Isaac Asimov

Public Domain

"I instantly learned the measure of manliness in the Army: it was how far you could recede from ordinary decency."

In Memory Yet Green: The Autobiography of Isaac Asimov, 1920-1954

page 433 of 732

Honda in the Matrix

                

This black Honda Civic was in front of my black Honda Civic while I was sitting at a stop light. Same model, same year. Then the license plate caught my eye. 5 of the 6 numbers / letters are the same as the ones on my license plate. And 4 of them are in the same spot. 

Universe? Stop fucking around and set me up with some winning lottery numbers.

P.S. Sorry about my dusty dashboard. I was busy reading when I should have been cleaning.

ADDENDUM:

Not as impressive, but still... same car make and model, same color, 3 of six characters match AND are in the same places, two others just one off and in the same places. I'm calling it another freaky thing.

Емч: Идиот by Фёдор Михайлович Достоевский

I read this one a long, long time ago, and I'm sorry to say that I don't remember anything about it, not even if I liked it or not. xxii + 660 = 682 pages...with the novel itself clicking in at 640 pages. So I'm thinking 23 days.

And of course I had to start nibbling on it right away (February 21, thus Day 0), and found this interesting bit in Linda J. Ivanits' Introduction:

"Does Myshkin represent a new Don Quixote or a Christ for contemporary Russia?" (ix)

Day 1 (DDRD 2,305) February 22, 2024

Read to page 14.

So today I started The Idiot, the story of Prince Myshkin, and this appeared in my Facebook feed:

Thanks for fucking with me, Universe.

Meanwhile, back in The States....

"...General Yepanchin was still in what might be called full sap, he was no more than fifty-six, the flower of manhood, when a man begins leading his real life." (15)

Well, when you put it that way, 66...to be 67 in a little bit... doesn't sound so bad, does it? Just a few milliliters under the Full Sap mark.

Day 2 (DDRD 2,306) February 23, 2024

Read to page 44. Not really grabbing me yet, but I do like Prince Myshkin.

Day 3 (DDRD 2,307) February 24, 2024

Read to page 74.

In some ways, this seems like the thumbnail sketch version of The Brothers Karamazov. Marie is very much like Stinking Lizaveta, Prince Myshkin seems very much like Alyosha. At any rate, I'm sorry to say that this far in the story still hasn't grabbed me, and I feel like I'm just pushing this big boulder up a steep hill.

Interesting perspective: "One can tell a child everything, anything. I have often been struck by the fact that parents know their children so little. They should not conceal so much from them. How well even little children understand that their parents conceal things from them, because they consider them too young to understand!" (69)

Day 4 (DDRD 2,308) February 25, 2024

Read to page 110.

Day 5 (DDRD 2,309) February 26, 2024

Read to page 140. With 520 pages to go, there's plenty of time for my mind to change, but as of this moment I do not like this book very much. We seem to be stumbling from one meaningless conversation to another, with no guiding light, no goal, no purpose. And even worse, there is nothing beautiful or even noteworthy about Dostoyevsky's language. It is, in fact, banal. I can switch to a different translation and see if that helps at all, I suppose.

Day 6 (DDRD 2,310) February 27, 2024

Read to page "170." I switched over to the Constance Garnett translation for today...thus the " " as the page numbers were different, but I read to the same point that 170 would be. And? Well, it wasn't any better. Maybe ill have another go at it tomorrow.

Day 7 (DDRD 2,311) February 28, 2024

Read to page "200."

I went to my friends at IMDb to see if (1) there was a filmed version of The Idiot and (2) if so, who they got to play Nastasya Filipovna. 

I found three versions: from 1951, A Japanese version directed by Akira Kurosawa; from 1958, A Russian version; and from 2003, A Russian tv mini-series. Here are the respective Nastayas:

All perfectly fine looking women...especially Lidiya... but none quite fit my idea of a woman so beautiful that it made you woozy to be in her presence.

I was thinking that Charlotte Kemp Muhl would be a good pick:

She makes me woozy, anyway.

General Ardalion Alexandrovitch Ivolgin says that he is "the victim...of an 'unbounded trust in the nobility of the human heart.'”

I think that's the new epitaph.  Here lies etc. Yep.

Meanwhile, back in the States....

Prince Myshkin (although for Constance it's Muishkin) writes a letter to Aglaya (Aglaia) which contains this superb line:

"I am conscious of an irresistible desire to remind you of my existence...."

Come to think of it, that would be a pretty good epitaph, too.

Meanwhile, back in the States....

Prince Myshkin (although for Constance it's Muishkin) writes a letter to Aglaya (Aglaia) which contains this superb line:

"I am conscious of an irresistible desire to remind you of my existence...."

