Larry’s Comments (group member since Nov 23, 2020)

Larry’s comments from the Nonfiction Reading - Only the Best group.

So good, Eileen. Many thanks for posting this poem today.

Love and maybe beauty, Sher.

That first one, love, is so often tied to loss.

One of the most famous Haiku is this one below by Bashō:

To be honest, it helps if you have been to Matsushima. I have and spent an afternoon slowly going around the many little islands of Matsushima.

Matsushima!
Ah, Matsushima
Matsushima!

Faubion Bowers. The Classic Tradition of Haiku: An Anthology (Dover Thrift Editions) (Kindle Location 161). Kindle Edition.

Such good points, John.

Carol wrote: "Here is a poem of love by the Romantic poet, Elizabeth Barrett Browning.
How do I love thee? (Sonnet 43).

How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.
I love thee to the depth and breadth and height..."

One of the most famous American poems, but it's been a long time since I read the whole poem. Thanks for posting this one, Carol.

John wrote: "G.K. Chesterton is largely known for his Father Brown mystery series. However, I've started The New Jerusalem, observations of Palestine in the early days of Zionism..."

John, he is also known--but not very well known--these days for a fascinating political philosophy. This is Distributism.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Distrib...

I think that this one paragraph from a Medium article is. agood explanation of it, without naming it.

"Chesterton's advocacy for a politics rooted in a general understanding of religion, of a virtuous and properly ordered society, his opposition to modernist defenses of capitalism and socialism detached from general belief, left an indelible legacy in that sector of public life"

SOURCE: https://medium.com/s/conservative-roo...

I actually have a friend who is deeply enamored with Chesterton who who claims to be a Distributionist, but every time my friend tries to explain it to me, I end up saying to him, "You just seem sort of Conservative to me." I'm not trying to antagonize my friend, but we both end up being frustrated.

John wrote: "Don't want to clutter the folder too badly, but the era between WW II and, say, 9/11 was one of great societal change covered by essayists. So, here's a solid five-star read I just finished to kick..."


John,

I wish essays were a more popular form these days. They have so much to offer. Here's the latest offering in this series: The Best American Essays 2020. I actually haven't bought this one yet, but I will. The volumes vary greatly from year to year deoending on who is the editor for the year.

I totally understand, Sher. And I’m posting from my IPhone also. We’re back at the Cancer Institute today for the next cycle of chemo.

Carol, it also occurs to me that I plan to post the whole poem to be discussed as we work through the book. Hence not having a copy of the book isn't necessarily a huge problem.

Carol wrote: "Yes, I am probably being extremely overcautious. At present, I have several books in quarantine, including Obama's biography, 5 Xmas piano music books (will have to be for next Xmas now! And don't ...Unfortunately, there does not appear to be a Kindle version, but there are other translations on Kindle, so if you want to start without me, I would probably be able to find at least some of the poems there"

Carol, I actually did buy a Kindle version. Let me see if it's in the Amazon.UK store as well.

Just checked. You are right. The Kindle store for the UK Amazon store doesn't have it yet. Let's wait until you get a paper copy and it comes out of quarantine!

I actually buy some physical books from the Amazon.Uk store. They had the two sequels to the The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo almost six months before they became huge hits and were published in the United States!

Carol wrote: "I would like to do that Larry, but when I receive any book I always leave it at least 2 weeks in quarantine- perhaps over the top but I am a very cautious person and never rely on official figures ..."

I'm willing to wait months! So we can work it out.

Are you being overly cautious? I won't criticize anyone who is cautious these days. It's not just that Covid-19 can kill you ... many, many survivors are being left with long run disabilities, both serious and mild. One of the unanswered questions is whether a mild case with leave you with mild long run impairments. We are extremely careful ourselves.

Sher, I will post this question here, mainly for you and Carol, but for anyone else who sees it and wants to join in. When you and Carol have that Tu Fu book, would you both like to methodically work through it with me ... reading perhaps five poems a week, starting form the beginning? We could set up a new thread in the poetry folder just for this.

