Friday, December 11, 2009

Respite

This blog will resume on January 4, 2010. It consist of brief summaries of essays written over the years. RayS.

Thursday, December 10, 2009

Essay: Conclusion of Walden. Henry David Thoreau.


One-minute review: Contains some of Thoreau’s memorable statements.


“I left the woods for as good a reason as I went there. Perhaps it seemed to me that I had several more lives to live, and could not spare any more time for that one.” ………. “I learned this, at least, by my experiment: that if one advances confidently in the direction of his dreams, and endeavors to live the life which he has imagined, he will meet with a success unexpected in common hours.” ………. “If you have built castles in the air, your work need not be lost; that is where they should be. Now put the foundations under them.” ………. “The commonest sense is the sense of men asleep, which they express by snoring.” ………. “If a man does not keep pace with his companion, perhaps he hears a different drummer.” ………. “Say what you have to say, not what you ought.” ………. “The fault-finder will find faults even in Paradise.” ………. “There is an incessant influx of novelty into the world, and yet we tolerate incredible dullness.” ………. “Only that day dawns to which we are awake.”


Memorable ideas and words. Thoreau is the cheerleader for mankind.


Great Essays. Ed. Houston Peterson. New York: Washington Square Press, Inc. 1960.

What is an essay? “They are all prefaces. A preface is nothing but a talk with the reader; and they [essays] do nothing else.” Charles Lamb.

Wednesday, December 9, 2009

Essay: "Hawthorne and His Mosses." Herman Melville.

Essay: “Hawthorne and His Mosses.” Herman Melville.


One-minute review: In praise of Hawthorne’s writings. His books, tales, sketches seem so quiet. He is not what he seems. There is an element of blackness in him. Melville compares Hawthorne to Shakespeare. If people do not have time to read and understand Shakespeare, it is no wonder that they do not have time to read Hawthorne. “…the American, who up to the present day has evinced in literature, the largest brain with the largest heart, that is Nathaniel Hawthorne.”


Ideas:

“A papered chamber in a fine old farm-house, a mile from any other dwelling, and dipped to the eves in foliage—surrounded by mountains, old woods and Indian ponds—this, surely, is the place to write of Hawthorne.”


“…had it recommended to me by a tasteful friend, as a rare, quiet book, perhaps too deserving of popularity to be popular.”


“ ‘Hawthorne and Mosses,’ said I, ‘no more: it is morning; it is July in the country and I am off to the barn.’ ”


“…but it was for me [Hawthorne] to give them rest. Rest, in a life of troubles. What better could be done for anybody….”


“All over him, Hawthorne’s melancholy rests like an Indian summer….”


“But it is the least part of genius that attracts admiration. Where Hawthorne is known, he seems to be deemed a pleasant writer, with a pleasant style—a sequestered, harmless man, from whom any deep and weighty thing would hardly be anticipated—a man who means no meanings.”


“For it is not the brain that can test such a man: it is only the heart.”


“Besides, this absolute and unconditional adoration of Shakespeare has grown to be a part of our Anglo-Saxon superstitions.”


“It is not so much paucity as superabundance of material that seems to incapacitate modern authors.”


“But it is better to fail in originality than to succeed in imitation. He who has never failed somewhere, that man cannot be great. Failure is the true test of greatness.”


“—a seeker, not a finder….”


“…fortune has more to do with fame than merit.”


Great Essays. Ed. Houston Peterson. New York: Washington Square Press, Inc. 1960.

What is an essay? “They are all prefaces. A preface is nothing but a talk with the reader; and they [essays] do nothing else.” Charles Lamb.

Tuesday, December 8, 2009

Essay: "Uses of Great Men." Ralph Waldo Emerson.

One-minute review: “…great men exist that there may be greater men.” “It is for man to tame the chaos….”


Ideas:

“He is great who is what he is from nature, and who never reminds us of others.”


“Certain men affect us as rich possibilities, but helpless to themselves and to their times….”


“…so each man converts some raw material in nature to human use.”


“Something is wanting to science until it has been humanized.”


“…they seem to fascinate and draw to them some genius who occupies himself with one thing all his life long.”


“Man, made of the dust of the world, does not forget his origin; and all that is yet inanimate will one day speak and reason.”


“Every ship that comes to America got its chart from Columbus. Every novel is a debtor to Homer. Every carpenter who shaves with a foreplane borrows the genius of a forgotten inventor.”