Come to think of it, that would be a pretty good epitaph, too.

Some comparison shopping:

"The room had a blue wall-paper, and was well, almost pretentiously, furnished, with its round table, its divan, and its bronze clock under a glass shade. There was a narrow pier-glass against the wall, and a chandelier adorned with lustres hung by a bronze chain from the ceiling.

"When the prince entered, Lebedeff was standing in the middle of the room, his back to the door. He was in his shirt-sleeves, on account of the extreme heat, and he seemed to have just reached the peroration of his speech, and was impressively beating his breast."

or

"The room was papered in dark blue and mostly arranged, not without a certain pretension to elegance; that is, with a round table and a sofa, a bronze clock in a glass case,  a narrow mirror on the wall and a small and very ancient glass chandelier suspended from the ceiling by a bronze chain, while in the center of the room stood a narrow mirror on the wall and a small and very ancient glass chandelier suspended from the ceiling by a bronze chain, while in the center of the room stood Mr. Lebedev himself himself, his back to the door as the prince entered, in the waistcoat but no jacket in deference to the sunnier clime, pounding him himself on the chest as he declaimed bitterly on some subject or other."

The first is Constance's version. She clearly went for simpler syntax, and by doing so she clarifies the passage (and lays less stress on the reader). But the most important difference to me is Constance's use of the phrase, "well, almost." That interjection makes the narrator more of a presence as an actual person who is not completely sure about what he is narrating. I like that.

Day 8 (DDRD 2,312) February 29, 2024

Read to page "230."

When I was a little kid, I used to look out the back window of the car and watch the line in the road, and as long as it was unbroken, I would sing, "Where will it end? Where will it end?" Etcetera. I'm thinking about that song s I continue to read this book.

This morning I happened upon a video entitled 15 Bible Verses That Identify Donald J. Trump as the Antichrist.

Shortly thereafter I started on today's DDR in The Idiot , and almost immediately ran into this line: "‘They tell me you expound the prophecies relating to Antichrist,’ said he, when we were alone. ‘Is that so'?"

Public Domain

Well. There it is.

Day 9 (DDRD 2,313) March 1, 2024

Read to page "261."

Constance says, "Compassion is the chief law of human existence."

Henry & Olga say, "Compassion is the chief and perhaps the only law of human existence." (241)

Hmmm. I like the latter better, but really...it's a bit overly optimistic, isn't it? I'm calling this one for Constance... though I'd like to see the original Russian, if you please. Just to be sure. As if the would do me any good.

Day 10 (DDRD 2,314) March 2, 2024

Read to page 291. No quotes. I'm back to the Henry & Olga translation. Not out of disatisfaction with Constance, but out of the desire to hold a real book in my hands again. Even one I don't particularly like. Sigh. 369 🍼of 🍻 on the wall....

A line from Waiting for Godot occurs to me:

"This is becoming really insignificant."

Day 11 (DDRD 2,315) March 3, 2024

Read to page 321. Tough hill to climb today. 339 to go...so almost at the halfway point.

Sigh.

Day 12 (DDRD 2,316) March 4, 2024

Read to page 351. 🏔

Day 13 (DDRD 2,317) March 5, 2024

Read to page 381. 🏔🏔🏔 A VERY hard read, in part because I got sick, but also because I just don't like this book (it pains me to say).

I checked out a review on reddit, just to see if anyone else found this book less than spectacular, and r/books had this to say: "...most of the scenes seemed pretty inconsequential. As someone else on this subreddit said, the book felt like a daytime soap opera. I especially disliked how overly dramatic the female characters are and how they freak out and storm off in practically every scene. Overall, the labor of reading these 650 pages was not really worth it, but I slugged though because I wasn't gonna put it down after reading~400 pages. Anyone else feel the same about this book?"

Yep.

Day 14 (DDRD 2,318) March 6, 2024

Read to page 411. You know, it don't come easy.

As a matter of fact, I actually started wondering if I really want to stay on this All Of Dostoyevsky's Fiction path I've been treading for the past 4 months. 249 pages of this (8 days), and then...can I count on Demons and The Adolescent being better? You know, there are a lot of other things I've been wanting to read....

In other news, I've just read a bunch of "Dostoyevsky's Greatest Novels" lists, and every one of them included The Idiot. What the fucking fuckity fuck, man?

Day 15 (DDRD 2,319) March 7, 2024

Read to page 441.

Some true Truths today:

(1) "Oh, you may be certain that Columbus was happy not when he had discovered America but rather when he was just on the point of discovering it; you may be certain that his highest moment of happiness was perhaps three days before the discovery of the New World, when his mutinous crew in desperation almost turned back to Europe!" (412)

After Keats' "Ode on a Grecian Urn":

Heard melodies are sweet, but those unheard

Are sweeter....

