I ought to lap up Jeanne Larsen's Silk Road like cream. In fact I've been trying to read it since 1996, which is apparently when I bought it, in Tokyo (vaguely vaguely, a 2nd hand English bookstore in Ebisu), from someone who evidently bought it in Malaysia, going by the bookseller's stamp on the title page. I should lap it up even more now when I understand the pastiches that she's using (Ming storytellers, Buddhist chronicles, Daoist tales) plus the varying version of events these sources give to supplement the first-person narration (oral tradition in action, playing with texts, meta meta yum) plus the delight of a Karin-like gallimaufry of duelling Great Western Mothers, Jade Emperors, Guan-yin, petty bureaucrats in the Heavenly order, and uppity pearl spirits. I still find it a slog, alas.
No health within us and nothing to read
I ought to lap up Jeanne Larsen's Silk Road like cream. In fact I've been trying to read it since 1996, which is apparently when I bought it, in Tokyo (vaguely vaguely, a 2nd hand English bookstore in Ebisu), from someone who evidently bought it in Malaysia, going by the bookseller's stamp on the title page. I should lap it up even more now when I understand the pastiches that she's using (Ming storytellers, Buddhist chronicles, Daoist tales) plus the varying version of events these sources give to supplement the first-person narration (oral tradition in action, playing with texts, meta meta yum) plus the delight of a Karin-like gallimaufry of duelling Great Western Mothers, Jade Emperors, Guan-yin, petty bureaucrats in the Heavenly order, and uppity pearl spirits. I still find it a slog, alas.
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Lying in bed as is my habit, because it's warm and I don't hurt, and thinking gloomy thoughts about knee replacements, or more pecisely rehab after…
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Dentist appointment today, in spite of flailing through snowdrifts to get to cabs, at least got me a good half hour of conversation with the…
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Buoyed by my shopping trip last week, today I rollatored the equal distance to the laundromat to wash my duvet cover. Then walked the two blocks down…
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