Time

[Pagey]

'But what is the point of life if not to be happy?'
Laughter, a snort of derision. Dreams of unabashed grandeur not yet hampered by disillusionment. And then the pang of reality, the dagger in your side, the expulsion from the garden.
The trials. The experiments, the hopes to get it back. A futile hope, really. Once it's gone it's a lost cause, a naïve search in vain for a greener time. You don't get that back. You had your chance. You lost it. You fucked up.
So you bury yourself and you wait, and you draw up colorful images of luxury and fulfillment, and you wonder, 'why me'? All the while too scared to face the answer so obviously exposed before your eyes and so insultingly cast aside.
Failure, really, is what it is. Daunting and dreary and seeping into your globes.
And you wonder what the bigger plan is as you tilt your head back and struggle to hold on to a shimmering light that flickers in the distance before your gaze, playing a never-ending game of hide-and-go-seek as bubbles of frustration grip you and never let go.

 

[laugh]

nice prose

 

[laugh]

Ticking away the moments
That make up a dull day
Fritter and waste the hours
In an off-hand way
Kicking around on a piece of ground
In your home town
Waiting for someone or something
To show you the way
Tired of lying in the sunshine
Staying home to watch the rain
You are young and life is long
And there is time to kill today
And then the one day you find
Ten years have got behind you
No one told you when to run
You missed the starting gun
And you run and you run
To catch up with the sun
But it's sinking
Racing around
To come up behind you again
The sun is the same
In a relative way
But you're older
Shorter of breath
And one day closer to death
Every year is getting shorter
Never seem to find the time
Plans that either come to naught
Or half a page of scribbled lines
Hanging on in quiet desperation
Is the English way
The time is gone
The song is over
Thought I'd something more to say
Home
Home again
I like to be here
When I can
When I come home
Cold and tired
It's good to warm my bones
Beside the fire
Far away
Across the field
Tolling on the iron bell
Calls the faithful to their knees
To hear the softly spoken magic spell...

 

[Pagey]

^Hah, was the reference that obvious?

 

[laugh]

have you read any kerouac? i love his prose.

 

[Pagey]

Well I've read On the Road (who hasn't) but that's it - I should check out some more of his stuff though. In terms of prose my favorite author's by very far Fitzgerald, the Great Gatsby's the novel that made me decide to study English Lit.

 

[laugh]

really, i just dont get what is the hype about the great gatsby? i read it cause hst recommended a million times in like all his books. i thought gatsby was/is majorly over rated. maybe i should reread? havnt bothered to watch the flick tbh. is there any other fitzgerald you would recommend?
maybe you would like 'the dharma bums' or 'lonesome traveller' by kerouac. iv enjoyed all kerouac stuff except for when hes writing about trains i usually just skip that shite.
have you read any kesey or hesse?

 

[Pagey]

Well Tender is the Night is a masterpiece as well, but if you didn't like Gatsby you might not enjoy that one either. I dunno, I don't think the story in itself is more genius than anything else, it's just the way he writes - I find it just ridiculously beautiful. Plus I love it more every time I read it. The Redford film isn't great I think but the DiCaprio one coming out in may looks really promising.
I'll check those out, thanks. Haven't read any KEsey or Hesse though english isn't my first language so there's a lot of fairly obvious stuff I haven't read (yet).

 

[laugh]

im pretty confident you will love hesse, and kesey is one of my favourites, they were both genius imo. how about camus, you would have read camus being french, right? think i might need to reread the gatsby.

 

[Pagey]

I'll add them to my reading list!
And yeah I've certainly read my fair share of Camus. The french author I like most is Sartre if you've read any of his stuff?
You should definitely give Gatsby another chance I think, it's only on the second/third reading that I really started to love it this much cuz that's when you start to really pay attention to language I think

 

[laugh]

no, but he is high on my to do read list. would you recommend one of his to start with? yeh iv got a copy of gatsby so i might dust it off and give it another go

 

[Shrooms00087]

Amazing.

 

[Pagey]

no, but he is high on my to do read list. would you recommend one of his to start with? yeh iv got a copy of gatsby so i might dust it off and give it another go

Yeah let's see - I'd start with either Les Séquestrés d'Altona or Huis Clos, with Huis Clos being one of his most famous. But both those books are extremely interesting. Lemme know what you think!
I don't know if you're reading them in french/ if so, what your level is, but Les Séquestrés d'Altona is considerably more complicated when it comes to the language used, just in case.

Amazing.

Well thank you

 

[Ashley]

That - Pagey, my dear - is top shelf.

Ash.

 

[dhcdavid]

The first Kerouac I ever read was "Desolation Angels" which is simply stunning; and I say that now even with the benefit of hindsight having read all his other stuff.

Simply stunning prose: first half of the book is him, Kerouac, in total isolation working as a "fire-watcher" on top of a mountain in a forest. Really beautiful man-at-one-with-nature-and-himself kinda stuff.

Second half of book is him down off mountain hanging with pals in San Francisco. Also great (better than I can make it sound) and a perfect balance to the first half of "Desolation Angels". Go buy it now.

I loved it ("Desolation Angels") so much I ended up doing a big dissertation in my lit degree on it and Kerouac.

 

[salpairadice]

Well Tender is the Night is a masterpiece as well, but if you didn't like Gatsby you might not enjoy that one either. I dunno, I don't think the story in itself is more genius than anything else, it's just the way he writes - I find it just ridiculously beautiful. Plus I love it more every time I read it.

I love Fitzgerald as well, people look at me weird when I tell them this. Even This Side of Paradise, his most inconsistent work. It's the egotist in us %)

 

[panic in paradise]

That - Pagey, my dear - is top shelf.

Ash.

yeah this pretty swill pagey
~

Well Tender is the Night is a masterpiece as well, but if you didn't like Gatsby you might not enjoy that one either. I dunno, I don't think the story in itself is more genius than anything else, it's just the way he writes - I find it just ridiculously beautiful. Plus I love it more every time I read it. The Redford film isn't great I think but the DiCaprio one coming out in may looks really promising.
I'll check those out, thanks. Haven't read any KEsey or Hesse though english isn't my first language so there's a lot of fairly obvious stuff I haven't read (yet).

that is an interesting inquiry, a conundrum of sorts - is it the writer, what is written, or how it is interpreted by the reader.

art i think is what takes on life or form in the imagination of the appreciator,
and that way art is a timeless thing.