(2) "... people are created to torture one another." (413) 

Well...I can see clearly now the rain is gone. 

🌧 🌦🌈

And how about this for the coup de grâce:

(3) "If I could never have been born, I certainly would never have chosen existence on such ludicrous terms." (433)

The reading was a bit better today...maybe because of the whole suicide thing. It's hard to make that kind of shit boring.

Day 16 (DDRD 2,320) March 8, 2024

Read to page 480. At very least, I might take a break from Dostoyevsky after this Idiot thing and read that big Handel opera book I got a couple of months back.

Day 17 (DDRD 2,321) March 9, 2024

Read to page 510. 150 pages to go.

Day 18 (DDRD 2,322) March 10, 2024

Read to page 550.

"...people are more ready to believe crude liars who are amusing than a man of worth and merit." (516)

Ain't that the truth.

Day 19 (DDRD 2,323) March 11, 2024

Read to page 580. 80 pages to go, then. Three days or less. Sigh. I think I'm definitely going to take a Dostoyevsky break after this. I do fear that I might not make it back, but at this point I'm just exhausted by disappointment in this novel. How is it possible that so many people regard this as not only one of Dostoyevsky's greatest, but as one of the greatest novels of all time?

There was a passage which lifted me out of my reading torpor for a moment. Not in a good way. It was the Prince's vitriolic diatribe against Catholicism. It's long, so I went for the Constance translation which I could easily copy and post (as opposed to the Henry & Olga translation, which I would have to copy word by word).

“It is not a Christian religion, in the first place,” said the latter, in extreme agitation, quite out of proportion to the necessity of the moment. “And in the second place, Roman Catholicism is, in my opinion, worse than Atheism itself. Yes — that is my opinion. Atheism only preaches a negation, but Romanism goes further; it preaches a disfigured, distorted Christ — it preaches Anti-Christ — I assure you, I swear it! This is my own personal conviction, and it has long distressed me. The Roman Catholic believes that the Church on earth cannot stand without universal temporal Power. He cries ‘non possumus!’ In my opinion the Roman Catholic religion is not a faith at all, but simply a continuation of the Roman Empire, and everything is subordinated to this idea — beginning with faith. The Pope has seized territories and an earthly throne, and has held them with the sword. And so the thing has gone on, only that to the sword they have added lying, intrigue, deceit, fanaticism, superstition, swindling; — they have played fast and loose with the most sacred and sincere feelings of men; — they have exchanged everything — everything for money, for base earthly power! And is this not the teaching of Anti-Christ? How could the upshot of all this be other than Atheism? Atheism is the child of Roman Catholicism — it proceeded from these Romans themselves, though perhaps they would not believe it. It grew and fattened on hatred of its parents; it is the progeny of their lies and spiritual feebleness. Atheism! In our country it is only among the upper classes that you find unbelievers; men who have lost the root or spirit of their faith; but abroad whole masses of the people are beginning to profess unbelief — at first because of the darkness and lies by which they were surrounded; but now out of fanaticism, out of loathing for the Church and Christianity!”

I was pretty shocked by all of that. Also, in searching for that bit, I did a search in my Kindle collection of All Of The Novels of Dostoyevsky and came across this bit from Demons: "...you believed that Roman Catholicism was not Christianity; you asserted that Rome proclaimed Christ subject to the third temptation of the devil. Announcing to all the world that Christ without an earthly kingdom cannot hold his ground upon earth, Catholicism by so doing proclaimed Antichrist and ruined the whole Western world. You pointed out that if France is in agonies now it’s simply the fault of Catholicism, for she has rejected the iniquitous God of Rome and has not found a new one."

And of course that slides right into place with the whole Grand Inquisitor scene from The Brothers Karamazov. Seems pretty clear that Dostoyevsky had a true hatred for Catholicism. 

I find that very disappointing.

Day 20 (DDRD 2,324) March 12, 2024

Read to page 610. 50 pages to go.

Dostoyevsky has often shown a fondness for intrusive narrators, but so far as I've read, this one is by far the most intrusive. He not only bows into the frame to let you know he's there...he even discusses how he is telling the story. Is that why people regard The Idiot as experimental? Cuz if so...that's just bullshit. Lots of other writers were breaking and entering their stories before FD. 

Why the hell do people like this fucking book???

Day 21 (DDRD 2,325) March 13, 2024

Read to page 660, aka The End.

Just couldn't face 30 pages of this straight out of the chute this morning, so I turned to the Afterword (pages 645 to 655). And almost immediately hit this: "The Idiot was...Dostoyevsky's personal favorite." (645)  Holy shit, man.

