book notes 2015-2019
- cre8ivnrg
- Dec 27, 2022
- 15 min read
Updated: Dec 28, 2022
Ernest Hemingway, On Writing
(Touchtone Paperback Edition, 1999) - Edited by Larry W. Phillips. Read August, 2019. Hemingway expressly asked that his letters not be published, but I'm so glad they were. Huge respect. If you want to write, read this entire book. #writing #hemingway
notes n quotes
"There's nothing to writing. Just sit down at the typewriter and bleed."
“I was trying to write then and I found the greatest difficulty, aside from knowing truly what you really felt, rather than what you were supposed to feel, and had been taught to feel, was to put down what really happened in action; what the actual things were which produced the emotion that you experienced. In writing for a newspaper you told what happened and, with one trick and another, you communicated the emotion aided by the element of timeliness which gives a certain emotion to any account of something that has happened on that day; but the real thing, the sequence of motion and fact which made the emotion and which would be as valid in a year or in ten years or, with luck and if you stated it purely enough, always, was beyond me and I was working very hard to try to get it.”―Ernest Hemingway, Death in the Afternoon
“Forget your personal tragedy. We are all bitched from the start and you especially have to be hurt like hell before you can write seriously. But when you get the damned hurt, use it-don't cheat with it.”―Ernest Hemingway
“But sometimes when I was starting a new story and I could not get it going, I would sit in front of the fire and squeeze the peel of the little oranges into the edge of the flame and watch the sputter of blue that they made. I would stand and look out over the roofs of Paris and think, 'Do not worry. You have always written before and you will write now. All you have to do is write one true sentence. Write the truest sentence that you know.' So finally I would write one true sentence, and then go on from there.”―Ernest Hemingway, A Moveable Feast
“All modern American literature comes from one book by Mark Twain called Huckleberry Finn. If you read it you must stop where Jim is stolen from the boys. That is the real end. The rest is just cheating. But it’s the best book we’ve had. All American writing comes from that. There was nothing before. There has been nothing as good since.”
"That essential gift for any good writer is a built-in shit detector. This is the writer's radar and all good writer have had it."
(from George Plimpton, An Interview with Ernest Hemingway The Paris Review 18 Spring,1958)
"Good writing is true writing. If a man is making a story up it will be true in proportion to the amount of knowledge of life that he has and how conscientious he is; so that when he makes something up it is as it would truly be.”― Ernest Hemingway, On Writing
"When you first start writing stories in the first person if the stories are made so real that people believe them the people reading them nearly always think the stories really happened to you. That is natural because while you were making them up you had to make them happen to the person who was telling them. If you do this successfully enough you make the person who reading them believe that the things happened to him too. If you can do this you are beginning to get what you are trying for which is to make the story so real beyond any reality that it will become a part of the reader's experience and a part of his memory. There must be things that he did not notice when he read the story or the novel which without his knowing it enter into his memory and experience so they are a part of his life."#hemingway #papa #onwriting #deathintheafternoon #amoveablefeast
Solo Faces - James Salter
Read March, 2019. Novel-ized account of the obsession that draws climbers away from civilization to test themselves against the most intimidating and inaccessible mountains in the world. James Salter brilliantly captures the adventure of summiting along with its physical tolls and emotional trials.
notes n quotes
“There are men who seem destined to always go first, to lead the way. They are confident in life, they are the first to go beyond it. Whatever there is to know, they learn before others. Their very existence gives strength and drives one onward. Love and jealousy were mingled there in the darkness, love and despair.”
― James Salter, Solo Faces: A Novel
Engaging and highly detailed, Wade plods first through the The Great War, it's tremendous impact on an entire generation of men, and ends with the tales of three legendary British Everest expeditions of the 1920’s. It was difficult to imagine the immense tragedies of the war it's unsurmountable losses but I stayed with it, as I stayed with Somerset Maugham's The Razor's Edge, after it left me so many questions - and with in hopes of deeper understanding of these historical outcomes, the Lost Generation, their passion for nature and achievements against impossible odds. The book will eventually lead you through a wonder-filled travelogue of the Himalayas, and the relentless passion of those who pioneered the first climbs. Wade Davis took ten years to write these historical accounts, and the massive amount of research he has done is the most impressive takeaway from this book. A vivid account of the men, the mountains and the movement, as well as the expansion of Buddhism into Tibet and beyond.
notes n quotes
"I want to lose all harshness of jagged nerves, to be above all gentle. I feel we have achieved victory for that almost more than anything-to be able to cultivate gentleness."