“How to illustrate the distinctive benefit of ideas….”


“Great men…clear our eyes from egotism, and enable us to see other people and their works.”


Great Essays. Ed. Houston Peterson. New York: Washington Square Press, Inc. 1960.

What is an essay? “They are all prefaces. A preface is nothing but a talk with the reader; and they [essays] do nothing else.” Charles Lamb.

Monday, December 7, 2009

Essay: "English Writers on America." Washington Irving.

One-minute review: Irving says that too many English travelers in America criticize America in the English press and thinks that the English should be much more objective in discussing America—especially since America is a classless society in which most Englishmen would prosper. On the other hand, Irving thinks Americans should not express antipathy toward the English. We have too much in common.


Ideas:

“Such persons become embittered against the country [America] on finding that there, as everywhere else, a man must sow before he can reap; must win wealth by industry and talent; and must contend with the common difficulties of nature, and the shrewdness of an intelligent and enterprising people.”


“But why are we so exquisitely alive to the aspersions of England? Why do we suffer ourselves to be so affected by the contumely she has endeavored to cast upon us?


“There is a general impression in England, that the people of the United States are inimical to the parent country.”


“Nothing is so easy and inviting as the retort of abuse and sarcasm; but it is a paltry and an unprofitable contest.”


“Knowledge is power and truth is knowledge; whoever, therefore, knowingly propagates a prejudice, willfully saps the foundation of his country’s strength.”


“Opening, too, as we do, an asylum for strangers from every portion of the earth, we should receive all with impartiality.”


Great Essays. Ed. Houston Peterson. New York: Washington Square Press, Inc. 1960.

What is an essay? “They are all prefaces. A preface is nothing but a talk with the reader; and they [essays] do nothing else.” Charles Lamb.

Friday, December 4, 2009

Essay: "On Noise." Arthur Schopenhauer.

One-minute review: Noise obstructs the intellect in doing its work and people who make noise—wanton, useless noise—are insensitive to the finer things in life.


Quotes:

“There are people, it is true—nay, a great many people—who smile at such things, because they are not sensitive to argument, or thought, or poetry, or art, in a word, to any kind of intellectual influence.”


“Noisy interruption is a hindrance to…concentration.”


On the Germans: “For a musical nation, they are the most noisy I have met with. That they are so is due to the fact, not that they are more fond of making a noise than other people—they would deny it if you asked them—but that their senses are obtuse; consequently, when they hear a noise, it does not affect them much. It does not disturb them in reading or thinking simply because they do not think; they only smoke, which is their substitute for thought.”


Recommends a work consisting of “a detailed description of the torture to which people are put by the various noises of a small Italian town.”


Great Essays. Ed. Houston Peterson. New York: Washington Square Press, Inc. 1960.

What is an essay? “They are all prefaces. A preface is nothing but a talk with the reader; and they [essays] do nothing else.” Charles Lamb.

Thursday, December 3, 2009

Essay: "On the Knocking at the Gate in Macbeth." Thomas DeQuincey.

Essay: “On the Knocking at the Gate in Macbeth.” Thomas DeQuincey.


One-minute review: The author wonders at the meaning of the knocking at the gate after Duncan’s murder by Macbeth and his wife. He decides that there are no incidents without purpose in Shakespeare. He decides that the awfulness of the scene of the murder stops life, becomes isolated from life, and the knocking at the gate causes life to resume after the suspended scene of the murder. There are no extraneous incidents in the plays of Shakespeare.


Great Essays. Ed. Houston Peterson. New York: Washington Square Press, Inc. 1960.

What is an essay? “They are all prefaces. A preface is nothing but a talk with the reader; and they [essays] do nothing else.” Charles Lamb.

Wednesday, December 2, 2009

Essay: "On Going a Journey." William Hazlett.

One-minute review: “One of the pleasantest things in the world is going a journey; but I like to go by myself. I can enjoy society in a room; but out of doors, nature is company enough for me. I am then never less alone than when alone.”


Quotes:

“Instead of an awkward silence, broken by attempts at wit or dull commonplaces, mine is that undisturbed silence of the heart which alone is perfect eloquence.”


“I am for this synthetical method on a journey in preference to the analytical. I am content to lay in a stock of ideas then, and to examine and anatomize them afterwards.”


“If I express this feeling to another, he may qualify and spoil it with some objection.”


“With change of place we change our ideas; nay, our opinions and feelings.”


