a mere woman

"Here's an interesting piece of ephemera, also involving Schocken, Hannah Arendt, and Kafka- this is the letter in which Arendt has Mr. Schocken personally take on the 'Kafka Kerfuffle' (as I am now calling it) because, once again, the person in question (Kurt Wolff!) doesn't want to do business with her, a mere editor (and one suspects, a mere woman as well)."

this is a marvelous, especially when read in full.

just go, now, if you can. it is via jacket mechanical, the

exceedingly fine blog of peter mendelsund.

i am truly hoping that mr. mendelsund is the one who will be redesigning the hannah arendt backlist. i started to read some of her work on the plane home, and it was only a small book i'd picked up as a gift for someone, and i think i got a little chocolate (not much, just a little, really. but darn) on it & the only thing is it was a white cover and beautiful and of course i needed to fess up when delivering the very small but hard-to-part-with gift. anyway, i hope to be reading far more arendt soon. encountering her again- so quickly after the chocolate on the plane mishap- in mr. m's magnificent blog was just too much not to pass on to you, my beloved reader. (who on earth has the patience to read a blog these days, if it is not one of the greats? i begin to wonder. well. i've always wondered.) so, if you stuck around long enough to read this probably soon to disappear blurb, thanks. really.

(did i once say i would only blog on sundays during lent? let's have this count as sunday. tomorrow is sunday, too. who knows?)

and, should i keep my lenten promise, the blogs on the right side of the page, just click them. they are always fine reads, true inspiration. that is what i mean when i mention the greats, those are some. pictures to the links sometimes seem to grow and grow, which is fine, but my technical expertise seems not to. how does one tame this part of blogger? if only i knew. (i do truly believe that code is poetry. if only i could write either!)

creamsicle logic

in the meantime: here's what

i saw as we blew out of town.

it was a joy.

i shall wear the bottoms of my trousers rolled

And would it have been worth it, after all,
After the cups, the marmalade, the tea,
Among the porcelain, among some talk of you and me,
Would it have been worth while,
To have bitten off the matter with a smile,
To have squeezed the universe into a ball
To roll it toward some overwhelming question,
To say: “I am Lazarus, come from the dead,
Come back to tell you all, I shall tell you all”—
If one, settling a pillow by her head,
Should say: “That is not what I meant at all.
That is not it, at all.”

And would it have been worth it, after all,
Would it have been worth while,
After the sunsets and the dooryards and the sprinkled streets,
After the novels, after the teacups, after the skirts that trail along the floor—
And this, and so much more?—
It is impossible to say just what I mean!
But as if a magic lantern threw the nerves in patterns on a screen:
Would it have been worth while
If one, settling a pillow or throwing off a shawl,
And turning toward the window, should say:
“That is not it at all,
That is not what I meant, at all.”

No! I am not Prince Hamlet, nor was meant to be;
Am an attendant lord, one that will do
To swell a progress, start a scene or two,
Advise the prince; no doubt, an easy tool,
Deferential, glad to be of use,
Politic, cautious, and meticulous;
Full of high sentence, but a bit obtuse;
At times, indeed, almost ridiculous—
Almost, at times, the Fool...

love this collection.

have loved j. alfred

since i met him

in professor hanna's

class, c. 1977.

(sue hanna taught me more

about words than i

did imagine at the time)

this?

it's a departure, i

suppose, from the past,

but it also hearkens

back. like all

great collections that

will be remembered,

it looks forward.

i don't really read fashion

press (did for many years)

anymore, just know what

i like. that's that. i can only

imagine what's been said

about all of this.

well. i think this

is one for history,

a game changer.

that's my vote.

The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock

Eliot, T.S.

1917

images: chanel + vogue + pgt

up the down staircase

quite an entrance

watery dominion

this might be

just the thing

if

if one were to go back again and

again there would still be no end

to the wonderment here

Hackesche Höfe,

Golem Kollektion

love and thanks to B :)

three

ways to look at gray

light. dust. snow.