Tag: Beauty

• June 27, 2013

  ‘Now being seen off, now seeing off…’

  Kenko writes, ‘In all things, it is the beginnings and the ends that are interesting.’ A greeting, a farewell; a fresh hello, a tender adieu. In Robert Aitken’s translation of Basho’s haiku, we observe the farewell at its most elemental: ‘Now being seen off, Now seeing off–the outcome: Autumn in Kiso.’ What is of interest, of…
• June 26, 2013

  There is nothing worse than a house that is too done up…

  ‘A house, I know, is but a temporary abode, but how delightful it is to find one that has harmonious proportions and a pleasant atmosphere. One feels somehow that even moonlight, when it shines into the quiet domicile of a person of taste, is more affecting than elsewhere. A house, though it may not be…
• June 18, 2013

  ‘Why is Tu Fu sad?’ asks the master

  ‘Why is Tu Fu sad?’ asks the master. A Poem About Radiance ‘It is obvious,’ replies the first pupil. ‘It is, as Tu Fu says: the longest bough has been broken.’ A second pupil differs: ‘The world is unjust: the violent and strong will always crack and break the weak and frail. Had we not…
• June 8, 2013

  Wandering babies in Topanga Canyon…

  Early in Sense and Sensibility, Willoughby exuberantly proclaims that there is no place he would rather live than in a cottage and, in particular, in a cottage that in all respects resembles the one the Dashwoods have let. Eleanor replies–come, come now, dear Willoughby–that the hallways are dark and the quarters are cramped. Would he really…
• April 26, 2013

  Can we tell an alternative story of not being at home?

  ‘The one who masters walking leaves no footprints. / The one who masters speaking makes no slips of the tongue.’ —Daodejing 27, trans. Wenlong Lu and Keith Wayne Brown I believe one could write an alternative story of human embodiment, worldly engagement, and understanding that would not avail itself of a psychologist’s categories but would…