“Those who wish to forget painful thoughts, do well to absent themselves for a while from the ties and objects that recall them; but we can be said only to fulfill our destiny in the place that gave us births.”


Great Essays. Ed. Houston Peterson. New York: Washington Square Press, Inc. 1960.

What is an essay? “They are all prefaces. A preface is nothing but a talk with the reader; and they [essays] do nothing else.” Charles Lamb.

Tuesday, December 1, 2009

Essay. "The Death of John Cavanaugh." William Hazlitt.

One-minute review: Tribute to a superb athlete, the best “Fives-player” who ever existed. It was apparently a game in which the participants struck a ball and it was Cavanaugh’s great skill to know when and to what degree he needed to strike the ball, his ability to ferret out his opponent’s weaknesses in the competition and to take advantage of them that gave Cavanaugh his superiority.


Ideas:

“When a person dies, who does any one thing better than anyone else in the world, which so many others are trying to do well, it leaves a gap in society. It is not likely that anyone will now see the game of Fives played in its perfection for many years to come, for Cavanaugh is dead, and has not left his peer behind him.”


“His eye was certain, his hand fatal, his presence of mind complete. He could do what he pleased, and he always knew exactly what to do. He saw the whole game, and played it; took instant advantage of his adversary’s weakness….”


Comment: Could serve as a model for the eulogy of any person of great skill. RayS.


Great Essays. Ed. Houston Peterson. New York: Washington Square Press, Inc. 1960.

What is an essay? “They are all prefaces. A preface is nothing but a talk with the reader; and they [essays] do nothing else.” Charles Lamb.

Monday, November 30, 2009

Essay: "That We Should Lie Down with the Lamb." Charles Lamb.

10-second review: The sun and moon are all right for doing things, but inspiration requires candle-light.


Ideas:

“Hail candle-light! without disparagement to sun or moon, the kindliest luminary of the three—if we may not rather style thee their radiant deputy, mild viceroy of the moon! We love to read, talk, sit silent, eat, drink, sleep by candle-light. They are everybody’s sun and moon.”


[What did the old folks do without candle-light?]


“There is absolutely no such thing as reading, but by a candle.”


“Can you tell pork from veal in the dark?”


“…daylight furnishes the images, the crude material [for poetry]…[but] must be content to hold their inspiration of the candle.”


Milton’s Morning Hymn in Paradise, we would hold a good wager, was penned at midnight; and Taylor’s rich description of a sun rise smells decidedly of the taper.”


“Betty, bring the candles.”


Great Essays. Ed. Houston Peterson. New York: Washington Square Press, Inc. 1960.

What is an essay? “They are all prefaces. A preface is nothing but a talk with the reader; and they [essays] do nothing else.” Charles Lamb.

Wednesday, November 25, 2009

Essay: "The Superannuated Man." Charles Lamb.

10-second review: After years of the tedium of working as a clerk, he is retired at a pension of two-thirds of his salary for life and now he is free to do what he likes, and he is overwhelmed by the sense of freedom. An unforgettable expression of the sense of freedom in retirement.


Ideas:

“I had grown to my desk, as it were; and the wood had entered into my soul.”


“I was in the condition of a prisoner in the Old Bastille, suddenly let loose after a forty years’ confinement. I could scarce trust myself with myself.”


“It was like passing out of time into eternity—for it is a sort of eternity for a man to have his time all to himself.”


“I am in no hurry. Having all holidays, I am as though I had none.”


“If time were troublesome, I could read it away.”


“I walk, read or scribble (as now) just when the fit seizes me.”


“For that is the only true time, which a man can properly call his own, that which he has all to himself; the rest, though in some sense he may be said to live it, is other people’s time, not his.”


“I have done all that I came into this world to do…and have the rest of the day to myself.”


Great Essays. Ed. Houston Peterson. New York: Washington Square Press, Inc. 1960.

What is an essay? “They are all prefaces. A preface is nothing but a talk with the reader; and they [essays] do nothing else.” Charles Lamb.


Note: This blog will resume on Monday, November 30, 2009.

Tuesday, November 24, 2009

Essay: "Sanity of True Genius." Charles Lamb.

One-minute review: Genius is not allied with insanity. Genius lives by dreams that can be incoherent in sleep, but, when the genius awakes, are shaped by judgment and tested by reality. The genius creates—which implies shaping and consistency—his poetry out of these dreams. The poet turns life into a dream.


Comment: Interesting thought. RayS.


