by beatriceotto | Sep 14, 2018 | poetry mojo, writing & writers
Keats was a bold player, keeping his eye determinedly focussed on achieving enduring greatness, not on the fads and fashions of the critical present. His letters reveal his willingness to fly in the face of, and transcend, the vagaries of reviewers. Here he uses a...
by beatriceotto | Aug 31, 2018 | poetry mojo, writing & writers
My earliest impressions of Keats were as a languishing poetic type, not a man of action. Now, after getting to know him through his letters (among the best I have read), he comes across as a vital, life-loving and out-stepping person, even though destroyed by illness...
by beatriceotto | Aug 31, 2018 | writing & writers
I found this description of the stark Cretan landscape startlingly original, using good prose as a metaphor and incidentally giving a taut definition of what makes for fine writing. I gladly add this to the WritingRedux series of Key Penmanship Indicators (KPIs). I...
by beatriceotto | Aug 17, 2018 | writing & writers
Henry Miller is himself a wonderful writer, and this comment about a critical element of successful story-telling took me by surprise. While I am not sure what to make of it, I’ve also turned it over in my mind to see if it would serve as a license to take...
by beatriceotto | Aug 3, 2018 | poetry mojo, writing & writers
This is one of the longest and most entertaining chapters in Machado de Assis’ novel Don Casmurro, a fictional memoir of the eponymous narrator. Many of the other chapters are shorter than a sonnet, but I liked this one, describing the sonnet he almost wrote,...
by beatriceotto | Jul 27, 2018 | poetry mojo, writing & writers
This made me laugh, Keats’ pithy analysis of the source of English literary brilliance. There are several references in his letters to his belief that he will be recognised as one of the great poets of his country, already star-studded with great poets, but not...
by beatriceotto | Jul 20, 2018 | readers & reading, writing & writers
This is a description by Anthony Burgess of the reader’s reaction to Mervyn Peake’s writing in the intricately imaginative Gormenghast trilogy. My reaction to Peake’s Titus Groan, the first of the trilogy, is that the effect of his writing is in...
by beatriceotto | Jul 13, 2018 | poetry mojo, writing & writers, you got mail
Here are Keats’ own aspirations for his letter-writing. Whether he found interesting matter or just made matter interesting, his letters reveal a brilliantly alert, alive, playful, lovable human being. Andrew Motion’s splendid biography also comments on...
by beatriceotto | Jun 19, 2018 | places & spaces, writing & writers
We first noticed it when it was still a construction site, but even on a grimly dank and overcast day, there was something about this tall, light, filigree structure in the middle of fields on the edge of a farming village. You could see it from miles away and we did...