Ho. Lee. Shit.

Later on,  says, "there is no binding idea in The Idiot." (645) Hmpf. Seems to me that the definition of A novel is a collection if binding ideas. But what do I know.

If I were a rich man...deedle deedle deedle deedle deedle die....

At any rate, I'm through with it, will never go back to it, wish I had my 21 days spent on it back.

Time for a Dostoyevsky break.

DDR Day 1 to 1,000: 13,449 pages read, 13.45 Average Pages Per Day

A History of Philosophy Volumes I - XI

History of Civilization in England Volumes I - III

Miscellaneous and Posthumous Works of Henry Thomas Buckle Volumes I - III

Civilization and Capitalism, 16th - 18th Century Volumes I - III

The Mediterranean and the Mediterranean World in the Age of Philip IIl Volumes I - III

This Happened In My Presence: Moriscos, Old Christians, and the Spanish Inquisition in the Town of Deza, 1569-1611

The Stolen Village: Baltimore and the Barbary Pirates

Peat and Peat Cutting

+

DDR Day 1,001 to Day 2,000:
(1) Leviathan 63 days, 729 pages
(2) Stalingrad 27 days, 982 pages
(3) Life and Fate 26 days, 880 pages
(4) The Second World War 34 + 32 + 40 + 43 + 31 + 32 days = 212 days, 4,379 pages
(5) Baron Wenckheim's Homecoming 10 days, 572 pages
(6) The Great Bridge 25 days, 636 pages
(7) The Path Between the Seas 29 days, 698 pages
(8) Blake: Prophet Against Empire, 23 days, 523 pages
(9) Jerusalem 61 days, 1,266 pages
(10) Voice of the Fire 9 days, 320 pages
(11) The Fountainhead 15 days, 720 pages

(12) The Pacific Trilogy: Pacific Crucible 23 days, 640 pages
(13) The Pacific Trilogy: The Conquering Tide 28 days, 656 pages
(14) The Pacific Trilogy: Twilight of the Gods 31 days, 944 pages

(15) Jazz: Its Evolution and Essence 13 days, 304 pages
(16) Toward Jazz 18 days, 224 pages
(17) The Worlds of Jazz 13 days, 279 pages
(18) To Be or Not...to Bop 14 days, 571 pages
(19) Kind of Blue 4 days, 224 pages
(20) Kind of Blue: Miles Davis and his Masterpiece: 5 days, 256 pages
(21) Miles: The Autobiography 16 days, 445 pages
(21) A Love Supreme: The Story of John Coltrane's Signature Album: 8 days, 287 pages
(22) Ascension: John Coltrane and His Quest 8 days, 304 pages
(23) Living With Music: Ralph Ellison's Jazz Writings 11 days 325 pages

(24) The Pickwick Papers 28 days, 983 pages
(25) Oliver Twist 16 days, 542 pages
(26) Nicholas Nickleby 27 days, 1,045 pages
(27) The Old Curiosity Shop 22 days, 753 pages
(28) Barnaby Rudge 24 days, 866 pages

(29) Master Humprhey's Clock 4 days, 145 pages
(30) Martin Chuzzlewit 32 days, 1,045 pages
(31) American Notes 10 days, 324 pages
(32) Pictures From Italy 7 days, 211 pages
(33) Christmas Stories Volume I 10 days, 456 pages
(34) Christmas Stories Volume II 15 days, 472 pages

(35) Christmas Books 17 days, 525 pages

(36) The Annotated Christmas Carol  7 days, 380 pages

(37) Dombey and Son 30 days, 1,089 pages

(38) Sketches by Boz 22 days, 834 pages

2nd 1K Total: 26,834 pages (to SBBII) = 28.76 Average Pages Per Day

Grand Total: 40,273 pages, 20.83 Average Pages Per Day

(39) David Copperfield 21 days, 1,092 pages

(40) The Uncommercial Traveller 12 days, 440 pages

(41) A Child's History of England 10 days, 491 pages

(42) Reprinted Pieces 14 days, 368 pages

(43) Miscellaneous Papers Volume I 18 days, 542 pages

        + 25 pages Bleak Hose and 9 pages Miscellaneous Papers II = 2,000 days' worth.

2nd 1K Total: 29,801pages = 29.8 Average Pages Per Day

Grand Total: 43,250 pages, 21.625 Average Pages Per Day

DDR Day 2,001 to Day 3,000:

(1) Miscellaneous Papers Volume II 28 days (don't count, while reading BH), 494 pages
(2) Bleak House 37 days, 1,098 pages

494 - 9 = 485 + 1098 - 25 = 1073 = 1,558 pages towards 3K...in 37 days, for a daily rate of 42+ pages (!).

