R.L. Swihart's Blog, page 32

Eagle @ Bolsa Chica

Yesterday: An Eagle landed @ Bolsa Chica Yesterday: Lucky Me.🎈

#rlswihart13 #happyfriday #tgif #baldeaglesofinstagram #baldy #baldeagle #bolsachica #socal #huntingtonbeach #nature #beautiful  #poetry #readmorepoetry2024♥️

Henry James: The Aspern Papers

There could be no Venetian business without patience, and since I adored the place I was much more in the spirit of it for having laid in a large provision. That spirit kept me perpetual company and seemed to look out at me from the revived immortal face--in which all his genius shone--of the great poet who was my prompter. I had invoked him and he had come; he hovered before me half the time; it was as if his bright ghost had returned to earth to tell me that he regarded the affair as his own no less than mine and that we should see it fraternally, cheerfully to a conclusion. It was as if he had said, "Poor dear, be easy with her; she has some natural prejudices; only give her time. Strange as it may appear to you she was very attractive in 1820. Meanwhile are we not in Venice together, and what better place is there for the meeting of dear friends? See how it glows with the advancing summer; how the sky and the sea and the rosy air and the marble of the palaces all shimmer and melt together." My eccentric private errand became a part of the general romance and the general glory-- I felt even a mystic companionship, a moral fraternity with all those who in the past had been in the service of art. They had worked for beauty, for a devotion; and what else was I doing? That element was in everything that Jeffrey Aspern had written, and I was only bringing it to the light.

Henry James: The Aspern Papers

One doesn't defend one's god: one's god is in himself a defense.

Henry James: Washington Square

"She's going to stick, by Jove! she's going to stick." "Do you mean that she is going to marry him?" Mrs. Almond inquired. "I don't know that; but she is not going to break down. She is going to drag out the engagement, in the hope of making me relent." "And shall you not relent?" "Shall a geometrical proposition relent? I am not so superficial." "Doesn't geometry treat of surfaces?" asked Mrs. Almond, who, as we know, was clever, smiling. "Yes; but it treats of them profoundly. Catherine and her young man are my surfaces; I have taken their measure." "You speak as if it surprised you." "It is immense; there will be a great deal to observe." "You are shockingly cold-blooded!" said Mrs. Almond. "I need to be with all this hot blood about me. Young Townsend indeed is cool; I must allow him that merit."

Henry James: Washington Square

The Doctor had been rather disappointed at not finding his compact and comfortable little hostess surrounded in a more visible degree by the ravages of Morris Townsend's immorality; but he had said to himself that this was not because the young man had spared her, but because she had contrived to plaster up her wounds. They were aching there, behind the varnished stove, the festooned engravings, beneath her own neat little poplin bosom; and if he could only touch the tender spot, she would make a movement that would betray her. The words I have just quoted were an attempt to put his finger suddenly upon the place; and they had some of the success that he looked for. The tears sprang for a moment to Mrs. Montgomery's eyes, and she indulged in a proud little jerk of the head. "I don't know how you have found that out!" she exclaimed. "By a philosophic trick--by what they call induction. You know you have always your option of contradicting me. But kindly answer me a question. Don't you give your brother money? I think you ought to answer that." "Yes, I have given him money," said Mrs. Montgomery. "And you have not had much to give him?" She was silent a moment. "If you ask me for a confession of poverty, that is easily made. I am very poor."

Burrowing Owls: Salton Sea

First Burrowing Owl @ Salton Sea (Thanks! Tony for the Tip). This little guy is "just doing his job" so I hope those BIG MACHINES don't roll over his inverted castle. I want to go back in the spring and see the family.♥️🎈

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Henry James: Washington Square

She confessed that she was not particularly fond of literature. Morris Townsend agreed with her that books were tiresome things; only, as he said, you had to read a good many before you found it out.

Henry James: Washington Square

In those days in New York there were still a few altar-fires flickering in the temple of Republican simplicity, and Dr. Sloper would have been glad to see his daughter present herself, with a classic grace, as a priestess of this mild faith. It made him fairly grimace, in private, to think that a child of his should be both ugly and overdressed. For himself, he was fond of the good things of life, and he made a considerable use of them; but he had a dread of vulgarity, and even a theory that it was increasing in the society that surrounded him.

Henry James: Washington Square

Once, when the girl was about twelve years old, he had said to her: "Try and make a clever woman of her, Lavinia; I should like her to be a clever woman." Mrs. Penniman, at this, looked thoughtful a moment. "My dear Austin," she then inquired, "do you think it is better to be clever than to be good?" "Good for what?" asked the Doctor. "You are good for nothing unless you are clever."

James Joyce: Portrait

 —The soul is born, he said vaguely, first in those moments I told you of. It has a slow and dark birth, more mysterious than the birth of the body. When the soul of a man is born in this country there are nets flung at it to hold it back from flight. You talk to me of nationality, language, religion. I shall try to fly by those nets.