w&f

The Mountain Goats - No Children

When you look at the strategy of my media diet, which is to ignore the noise, I think that is subconsciously an effort to avert the ADD, the focus on the shiny superficiality that Nick Carr warns about. At this point, my media diet reflects what actually seems to make my life better. I made a conscious decision to shield myself from the conventional notion of what people should be consuming on a daily basis. It wouldn’t allow me to focus on the things I do want to focus on—more long-wave things. Once I identify a long-wave trend, then my appetite is infinite. Whereas what’s going on in Washington today, I may not hear about it for months.

you want to do something new when you’re writing a novel. i mean, it’s right there in the word. novel.

It is with unbelievable difficulty that my ideas arrange themselves into any order in my head. They circle there obscurely, they ferment to the point where they stir me, fire me, cause my heart to palpitate; and in the midst of all this emotion I see nothing clearly; I cannot write a word, I must wait. Imperceptibly, the great movement subsides, order succeeds chaos, everything finds its proper place; but slowly, and only after a long and confused agitation. Have you ever been to the opera in Italy? While the scene is being changed in the great theatres there, an air of disorder prevails, which is disagreeable and lasts for quite a while: the sets are all muddled together on every side there is a heaving and a pulling, which it is disturbing to watch; you are afraid it is all going to topple over. And yet little by little everything finds its place, nothing is missing, and you are astonished to see emerge from all this tumult a delightful spectacle. This process is more or less what goes on in my head when I am trying to write.