Strange things have been happening

Excerpt from The Three-Body Problem by Cixin Liu

Photo by Michael on Unsplash

This is an excerpt from the book The Three-Body Problem by Cixin Liu, translated by Ken Liu.

“Fine. I’ll tell you what little I know.” Da Shi pointed to the shore of the moat around the Forbidden City. The two found a spot and sat down.

It was not night, and traffic flowed ceaselessly behind them like a rive. They watched their shadows lengthening and shortening over the moat.

“In my line of work, it’s all about putting together many apparently unconnected things. When you piece them together the right way, you get the truth. For a while now, strange things have been happening.

“For example, there’s been an unprecedented wave of crimes against academia and science research institutions. Of course you know about the explosion at the Liangxiang accelerator construction site. There was also the murder of that Nobel laureate…the crimes were all unusual: not for money, not for revenge. No political background, just pure destruction.”

“Other strange things didn’t involve crimes. For example, the Frontiers of Science and the suicides of those academics. Environmental activists have also become extra bold: protest mobs at construction sites to stop nuclear power plants and hydroelectric dams, experimental communities ‘returning to nature,’ and other apparently trivial matters…Do you go to the movies?

“No, not really.”

“Recent big-budget films all have rustic themes. The setting is always green mountains and clear water, with handsome men and pretty women of some indeterminate era living in harmony with nature. To use the words of the directors, they ‘represent the beautiful life before science spoiled nature.’ Take Peach Blossom Spring: it’s clearly the sort of film that no one wants to see. But they spent hundreds of millions to make it. There was also this science fiction contest with a top reward of five million for the person who imagined the most disgusting possible future. They spent another few hundred million to turn the winning stories into movies. And then you’ve got all these strange cults popping up everywhere, where every cult leader seems to have a lot of money…”

“What does that last bit have to do with everything you mentioned before?”

“You have to connect all the dots. Of course I didn’t need to busy myself with such concerns before, but after I was transferred from the crime unit to the Battle Command Center, it became part of my job. Even General Chang is impressed by my talent for connecting the dots.”

“And your conclusion?”

“Everything that’s happening is coordinated by someone behind the scenes with one goal: to completely ruin scientific research.”

“Who?”

“I have no idea. But I can sense the plan, a very comprehensive, intricate plan: damage scientific research installations, kill scientists, drive scientists like you crazy and make you commit suicide—but the main goal is to misdirect your thoughts until you’re even more foolish than ordinary people.”

“Your last statement is really perceptive.”

“At the same time, they want to ruin science’s reputation in society. Of course some people have always engaged in anti-science activities, but now it’s coordinated.”

“I believe it.”

Now you believe me. So many of you scientific elites couldn’t figure it out, and I, having gone only to vocational school, had the answer? Ha! After I explained my theory, the scholars and my bosses all ridiculed it.”

“If you had told me your theory back then, I’m sure I wouldn’t have laughed at you. Take those frauds who practice pseudoscience—do you know who they’re most afraid of?”

“Scientists, of course.”

“No. Many of the best scientists can be fooled by pseudoscience and sometimes devote their lives to it. But pseudoscience is afraid of one particular type of people who are very hard to fool: stage magicians. In fact, many pseudoscientific hoaxes were exposed by stage magicians. Compared to the bookworms of the scientific world, your experience as a cop makes you far more likely to perceive such a large-scale conspiracy.”

“Well, there’re plenty of people smarter than me. People in positions of power are well aware of the plot. When they ridiculed me at first, it was only because I wasn’t explaining my theory to the right people. Later on, my old company commander—General Chang—had me transferred. But I’m still not doing anything other than running errands…That’s it. Now you know as much as I do.”

Have you read this book? I’d love to hear your thoughts in a comment below!

The Three-Body Problem – Summary

Here is the book summary from Goodreads:

Set against the backdrop of China’s Cultural Revolution, a secret military project sends signals into space to establish contact with aliens. An alien civilization on the brink of destruction captures the signal and plans to invade Earth. Meanwhile, on Earth, different camps start forming, planning to either welcome the superior beings and help them take over a world seen as corrupt, or to fight against the invasion.

Copyright © 2006 by Cixin Liu.

