Robbie Claravall > Recent Status Updates

This novel is so hard to pin down. Not a criticism per se, but I can see this having a lot of interpretations/readings.

'I find my way into a predictable world, a pattern that acquires more and more details. I flow in and out of the house. I flow through the day. I am fluid. I let myself flow with the sounds, like a liquid, and liquids flow in to fill any available space.'

'...he'll own and preserve this place that breeds time, time that does not flow but stagnates among adobe walls that will never fully fall.'

'...you're what you are only for as long as the disguise lasts.'

'He only wanted to see a living God donkey with a silver halo around its head. A donkey that sits in a bank vault on bars of solid gold, where on some days this God donkey was being ridden by a Hindu goddess.'

Man this book is funny as shit HAHAHAHAHA

'...I'd repeat those words in a strange, distorted voice, full of anger about so many things, an anger that only grew with time.'

'...we have to remember that what we observe is not nature in itself but nature exposed to our method of questioning.'

'Dad is back, so very still and silent, standing in the garden. He looks like he has been hurt in some way. Very deep inside him.'

`Love, now what do I mean by a word like that, because if there's any word in the world that doesn't mean anything it's that one.'

'What does he know about war, sitting in front of a piano all day, lost in the clouds?'

'...excess of reflection can paralyse the will.'

'In this last moment the water is no longer lifeless but life-filled, and I'm glad, at the end, to be a part of this, intermediate in this, glad that everything I've seen and done, everything I've felt will be continuous in this, generative and fertile in this flux, cycles of transformation, not ending but beginning, beginning again, as it always was and will be, new worlds in transformation, new eternities...'

"'When I stand here, I feel like I'm slipping away.' He gestured at the water—'It anticipates us, contains us, outlives us. And we are right here with it.'"

'Western strategists test their maxims by victories in battles; Sun Tzu tests by victories where battles have become unnecessary.'

'This isn't about sex, no, this is an affair of the heart.'

My Kobo Forma broke... :( Got myself a Kindle Paperwhite 11th Gen then—diverting ecosystems, managing expectations.

‘It’s subversive not to hide behind a prototype, to take up space, to resist behaving for the comfort of others. To act according to interest.’

Here are my favourite books so far for the first third of 2023:

THE CHAOS MACHINE: THE INSIDE STORY OF HOW SOCIAL MEDIA REWIRED OUR MINDS AND OUR WORLD (Max Fisher)
PORN: AN ORAL HISTORY (Polly Barton)
THE YEARS (Annie Ernaux)
THE SELFISHNESS OF OTHERS: AN ESSAY ON THE FEAR OF NARCISSISM (Kristin Dombek)
A BOY’S OWN STORY (Edmund White)

‘The lesson was unambiguous: shut HAL off. Even if it meant losing whatever benefits HAL brought. Even if it was difficult, in the film’s final scenes, to rip HAL’s tentacles from the systems governing every facet of the astronauts’ lives. Even if the machine fought back with all its power.’

Brilliant ending!!!

I asked ChatGPT for some Autofiction recommendations and here are her picks:

1. THE MEZZANINE by Nicholson Baker
2. THE LAST SAMURAI by Helen DeWitt
3. THE ARGONAUTS by Maggie Nelson
4. THE YEAR OF MAGICAL THINKING by Joan Didion
5. THE EMPATHY EXAMS by Leslie Jamison

Let’s see if she has good taste. :)

Updated Resolution: I can focus on (1) physical book and (1) e-book at the same time.

I feel very passionately about art, so I just want to share some words on why I am not ‘rating’ books (or films, for that matter) anymore unless it is a 5. Instead, I seek to focus on immersion and relation in both my literary and cinematic experiences henceforth. My in-depth elucidation can be read here (though it must be noted that the text in the link is written in the context of films): https://boxd.it/3EGrCJ

2023 Reading Resolution: Read. ONE. Book. At. A. Time. :)

I’ve completely immersed myself in Knausgaard’s entire My Struggle series from the months of August to December last year and the experience has been otherworldly, almost akin to a meditative, transcendental sort-of-state. I literally felt like I was ‘lost’ in the pages. This is the immersion I am striving for.

Top 10 Books of 2022
1. MY STRUGGLE I-VI (Knausgaard)
2. SEPTOLOGY I-VII (Fosse)
3. SEA OF TRANQUILITY (St. John Mandel)
4. THE CORRECTIONS (Franzen)
5. HEAVEN (Kawakami)
6. CASE STUDY (Burnet)
7. THE POSSESSION/HAPPENING (Ernaux)
8. THE BOOK OF FORM AND EMPTINESS (Ozeki)
9. IN PRAISE OF SLOWNESS: CHALLENGING THE CULT OF SPEED (Honoré)
10. HOW HIGH WE GO IN THE DARK (Nagamatsu)

This book is rife with bullshit mindgames and psychological trickery. Relationships should be as open and as authentic as possible. Not sure if I want to continue...

‘How weeding and raking the moss in the garden helped me understand that what’s important is not finishing a task but rather just doing it, completely. Doing connects me to this moment, this weed, this patch of moss. This moment is my real life. I am not separate from this moment, or from the floorboards, or the trees...’

This book is honestly fantastic. Going to spend the rest of my Sunday evening devouring this.

’Everyone’s got an opinion. Everyone’s got a story to tell.’