I was determined to write something today.
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The book I read.
Tag: Literature
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Apocalypse Now?
So.
We’re in lockdown. Today marks the end of week two. In that time, and aside from my wife and dog, I’ve had face-to-face conversations with precisely three people, all neighbours, and all from the safety of at least two metres distance. It’s a curious existence, but one that we have all seemingly adapted to with great speed.
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It’s been a while..
So.
I’ve not posted for a while.
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What is it?
I don’t know what this blog is. I’ve written about art and film for over ten years and have always needed a platform. Recently though, I have begun to look away from screens in general, spending less time on social media, and less time interacting with content online. Where once the smartphone distracted, books are back, and I’m spending more time sat in front of films rather than discussing them on twitter.
Professionally I’ve shifted quite dramatically in the last 18 months too, and, as is no doubt eminently relatable, work dominates much of my time. So drastic was the shift in professions that I’ve found myself engrossed in learning again, and am immersing myself in design-related theory when not in the office. I’ve shifted politically too (well, slid), and am now a bona-member of the Green Party.
This is all to say that I *think* this blog should be about all of the things that interest and excite me. It should be about design, culture, art and cinema, and of literature, fashion, interesting music and the world at large. It *should* be about progressive politics on an intimate level, as per my personal mantra in the otherwise overwhelming age of Donald Trump and Brexit. I’m quite the optimist, but the world feels in a really bad place at the minute, between the state of the environment and our blusterous political leaders: I’m trying to focus on the world from my doorstep, and affect change that way. I want this outlet to be an extension of all of those things.
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Salinger at 100.
The year of the pig marks the centenary of J. D. Salinger.
Salinger is my favourite American writer. The Catcher In The Rye is *the* great novel about grief, and his short stories and novellas concerned with the Glass family is somehow both at once a sprawling and unassuming opus.
To mark the occasion Penguin have reissued the four Salinger books that make up his readily-available oeuvre, The Catcher In The Rye, Nine Stories (aka For Esme – With Love And Squalor), Franny And Zooey and Raise High the Roof Beam, Carpenters and Seymour: An Introduction in handsome new editions based upon their initial iconic covers.
Salinger was famously very particular about how his work was presented, with the author eventually settling on a minimalist, text only approach to cover images. The famously reclusive author was said to be against artist impressions of his characters being submitted, instead choosing place the emphasis of creation on the combination of his words and the imagination of the reader.
The Glass Family 