Not as Obvious as It Ought to Be

Teach the book on its merits, not on its laurels.

(And by book, I mean anything.  I mean specific books first, of course, the ones by Homer and Melville and Austen and Shakespeare and whomever is popular in the moment, but I certainly mean anything also.)

Recommended for the Literary Reader

Shadows of the Past: Advice

"Think harder; write better."
--from one of my favorite professors to the English 47B class as a whole; he was a tad frustrated with the first essays we had handed in . . . .

"Don't indulge your natural diffidence."
--from a professor after a mock-interview back in the graduate school days; spot on, by the way.

"Be wary of that tendency to idealize, to see the best qualities and to be oblivious to all others."
--note to self, echoed by a therapist

I'm finding myself reflecting on the advice, the possible wisdom or useful statements, that I've encountered or confronted.  These three stand out, though I have no doubt forgotten even better advice that I have failed to benefit from; to those advisers who meant well for me, I wish I'd been paying closer attention.

(I think that last piece of advice was/is meant to be applied to myself by myself too.)


P.S.  A good friend who was there corrects me:
'And, I think it was: "Think harder, write better, be smarter."'

Old Notebook: Was I Talking To Myself?

"Be more careful about what you offer to other people. I know you mean well in the moment, but you tend to set up expectations that you don't follow through on. People get frustrated and confused when that happens."

--entry in an old notebook--

Question: Was I talking to myself or to someone else?

Why Wouldn't You?

Read, read, read.  

P.S.  The second International Dorothy Dunnett Day will be this November 10, 2012.  For details, consider this link, please.  

When In Rome . . .

There is a tide in the affairs of men
Which, taken at the flood, leads on to fortune;
Omitted, all the voyage of their life
Is bound in shallows and in miseries.
On such a full sea are we now afloat,
And we must take the current when it serves
Or lose our ventures.
------------William Shakespeare, Julius Caesar (4.3)
The character Brutus is speaking.


Never let the future disturb you.  
You will meet it, if you have to, 
with the same weapons of reason 
which today arm you against the present.
------------Marcus Aurelius, Meditations: Book VII
(Staniforth translation)


The gladiator takes his counsel in the sand.
------------old Roman proverb
(Barton translation)