(3) Hard Times 11 days, 459 pages

(4) Little Dorrit 29 days, 1,606 pages

(5) A Tale of Two Cities 9 days, 460 pages

(6) Great Expectations 16 days, 580 pages

(7) Our Mutual Friend 29 days, 1,057 pages

(8) The Mystery of Edwin Drood 6 days, 314 pages 

FTR vis-a-vis Dickens: 18,671 pages in 468 days = 39.9 pages per day!

(9) Dickens and Kafka, 7 days, 315 pages

(10) Franz Kafka: A Biography 8 days, 267 pages

(11) The Frozen Sea: A Study of Franz Kafka 5 days, 198 pages

(12) Franz Kafka, A Writer's Life 12 days, 385 pages

(13) The Lost Writings 2 days, 138 pages

(14) Amerika: The Missing Person 11 days, 333 pages

(15) The Brothers Karamazov  24 days, 816 pages

(16) The Eternal Husband & Other Stories 8 days, 375 pages

(17) Poor Folk 5 days, 164 pages

(18) The Double 4 days, 190 pages

(19) The Landlady 3 days, 90 pages

(20) Netochka Nezvanova 6 days, 196 pages

(21) The Village of Stepanchikovo 8 days, 265 pages

(22) Uncle's Dream 4 days, 162 pages

(23) The Insulted and the Injured 14 days, 451 pages

(24) Notes From a Dead House 8 days, 327 pages

(25) Notes From Underground  4 days, 171 pages

(26) Crime and Punishment 13 days, 555 pages             3,762 total Dostoyevsky pages as of now

(27) The Gambler 10 days, 405 pages

(28) The Idiot 21 days, 682 pages

(29) Demons

(30) The Adolescent

Detective Comics #1081

I've been following Detective Comics on & off for 58 years. That's pretty close to the beginning of my comic book reading / buying start, as I remember an ad for issue #352 in the first comic book I bought (Justice League of America #45), and I still own a copy of  Detective Comics #355. That had a cover date of September, 1966. I had just turned 9.

I never stayed with the book for too long, but I never stayed away for too long, either. My current WITH started with issue #1075 when I saw that Francesco Francavilla was going to be doing the art. Everything Francesco Francavilla does is worth your time. And I had to stick around for the next issue when I saw that the brilliant Jason Shawn Alexander would be handling the art on that one. And he stuck around until #1080, so so did I...even though Mr. Alexander's art here couldn't hold a candle to his work on Spawn. 

I was pretty unhappy with the writing of Ram Venkatesan (aka Ram V), which tends to be a purple shade of florid, and thought that I'd be putting the kibosh on the title at that point, but two simple words: I Forgot. Thus did issue #1081 come into my possession. And you know what? I think I'm going to stick around for another issue or two and see what happens. 

Mostly it was the art. According to the credits, the penciller is Milan-born Stefano Raffaele, and the inker is Roman-born Riccardo Federici. The latter did a lot of work on the Action Comics Warworld saga...and you know what? The art on Detective Comics #1081 looks a lot like that work: it's got a much lighter touch than the usual comic book art...very elegant. Well, here: have a couple thousand words on it:

So I'm guessing that Mr. Federici did a lot more than ink these pages. Furthermore...pages 10-12 and 16-18 have a very different look...and either one (or both) of those Italian boys is a fantastic mimic, or DC snuck in six pages of Francesco Francavilla without telling us what was going on. I've got a pretty good eye for comic book artists, and those pages are VERy Francavilla-ish. 

And the story? Well...it's one of those Batman is near death and thus hallucinating like a motherfucker things that seem very familiar...aka overused. See, Batman is in the desert and he has to fight a bat creature during the daytime and then travel across the desert at night in order to Find Himself. Yeah, I know...ho fucking hum for me, too. 

However...if you look back at the picture posted above and read the caption, you'll see a reference to "Calvino's Traveler." That, of course, is Italo Calvino, and if nothing else an allusion to his novel If on a winter's night a traveler. Well. I will admit that I have not yet read this tome...nor anything else by Mr. Calvino...but I know enough to know that he is a Big Fucking Deal, and not the kind of fellow that a comic book writer is apt to make reference to. In fact, I can confidently say that after 58 years of reading comic books...and we're talking about tens of thousands of books here...I have never before seen a reference to Calvino. So Ram gets points for that. 

Thus yes, looks like I'll be coming back for issue 1082. And now, of course, I'm itching to get at some Italo Calvino as well. Sigh. 

Емч: Игрок с дневником Полины Сусливой by Федор Достоевский

 

XXXIX + 366 = 405. But only 195 of that is The Gambler. The rest is Introduction, excerpts from Polina Suslova's diary, a story by PS, and some letters. So we'll see how that goes.

