This is not a systematic review or commentary of A.O. Scott’s Better Living Through Criticism: How to Think About Art, Pleasure, Beauty, and Truth. It is a meandering meditation and collage of notes and thoughts on criticism after reading Scott’s book.

The following two sentences I will use and think about as a writer for […]

The whole book was great, but Chapter 3 made me dizzy. I’ll admit that it could have been caffeine, but when I finished reading Chapter 3 of Hope Jahren’s memoir Lab Girl I felt dizzy, giddy, and inspired. It’s a great chapter, and a great book.

This is the first paragraph of Chapter 3 of […]

Aldo Leopold’s A Sand County Almanac: a book that I’ve been not reading for years.

This is a fun category not to be confused with books I will never read or books that I should try to find someday or books that I might read. This is one of those books that has been recommended […]

Just read Lisa Feldman’s opinion piece “The Benefits of Despair” in the Gray Matter series in The New York Times. 

She describes the psychological term “emotional granularity” as something that people with finely tuned feelings have. Those who feel “creeping horror or fury, rather than just general awfulness.” She writes, “Emotional granularity isn’t just about […]

My first thought was to title this post:

RETROSPECTIVELY REALIZING THAT PRAYERS YOU NEVER REMEMBER EXPLICITLY ASKING HAVE BEEN ANSWERED

Instead, let’s say that I appreciate the lists. Every year around my birthday I am tempted to feel bad about all that I haven’t done, all that I am not, all the things that haven’t […]