Saturday

Charles Dickens: 5 Facts on the Author

Charles Dickens: 5 Facts on the Author:

 "A small boy, barely 12 years old, sits in a rat-infested London warehouse, endlessly, wrapping, tying, and pasting labels onto jars of black boot polish. He has walked five miles to get to work, and after 10 hours, will walk that many more to get back to his rented room. He sees his family only on Sundays, when he visits London’s Marshalsea prison, where his father has been jailed for debt.

 The child’s whole family except for one sister, in fact, now resides in the debtors prison. This childhood episode shadowed Charles Dickens’ life and colored his writing. Dickens went on to achieve unprecedented celebrity as the most popular novelist of his century, and his fictional tales about abused, neglected, parentless children still resonate with readers over 150 years after they were written."




Monday

No matter what happens tomorrow























"No matter what happens tomorrow, or for the rest of my life i'm happy now, because I love you."
~~ GROUNDHOG DAY (1993)

this is a Phil (Bill Murray) quote from the movie. LOL! i actually like it, it says to me that it is important to live the moment and enjoy the good things that are happening right now.

its a powerful philosophy, easier said than done.

the opposing view is the one held by another great flick: Crimes and Misdemeanors (by Woody Allen): the Universe cares not for what we do or how we feel. i find that view overwhelming.

funny. today i received news that a woman i loved and lived with for five years has passed away. actually she passed away four years ago at the ripe young age of forty-five, though i was unaware until today.

i had not seen her since 1992 so i don't understand why i feel like i have been kicked in the gut.

i've been thinking . . . i am grateful for the time we were together, though i am saddened because i will never see her again. i would have liked to let her know that she was someone special to me, at the least, one last time.

Scott McCloud on artistic frustration, optimism, and evolution in 7 comic books · Reading List · The A.V. Club

Scott McCloud on artistic frustration, optimism, and evolution in 7 comic books · Reading List · The A.V. Club:

 "One of the leading theorists of the comic-book industry, Scott McCloud has done considerable work expounding on the unique properties of the medium in his works Understanding Comics, Reinventing Comics, and Making Comics. This month, he releases his first full-length graphic novel, The Sculptor, detailing the experience of a creatively stifled 26-year-old sculptor that makes a deal with the devil allowing him to effortlessly sculpt any material with his bare hands, an extraordinary ability that reawakens his artistic drive but introduces new problems for his personal life. With a deep knowledge of comics and graphic novels, McCloud spoke to The A.V. Club about seven works that look at artistic frustration from multiple angles."



Ulysses







James Augustine Aloysius Joyce was an Irish novelist and poet, considered to be one of the most influential writers in the modernist avant-garde of the early 20th century. [Wikipedia]

Born: February 2, 1882, Rathgar, Republic of Ireland



The remarkable, yet troubled, life of the author of The Dubliners, Ulysses, and Finnegans Wake. James Joyce's parents squandered their fortune, sending the family into poverty in his youth; his relations with fellow Irishmen became strained, forcing his move to Switzerland; Ulysses was banned in the U.S. and England due to its graphic nature; and after relocating to France in 1920, Joyce reportedly moved from apartment to apartment to escape the accompanying attention of his literary fame.