On sincerity

I'm sure you've had to say things you haven't meant before. You've read friends'poetry...? Had girlfriends...?

- The West Wing

Fact

[via Chris Mac - obviously]

Chekh-it

The task of a writer is not to solve the problem, but to state the problem correctly.

- Chekhov

[via Dominic Hilton]

'Oink.' (Rhymes with 'oink'.)

[Courtesy of BaconPop. With thanks to LS.]

Metaphor = truth

It is possible to find a metaphor for anything, an analogue: but the image is encountered, not found; it is an account of the poet's perception, the act of perception; it is a test of sincerity, a test of conviction, the rare poetic quality of truthfulness.

- George Oppen, courtesy of The Paris Review

The justification for truth

We are free to choose our paths
but choose We must, no matter
where they lead, and the tales We
tell of the Past must be true.

- WH Auden, 'Aubade'

On the two types of story (superb!)

the hectic experimentalism of the so-called McSweeney's short story (reflexive, impertinent, typographically playful, slightly annoying)... emerged around the turn of the millennium to challenge the dominance of the so-called New Yorker short story (calm, humane, sparse, slightly dull).

- Robert Macfarlane, Sunday Times

That's showbiz!!!

Insofar as generic judgments are possible, the ghosted autobiography of a show business celebrity is the lowest form of literary life.

- Geoff Dyer, New York Times Book Review

[To wit...]

Sebald summarises the human condition

Acts of negligence in accordance
with relative beauty
strength or wit

- WG Sebald, 'Festifal', Across the Land and the Water

Oh.

Speaking from experience, he had the strongest possible opinion on the deleterious effect of regular journalism on a writer's work.

- Victoria Glendinning, Leonard Woolf: a biography

Truth

Any literary work made anywhere is a request from writer to reader: Do you recognise anything? Are we both human beings.

- Julian Evans, Making the World Legible

(Oftentimes, of course, the answer is No.)

Truth

Non/Fiction

Fiction's about what it is to be a fucking human being.

- David Foster Wallace

Emphases at reader's discretion.

Unspoken truths

I don't say a great deal that isn't true. But I also don't say a lot that is.

Honouring wood

I have been sitting at this desk for hours, staring into the darkened shelves of books. I love their presence, the way they honour the wood they rest upon.

- Brautigan, The Abortion: an historical romance 1966

Reflections in Oxfam Bookshop, Marylebone

1) If you don't have a name like Isaac Bashevis Singer you're screwed. Don't even bother putting pen to paper.

2) Everyone Has a Good Story? Bollocks. Everyone has a story. What makes it good is how you write it.

3) No-one has read that green novel by Ethan Hawke.

In defence of convincing lies

They have the merit of being 'true'.

To attempt one's life

A stupid and dysfunctional euphemism for attempting one's death.

Alëtheia? Who the fück is Alëtheia?!

While re-writing Æsop this afternoon, I went to some trouble to secure the correct transcription (according to the Penguin edition I was ripping off) of 'Truth' - Alētheia.

Howsoever many times I inserted the odd ē character, though, whenever I hit 'Publish' the word came out corrupted - Al?theia.

Even the 'Insert custom symbol' option came up short: Wordpress didn't have it (define 'custom'...). Irritated, I settled for an umlaut. But not before noting, in the context of my two variations which question 'Truth', the irony of the recurring question mark in the middle of her name.

The ash ligature - æ - was, by contrast, almost disappointingly easy.