This great novel is just my first step in a greater task. My professor has given me personal assignment, so to speak; I am to read the Western Canon, to wake my Orphic voice from its blatant sleep-talking. The list is comprehensive, and it will involve delving into other languages to fully complete. Though the prospect of diversifying and enlightening my mind to the entirety of European literature is thrilling, I might be compelled to limit myself to English and the Latinate.
If anyone is interested in a collection of good works to read (I know that reading can't be quite dead yet), then go here.
My social world, on the other hand, is a gripping tale of another level entirely. My institutionalized academic world is waning into dormancy, perhaps even death, my love life is in proverbial shambles, and I'm in a struggle with what my counselor says are traits and symptoms commonly associated with bipolar disorder. My life's throes are synonymous with the rolling snowball.
And now, for non sequitur; my psychology professor, distraught over the poor turnout to the last day of class, entrusted the students who did show up with the answer to a bonus question on our final. The question, the only one not a multiple choice, is to correctly identify and write down her youngest nephew's full name. Respect can be earned in sometimes the most peculiar of manners.
I do enjoy these bitter nights. To quote Melville,
Nothing exists in itself. If you flatter yourself that you are all over comfortable, and have been so for a long time, then you cannot be said to be comfortable anymore. [...] For the height of this sort of deliciousness is to have nothing but the blanket between you and your snugness and the cold of the outer air. There you lie like the one warm spark in the heart of an arctic crystal.
Moby-Dick, Chapter 11
And with that, I bid you adieu.
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