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Me and a frog (August 30, 2004)

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Listen, this process called poetry is an exercise in imagining memory, and then having that memory snare and cherish imagination.

Breyten Breytenbach


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My attempt to re-read J.R. is now officially interrupted -- I did not get even as far into it as I did on the first reading of it. And let me say this about that book: it is beautifully written and often uproariously funny; but the plot is way too dense for my puny understanding to encompass. But. I will read it again in a few years and perhaps everything will fall into place.

The agent of disruption here is Philip Roth's new novel, The Plot Against America. I have been seeing articles about this for a while now and thinking, it sounds like an interesting premise; then there was a long review in Sunday's Times Book Review that really intrigued me; and whaddaya know, Monday afternoon found me in Coliseum Books handing the clerk my money.

And it's an interesting book, so far (about a quarter of the way through). Very readable and engaging, though I was thinking this afternoon the scenes move kind of predictably -- like I can see Roth setting up the scene and deciding what is going to happen in it. This is the first book I have read by Roth since I was in college, indeed since I was in my first year of college, when I read Portnoy's Complaint, Our Gang, and (I believe) Goodbye, Columbus.

posted evening of Wednesday, October 6th, 2004
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