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Personal subscription of New York Review of Books forthcoming! I’ve debated subscribing for a while now. I refrained because I never made use of my subscription to The New Yorker. But now my one friend who always has a copy lying around is moving to Williamsburg (trendy!!) and the Butler periodicals room is noncirculating. But unlike my friend Pierce, I will not tote periodicals to Butler during finals (3quarksdaily, A&L Daily, The Smart Set, The Rumpus already provide enough procrastination, do not need more enticing reading that is not my own.)
Reading Essais in French really is a different, and better, experience. A lot is lost in translation, but by no means Donald Frame’s fault. He used to teach at Columbia, I wish I had met him before he died.
“Hob-knobbed with Hobbes, discoursed with Descartes.” Punny! That is also a pull quote from a paper that I plan to hand in next week.
Even though all my papers are involves works from the 18th century or earlier, I’m totally using Deleuze and Barthes (maybe even Jameson) in my papers. Sometimes I do feel dorky hauling around books with titles like Petrarch and the Textual Origins of Interpretation. S/Z is much cooler. It really is, objectively speaking.
New hiding spot: favorite cubby on the fifth floor. The American History and Literature Reading Room is usually occupied by intense law/med/grad students. It is the Panopticon. I can only see the back of my desk, a good number of people can see my computer screen.
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This Literature and Science paper is just not coming along. I feel such a strong affinity with Margaret Cavendish, or “Mad Madge,” so I want to do her justice.
She was insane, but also notoriously shy. Samuel Pepys characterizes her as “mad, conceited and ridiculous,” while Virginia Woolf is slightly, but ever-so-slightly, more evenhanded: “There is something noble and Quixotic and high-spirited, as well as crack-brained and bird-witted about her.” Her marriage with Duke Cavendish is also a wonderful love story—everyone at court was shocked when the handsome warrior duke fell for the eccentric socially-inept Maid of Honour. Someone should really make a period adaption already.
Underslept, very much so (perhaps even too much so, I guess we’ll find out).
Diet: cigarettes, caffeine, and candy. The occasional P&W sandwich or salad when I remember to eat. Life motto: “If you’re not smart, you should at least be pretty. If you’re not pretty, you should at least be thin.”
Way behind schedule on work. I managed to forget/supress that my literature and science paper requires a good deal of research. I also forgot how slowly I write. Like I said, decreasing word count after working on an entire day. It’s do-able. I’ve done it, many a time.
Hedonism- “I don’t want to talk about it.” One day, I too will mature and gain some self-control. ‘Til then.
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things of little relevance 
Have you ever been inside the Comp Lit reading room? Apparently it exists. Apparently it is awesome. Apparently even Gayatri frequents.
Also, what do you do when you (Lucy) realize you’re smart, pretty, and thin? You eat a cheeseburger. So eat a cheeseburger and drink some coca-cola already, and not only for its caffeine content. 🙂
Life motto: If you don’t enjoy life, you enjoy work. If you don’t enjoy work, you enjoy boys. If you don’t enjoy boys, you enjoy delicious and elaborately-conceived meals, with friends, followed by many glasses (read: bottles) of wine.
Comment by Julia May 9, 2009 @ 2:48 amyou might want to lay off that occasional p&w sandwich if you want to follow your life motto.
Comment by khalid May 10, 2009 @ 9:50 pmALL THIS WOMAN
Comment by Lucy May 11, 2009 @ 4:15 am