George Malory to his wife Ruth at the end of the Great War
― Wade Davis, Into the Silence: The Great War, Mallory and the Conquest of Everest
“Let him who thinks war is a glorious, golden thing, who loves to roll forth stirring words of exhortation, invoking honour and praise and valour and love of country … Let him but look at a little pile of sodden grey rags that cover half a skull and a shin-bone and what might have been its ribs, or at this skeleton lying on its side, resting half crouching as it fell, perfect that it is headless, and with the tattered clothing still draped round it; and let him realize how grand and glorious a thing it is to have distilled all youth and joy and life into a fetid heap of hideous putrescence! Who is there who has known and seen who can say that victory is worth the death of even one of these?”
― Wade Davis, Into the Silence: The Great War, Mallory and the Conquest of Everest
“Young first encountered George Mallory in 1909, at a Cambridge dinner. At Easter he invited Mallory to Pen y Pass, and the following summer the two went off, at Young’s expense, to the Alps, where they were joined by Donald Robertson, a close friend and peer of Hilton Young’s. They climbed a number of peaks, none more dramatic than the southeast ridge of the Nesthorn, where Mallory nearly died. He was leading at the time, inching his way across fluted ice, seeking a route around the third of the four great towers that blocked the way up the ridge. Young would later recall his sudden astonishment: “I saw the boots flash from the wall without even a scrape; and, equally soundlessly, a grey streak flickered downward, and past me, and out of sight. So much did the wall, to which he had clung so long, overhang that from the instant he lost hold he touched nothing until the rope stopped him in mid-air over the glacier. I had had time to think, as I flung my body forward on to the belayed rope, grinding it and my hands against the slab, that no rope could stand such a jerk; and even to think out what our next action must be—so instantaneous is thought.” Miraculously, the rope held and Mallory was uninjured.”
― Wade Davis, Into The Silence: The Great War, Mallory, And The Conquest Of Everest
I bought this book to research the back roadways that may also make beautiful bikeways. The best of them, it seems lead to the borders and beyond. A better suited title might be "Leaving Georgia" however I thoroughly enjoyed this wonderful travelogue, with all it's peaceful routes and stopovers, down the Atlantic Coastal Plain in the south, the barrier islands, the roads (and rail trails) to Charleston, the outer foothills; winding north, both paved and gravel, to the Appalachians in the northwest or the Blue Ridge Mountains of Georgia’s northeast. My goal for 2020 is to partner with another restless soul for some or all of these adventures!
Neitzsche was a German philosopher of the late 19th century who challenged the foundations of Christianity and traditional morality. Having made it a life goal not to fully buy in to one philosophy or religion without understand of all, I read this with an open mind, and since I could not reach any conclusions, or come to agreement, I leave it to be as it is and myself, unresolved. Clearly, however, the interests are similar - the enhancement of the individual, and of culture as a whole. Neitzsche believed that beauty, truth, creativity, power and the genuine exploration of realities are of the world we live in, rather than those situated in a world beyond. Central to his philosophy: the idea of “life-affirmation,” which involves questioning all dogma and doctrines that drain life's expansive energies, however socially acceptable and prevalent those views might be. I can't help but applaud his bravery with all his writings. Truth can't be discovered until we explore the most brutal questions.
notes n quotes
"Every profound spirit needs a mask."
― Friedrich Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil
“When one is young, one venerates and despises without that art of nuances which constitutes the best gain of life, and it is only fair that one has to pay dearly for having assaulted men and things in this manner with Yes and No. Everything is arranged so that the worst of tastes, the taste for the unconditional, should be cruelly fooled and abused until a man learns to put a little art into his feelings and rather to risk trying even what is artificial — as the real artists of life do.”
― Friedrich Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil
“The Christian faith from the beginning, is sacrifice the sacrifice of all freedom, all pride, all self-confidence of spirit, it is at the same time subjection, self-derision, and self-mutilation.”
― Fredrich Nietzche, Beyond Good and Evil: Prelude to a Philosophy of the Future
Read April 2019. The inspiring true story of four men who found a new hope for Rwanda. In a land clamoring for heroes, Adrien Niyonshuti, Tom Ritchey, Jonathan Boyer, and Paul Kagame confront impossible odds as they struggle to put an upstart the Rwanda's national cycling team.
Pema Chödrön, Paperback, 176 pages
Published August 21, 2001 by Shambhala (first published 1994)
Read January-May 2017. #perspective #outlook #newlife. I started this book shortly after experiencing sudden permanent hearing loss concurrently with the final months of my father's third and final battle with cancer. It's one of those rare companions, timed so perfectly, destined for the present moment. My copy is overrun with highlights of Chodron's insightful teachings, memoirs, guided meditation and often humorous insights on embracing rather than denying the painful aspects of our lives. The teachings on compassion are comprised of sixty traditional Tibetan Buddhist maxims, such as: "Always apply only a joyful state of mind," "Don't seek others' pain as the limbs of your own happiness," and "Always meditate on whatever provokes resentment." Start Where You Are helped me to develop the courage to simply observe instead of judge; work with inner pain and discover joy, well-being, and confidence. Highly recommended.
notes n quotes
"Train whole-heartedly."T
"Start where you are. Drop the storyline."
