Better Than Friday - 130 (Patreon)

Olá everyone, I'm currently working through Dino Buzzati's 'The Tartar Steppe', it's fantastic so far, highly recommended for anyone who enjoys the cinema of Antonioni and the writings of Borges (who approved of this book). Thanks to Chris Bianchi for the gift. 

Meditative, spacious, but with a warm writing style, not at all cold and barren in spite of the landscape the characters inhabit. I think he's also been compared to Kafka quite a bit. 

I'm going to be restructuring the patron-tiers this year, trying to add some new stuff, so I'll be posting more polls soon. I'd greatly appreciate your input. 

Have a nice weekend, and thanks for your support. 

1. A book from Eça de Queirós I'd like to read - The City and the Mountains 

I haven't yet had the pleasure of reading Queirós, anyone read him? 

------------------------------------------------------------------Eça de Queirós's novel is a hymn to country life: The City and The Mountains satirizes the emptiness of city life and of modernity itself. Wonderfully funny, it bubbles with joie de vivre.

Born in Paris, Jacinto is the heir to a vast estate in Portugal which he has never visited. He mixes with the creme de la creme of Paris society, but is monumentally bored. And then he receives a letter from his estate manager saying that they plan to move the bones of his ancestors to the newly renovated chapel―would he like to be there? With great trepidation, Jacinto sets off with his best friend, the narrator, on the mammoth train journey through France and Spain to Portugal. What they discover in the simple country life will upend their own lives deliciously....

Newly translated by the acclaimed translator Margaret Jull Costa, New Directions is proud to publish The City and The Mountains, and to once again bring Eça de Queirós' brilliant prose to life.

2. This Is Why First Portugal Serial Killer’s Head Ended Up In a Jar

Ah ... so that's why.An unusual history lesson. 

2. The Anti Bob Ross

Saw this on Haden's instagram. Hilarious.

4. The Decay of Cinema 

And here's the Susan Sontag essay referenced."Perhaps it is not cinema that has ended but only cinephilia -- the name of the very specific kind of love that cinema inspired. Each art breeds its fanatics. The love that cinema inspired, however, was special. It was born of the conviction that cinema was an art unlike any other: quintessentially modern; distinctively accessible; poetic and mysterious and erotic and moral -- all at the same time. Cinema had apostles. (It was like religion.) Cinema was a crusade. For cinephiles, the movies encapsulated everything. Cinema was both the book of art and the book of life."- Susan Sontag - The Decay of Cinema

5. Rosencrantz and Guildernstern are Dead

alabasterbarley was talking about this play on the Discord, and it reminded me of the film adaptation with Tim Roth and Gary Oldman.

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