought to have it. – Langston Hughes A smile is the shortest distance between two people. – Victor Borge

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Our culture peculiarly honors the act of blaming, which it takes as the sign of virtue and intellect. – Lionel Trilling

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A West Virginia college student is suing his fraternity, alleging that he fell off a deck when a drunken frat brother fired a bottle rocket out of his own anus. Louis Helmburg III alleges that Travis Hughes’s bottle-rocket stunt so startled him that he jumped back and fell. “Firing bottle rockets out of one’s anus,” [...]

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Work on one thing at a time until finished. Start no more new books, add no more new material to “Black Spring.” Don’t be nervous. Work calmly, joyously, recklessly on whatever is in hand. Work according to Program and not according to mood. Stop at the appointed time! When you can’t create you can work. Cement a little [...]

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Glenn Gould, Goldberg Variations 1-7

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by Michael Castleman psychologytoday From media reports, one might infer that Catholic priests commit most pedophilia. In fact, only a tiny fraction of child sex abusers are priests. We know who the pedophiles are from the National Sexual Health Survey (NSHS), a large, comprehensive study of American sexuality based on in-depth interviews in 1996 with a representative sample [...]

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by Alice Dreger psychologytoday I thought about holding off on this post until the next time somebody in the news declares that gay men are to blame for the sexual abuse of children. I’d probably only have to wait a couple of weeks at most. But I’ve decided to go ahead and put this research [...]

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What would Socrates say? All those Greeks were homosexuals. Boy, they must have had some wild parties. I bet they all took a house together in Crete for the summer. A: Socrates is a man. B: All men are mortal. C: All men are Socrates. That means all men are homosexuals. – Woody Allen, Love and [...]

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