It's a great question, Sher. I'm not totally consistent. I tried about a year ago to go through the The Oxford Book of English Verse and I just got bored with some of the really early poetry. So I quit.

The one poet that comes to mind, whose books I have gone through methodically from the beginning to the end, is Billy Collins.

Carol wrote: "Will also order the Hinton book. Am very taken with Du Fu. He seems so contemporary and not back in the Tang Dynasty. Chinese New Year coming up soon in February. Have also found a French translati..."

Carol, Tu Fu or Du Fu? It is interesting to me that the Taoism is probably correctly pronounced as Daoism. So I like it every time you write Du Fu.

I only had to read some of his poems in this book written during the Civil War to capture that "contemporary" feeling. And I agree with you totally about our limitations when it comes to appreciating poetry if you don't know the language in which the poetry was originally written.

Sher, you know I actually looked first to see if there was a Kenneth Rexroth translation of his poems. I mentioned the books by Rexroth, with the essay on Tu Fu. I'll quote a bit more from that:

"Tu Fu is , in my opinion, and in the opinion of a majority of those qualifies to speak, the greatest non-epic, non-dramatic poet who has survived in any language." And then Rexroth goes on to explain brilliantly exactly what kind of poet Tu Fu is ... he is one who writes "poetry of reverie."

So looked for a Rexroth translation of Tu Fu, finding this, "Thirty-Six Poems by Tu Fu Translated by Kenneth Rexroth." But I couldn't find any available copies of that book. (Was that book where you found the Tu Fu poem that you posted?) I looked to see what was available and was really, really happy to find the expanded and newly translated edition of his poetry by Hinton.

Against Endings
by Dorianne Laux

On the street outside the window
someone is talking to someone else,

a baffling song, no words, only the music

of voices—low contralto of questions,
laughter’s plucked strings—voices in darkness

below stars where someone straddles a bike
up on the balls of his feet, and someone else

stands firm on a curb, her arms crossed, two

dogs nearby listening to the human duet,
stars falling through a summer night

a sudden car passing, rap song thumping,

but the voices, unhurried, return, obligatos afloat
on the humid air, tiny votives wavering

as porch lights go out—not wanting it to stop—

and Mars rising over the flower shop, up
through the telephone wires

SOURCE: https://www.garrisonkeillor.com/radio...

I just bought a new (actually revised) collection of Tu Fu's poetry ... The Selected Poems of Tu Fu: Expanded and Newly Translated by David Hinton. I am greatly looking forward to working my way through it.

Sher wrote: "I really like this poem from the 8th century by Tu Fu. Brings beauty to impermanence.

Jade Flower Palace

translated by Kenneth Rexroth

The stream swirls The wind moans in
The pines. Gray rats s..."

I have never read more than a handful of Chinese poems. I love this one.

I really recommend two books by Kenneth Rexroth. They are Classics Revisited and More Classics Revisited. They are exactly what the titles suggest, with essays on the classics he recommends. The first one starts with the Epic of Gilgamesh and ends with Chekov's Plays and his essays are illuminating. The 27th work recommended is Poems by Tu Fu. He loves the poetry of Tu Fu.

John wrote: "Carol wrote: "John wrote: "One thing I have found about haiku is that it is a great form of mindfulness and would be something helpful for anxiety or similar issues. Everything is in the moment, wh...Lately I find haiku a good antidote to the thought of who currently holds the US nuclear launch codes."

I find myself thinking about that several times a day.

He Wishes for the Cloths of Heaven
by William Butler Yeats

Had I the heavens’ embroidered cloths,
Enwrought with golden and silver light,
The blue and the dim and the dark cloths
Of night and light and the half-light,
I would spread the cloths under your feet:
But I, being poor, have only my dreams;
I have spread my dreams under your feet;
Tread softly because you tread on my dreams.


https://www.garrisonkeillor.com/radio...