Prometheus strangling the vulture II

This is by a guy named Jacques Lipshitz. Born in Lithuania to a French first name and a Jewish last one. Sculpture seen in the garden of the Whitney, which has an collection of art in the open air.

In Minneapolis

they have cool signs.

home for the homeless

Same place, pretty much, just right around the corner. Someone's been littering in the little brick building, even though it's all barred up.

tires by the tracks

I saw these in the town where I was born, right next to a garage and not too far from the railroad yard.

Metaphor of a Minotaur

Isn't it true that the Minotaur is nothing other than our selves, the joining of human and animal, which we must hide in a labyrinth because it represents some abominable desire? We hide it and yet it demands, and gets, its sacrifice, however indirectly. Our Minotaur, whose human parts we empathize with, whose animal parts we reject, is only as mortal as we are. Theseus will not come.

On names

Donald Barthelme wrote the immortal words "the great chicken factories" in his immortal novel Paradise, published in 1986. Putnam's released it and the Dalkey Archive has picked it up. I bought it for $12.95.

Paranoia and its discontents

The worst thing about paranoia is that you can't let people know you're paranoid, because they will look at you funny. You must therefore confirm or refute your suspicions by secret means. Sometimes your best friend, for these purposes, will be a fellow paranoiac, if the person is not already under direct suspicion -- other times this is not the case.

Take my wife, for example: either she is cheating on me or she is not cheating on me. Impossible to ask, although in an ideal world she would be the best and most authoritative source in such inquiries. However, the topic itself compromises her, whether she is innocent or not. I must turn, therefore, to my best friend (no, not box wine), to resolve the issue.

But immediately a problem emerges. Greg knows both my wife and me, and has been a friend to both. If he knows something, it will be because my wife placed her confidence in him as a friend. I am asking him to betray that confidence. If he betrays her, he is less trustworthy in my eyes. And if he knows something already, but has said nothing, then he has already betrayed me, and no matter how forthcoming he is now he cannot efface that.

If he refuses to help, I will resent it. So Greg is in situation, as am I.

Joan Didion and the dead

Didion's last book was hyped to death precisely because it was about death, which is supposed to sober and soften up the readership. But death is nothing new. Nor sickness nor loss of loved. While such narratives are necessary, they are unlikely in their content to be groundbreaking. All that remains for her then is her tone, some novel angle, but she did not create the first or find the second. And that, because she is complacent. She has confused her own voice with that of authority, and any attempt at autobiography, like The Year of Magical Thinking, becomes an exercise in name-dropping. But names drop like turds and stink like them, too. Literati and celebrities have known and consoled Didion -- what does it matter?