dolce far niente -- not quite
Actually, it's dolce far troppo, right now, as I am doing many things at once. I'm emptying the dishwasher and washing last night's glassware, I'm starting the laundry and some cookie dough that has to sit in the fridge for several hours before baking (those little round brown-and-white cookies you've been planning to make, Mom), I've begun writing The Paper, and I'm thinking about Smilin' Jack.
The paper will go well. I'm running to the computer every couple of minutes to add something to the introduction as I do these other tasks. I found a gold mine in The Emerald City of Oz, where Baum describes Oz in absolutely perfect utopian terms. It's what I'm beginning the paper with. I'm still debating about the final organization, but I think I've decided to not go with chronological organization. If I do it chronologically, Barks will just be the last thing. If I do it by topics (getting there, getting away, money in utopia, work in utopia, etc.) I can have comics all through it and it will be a little less boring.
Anyway. In Smilin' Jack there's a guy who always has buttons popping off his shirt. Was he in any of the comix you got, Suze? If not, do you want me to scan and email you a few panels of it? Let me know. It would be an interesting thing to code.
Dinner last night was stuffed portabella mushrooms (spinach, rice, poblanos, cheddar), quite good. It was meant to be a vegetarian main dish. I served it with cubed steaks and, for Charlie, some leftover mashed potatoes. Quite good, actually. From this month's Food and Wine. (sorry about lack of italics - due to lack of time)
Must get back to the business at hand. At least I've begun, and this scatteredness is part of my thinking process. I think the paper will go pretty quickly. "If the thought is clear, the words will come." My grad school mantra, courtesy of Montaigne (and others) via Frieda Brown.
Oh. Do the words "dolce far niente" mean anything to most people, or should I translate in the paper?
posted by Sandy @ 8:54 AM
7 Comments:
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Ooooh, lucky you-- writing a real paper, and having a handle on it. I agree that a topical approach would work best, so you can scatter Barks throughout. I can't wait to hear it. And of course to get to spend time with you.
Um, and please do translate for those of us language deprived...
Haven't run across the Smilin' Jack button-popper yet, but I'm only half-way through my 1948 romp. I'm currently going through the year and indexing which comic appears where/when, and exactly which pages we actually have. It's tiring but incredibly rewarding work-- which I get to do in the most beautiful space in all the libraries. More about this later...
"It's sweet to do nothing." Often used as a noun, e.g., "I've finally found my dolce far niente."
Is the rare book room still right in the top of the library? I spent most of a year there, working on the very rare French translation of Tristram Shandy (soon to be a movie!).
Is the rare book room still right in the top of the library? I spent most of a year there, working on the very rare French translation of Tristram Shandy (soon to be a movie!).
Sandy-- um, "the library"? You are thinking of Library West, right? That building has been closed for addition/rennovation for over two years now. (All the books are in remote storage.) Even before that, rare books had moved into the spectacular large reading room on the second floor of the old building: Library East. Do you remember it?
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