Translated by: Ken Liu

You can find more details here on Goodreads and on StoryGraph.

I would go into the forest…

This is a quote from the book Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead by Olga Tokarczuk, translated by Antonia Lloyd-Jones.

Quote by Olga Tokarczuk, “I would go into the forest – I could wander around it endlessly. Here things were quieter the forest was like a vast, deep, welcoming refuge in which one could hide. It lulled my mind.”

Have you read this book? I’d love to hear your thoughts in a comment below!

If you’re interested, you can read an excerpt from the book here.

Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead – Summary

Here is the book summary from Goodreads:

One of Poland’s most imaginative and lyrical writers, Olga Tokarczuk presents us with a detective story with a twist in Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead. After her two dogs go missing and members of the local hunting club are found murdered, teacher and animal rights activist Janina Duszejko becomes involved in the ensuing investigation. Part magic realism, part detective story, Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead is suspenseful and entertaining reimagining of the genre interwoven with poignant and insightful commentaries on our perceptions of madness, marginalised people and animal rights.

Copyright © 2009 by Olga Tokarczuk.

Translated by: Antonia Lloyd-Jones

You can find more details here on Goodreads and on StoryGraph.

Refining your craft

Excerpt from The Poetry Handbook by Mary Oliver

Photo by Orfeas Green on Unsplash

This is an excerpt from the book The Poetry Handbook by Mary Oliver.

Everyone knows that poets are born and not made in school. This is true also of painters, sculptors and musicians. Something that is essential can’t be taught; it can only be given, or earned, or formulated in a manner too mysterious to be picked apart and re-designed for the next person.

Still, painters, sculptors, and musicians require a lively acquaintance with the history of their particular field and with past as well as current theories and techniques. And the same is true of poets. Whatever can’t be taught, there is a great deal that can, and must, be learned.

This book is about the things that can be learned. It is about matters of craft, primarily. It is about the part of the poem that is a written document, as opposed to a mystical document, which of course the poem is also.

It has always seemed to me curious that the instruction of poetry has followed a path different from he courses of study intended to develop talent in the field of music o the visual arts where a step-by-step learning process is usual, and accepted as necessary. In an art class, for example, every student may be told to make a drawing of a live model, or a vase of flowers, or three potatoes for that matter. Afterward, the instructor may examine and talk about the various efforts. Everyone in the class recognizes that the intention is not to accomplish a bona fide act of creation, but is an example of what must necessarily come first—exercise.

Is anyone worried that creativity may be stifled as a result of such exercise? Not at all. There is rather, a certainty that dialogue between instructor and student will shed light on any number of questions about technique, and give knowledge (power) that will open the doors of process. It is craft, after all, that carries an individual’s’ ideas to the far edge of familiar territory.

The student who wishes to write a poem, however, is nicely encouraged to go ahead and do so, and, having written it, is furthermore likely to be encouraged to do another along the same lines. Quickly, then, the student falls into a manner of writing, which is not a style but only a chance thing vaguely felt and not understood, or even, probably, intended. Continuing in this way, the writer never explores or tries out other options. After four or five poems, he or she is already in a rut, having developed a way of writing without ever having the organized opportunity to investigate and try other styles and techniques. Soon enough, when the writer’s material requires a change of tone, or some complex and precise maneuver, the writer has no idea how to proceed, the poem fails, and the writer is frustrated.

Perhaps sometime you will have an idea for a piece of music, you may actually “hear” it in the privacy of your mind—and you will realize how impossible it would be to write it down, lacking, as most of us do, the particular and specialized knowledge of musical notation. Why should our expectation about a poem be any different? It too is specialized, and particular.

Poems must, of course, be written in emotional freedom. Moreover, poems are not language but the content of the language. And yet, how can the content be separated from the poem’s fluid and breathing body? A poem that is composed without the sweet and correct formalities of language, which are what sets it apart from the dailiness of ordinary writing, is doomed. It will not fly. It will be raucous and sloppy—the work of an amateur.

This is why when I teach a poetry workshop, I remove for a while the responsibility of writing poems, and order up exercises ealing with craft. Since every class is different, the assignments, of course, differ too. Any instructor who agrees with the idea can easily think of suitable and helpful exercises. So can the students themselves.