"We already have everything we need."
"Breathe rather than blame. Drive all blames into one."
"Be grateful to everyone. Yes, everyone."
"Ego is something you come to know, befriend it."
"Be willing to die over and over again."
"Always maintain only a joyful mind."
"When resistance is gone, so are the demons."
"You cannot do the work in the safety zone. Live your life loving and open."
"Make friends with ourselves."
"When you are wounded, first figure out the right speech, and the actions to follow."
"Break a habit. Do something different. Take a job you wouldn't likely take."
"Abandon the idea of fruition. Just be where you are."
"Give up all hope. For as long as you are wishing for things to change, they never will."
"Commit to all actions with intention."
"Label our thoughts. Observe."
"Be grateful---all situations teach us."
"Whatever you meet unexpectedly, rest in it."
"Soft heart. Loving-kindness for self, for others."
"We think that the point is to pass the test or overcome the problem, but the truth is that things don't really get solved. They come together and they fall apart. Then they come together again and fall apart again. It's just like that. The healing comes from letting there be room for all of this to happen: room for grief, for relief, for misery, for joy."
"Sometimes, if you put distance between yourself and those who hurt you, they will come around to you, with greater understanding."
“Start now. Start where you are. Start with fear. Start with pain. Start with doubt. Start with hands shaking. Start with voice trembling but start. Start and don’t stop. Start where you are, with what you have. Just … start.”
Oil and Marble: A Novel of Leonardo and Michelangelo
Stephanie Storey
Read January 2017. From 1501—1505, Leonardo da Vinci and Michelangelo Buonarroti both lived and worked in Florence. Leonardo was a charismatic, handsome fifty year-old at the peak of his career. Michelangelo was a temperamental sculptor in his mid-twenties, desperate to make a name for himself. They were masters of the new era, one full of arrogance, the other so anxious and humble, he hid away in the cathedral bell tower during the unveiling of his greatest work. It's a story not just of the struggles of achieving great mastery, but also of self-mastery. I loved this book, even if, as it turns out only half of its politics and drama is actual true.
notes n quotes
"As he wandered in search of pigments and skulls, he marveled at how much busier the market was now than it was when he was young. Back then there were some leather makers, a few silk weavers, a butcher, a cooper, and a hosier. Shopping in the market had been a bucolic experience, but over the years, an entrepreneurial spirit had taken over the Florentines like a fever, and every citizen seemed to have a stall. There was desperate rush to buy and sell goods. Leonardo had pondered the shift for quite some time and after much deliberation had developed a theory to explain it.
"Less than 50 years before, Johannes Gutenberg had given the world the printing press. Before Gutenberg, manuscripts could only be reproduced by hand and they were rare and expensive. However, since the creation of the printing press, more books were available to more people, and literacy was on the rise. Revolutionary ideas of independence and freedom trickled from the upper classes all the way down to the men, women, and children sleeping on the streets. The masses were still illiterate, but the democratization of information empowered people to take control of their lives, which resulted in, among other things, a rise in independent merchants. Leonardo applauded autonomy but the changes also worried him. He mistrusted book learning. If he wanted to discover how light reacted to a curved piece of glass, he didn’t read about it, but found a piece of glass and exposed it to light. If he wanted to cook soup he didn’t use a recipe, but experimented with is own ingredients. If he wanted to find out what was hiding in the back of a cave, he crawled inside on his own hands and knees. With the explosion of books, people were likely to rely on the theories of other men, instead of learning from their own experiences. That path led to the regurgitation of old ideas, not newly formed thoughts. With a large library, people would no longer memorize facts, but look up whatever they wanted to know in a book. The only way Leonardo had ever made a unique discovering was by contrasting, comparing, or combining two disparate pieces of knowledge, already housed in his brain. If he no longer mentally stored information, he would no longer make unexpected connections and create something new. A unique thought sprang from a unique being, possessing unique knowledge. A book, although a handy storage unit, did not have the capability of the human mind to develop fanciful inventions. If the explosion of books continued, the world might be left with a bunch of mindless merchants selling meaningless material goods to each other, no one capable of inventing something new and spectacular. It was ironic. An exceptional invention like the printing press might actually end human innovation altogether."