Day 1 (DDRD 2,295) February 12, 2024

The back of this book lists the Dostoevsky Notebooks Published by the University of Chicago Press:

After seeing that, I decided I would not even attempt to read anything beyond FD's novels and short stories.  Which, of course, immediately calls into question 50% of this volume. So I'll play that by ear. I'll definitely read the Introduction. From which I've already learned that Dostoyevsky wrote this book (actually dictated it) from October 4 to October 29, 1866. That's pretty speedy. 💥😁

Onward.

Read to page 11.

Speaking of the Introduction:

When discussing one of Dostoyevsky's three great loves, editor Edward Wasiolek says, "Dostoyevsky's Polina in The Gambler is far more attractive and complex than is the living prototype...." (xi)

I thought about how that definitely applies to me and my perception of most of the women who have been in my life. I saw them as much better people than they really were. I don't think it's the pedestal treatment so much as it is the blindness of love thing. If I'd been able to see clearly, I certainly would have had less heartache in my life. 50% fewer marriages, too.

Of Dostoyevsky's first wife, EW Notes that she "repaid Dostoyevsky's generosity with open contempt and distaste." (xiii) Well...been there, done that, got a T-shirt.

Here are some adjectives for the woman Dostoyevsky loved: "fitful, tempestuous, destructive, vengeful, cruel." (xxii)

Yep, yep, yep, yep, and yep.

And here is a bit of wisdom from one of Dostoyevsky's letters: "Whoever demands everything from others, while not feeling any obligation on his part, will never find happiness." (fn xxii)

P.S.: Both of the above pictures come from my phone camera. 

Day 2 (DDRD 2,296) February 13, 2024

Read to page 35. A bit short of goal. But it was a busy day with little (almost no, actually) down time, and, alas, this book is just not grabbing me. Could it be the translator? I've never encountered this Victor Terras previously. I might switch to Constance for a chapter and see how that goes.

Day 3 (DDRD 2,297) ❤❤February 14, 2024❤❤

Read to page 110.

Read Chapters 5 and 6 in Constance's translation (courtesy of Internet Archive), and it didn't seem any better. The bit about the ballcrushing grandma winning big at the roulette table was good, but I still just can't get caught up in this book. Kind of looking forward to it being over, to tell the truth.

Day 4 (DDRD 2,298) February 15, 2024

Read to page 140.

Day 5 (DDRD 2,299) February 16, 2024

Read to page 172.

Day 6 (DDRD 2,300) February 17, 2024

Read to page 198, which is the end of The Gambler. I didn't think much of this book at all, and I'm tempted to move on to The Idiot to get the taste of it out of my mouth, but I'll have at least a nibble on the Diary of Polina Suslova and see if I want to spend another week on this thing.

Meanwhile, back in the States:

I dug this 

out of the hall closet and will probably watch it later today.

Day 7 (DDRD 2,301) February 18, 2024

Read to page 230. Meh. I'll give it another day, but it's not feeling very necessary. Didn't get to the movie yet.

Day 8 (DDRD 2,302) February 19, 2024

Read to page. 273. The reading seemed a bit more interesting today, so I'll at least go for another day...which will put me at the end of the diary...and a mere two days from finishing, so that's probably what I'll do. 

In one of the diary entries I read today there was mention of a Russian painter, Valery Yakobi. I took a Wikipedia on him and found this arresting painting:

Public Domain

Apparently, Yakobi was very interested in the plight of the poor.

I also thought that this was interesting: 

"Let people deceive me, let them laugh at me, but I want to believe in people, let them deceive me. And besides, they can't do very great damage, can they?" (250)

And here's an interesting coincidence. Yesterday I saw The Pirates of Penzance with Jacqueline and Joe. One of the running jokes was that whenever the lead character said the word "duty," he or someone else would immediately and sonorously echo "Duty." Well, check this out:

Hello lampost. What you knowin'?

ADDENDUM: Basketball practice day, so I went for a few more pages. Read to page 302.

"As I remember what happened two years ago, I begin to hate D[ostoevsky].  He was the first to kill my faith." (278)

Well. I'd like to Paul Harvey that one.

Day 9 (DDRD 2,303) February 20, 2024

Read to page 340. Finished Polina's shirt story, which I actually enjoyed.

"...once a thing had entered her heart, it left an indelible mark. So it was also this time: a black thought had descended upon her heart, and was burning it slowly, but surely." (319)

That's pretty good, isn't it? I'm beginning to not be sorry that I didn't abandon this book after The Gambler finished.

So tomorrow I'll finish the letters, and that will be that.

