Daniel’s Reviews > Daemon Voices: On Stories and Storytelling > Status Update

Republic of Heaven - meh. I skimmed a bit. Who the hell considers Jane Eyre a childrens book?

God and Dust - Interesting for both view of author and his reading of His Dark Materials, but also interesting aside on role of "psychological resonance" in institutional racism. (As a sort of feedback loop amplifying cultural tendencies that might seem quite minor on their own.) It doesn't really match my reading of the term, but an interesting idea nevertheless.

Only one essay left. 22 pages or so.

Talents & Virtues - Story as the school of morals and the threats of theocracy and literary criticism.

2 essays left. I will be so glad to be done with this book.

Soft Beulah's Night - More Blake stuff

Writing Fantasy Realistically- Tolkien is no George Eliot

Maus. Balloon Debate (good, and short). The Anatomy of Melancholy - why you gotta make me want to read long books?

the fire-maker's daughter - allegedly about fun preceding theme, but mostly just about a play he wrote

imaginary friends - best piece in a while? children, reading, play, and belief. a response to something stupid richard dawkins said.

i feel like there's a pretty clear distinction between pieces where he has something to say, and the ones that are just a fluffy intro as a favor or something.

Oliver Twist: good piece on Dickens / Twist

Let's Pretend: fluff piece. cinema vs theater

borderlands: starts out discussing reading as a liminal space but quickly turns into a rambley reminiscence about illustrations

the classical tone: the narrator, pov, tense - interesting, but perhaps somewhat underdeveloped, constrained by nature of being a themed talk relating to a particular author

a bar: modernism ( a bit of meta )

poco a poco: tiny events/actions as the building blocks of story ( and basis of metaphor ), and an overly lengthy examination of one example

getting bored of this. not entirely uninteresting, but less practical than one might hope.