Ari Bach's Blog, page 24

Umberto Eco, who owned 50,000 books, had this to say about home libraries:

katsdom:

Umberto Eco, who owned 50,000 books, had this to say about home libraries:

“It is foolish to think that you have to read all the books you buy, as it is foolish to criticize those who buy more books than they will ever be able to read. It would be like saying that you should use all the cutlery or glasses or screwdrivers or drill bits you bought before buying new ones.

"There are things in life that we need to always have plenty of supplies, even if we will only use a small portion.

"If, for example, we consider books as medicine, we understand that it is good to have many at home rather than a few: when you want to feel better, then you go to the ‘medicine closet’ and choose a book. Not a random one, but the right book for that moment. That’s why you should always have a nutrition choice!

"Those who buy only one book, read only that one and then get rid of it. They simply apply the consumer mentality to books, that is, they consider them a consumer product, a good. Those who love books know that a book is anything but a commodity.”

woolandcoffee:aspiringwarriorlibrarian:I’ve seen the Ursula K LeGuin quote about capitalism going...

woolandcoffee:

aspiringwarriorlibrarian:

I’ve seen the Ursula K LeGuin quote about capitalism going around, but to really appreciate it you have to know the context.

The year is 2014. She has been given a lifetime achievement award from the National Book Awards. Neil Gaiman puts it on her neck in front of a crowd of booksellers who bankrolled the event, and it’s time to make a standard “thank you for this award, insert story here, something about diversity, blah blah blah” speech. She starts off doing just that, thanking her friends and fellow authors. All is well.

Then this old lady from Oregon looks her audience of executives dead in the eye, and says “Developing written material to suit sales strategies in order to maximize corporate profit and advertising revenue is not the same thing as responsible book publishing or authorship.”

She rails against the reduction of her art to a commodity produced only for profit. She denounces publishers who overcharge libraries for their products and censor writers in favor of something “more profitable”. She specifically denounces Amazon and its business practices, knowing full well that her audience is filled with Amazon employees. And to cap it off, she warns them: “We live in capitalism. Its power seems inescapable. So did the divine right of kings.Any human power can be resisted and changed by human beings. Resistance and change often begin in art. Very often in our art, the art of words.”

Ursula K LeGuin got up in front of an audience of some of the most powerful people in publishing, was expected to give a trite and politically safe argument about literature, and instead told them directly “Your empire will fall. And I will help it along.”

We stan an icon.

dduane:deanofbeans:disneysmermaids:cherribalm:site that you can type in the definition of a...

dduane:

deanofbeans:

disneysmermaids:

cherribalm:

site that you can type in the definition of a word and get the word

site for when you can only remember part of a word/its definition 

site that gives you words that rhyme with a word

site that gives you synonyms and antonyms

THAT FIRST SITE IS EVERY WRITER’S DREAM DO YOU KNOW HOW MANY TIMES I’VE TRIED WRITING SOMETHING AND THOUGHT GOD DAMN IS THERE A SPECIFIC WORD FOR WHAT I’M USING TWO SENTENCES TO DESCRIBE AND JUST GETTING A BUNCH OF SHIT GOOGLE RESULTS

OMG

This one’s an always-reblog, because who knows who needs it and hasn’t seen it yet?

Book recommendations from John Langan.

victusinveritas:

John Langan’s Top Twenty, Er, Thirty (Three) Horror Novels

Book recommendations from John Langan.

New male author character description dropped.

internetgothgf:

He asked what my tits look like and I sent this from my recent breast exam. He didn’t find it as funny as I did. No one appreciates my art 😔

New male author character description dropped.

wait are you the tumblr blog who advertised some movie on youtube you were involved in that involved some college students getting wishes from some old guy in a cave? because that movie and its exploration of certain superpowers and their downsides is embe

Yep, Jealous Gods, wrote and directed-

@public-trans-it

As the sequels I outlined will likely never be made, their spoilers-

I had two sequels in mind for Jealous Gods. The first was "Vengeful Gods," and it covered Quail and Bridge as they evaded the consequences of the end of Jealous Gods, basically a cat and mouse across the globe where the mouse knows the cats every move, but there were some crazy wildcards and fun times. Also has Don return in a new form or a thousand because he copied his mind into many other people before the climax. Had a lot of stuff I wished Matrix did with the many Agent Smiths.

The second was called "The Lonely God" and covers Clarke's eternity, including his activity during the events of the Valhalla trilogy. He leaves Earth when the end of Gudsriki happens and it covers like a billion years before he willingly goes into the sun. The thing Bridge sentenced him to immortality for was that he destroyed something that would've been beautiful and amazing, and he's the only person who even knows what it was. So in the end, in the core of the sun after the heat death of the universe, is the one person who remembers and can never forget. Literally inspired by a kid who destroyed one of my drawings in high school and ended up being the only person other than me who saw it.

So uh, there's the whole basic scheme of my UCU (Unmade Cinematic Universe).

Who would you cast as Violet if your books got made? I’d pick Kendall Jenner.

Don't fucking tempt him.

This is the best metaphor I’ve ever heard for casting in movies where all the “normal high school students” are 30 year old supermodels.

Who would you cast as Violet if your books got made? I’d pick Kendall Jenner.

Don't fucking tempt him.

meet cute: it’s raining and I see your battered bleeding body lying in the mud and I kick it…

kraniumet:

meet cute: it’s raining and I see your battered bleeding body lying in the mud and I kick it slightly to see if you’re dead

Any Writing Professor: Do not name any two characters with the same letter, it will confuse your…

Any Writing Professor: Do not name any two characters with the same letter, it will confuse your audience.

George RR Martin and Hidetaka Miyazaki: This is Radagon, who married Rennala, mother of Ranni who likes to pose as Renna, enemy of Rykard and Radahn. He is really Marika, Maliketh’s Goddess, mother to Morgott (AKA Margit) Mohg, Malenia mother of Millicent, Miquella, possibly Melina and now Messmer, and she had them after she raised Godwyn and Godefroy with Godfrey, from whom Godrick is descended.