adventures

Gimbling in the Wabe – Too Many Books

This week, I’m reposting one of my very favorite Gimblings – a little poem I wrote a few years ago that still feels true today. My house is a little less hoard-ish since I wrote this, but it’s still chock full of books. ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ Too Many […]

Gimbling in the Wabe – Too Many Books

An oldie, but a goodie. Enjoy! Too Many Books I have books upon the windowsills and books piled up on chairs. Books stacked high in corners and books upon the stairs. I have books packed tight on bookshelves and on top of them more books. Books piled high on nightstands […]

Birthdays

On this day, April 14, in 1954, science fiction writer Bruce Sterling was born in Brownsville, Texas. The author of a dozen novels and numerous short stories, he is considered one of the founding members of the cyberpunk sub-genre, and is perhaps its most celebrated promoter. Winning two Hugo Awards, and coining the phrase “slipstream” to refer to a type of speculative fiction that falls between traditional sci-fi/fantasy and mainstream literature, he is also involved in numerous projects such as the Dead Media Project (highlighting archaic tech such as phenakistoscopes and 1980s video games) and the Viridian Design Movement (supporting high-tech, stylish “green” design). Today, he turns 67.

Birthdays

On this day, December 3, in 1857, Joseph Conrad was born in Berdichev, Imperial Russia (modern
Ukraine, then a part of Poland). While he settled in England and wrote in English, he always considered himself a Pole. Heart of Darkness, one of the most famous of his 20 novels (which explores colonialism and the attitudes regarding what constitutes a barbarian versus civilized society) is considered one of the best English novels of the 20th century, as is his novel Lord Jim, which chronicles a crew’s abandonment of its disabled ship. Conrad died in England in 1924 at age 66.