Not much! The White Bear, by Henrik Pontoppidan. Two novellas in a nice little nyrb edition. I liked both of them a lot, especially the first one. I don't really know why, but I love reading about the clergy. Particularly when it's small-time, rather pathetic. Also I haven't gone wrong so far with nyrb editions. On...

I've seen a lot of posts here and elsewhere that have this little badge at the bottom: At first I found it kinda cute and made a mental note to add it to my template, but after a very short time I changed my mind. I don't want to do it. It annoys me that this should be necessary. I really understand why people do it...

This seems to be the only post I make, so although I don't particularly enjoy writing it I will write it. Truth be told I've been kind of in a mood. Hope it passes soon! Dubliners, by James Joyce. For reasons unclear, likely just coincidence, I've read many book set in or about Ireland and Dublin as a teenager. It...

Antología de la literatura fantástica, compiled by Jorge Luis Borges, Silvina Ocampo and Adolfo Bioy Casares. An extensive selection of fantastic stories, some more clearly so than others. My clear favorite was Enoch Soames, by Max Beerbohm, which is in the public domain. It's a great story. You can clearly see...

Last month I visited Uruguay for the second time since I moved out. The first time I visited I took my German boyfriend, who also wanted to trade a winter month for a summer one, and spent most of the time introducing him to everyone and showing him around in what I sometimes call a nostalgia tour. I am proficient...

Every year when the summer starts it brings with it guilt. I finish work, come back home from the office, stand in our balcony looking onto the building's little internal patio and wonder: should I be outside, enjoying the summer? Getting your feet wet in the ocean feels like a proper summer activity and, as I lived...

My plan to write here often has, not unexpectedly, failed. I can believably blame for this my two week trip to Uruguay and so I will. To get back into it, here's a list of what I've read last month: Another Day of Life by Ryszard Kapuściński, a Polish correspondent in Angola during the civil war in 1975. This was an...

After a long trip, I'm finally home in Uruguay. The main purpose of the visit, aside form celebrating my birthday and seeing family and friends, etc, is bringing back with me to Berlin some of my old stuff, namely books. I came with a practically empty suitcase (which I will have to replace, because some time during...

Last year I discovered Proust. It's really one of those things: everyone tells you you have to read Proust, but you don't, until one day you do and when you do you ask "why did no one ever tell me?". This month I finished In the Shadow of Young Girls in Flower, translated into English by James Grieve. It reminded me...

I've been thinking a lot recently about my friends' parents. When you're in school and you go to your friend's house their parents are there. You see them all the time, they ask about you and about your family, they occasionally feed you and take you places. Some times you even spend several days together with them....

Yesterday I came across this post: The creative journey is not an inconvenience. In it, Moody Warlock says: The journey to create art IS part of the art. It's not dispensable. It's not an inconvenience. It's the way we create meaning for ourselves. It's the method by which we grow and understand both ourselves and...