Day 10 (DDRD 2,304) February 21, 2024

Read to page 366, The End. Most of the letters were pretty interesting...and her sad. To think that this great writer, who would only live 59 years, was in such terrible shape then: 45 years old, broke, not even able to buy food, stuck with a gambling addiction, far from home and unable to buy a train ticket back to his wife, begging money from everyone he knew.... And yet he managed to write Crime and Punishment around this time...and The Gambler as well.

Dostoyevsky in a letter to Polina, with reference to "Apollinaria":

"I love her still, I love her very much, but by now, I wish I did not love her. She is not worthy of such love.  I feel sorry for her, because I can foresee that she will always be unhappy. Nowhere will she find either friend or happiness. Whoever demands everything from others, will not feeling any obligation on his part, will never find happy happiness." (342)

This reminds me of someone I once loved so much that it makes me want to cry for her.

This book is so old that it has the pocket and card in the back for check out:

Onward.

P.S. Thought I should watch the movie before moving on go The Idiot. It was an interesting 97 minutes. Which is not the same as good. Director Károly Makk, who seems to have made no other films of note, made some very bad choices in the telling of this story. Which, by the way, is not just The Gambler, but the story of Dostoyevsky and Anna Snitkina

writing the novel as well.  Truth to tell, that was the more compelling story. It's worth seeing if you're A Dostoyevsky fan...or an Albus Dumbledore fan, since Michael Gambon plays Dostoyevsky. A rude, nasty version of FD most of the time. 

DDR Day 1 to 1,000: 13,449 pages read, 13.45 Average Pages Per Day

A History of Philosophy Volumes I - XI

History of Civilization in England Volumes I - III

Miscellaneous and Posthumous Works of Henry Thomas Buckle Volumes I - III

Civilization and Capitalism, 16th - 18th Century Volumes I - III

The Mediterranean and the Mediterranean World in the Age of Philip IIl Volumes I - III

This Happened In My Presence: Moriscos, Old Christians, and the Spanish Inquisition in the Town of Deza, 1569-1611

The Stolen Village: Baltimore and the Barbary Pirates

Peat and Peat Cutting

+

DDR Day 1,001 to Day 2,000:
(1) Leviathan 63 days, 729 pages
(2) Stalingrad 27 days, 982 pages
(3) Life and Fate 26 days, 880 pages
(4) The Second World War 34 + 32 + 40 + 43 + 31 + 32 days = 212 days, 4,379 pages
(5) Baron Wenckheim's Homecoming 10 days, 572 pages
(6) The Great Bridge 25 days, 636 pages
(7) The Path Between the Seas 29 days, 698 pages
(8) Blake: Prophet Against Empire, 23 days, 523 pages
(9) Jerusalem 61 days, 1,266 pages
(10) Voice of the Fire 9 days, 320 pages
(11) The Fountainhead 15 days, 720 pages

(12) The Pacific Trilogy: Pacific Crucible 23 days, 640 pages
(13) The Pacific Trilogy: The Conquering Tide 28 days, 656 pages
(14) The Pacific Trilogy: Twilight of the Gods 31 days, 944 pages

(15) Jazz: Its Evolution and Essence 13 days, 304 pages
(16) Toward Jazz 18 days, 224 pages
(17) The Worlds of Jazz 13 days, 279 pages
(18) To Be or Not...to Bop 14 days, 571 pages
(19) Kind of Blue 4 days, 224 pages
(20) Kind of Blue: Miles Davis and his Masterpiece: 5 days, 256 pages
(21) Miles: The Autobiography 16 days, 445 pages
(21) A Love Supreme: The Story of John Coltrane's Signature Album: 8 days, 287 pages
(22) Ascension: John Coltrane and His Quest 8 days, 304 pages
(23) Living With Music: Ralph Ellison's Jazz Writings 11 days 325 pages

(24) The Pickwick Papers 28 days, 983 pages
(25) Oliver Twist 16 days, 542 pages
(26) Nicholas Nickleby 27 days, 1,045 pages
(27) The Old Curiosity Shop 22 days, 753 pages
(28) Barnaby Rudge 24 days, 866 pages

(29) Master Humprhey's Clock 4 days, 145 pages
(30) Martin Chuzzlewit 32 days, 1,045 pages
(31) American Notes 10 days, 324 pages
(32) Pictures From Italy 7 days, 211 pages
(33) Christmas Stories Volume I 10 days, 456 pages
(34) Christmas Stories Volume II 15 days, 472 pages

(35) Christmas Books 17 days, 525 pages

(36) The Annotated Christmas Carol  7 days, 380 pages

(37) Dombey and Son 30 days, 1,089 pages

(38) Sketches by Boz 22 days, 834 pages

2nd 1K Total: 26,834 pages (to SBBII) = 28.76 Average Pages Per Day

Grand Total: 40,273 pages, 20.83 Average Pages Per Day

(39) David Copperfield 21 days, 1,092 pages

(40) The Uncommercial Traveller 12 days, 440 pages

(41) A Child's History of England 10 days, 491 pages

(42) Reprinted Pieces 14 days, 368 pages

(43) Miscellaneous Papers Volume I 18 days, 542 pages

        + 25 pages Bleak Hose and 9 pages Miscellaneous Papers II = 2,000 days' worth.

