On Tyranny

Read more: the art room plant: Nora Krug

via everlasting blort

Library In The Earth

Burrowed in a corner of the KURKKU Fields in Kisaru, Japan is a library destined to serve the farmers during their downtime in bad weather. Designed by architect Hiroshi Nakamura & NAP, Library in the Earth occupies a space that was once a natural valley filled with construction debris, leaving only flat, dry land above.

Photography © Koji Fujii / TOREAL

Read more 

Jennie's Boy by Wayne Johnston

Thriller writer Linwood Barclay will champion Jennie's Boy by Wayne Johnston on

Canada Reads 2025. The debates take place March 17-20.

A Book Wheel

via swissmiss

Ideas of Heaven

 

“Many years before, it is true, on a visit to the poet laureate, Alfred Austin, as they sat with others on the lawn in the afternoon, it was suggested that each person should tell his idea of heaven: ‘Austin’s idea was to sit … in a garden, and while he sat to receive constant telegrams announcing alternately a British victory by sea and a British victory by land’; ‘mine’, said Blunt, ‘was to be laid out to sleep in a garden, with running water near, and so to sleep for a hundred thousand years, then to be woke by a bird singing, and to call out to the person one loved best, “Are you there?” and for her to answer, “Yes, are you?” and so turn round and go to sleep again for another hundred thousand years’.” — Edith Finch, Wilfrid Scawen Blunt, 1938

Via Futility Closet

The Self

 

Football

via Biblioklept

Medical History - Nicole Sealey

 

Number Of Books Banned By Schools In Each US State

The map above comes from from PEN America, which tracks book bans and fights censorship in public schools and libraries across the country.

Brilliant Maps

Still Here

 

How Our Love Ends

 

Descriptions Of Things And Atmosphere - F. Scott Fitzgerald

These descriptions taken from the notebooks of F. Scott Fitzgerald are a testament to his enormous talent:
• “The island floated, a boat becalmed, upon the almost perceptible curve of the world.”
• “The first lights of the evening were springing into pale existence. The Ferris wheel, pricked out now in lights, revolved leisurely through the dusk; a few empty cars of the roller coaster rattled overhead.”
• “Farther out in the water there were other lights where a fleet of slender yachts rode the tide with slow dignity, and farther still a full ripe moon made the water bosom into a polished dancing floor.”
• “It was a cup of a lake with lily pads for dregs and a smooth surface of green cream.”
• “A region of those monotonous apartment rows that embody the true depths of the city — darkly mysterious at night, drab in the afternoon.”
• “Spring came sliding up the mountain in wedges and spear points of green.”

Read More 

via  Futility Closet

Hollywood’s Eve

Eve Babitz came of age in Los Angeles in the 60s and 70s. She knew all the fun people and best places to go and partied like there was no tomorrow. She was a groupie and there was lots and lots of sex, drugs and rock and roll. As she approached her thirties she began to write autobiographical novels and short stories that were presented as fiction and didn’t receive much recognition. 

Lily Anolik, a contributing editor at Vanity Fair, was intrigued by Eve’s story and tracked her down in 2012. By this time Eve was in her 70s and had suffered horrific burns when she dropped a lit cigar and her clothing caught on fire. She was living a reclusive life.

Anolik recently wrote a book about Eve’s relationship with Joan Didion that I wanted to read and someone suggested that I should read Hollywood’s Eve first. So I did and didn’t like it. Eve, as presented, was a narcissist who seems to have had a joyless life despite all the supposedly fun things she got up to. I didn’t get much of a sense of who she was and I lay that at Anolik’s feet. I think I’ll wait for a bit before I read Didion and Babitz.

Tell Me Everything | The Narrative Within

We all have stories to tell. It’s just that some of us are better than others at telling them.
Lucy Barton and Olive Kitteridge have something in common. They both like to collect stories from “unrecorded lives”. Lucy and Olive know that we’re all surrounded by stories just waiting to be told and they’re anxious to tell them.

Read More: Art For Housewives

The Frog In Prague - Stephen Dixon

They stand still. “And Kafka?” Howard says.

“Kafka is not buried here.”

“No? Because I thought—what I mean is the lady at my hotel’s tourist information desk—the Intercontinental over there—and also the one who sold me the ticket now, both told me—”

The man’s shaking his head, looks at him straight-faced. It’s up to you, his look says, if you’re going to give me anything for this tour. I won’t ask. I won’t embarrass you if you don’t give me a crown. But I’m not going to stand here all day waiting for it.

“Here, I want to give you something for all this.” He looks in his wallet. Smallest is a fifty note. Even if he got three-to-one on the black market, it’s still too much. He feels the change in his pocket. Only small coins. This guy’s done this routine with plenty of people, that’s for sure, and he’d really like not to give him anything.

“Come, come,” the man said.

“You understand?” Howard said. “For Kafka’s grave. Just as I told the lady at the ticket window, I’m sure the other parts of this ticket for the Old Synagogue and the Jewish Museum are all very interesting—maybe I’ll take advantage of it some other time—but what I really came to see—”

“Yes, come, come. I work here too. I will show you.”

Read more: Biblioklept