When each workshop member is at the same time dealing with the same technique, and is focusing as well on the same assigned subject matter, these exercises also are fo great help in making any gather of writers into an attentive and interacting class. Each writer quickly becomes interested in and learns from, the work of the other members.

A poet’s interest in craft never fades, of course. This book is not meant to be more than a beginning—but it is meant to be a good beginning Many instructors, for whatever reasons, feel that their “professional” criticism (i.e.s, opinion) of a student’s work is what is called for. This book is written in cheerful disagreement with that feeling. It is written in an effort to give the student a variety of technical skills—that is, options. It is written to empower the beginning writer who stands between two marvelous and complex things—an experience (or an idea or a feeling), and the urge to tell about it in the best possible conjunction of words.

Have you read this book? I’d love to hear your thoughts in a comment below!

A Poetry Handbook – Summary

In case you’re interested, here is the book summary from Goodreads:

“Mary Oliver would probably never admit to anything so grandiose as an effort to connect the conscious mind and the heart (that’s what she says poetry can do), but that is exactly what she accomplishes in this stunning little handbook.”
— Los Angeles Times

From the beloved and acclaimed poet, an ultimate guide to writing and understanding poetry.

With passion and wit, Mary Oliver skillfully imparts expertise from her long, celebrated career as a disguised poet. She walks readers through exactly how a poem is built, from meter and rhyme, to form and diction, to sound and sense, drawing on poems by Robert Frost, Elizabeth Bishop, and others. This handbook is an invaluable glimpse into Oliver’s prolific mind—a must-have for all poetry-lovers.

Copyright © 1994 by Mary Oliver.

More details can be found on Goodreads and on Storygraph.

You must remember to come back

This is a quote from The House on Mango Street by Sandra Cisneros.

Quote by Sandra Cisneros, “You must remember to come back. For the ones who cannot leave as easily as you.”

Have you read this book? I’d love to hear your thoughts in a comment below!

If you’re interested, you can read an excerpt from the book here.

The House on Mango Street – Summary

Here is the book summary from Goodreads:

Acclaimed by critics, beloved by readers of all ages, taught everywhere from inner-city grade schools to universities across the country, and translated all over the world, The House on Mango Street is the remarkable story of Esperanza Cordero.

Told in a series of vignettes – sometimes heartbreaking, sometimes deeply joyous–it is the story of a young Latina girl growing up in Chicago, inventing for herself who and what she will become. Few other books in our time have touched so many readers.

Copyright © 1984 by Sandra Cisneros.

You can find more details here on Goodreads and on StoryGraph.

Death bows his head – Poems by Rainer Maria Rilke

Photo by Jr Korpa on Unsplash

Here are two poems by Rainer Maria Rilke for Poetry Month.

Presaging

I am like a flag unfurled in space,

I scent the oncoming winds and must bend with them,

While the things beneath are not yet stirring,

While doors close gently and there is silence in the chimneys

And the windows do not yet tremble and the dust is still heavy –

Then I feel the storm and am vibrant like the sea

And expand and withdraw into myself

And thrust myself forth and am alone in the great storm.


Death

Before us great Death stands

Our fate held close within his quiet hands.

When with proud joy we lift Life’s red wine up

To drink deep of the mystic shining cup

And ecstasy through all our being leaps –

Death bows his head and weeps.

Have you read any of Rilke’s poems? I’d love to hear your thoughts in a comment below!

Poems of Rainer Maria Rilke – Summary

Here is the book summary from Goodreads:

Considered one of the most significant literary figures of his era, Austrian poet Rainer Maria Rilke served as a bridge between the themes and styles of the Romantic period and the concerns and anxieties that would give rise to modernism in the twentieth century. This collection brings together dozens of Rilke’s most popular and critically acclaimed works.

Copyright © by Rainer Maria Rilke.

Translated by: Jessie Lamont

You can find more details here on Goodreads and on StoryGraph.

Live in these books

This is a quote from the book Letters to a Young Poet by Rainer Maria Rilke, translated by Charlie Louth.

