It’s okay …

… to be interested in many things. According to Dr. Boli,

… if you are interested in more than one thing, accept your diagnosis. Polymathy is your certificate of manumission, your hall pass, your get-out-of-jail-free card, the thing that makes it possible for you to say, “I’m allowed to be interested in more than one thing.” In fact, you are not just allowed: you are required. Polymathy is your label; you must get into your box and stay there, just like everybody else. But the box labeled “polymath” is the only box that turns out to be as big as the whole universe.

A Wilde ghost story

A seasonal tale by Oscar Wilde, via Standard Ebooks.

The Canterville Ghost
A Hylo-Idealistic Romance

I
When Mr. Hiram B. Otis, the American Minister, bought Canterville Chase, everyone told him he was doing a very foolish thing, as there was no doubt at all that the place was haunted. Indeed, Lord Canterville himself, who was a man of the most punctilious honour, had felt it his duty to mention the fact to Mr. Otis when they came to discuss terms.

“We have not cared to live in the place ourselves,” said Lord Canterville, “since my grandaunt, the Dowager Duchess of Bolton, was frightened into a fit, from which she never really recovered, by two skeleton hands being placed on her shoulders as she was dressing for dinner, and I feel bound to tell you, Mr. Otis, that the ghost has been seen by several living members of my family, as well as by the rector of the parish, the Rev. Augustus Dampier, who is a Fellow of King’s College, Cambridge. After the unfortunate accident to the Duchess, none of our younger servants would stay with us, and Lady Canterville often got very little sleep at night, in consequence of the mysterious noises that came from the corridor and the library.”

“My Lord,” answered the Minister, “I will take the furniture and the ghost at a valuation. I come from a modern country, where we have everything that money can buy; and with all our spry young fellows painting the Old World red, and carrying off your best actresses and prima donnas, I reckon that if there were such a thing as a ghost in Europe, we’d have it at home in a very short time in one of our public museums, or on the road as a show.”

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Today’s quote

Lionel Shriver:

I believe that what progressives want most of all is to fail. They are most comfortable being against things. They are most comfortable campaigning for purposes that will never come to fruition. They are so dependent on the perpetuation of social ills like racism that in a pinch they will invent “microaggressions” undetectable to the naked eye; starved of racism, they will make the racism up. For progressives, a proper utopia, with nothing and no one left to denounce, would be hell.

Cheap thrills

Deutsche Grammophon is celebrating its eleventy-first year since its founding by offering digital downloads of a number of albums for $1 each at Bandcamp.1 The festivities have apparently been going on for seventeen years, since DG was established in 1898, but I didn’t discover this until today. Deutsche Grammophon releases generally are good performances recorded well, and at Bandcamp you can listen to the tracks you are interested in before buying.2

Of particular note in this pumpkin-ridden season is Martha Argerich’s DG debut, which includes her first recording of the finest Halloween music ever composed, Ravel’s “Gaspard de la nuit.” There are a lot of outstanding recordings of “Gaspard,” from Arturo Benedetti Michelangeli and Abbey Simon to Jean-Efflam Bavouzet and Steven Osborne, and Argerich’s interpretations rank with the best.

The Pullmi-Pushyu

The Uniparty ticket

The current flood of junk mail indicates that there is an election coming up. It puts me in mind of Jeff MacNelly’s depiction of the hypothetical “Reagan/Wallace” ticket from fifty years ago. A quick search online didn’t find it, so I thought I’d see if AI could approximate it. Ronald and George are long gone, of course, but the image remains universally applicable.

Frieren and the Wolfe

A couple of items that might be of interest to some visitors here:

You can preorder a 2027 calendar of Frieren at the Funeral. It’s in the “B3” format, so each of the two-month pages is poster-sized.

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Humble Bundle is currently offering 38 books by Gene Wolfe in EPUB format for $20. Kindle editions of individual volumes generally run between $10 and $15 apiece; if you have any interest in one of the best writers of our times, this deal an obvious bargain. I have nearly all the books already, but mostly as cheap pocket paperbacks which are increasingly tiring to read. Having them in electronic format means I can adjust the type size as necessary for readability.

Update: The offer ends tomorrow, October 22, at 11 a.m. central time. It’s been extended for five more days, as of October 24.

Six cubic feet of yellow

It’s prime time for the Maximilian sunflower, Helianthus maximiliani. I have the “Santa Fe” cultivar, which blooms a little later than the species and provides color when it’s particularly appreciated. H. maximiliani is native to Kansas and will probably survive in any but the most extreme climates. However, it’s aggressive, spreading by rhizomes and seeds, and can take over your yard if you’re not vigilant. In the right place it’s spectacular, but think carefully before planting it.

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Crazy in the right kind of way

Literary notes:

Ted Gioia recommends seven novels by Philip K. Dick. It’s a good list, though I would have included Martian Timeslip and added a collection of his short stories.

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JMSmith seeks to enlarge your vocabulary:

“Unctuously rectitudinous” means “too damn nice.” It means what Sam Francis meant when he called the ineffectual gentlemen of American conservatism “beautiful losers.”

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Question and answer with Clayton Barnett:

Q. If you could have lunch with any deceased writer who would it be, what would you eat and what would you talk about?

A. I would invite Descartes, Locke, Voltaire, and Kant. I would be late as I am calling in a tactical nuclear strike on these morons who pulled the so-called Enlightenment out of their nether-regions.

Tune of the day #365

The first Beethoven recording I ever bought was Arrau’s album of the last four sonatas. The second movement, “Arietta,” of the final one was the most wide-ranging, futuristic music I’d ever heard, anticipating everything from boogie piano to space music, and it remains a particular favorite of mine.

… and this is Tune #365, completing a year of music. No matter what your taste in music is, I’m sure there was something to annoy you. I hope you also heard something worth listening to and perhaps worth investigating further. From here on out I’ll post when the spirit moves me, which is not all that often any more.

Survivors

Zinnia grandiflora

A few plants flourished despite this year’s brutal summer. These include Zinnia grandiflora, above. It’s a low, spreading plant two or three inches tall with profuse yellow flowers all summer. Unlike the familiar garden zinnias, it’s a hardy perennial. It’s easy from seed and blooms the first year. Triple-digit temperatures don’t bother it, and it can tolerate considerable dryness, though it does bloom better with regular watering. It would make a good ground cover for dry places.

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