My all time favorite poem, though, is by Alastair Reid, called
Curiosity
may have killed the cat; more likely
the cat was just unlikely, or else curious
to see what death was like, having no cause
to go on licking paws, or fathering
litter on liter of kittens, predictably.
Nevertheless, to be curious
is dangerous enough. To distrust
what is always said, what seems,
to ask odd questions, interfere in dreams,
leave home, smell rats, have hunches
do not endear cats to those doggy circles
where well-smelt baskets, suitable wives, good lunches
are the order of things, and where prevails
much wagging of incurious heads and tails.
Face it. Curiosity
will not cause us to die--
only lack of it will.
Never to want to see
the other side of the hill
or that improbable country
where living is an idyll
(although a probable hell)
would kill us all.
Only the curious
have, if they live, a tale
worth telling at all.
Dogs say cats love too much, are irresponsible,
are changeable, marry too many wives,
desert their children, chill all dinner tables
with tales of their nine lives.
Well, they are lucky. Let them be
nine-lived and contradictory,
curious enough to change, prepared to pay
the cat price, which is to die
and die again and again,
each time with no less pain.
A cat minoriy of one
is all that can be counted on
to tell the truth. And what cats have to tell
on each return from hell
is this: that dying is what the living do,
that dying is what the loving do,
and that dead dogs are those who do not know
that dying is what, to live, each has to do.
(no copyright infringement intended. Poetry can't be summarized, it can only be told)
Damn, I got such chills down my back the first time I read that.
connie, those are some great poems.
are you more prone to enjoy a book if you stumbled across it yourself, or if it was at some point assigned?
I think I'm with you and Hec. Yes, I love a lot of books I've discovered myself (or through friends' recommendations), but I've also loved a great many books I've been assigned, because I've had some great professors who've helped me appreciate what I've read.
Keeping in mind that I'm very picky with my non-genre stuff (err, please don't ask me about the book sitting on my desk right now... I'm gonna lie, and claim it's Decartes Sue or something--okay, fine, bodice rippers from the late 80s/early 90s amuse me like the Bad Fic, the more lurid the cover art the better, and if it's relief? I practically swoon), I'd say my love/meh/hate breakdown is about 60/30/10 either way (assigned or found).
PS, Hec, you will notice that I did, in fact, post some of my brain droppings on Batcrap in the other thread. Just for you.
Okay, I lie. Because I want/NEED to talk about this issue. And so I did.
After Shakespeare, my favorite sonnets are Millay's. I maintain that she wrote the best sonnets of the twentieth century, and the rest of her work was no less wonderful.
okay, fine, bodice rippers from the late 80s/early 90s amuse me
I saw you snickering with awful glee over that fox-porn romance thingie in Chicago. Unsurprised.
Discussions I've had off thread have made me wonder, and this is a curiousity question more than anything: are you more prone to enjoy a book if you stumbled across it yourself, or if it was at some point assigned?
Definitely things I've stumbled across myself. Part of that is because I'm a moody, streaky sort of reader--I go through phases where I want nothing but a certain genre or style, or where I've overdosed on another and can't bear it for a year or two. Anything assigned has to be lucky to catch me in the right frame of mind.
In the library in my brain, Michael Chricton does not get shelved with the sci-fi, in spite of every one of his books (that I have read) having fictional science as a major part of the premise.
I think part of the disconnect is that his writing style is very much best-sellerese, which my brain does not parse as sci-fi no matter how much fictional science there is.
As tautological as it sounds, Michael Chricton writes Michael Chricton novels.
t bookmarking Jen's poetry post
BTW, for those of us who don't have huge book-buying budgets, college lit books are a great source of poetry, short stories, and other stuff. There is duplication, but surprisingly little, and the introductions are often amusing when they explain why they chose what. I just counted, and I have 7 books from lit courses, acquired in school when students were off-loading their books.
