Turtle, by Kay Ryan:

Who would be a turtle who could help it? A barely mobile hard roll, a four-oared helmet, She can ill afford the chances she must take In rowing toward the grasses that she eats. Her track is graceless, like dragging A packing-case places, and almost any slope Defeats her modest hopes. Even being practical, She’s often stuck up to the axle on her way To something edible. With everything optimal, She skirts the ditch which would convert Her shell into a serving dish. She lives Below luck-level, never imagining some lottery Will change her load of pottery to wings. Her only levity is patience, The sport of truly chastened things.

"How did you become a poet?""Reluctantly."

Charlie Rose interviews U.S. Poet Laureate Kay Ryan and James Billington of the Librarian of Congress:

If I've written this written this properly, it's like condensed soup... it should be reconstitutable in the mind of the reader and it should come out just about right if you've had a chance to read it.

And this:

I mistrust inspiration... I find it necessary to begin before I have any inspiration.

The History of Visual Communication. Plenty of good stuff here. I like the care taken in the further readings & references at the bottom of each section.

The old man will be home as soon as he can, and we will take a walk. That's poor folk's luxury.

That's a quote from Carleton Watkins, an early American landscape photographer who hauled thousands of pounds of equipment around the American West. His photos of the Yosemite area appeared in The Yosemite Book that helped make it a protected area, and had a big influence in creating national parks. He was great with the lens, but not so good with money. Sad story of failing health, failing eyesight, then insanity. He lost his life's work when the San Francisco earthquake struck and his studio burned.

Play creates order, is order. Into an imperfect world and into the confusion of life it brings a temporary, a limited perfection.

That's Johan Huizinga in his book Homo Ludens.

An interesting aside from photographer Michael David Murphy's Against Ease: or How the Inifinitely Reproduceable Pushes Us Further From the Source:

In some ways, the pricing of digital fine art prints seems to be a shift-away from paying for an actual print to paying for all the expense that went into creating the work that led to this actual print, because making the actual print is relatively cheap. And there’s something a lot less seductive in that, to me, as someone who might like to buy a print. I want to pay for the worth of the thing itself, not the artist’s overhead.

Austin's post about the new house has some of the more poignant, sweet, mind-blowing ideas that I've read lately:

I wonder about this proximity of bodies. I wonder how we will grow in a bigger space, with an upstairs and downstairs. How our changing spatial relationships might alter our story…

Hand Shadows to Be Thrown upon the Wall by Henry Bursill.

I recommend Wieland Samolak's 1993 album, Steady State Music:

When I was a teenager I used to sit on an empty field listening for hours to the sounds of distant cars, railroads, helicopters, and other motorized objects. These sounds, which are very rough and noisy when they are near, attracted me from the distance because they had merged and diffused into a continuum when they reached my ears. By this experience it came to my mind that it is more satisfying for me to listen to continuous changes within one sound than to the combinations of discreet sonic events usually found in music.

RjDj uses your iPhone and the environment you're in to make soundscapes, etc. It's some sort of sampler with echo and reverb or other scenes that makes life more like you're on something. There's a couple good videos of RjDj on geobloggers. [via funkaoshi]

Forty Four Presidents, a minicomic. My favorite page is the one with John Tyler and James K. Polk. [via things that make my dookie twinkle]

Tonight I went to listen to E.O. Wilson talk about ”Darwin and the Future of Biology”. Biology is most definitely not a strong interest of mine, but it was cool. It also reminded me that I've been meaning to read his book, Consilience: The Unity of Knowledge.

He opened with what seemed like an elementary review of Darwin, his books, his journeys, and his influence; then on to biology as it is today and the two major approaches to biology: functional versus evolutionary, the how versus the why, the lab versus the field, the problem solvers versus the naturalists. (He wasn't trying to paint them as warring factions, just equally valid methods that serve scientists with different interests and temperaments.) He also talked a bit about intelligent design and made the most basic, pragmatic, friendly critique I've heard yet: we just don't need it. It's a solution in search of a problem. He also did a good job of saying there's no point in antagonizing or mounting a heavy offense against ID advocates.

