One of the many pleasures of publishing with Farrar, Straus, Percy had learned over the years, was receiving copies of their newly published books. Percy usually found a few titles on each season’s list that strongly grabbed his attention, but one book on the fall 1974 list, a collection of two novellas and a memoir…
Interview with Cory MacLauchlin. (See my review of “Butterfly”). a confederacy of duncesButterfly in the TypewriterCory MacLauchlinJohn Kennedy Toolenew orleansphilosophical literature
Several people have asked me what (for the novice) is the best way in to Percy — well, fortunately a terrific documentary is available made by documentarist Win Riley. The film’s homepage is here — if you missed the PBS broadcasts the film is available on DVD. Having viewed the film several times and discussed…
He had read in the morning paper that a ladies’ art guild was having a hanging of its paintings in Pirate’s Alley. Imagining that the paintings would be offensive enough to interest him for a while, he pushed his wagon up onto the flagstones of the Alley toward the variety of artwork dangling from the…
Check out the Kafka Project. Franz KafkaKafkaphilosophical literature
Unfortunately, my feet could not keep pace with my soul (p. 197). Some musk which my system generates must be especially appealing to the authorities of the government . . . Like a bitch in heat, I seem to attract a coterie of policemen and sanitation officials (p. 198). Perhaps the Quarter will provide me…
Therefore, my size itself is a safeguard against my ever sinking too low within the structure of our civilization. I was there — on the very rim of our age — when my mother’s cataclysmic intemperance, as you well know, catapulted me into the fever of contemporary existence (pp. 195-196). (H/T to Cory McLaughlin for the…
The grandeur of my physique, the complexity of my worldview, the decency and taste implicit in my carriage, the grace with which I function in the mire of today’s world — all of these at once confuse and astound Clyde. Now he has relegated me to working in the French Quarter, an area which houses…
Bill Binnings has nearly finished the textured clay statue of his friend Walker Percy. I remember one man who hitchhiked all the way from California to meet Walker Bill Binningsphilosophical literaturePhilosophyWalker Percy
IMHO the greatest post-war writer in English and no slouch at philosophy either, each uniquely fused together. Without any doubt I’d put him up there with Kafka, Mann and Musil. The best (most elegant and most informed) biography of Percy is by the very excellent Patrick Samway, S. J. Samway also by the way was…
manwithoutqualities 