Quote by Rainer Maria Rilke, “Live in these books for a while, learn from them what seems to be worth learning, but above all love them.”

Have you read this book? I’d love to hear your thoughts in a comment below!

If you’re interested, you can read an excerpt from the book here.

Letter to a Young Poet – Summary

Here is the book summary from Goodreads:

A hugely influential collection for writers and artists of all kinds, Rilke’s profound and lyrical letters to a young friend advise on writing, love, sex, suffering and the nature of advice itself.

Copyright © 1929 by Rainer Maria Rilke.

Translated by: Charlie Louth

More details on Goodreads can be found here.

Beauty is not enough

Two poems by Edna St. Vincent Millay

Photo by Aaron Burden on Unsplash

Since it’s Poetry Month, below you will find two poems by Edna St. Vincent Millay.

Spring

To what purpose, April, do you return again?

Beauty is not enough.

You can no longer quiet me with the redness

Of little leaves opening stickily.

I know what I know.

The sun is hot on my neck as I observe

The spikes of the crocus.

The smell of the earth is good.

It is apparent that there is no death

But what does that signify?

Not only under ground are the brains of men

Eaten by maggots.

Life in itself

Is nothing,

An empty cup, a flight of uncarpeted stairs.

It is not enough that yearly, down this hill,

April

Comes like an idiot babbling and strewing flowers.


Sonnet

Time, that renews the tissues of this frame,

That built the child and hardened the soft bone,

Taught him to wail to blink, to walk alone,

Stare, question wonder, give the world a name,

Forget the watery darkness whence he came,

Attends no less the boy to manhood grown,

Brings him new raiment, strips him of his own:

All skins are shed at length, remorse even shame.

Such hope is mine, if this indeed be true,

I dread no more the first white in my hair,

Or even age itself, the easy shoe,

The cane, the wrinkled hands the special chair:

Time, doing this to me, may alter too

My anguish, into something I can bear.

Have you read any of Edna St. Vincent Millay’s poetry? I’d love to hear your thoughts in a comment below!

Selected Poems – Summary

Here is the book summary from Goodreads:

A magnificent anthology of the finest works of Edna St. Vincent Millay, perhaps the premier American lyricist of the twentieth century.

Copyright © by Edna St. Vincent Millay.

You can find more details here on Goodreads and on StoryGraph.

Poetry is the way

This is a quote from Audre Lorde, from her essay called Poetry is not a Luxury.

Quote by Audre Lorde, “Poetry is the way we help give name to the nameless so it can be thought.”

Have you read any of Audre Lorde’s essays? I’d love to hear your thoughts in a comment below!

If you’re interested, you can read an excerpt from the same essay here.

The Selected Works of Audre Lorde – Summary

Here is the book summary from Goodreads:

A definitive selection of Audre Lorde’s “intelligent, fierce, powerful, sensual, provocative, indelible” (Roxane Gay) prose and poetry, for a new generation of readers.

Self-described “black, lesbian, mother, warrior, poet” Audre Lorde is an unforgettable voice in twentieth-century literature, and one of the first to center the experiences of black, queer women. This essential reader showcases her indelible contributions to intersectional feminism, queer theory, and critical race studies in twelve landmark essays and more than sixty poems—selected and introduced by one of our most powerful contemporary voices on race and gender, Roxane Gay.

Copyright © 1977 by Audre Lorde (for this essay).

You can find more details here on Goodreads and on StoryGraph.

A special degree of familiarity

Excerpt from Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead by Olga Tokarczuk

Photo by Adam Chang on Unsplash

This is an excerpt from the book Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead by Olga Tokarczuk, translated by Antonia Lloyd-Jones.

‘What are you going to call her?’ I asked, as the first sips of tea warmed me from the inside, and the tangle of emotions caught in my throat began to melt a little.

Oddball shrugged.

‘I don’t know, maybe Fly, or Tray.’

I didn’t say anything, but I didn’t like it. Those names didn’t suit this Dog, considering her personal history. Something else would have to be thought up for her instead.

