A Daily Glance
Christophe Casamassima’s joys: a catalogue of disappointments strikes me as a book stylistically and thematically similar to my own books. In the first section Casamassima writes through Edmond Jabes' work, and the pace of it, if one can talk of pace in poetry, is slow and meditative, and like Jabes’ work itself, the pieces are commentaries on the writing process. The book’s other sections are no less interesting. For example, the section “da vinci’s lisp” reminds me of Olson’s comment “And the line come (I swear it) from the breath, from the breathing of the man who write,” yet Casamassima seems to be contemplating the line, if possible, through someone else’s breath. Basically, can we re-imagine how a person’s breath would create a piece that was never created? The longest section in the book deals with diverse ideas, but it has as an overall theme the way that writing is disruptive of life and communication. Ultimately, I enjoyed the book but am left wondering if I am biased because it looks like it was written by a kindred spirit.
Christophe Casamassima’s joys: a catalogue of disappointments strikes me as a book stylistically and thematically similar to my own books. In the first section Casamassima writes through Edmond Jabes' work, and the pace of it, if one can talk of pace in poetry, is slow and meditative, and like Jabes’ work itself, the pieces are commentaries on the writing process. The book’s other sections are no less interesting. For example, the section “da vinci’s lisp” reminds me of Olson’s comment “And the line come (I swear it) from the breath, from the breathing of the man who write,” yet Casamassima seems to be contemplating the line, if possible, through someone else’s breath. Basically, can we re-imagine how a person’s breath would create a piece that was never created? The longest section in the book deals with diverse ideas, but it has as an overall theme the way that writing is disruptive of life and communication. Ultimately, I enjoyed the book but am left wondering if I am biased because it looks like it was written by a kindred spirit.
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