Great Essays. Ed. Houston Peterson. New York: Washington Square Press, Inc. 1960.

What is an essay? “They are all prefaces. A preface is nothing but a talk with the reader; and they [essays] do nothing else.” Charles Lamb.

Monday, November 23, 2009

Essay: "Dream Children, A Reverie." Charles Lamb.

Ten-second review: The narrator reminisces about the days of his youth at the huge house occupied by Grandmother Field, its caretaker, and her brother Uncle John. The reverie ends when we find that the narrator is a bachelor with no children, and his two dream children with whom he has been sharing his memories fade from reality as he awakes from a nap.


Quote:

“ ‘We are not of Alice, nor of thee, nor are we children at all…. We are nothing, less than nothing, and dreams. We are only what might have been, and must wait upon the tedious shores of Lethe millions of ages before we have existence, and a name’—and immediately awaking I found myself quietly seated in my bachelor armchair, where I had fallen asleep….”


Great Essays. Ed. Houston Peterson. New York: Washington Square Press, Inc. 1960.

What is an essay? “They are all prefaces. A preface is nothing but a talk with the reader; and they [essays] do nothing else.” Charles Lamb.

Friday, November 20, 2009

Essay: "Mrs. Battle's Opinions on Whist." Charles Lamb.

Ten-second review: Mrs. Battle was a serious Whist player. She played for money. She would have nothing to do with the person who could win or lose with no concern for either. And she hated the language of Whist, so much so that she would not take up a trick because of the term she must use in taking it. The author wishes that he could play forever with his “sweet cousin,” the late Mrs. Battle.


Great Essays. Ed. Houston Peterson. New York: Washington Square Press, Inc. 1960.

What is an essay? “They are all prefaces. A preface is nothing but a talk with the reader; and they [essays] do nothing else.” Charles Lamb.

Thursday, November 19, 2009

Essay: "The Man of One Book." Isaac Disraeli [Father of Benjamin].

10-second review: Every great person seems to have a favorite author.


Ideas:

“A predilection for some great author, among the vast number which must transiently occupy our attention, seems to be the happiest preservative for our taste; accustomed to that excellent author whom we have chosen for our favorite, we may in this intimacy possibly resemble him.” [Re-reading our favorite author preserves our taste and even makes our writing style resemble his.]


“It is remarkable that every great writer appears to have a predilection for some favorite author….”


[Here follow several pages of examples of famous persons who focus on their favorite writers and read them again and again.]


“…Sir William Jones’s invariable habit of reading his Cicero through every year…amidst the multiplicity of his authors, still continues in this way to be ‘the man of one book.’ ”


Great Essays. Ed. Houston Peterson. New York: Washington Square Press, Inc. 1960.

What is an essay? “They are all prefaces. A preface is nothing but a talk with the reader; and they [essays] do nothing else.” Charles Lamb.

Wednesday, November 18, 2009

Essay: "National Prejudices." Oliver Goldsmith.

10-second review: To say that every other country is inferior to our own is a false patriotism. We, like the ancient philosopher, are citizens of the world.


Ideas:

“…we took occasion to talk of the different characters of the several nations of Europe; when one of the gentlemen, cocking his hat, and assuming such an air of importance as if he had possessed all the merit of the English nation in his own person, declared that the Dutch were a parcel of avaricious wretches; the French a set of flattering sycophants; that the Germans were drunken sots, and beastly gluttons; and the Spaniards proud, haughty and surly tyrants; but that in bravery, generosity, clemency, and in every other virtue, the English excelled all the rest of the world.”


“…the patriotic gentleman observed with a contemptuous sneer, that he was greatly surprised how some people could have the conscience to live in a country which they did not love, and to enjoy the protection of a government, to which in their hearts they were inveterate enemies.” [Said whenever some one criticizes the government and nation where one lives.]


[One of the marks of a gentleman is a lack of prejudice of any kind.]


“And in fact, you will always find that those are most apt to boast of national merit, who have little or no merit of their own to depend on….”


“Is it not very possible that I may love my own country without hating the natives of other countries?”


“I should prefer the title of the ancient philosopher, viz. a citizen of the world, to that of an Englishman, a Frenchman, a European….”


Essays: 1765.


Great Essays. Ed. Houston Peterson. New York: Washington Square Press, Inc. 1960.

What is an essay? “They are all prefaces. A preface is nothing but a talk with the reader; and they [essays] do nothing else.” Charles Lamb.