Anonymous - Early Christian Lives

A call the section on the Big Book List that are full of Anonymous authored texts largely derived from the Penguin classics list - the Anonymous Forest! Other pulls from that second on the list, Njal’s Saga (before I started doing the newsletter).

Going into this text, I have read The Life of Anthony in seminary so I counted that text completed here, and so I had some texts from Jerome to read and a few others. These writings were leaps and bounds more interesting to read than Voragine, sorry for the hate old guy - but Jerome is a much better writer. I will keep this section short as well, I enjoyed reading these biographies rather than hagiographies. The story of Anthony’s coat comes back in Jerome account of the life of Paul of Thebes. Apparently, Anthony thought that he was the first hermit, but someone tells Anthony of Paul of Thebes, so Anthony (in Paul’s story) sets off to find him.

A Centaur in the desert gives Anthony directions. Anthony finds Paul of Thebes in a cave, and Paul is dying so Anthony offers to wrap Paul in Athaneasus’s coat. Anthony only has two possession in the world, his own coat he entered into the monastic life with and one that Athaneaus gave him. Paul refuses to take the gesture of being wrapped in this coat, so Anthony brings it home with him. When Anthony dies, he wills the secondary coat back to Athaneaus. That is all you need to know about the Early Christian Lives, also Maurus comes back into play in the life of Benedict which was hilarious again.

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Lady Hyegyong - The Memoirs of Lady Hyegyong (Small Works List)

I went on a roller coaster ride with this pick. As it is often said about the Small Works List, I have no idea where this name came from or in what context it was meant to be read. I imagine if I went back to find where I found this name it would be from the Norton World Literature Anthology and it would be a short clipping of the incident that this whole text swirls around. What I find enchanting about this idea is that it sort of places as the fulcrum of Korean history this family drama and from the locus of this event there is a father and son struggling to understand their humanity together, the nature of good and evil is being wrestled with and the hope of a family and a nation hang in the balance of one simple act. Memoirs of Lady Hyegyong When I pulled this name in the Henri Michaux Youtube Video , I was a 0% knowledge of who this person was, I didn’t even know how to pronounce the name and did not try in that recording. I watched a few Youtube videos to get a ...

Eugene O'Neill Long Days Journey Into Night (Small Works List)

Just finished Long Days Journey into Night by Eugene O’Neill which was a deeply challenging text. I watched the 1987 version featuring Jack Lemmon, Peter Gallagher, and Kevin Spacey. There is some moments in this text that ring a little false, the relationship between the brothers when it works is good, but this idea of molding the younger brother seems very odd to me. I am not sure that stands up, but the mother’s preoccupation with becoming a nun or a concert pianist rather than taking up with the likes of the actor is a compelling story. The Irish dad that fights with his two sons that accuse him of being cheap is also fascinating. I didn’t know my dad who is 100% Irish, but the only time that I met him as an adult, I knew that I would have hated him. Oddly, he thought that the reason I came to see him was because I wanted money which I thought was odd. The one thing we did discuss while I was there was the books that we had read. I thought that he was lying to me the literature he ...

Anonymous - The Huarochiri Manuscript (Small Works List)

The next entry I pulled from the Small Works List was from what feels like the most popular list on that spreadsheet, the World Literature List 1000 to 1600. I have only pulled one other name at this point on the list but I have consistently been involved with World Lit from around this time period pretty consistently. Kadambari was on the list just before this one as well as Ki No Tsurayuki. The crazy thing is the connection between this text and Guaman Poma. The Huarochiri Manuscript represents a strange node in the make up of this history of this time period, and also happens to be the second indigenous authored text from the same region and the exact same time period. So, let me lay this out for a second. Guaman Poma is one of the only native Incan authors in the historical record. Guaman Poma’s 1200 page letter to King Phillip III was lost for hundreds of years as it was accidentally stored in the Royal Danish Library. Guaman Poma would have written his “letter” in 1...

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