-- excerpt from Chapter 11, "Leonardo"
The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck: A Counterintuitive Approach to Living a Good Life - Mark Manson
Read November 2016. People are happiest when they are problem solving, and conversely, self-delusion, entitlement, and the need to feel good about themselves all the time, only leads to more unhappiness. Mark delivers with brutal clarity a message most other self-help books and the trendy pseudo-Buddhist teachings lack. His 'counterintuitive' approach will surprise even the most jaded if put into practice, e.g., on page 9: "The desire for more positive experience is itself a negative experience. And, paradoxically, the acceptance of one’s negative experience is itself a positive experience. Everything worthwhile in life is won through surmounting the associated negative experience. Any attempt to escape the negative, to avoid it or quash it or silence it, only backfires. The avoidance of suffering is a form of suffering. The avoidance of struggle is a struggle. The denial of failure is a failure. Hiding what is shameful is itself a form of shame. Pain is an inextricable thread in the fabric of life, and to tear it out is not only impossible, but destructive: attempting to tear it out unravels everything else with it. To try to avoid pain is to give too many fucks about pain. In contrast, if you’re able to not give a fuck about the pain, you become unstoppable." #selfmastery
notes 'n quotes
“Who you are is defined by what you’re willing to struggle for."
“You and everyone you know are going to be dead soon. And in the short amount of time between here and there, you have a limited amount of f*cks to give. Very few, in fact. And if you go around giving a f*ck about everything and everyone without conscious thought or choice—well, then you’re going to get f*cked.”
The Wild Truth: The Secrets that Drove Chris McCandless Into the Wild
Carine McCandless (Audible) Narrated by Carine McCandless, Matt Gardner, Shelly McCandless.
Read
Read September 2016. Carine's deeply moving story of her brother Chris McCandless, of their abusive and chaotic upbringing and the events leading up to his disappearance in the Alaskan wilderness. Gripping and inspirational story of woman's resilience with a severely dysfunctional family life, culminating to an unspeakable tragedy. Authentic and beautifully narrated with tenderness and emotion and filling in so many unanswered questions.
notes 'n quotes
“Perhaps strength doesn’t reside in having never been broken, but in the courage required to grow strong in the broken places.”
Psychopath Free: Recovering from Emotionally Abusive Relationships With Narcissists, Sociopaths, and Other Toxic People - Jackson MacKenzie
Read December, 2016. This book called out to me in Audible, or I should say, called me out on some of the rules I had broken with myself and advice from others who knew before I even realized I had been a victimized and also endured a full course of victim-blaming. I saw freedom as simply transplanting myself a thousand miles away, but I wasn't really "free" from my own self-created prison just yet. The book turned out to be more useful that anything else I’ve read on the subject of cluster B personality disorders and it put me back on the path of self-awareness, self-acknowledgement of own frailties and the dangers of my “all in or nothing’ capacity for love. Even if you haven’t personally been involved with psychopath, you will save yourself a heap of pain but at the very least reading the '30 signs' and it’s accompanying guidance, which will educate you on how to recognize the these soul sucking vampires and protect yourself. All people eventually come in contact with at least one of these abusers and may be already unknowingly. MacKenzie’s approach is educational, and also personal, as he pulls numerous examples from his own experience. I will likely refer back to this book often and read it again.
It’s most revealing truths:
You are not to blame for what happened to you.
There is only a one-way escape from psychopathy. No contact.
Friendships may not healSan you, but information eventually frees you. Keep seeking it.
Detective work, self-forgiveness and self-loving is okay. It will give you the closure you will never get from a narcissist, sociopath or psychopath.
The average relationship with a psychopath goes through seven rounds of engagement and re-engagement or breakups, until the the abuser becomes bored or the abuser has finally planned how he/she will make the final devastating blow.
If it runs a shorter course, you are only a ‘transitional’ victim and if this is the case, consider yourself very lucky.
CBPDs have no souls, no empathy, no conscience, so don’t keep going back there.
Don’t try to explain what you’ve been through to others. No one gets it if they haven’t experienced it.
No one will be coming to save you, but yourself. Own and heal your own thoughts. Healing comes from greater self-awareness.
Do the work, even it compels you to take a break from friends or other people who are continually sucked into this persons fake reality tunnel or ‘fan club'
notes n quotes
“Psychopaths project and blame you for their own behavior. They accuse you of being negative when they are the most negative people in the world. They gaslight you into believing that your normal reactions to their abuse are the problem—not the abuse itself. When you feel angry and hurt because of their silent treatment, broken promises, lying, or cheating, there is something wrong with you. When you call them out on their dishonest behavior, you’re the abnormal one who is too sensitive, too critical, and always focusing on the negative.”
“If someone’s opinion of you goes from sky-high to rock bottom, this isn’t normal.”
“They don’t miss you, they miss controlling you and messing with your mind. That deep sorrow, that overwhelming feeling of loss they’re expressing—it seems so genuine, but that isn’t real. They’re panicking because they lost control and they want desperately to get it back. To get you back in line.”
“Healing from psychopathic abuse is a long journey. It is neither linear nor logical. You can expect to swing back and forth between stages, perhaps even inventing a few of your own along the way. It is unlike the traditional stages of grief, because you have not truly lost anything—instead, you have gained everything. You just don’t know it yet.”
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