In his review of Charles Simic‘s The Lunatic: Poems and The Life of Images: Selected Prose Phillip Lopate makes note of Simic’s “cultivation of awe,” his “opening himself to chance, that favorite tactic of Surrealists” and makes note of this pronouncement: Others pray to God; I pray to chance to show me the way out ofContinue reading “The Self As Prison”
Tag Archives: amor fati
Oscar Wilde’s Nietzschean Notes In De Profundis
In ‘Suffering is One Very Long Moment‘–part of a series of essays on prison literature–Max Nelson writes on De Profundis–“a letter written by Oscar Wilde during his imprisonment in Reading Gaol, to “Bosie” (Lord Alfred Douglas)”–and makes note that: Certain passages in De Profundis do seem to credit prison with strengthening and deepening their author’s nature, butContinue reading “Oscar Wilde’s Nietzschean Notes In De Profundis”
F. O. Matthiessen On ‘The Value Of The Tragic Writer’
In The Achievement of T. S. Eliot (Oxford University Press, New York, p. 107), F. O. Matthiessen writes: The value of the tragic writer has always lain in the uncompromising honesty with which he has cut through appearances to face the real conditions of man’s lot, in his refusal to be deceived by an easy answer, inContinue reading “F. O. Matthiessen On ‘The Value Of The Tragic Writer’”
Ghost From The Machine: Once Again, The Dead Return
Matt Osterman‘s Ghost from the Machine (2010)–originally titled and known internationally as Phasma Ex Machina–is touted by its marketing material as a ‘supernatural thriller’. A low-budget indie, it uses a cast made up of genuine amateurs who sometimes look distinctly uncomfortable and self-conscious on camera, and wears its modest production values on its sleeve. The story sounds hokeyContinue reading “Ghost From The Machine: Once Again, The Dead Return”
Samir Chopra 