Aaron > Recent Status Updates

“Käthe had once asked the boy why, what he had against Jews, how he could possibly wish more on Germany more hate and war. He replied: Excuse me, Frau Kollwitz, but I would like to stand for something. I would like to be there for something.—Now both of them wore swastika armbands. They looked more cheerful than she had ever seen them.

…

You know the difference between you and us …? We’re optimists.”

“In the Hitler years we still believed in books enough to burn them. Imagine, then, how much life our faith could impart to stone effigies of eagles back in the Kaiser’s day, when belief really meant something!”

Started listening to John Fleming's Chaucer class on this and it has enhanced the reading greatly. While I found the work enjoyable in its own right, the depth of the work was unclear to me. Hearing Fleming's framing of the Tales within the history of European literature, its relationship to The Consolation of Philosophy and Romance of the Rose has made this one of the most engaging literary experiences I've had.

'No more of this for God's dear dignity!'
Our Host said suddenly. 'You're wearying me
To death, I say, with your illiterate stuff.
God bless my soul! I've had about enough.'
...
'Why so?' said I, 'Why should you hinder me
In telling my tale more than another man,
Since I am giving you the best I can?'
'By God,' he said, 'put plainly in a word,
Your dreary rhyming isn't worth a turd!'

Keep rollin' rollin' rollin' rollin'

Miller's Tale is amazing. His and the Reeve's tales both have filthy euphemisms and slapstick. It's surprising how close this is to modern entertainment despite being 700 years old.

The Knight: Let me be brief
>gives history of Thebian combat
>80 page tale
>"now to sum things up"
>gives history of God's creation

I now know why I've never been assigned the Knight's Tale in English Lit. courses

I now have a baby, so I have very little time to read, but will hopefully get back to it in 2026 when things are a little easier to manage. In the meantime, I am letting myself rest and reflect when possible. It’s frustrating to take a break from reading and writing and drawing, but I also think that I will be a new person on the other side of this event. Looking forward to what that time holds.

“… there is always a good number who once meant to shape their own deeds and alter the world a little … perhaps their ardour in generous unpaid toil cooled as imperceptibly as the ardour of other youthful loves, till one day their earlier self walked like a ghost in its old home and made the new furniture ghastly. Nothing in the world more subtle than the process of their gradual change!”

I appreciate the analysis, but the writing style is starting to grate on me.

Reading the criticism first. Highlights are Robert Penn Warren, Sartre, and Ralph Ellison. The ones teasing out the qualities of each section of the book, especially pointing out unique relations to the objective truth, are also interesting and useful for a reread.