For this article

I am going to go through a long, very old, hand written notebook, take a few notes here from it, and then recycle it. One must rid oneself of things if one is to think. 1/ Republic should mean equality, but modernity is exclusionist: this is a problem. 2/ An article worth reading, on manners … More For this article

Ferreira da Silva

“In my own work I have argued that, rather than marking a rejection (as the hegemonic writers of the nation advocated) or the denial (as their critics insist) of race (i.e. racial difference), miscegenation institutes a mode of racial subjection predicated upon the necessary obliteration of the racial subaltern subject.” (ca. 2005) That sentence is … More Ferreira da Silva

Google

I truly resent Chrome and Firefox demanding your phone number or other information if you try to open e-mail at the public library; I have never given them my number nor do I feel they are justified in expecting me to even have a telephone. I do not believe their requirements exist for my own … More Google

Ginzburg, Melville

The July 29 New Yorker has a beautiful article about Natalia Ginzburg, who is wonderful, and a fascinating one about Melville. Ginzburg: imagination is stronger when you are happy – suffering makes the imagination weak and lazy – drowning in emotions, and in particular, in pain is NOT what women writers should do. This is … More Ginzburg, Melville

The new outline

I 1. The national novels are disturbing for what they do with incest, race, death [originary violence, romance of origins] 2. They’ve become nat. novels and also, under influence of Jameson & then Sommer, been read as nat. allegories 3. At that point the 1920s/30s national projects, which reflect some letrado discourse from further back … More The new outline