2nd 1K Total: 29,801pages = 29.8 Average Pages Per Day

Grand Total: 43,250 pages, 21.625 Average Pages Per Day

DDR Day 2,001 to Day 3,000:

(1) Miscellaneous Papers Volume II 28 days (don't count, while reading BH), 494 pages
(2) Bleak House 37 days, 1,098 pages

494 - 9 = 485 + 1098 - 25 = 1073 = 1,558 pages towards 3K...in 37 days, for a daily rate of 42+ pages (!).

(3) Hard Times 11 days, 459 pages

(4) Little Dorrit 29 days, 1,606 pages

(5) A Tale of Two Cities 9 days, 460 pages

(6) Great Expectations 16 days, 580 pages

(7) Our Mutual Friend 29 days, 1,057 pages

(8) The Mystery of Edwin Drood 6 days, 314 pages 

FTR vis-a-vis Dickens: 18,671 pages in 468 days = 39.9 pages per day!

(9) Dickens and Kafka, 7 days, 315 pages

(10) Franz Kafka: A Biography 8 days, 267 pages

(11) The Frozen Sea: A Study of Franz Kafka 5 days, 198 pages

(12) Franz Kafka, A Writer's Life 12 days, 385 pages

(13) The Lost Writings 2 days, 138 pages

(14) Amerika: The Missing Person 11 days, 333 pages

(15) The Brothers Karamazov  24 days, 816 pages

(16) The Eternal Husband & Other Stories 8 days, 375 pages

(17) Poor Folk 5 days, 164 pages

(18) The Double 4 days, 190 pages

(19) The Landlady 3 days, 90 pages

(20) Netochka Nezvanova 6 days, 196 pages

(21) The Village of Stepanchikovo 8 days, 265 pages

(22) Uncle's Dream 4 days, 162 pages

(23) The Insulted and the Injured 14 days, 451 pages

(24) Notes From a Dead House 8 days, 327 pages

(25) Notes From Underground  4 days, 171 pages

(26) Crime and Punishment 13 days, 555 pages                  3,762 total Dostoyevsky pages as of now

(27) The Gambler 10 days, 405 pages

(28) The Idiot

(29) Demons

(30) The Adolescent

Thundercats #1

 

I didn't think I was going to leave the house today. When possible, I don't. (There's PEOPle out there! *) But then I remembered that Thundercats #1 was due to be released today, and I was pretty sure that if I waited until Friday, when Joe and I usually go to The Great Escape, that it would be sold out. So I decided to make a  trip  out. Just to The Destination, though, as that is a mere 2.2 miles from my front door.

There were lots of copies available there. And so many different covers. In fact, when I got home and checked out the covers shown in the back of the book, there were about 150 different covers. ** How is that even possible? Some of these were quite expensive--$15. But I liked the "normal" cover (see above) just fine, so that's the one I picked up.

As I was waiting in line, the store owner was talking to another customer. When he saw that I had a Thundercats, he asked the other guy if he was going to buy it. The guy answered, "I don't know... that's a slippery slope." I was pretty puzzled by that response, and as my brain tried to ferret out the meaning, he beat me to the punch: "I'm afraid that I'd have to get every variant cover, and that would be expensive."

On the one hand, I couldn't help but think how weird and even pathetic that was. On the other hand, I knew that if I had the money, I would be exactly the same way. Comic book collecting and anal retentive behavior just go together like a horse and carriage.

ANYway...the comic book was pretty good. I don't know that I'll be around long, but when I visit my real comic book store this Friday, I'll probably put it on my list.

And now...for some reason I feel the need to dig up my dvd of Thundercats. 

Oh, by the way...that picture up top is not a download, not a scan. I took it with my phone camera. Given the way my hands shake, I'm pretty impressed with how it turned out. Just sayin', sir.

* I am 97% sure that that's a line from Thomas and the Magic Railroad, but Googling around hasn't allowed me to verify that, so I guess I'm going to have to rewatch the movie. The things we do for love.

** Seriously. You can see about 80 of them here: https://leagueofcomicgeeks.com/comic/8349130/thundercats-1