What a lack of imagination it is to have official first names and surnames. No one ever remembers them, they’re so divorced from the Person, and so banal that they don’t remind us of them at all. What’s more, each generation has its own trends, and suddenly everyone’s called Magdalena, Patryk, or – God forbid – Janina. That’s why I try my best never to use first names and surnames, but prefer epithets that come to mind of their own accord the first time I see a Person. I’m sure this is the right way to use language, rather than tossing about words stripped of all meaning. Oddball’s surname, for instance, is Świerszczyński – that’s what it says on his front door, with the letter ‘Ś’ in front of it. Is there really a first name that starts with the letter Ś? He has always introduced himself as ‘Świerszczyński’, but he can’t expect us to twist our tongues trying to pronounce it. I believe each of us sees the other Person in our own way, so we should give them the name we consider suitable and fitting. Thus we are polyonymous. We have as many names as the number of people with whom we interact. My name for Świerszczyński is Oddball, and I think it reflects his Attributes well.

But now, as I gazed at the Dog, the first thing that occurred to me was a human name, Marysia. Maybe because of the orphan in the classic children’s story – she was so emaciated.

‘She wouldn’t be called Marysia, would she?’ I asked.

‘Possibly,’ he replied. ‘Yes, I think that’s right. Her name’s Marysia.’

The naming of Big Foot occurred in a similar way. It was quite straightforward – it suggested itself to me when I saw his footprints in the snow. To begin with, Oddball had called him ‘Shaggy’, but then he borrowed ‘Big Foot’ from me. All it means is that I chose the right name for him.

Unfortunately, I couldn’t choose a suitable name for myself. I regard the one that’s written on my identity card as scandalously wrong and unfair – Janina. I think my real name is Emilia, or Joanna. Sometimes I think it’s something like Irmtrud too. Or Bellona. Or Medea.

Meanwhile Oddball avoids calling me by my name like the plague. That means something too. Somehow he always finds a way to address me as ‘you’.

‘Will you wait with me until they get here?’ he asked.

‘Sure,’ I readily agreed, and realized I’d never have the courage to call him ‘Oddball’ to his face. When you’re such close neighbours, you don’t need names to address each other. Whenever I see him weeding his small garden as I’m passing by, I don’t need his name to speak to him. It’s a special degree of familiarity.

The name of the book comes from William Blake’s prose work called The Marriage of Heaven and Hell, in a section called the Proverbs of Hell, you can read it here.

Have you read this book? I’d love to hear your thoughts in a comment below!

Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead – Summary

Here is the book summary from Goodreads:

One of Poland’s most imaginative and lyrical writers, Olga Tokarczuk presents us with a detective story with a twist in DRIVE YOUR PLOW OVER THE BONES OF THE DEAD. After her two dogs go missing and members of the local hunting club are found murdered, teacher and animal rights activist Janina Duszejko becomes involved in the ensuing investigation. Part magic realism, part detective story, DRIVE YOUR PLOW OVER THE BONES OF THE DEAD is suspenseful and entertaining reimagining of the genre interwoven with poignant and insightful commentaries on our perceptions of madness, marginalised people and animal rights.

Copyright © 2009 by Olga Tokarczuk.

Translated by: Antonia Lloyd-Jones

You can find more details here on Goodreads and on StoryGraph.

I never wanted to get married

This is a quote from the book The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath.

Quote by Sylvia Plath, “That’s one of the reasons I never wanted to get married. The last thing I wanted was infinite security and to be the place an arrow shoots off from. I wanted change and excitement and to shoot off in all directions myself, like the coloured arrows from a Fourth of July rocket.”

Have you read this book? I’d love to hear your thoughts in a comment below!

If you’re interested, you can read an excerpt from the book here.

The Bell Jar – Summary

Here is the book summary from Goodreads:

The Bell Jar chronicles the crack-up of Esther Greenwood: brilliant, beautiful, enormously talented, and successful, but slowly going under—maybe for the last time. Sylvia Plath masterfully draws the reader into Esther’s breakdown with such intensity that Esther’s insanity becomes completely real and even rational, as probable and accessible an experience as going to the movies. Such deep penetration into the dark and harrowing corners of the psyche is an extraordinary accomplishment and has made The Bell Jar a haunting American classic.

Copyright © 1963 by Sylvia Plath.

You can find more details here on Goodreads and on StoryGraph.