Lastly, the dreaded Q&A afterwards. This one wasn't too painful, but I recommend this as general advice: if you're going to quote the speaker, at least *listen* and quote the speaker accurately. There is such a thing as a stupid question. I suppose when you get to be as old and wise as Wilson, you learn to be as generous and polite as he was tonight.

Nigel Holmes and Good magazine partnered to make It's the Economy, Stupid!, an infodesigny look at the American economy of the past 90-ish years.

"As the parent of a four-year-old and a four-year-old who just inherited an additional $540 billion in bailout this week (on top of the $840 billion that everyone already knew about), I felt the need to write a primer that speaks to them." A primer on the subprime mortgage crisis, written for the young ones. [via hoovers biz]

How Beautiful It Is And How Easily It Can Be Broken collects some of the criticism of Daniel Mendelsohn. Books, movies, theatre. Mendelsohn is a Classics scholar so his work is constantly making connections with the old Greek and Roman tragedies and epics.

I didn't read all the essays because sometimes I just wasn't familiar with what he was criticizing. But among the ones I liked were:

• his wonderful critique of Brokeback Mountain, or rather, a critique of how the critical reception washed out what makes it special (An Affair to Remember);
• his pondering why Tarantino movies, Kill Bill in particular, can be so boring and lifeless (It's Only a Movie);
• his thinking about "the way in which what happens becomes the story of what happens... the way in which history becomes drama" in a review of the movies United 93 and World Trade Center (September 11 at the Movies)
• his studies of productions of Tennesee Williams' plays (Victims of Broadway I and Victims of Broadway II)
• his takedown of Alice Sebold's sappy The Lovely Bones (Novel of the Year)

Daniel Mendelsohn had a good interview on NPR last month.

There are small human heads in these heads of broccoli. [via waxy]

To celebrate its 120th anniversary, the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra is giving away a symphony every day. Yes, please. Here's the selection:

Franz Schubert - Symphony no. 8 'Unfinished' Ludwig van Beethoven - Symphony no. 2 Felix Mendelssohn - Symphony no. 4 'Italian' C?©sar Franck - Symphony in D minor Gustav Mahler - Symphony no. 1 Anton??n Dvo?ô?°k - Symphony no. 8 Camille Saint-Sa?´ns - Symphony no. 3 'Organ' Jean Sibelius - Symphony no. 2 Anton Bruckner - Symphony no. 8 Johannes Brahms - Symphony no. 2

What a nice surprise. Since you asked my opinion, I'd download the Schubert, the Dvo?ô?°k, and definitely grab the Sibelius---one of my favorites, period. Mahler, Bruckner, and Saint-Sa?´ns would be next if I had to choose. And if you get 6, you might as well get the rest... [via classical convert]

Strange as it may sound to many people, who tend to think of critics as being motivated by the lower emotions: envy, disdain, contempt even... Critics are, above all, people who are in love with beautiful things, and who worry that those things will get broken.

---Daniel Mendolsohn

There are a couple real standouts here, though this collection wasn't as sharp as some of the others in the Best American series that I've read (Science 2007, Science & Nature 2007, Comics 2006). As is tradition, here are my picks:

The Loved Ones is the must-read of the bunch. Tom Junod's awesome reporting starts with Sal and Mabel Mangano. The two New Orleans nursing home operators were accused of negligent homicide when many in their care died in post-Katrina flooding (the couple was later acquitted). Along the way he hits on broader themes of journalist ethics, family, love, blame, and responsibility. One of the best pieces I've come across this year.

The School is another great one. C.J. Chivers narrates the horrifying Beslan school hostage crisis, when Chechen rebels took 1000+ kids and adults hostage, using them as leverage against the Russian government. It's dramatic, troubling stuff.

My Roommate, the Diamond Thief is pretty much what it sounds like.

The Inside Job is Neil Swidey's reporting how an employee of John Ferreira embezzled about $7 million dollars over a couple years, without his knowledge.

NPR's 100 most important American musical works of the 20th century, with excerpts from each.