He got up and sat on the edge of the bedstead with his back to the window. “It’s better not to sleep at all,” he decided. There was a cold damp draught from the window, however; without getting up he drew the blanket over him and wrapped himself in it. He was not thinking of anything and did not want to think. But one image rose after another, incoherent scraps of thought without beginning or end passed through his mind. He sank into drowsiness. Perhaps the cold, or the dampness, or the dark, or the wind that howled under the window and tossed the trees roused a sort of persistent craving for the fantastic. He kept dwelling on images of flowers, he fancied a charming flower garden, a bright, warm, almost hot day, a holiday—Trinity day. A fine, sumptuous country cottage in the English taste overgrown with fragrant flowers, with flower beds going round the house; the porch, wreathed in climbers, was surrounded with beds of roses. A light, cool staircase, carpeted with rich rugs, was decorated with rare plants in china pots. He noticed particularly in the windows nosegays of tender, white, heavily fragrant narcissus bending over their bright, green, thick long stalks. He was reluctant to move away from them, but he went up the stairs and came into a large, high drawing-room and again everywhere—at the windows, the doors on to the balcony, and on the balcony itself—were flowers. The floors were strewn with freshly-cut fragrant hay, the windows were open, a fresh, cool, light air came into the room. The birds were chirruping under the window, and in the middle of the room, on a table covered with a white satin shroud, stood a coffin. The coffin was covered with white silk and edged with a thick white frill; wreaths of flowers surrounded it on all sides. Among the flowers lay a girl in a white muslin dress, with her arms crossed and pressed on her bosom, as though carved out of marble. But her loose fair hair was wet; there was a wreath of roses on her head. The stern and already rigid profile of her face looked as though chiselled of marble too, and the smile on her pale lips was full of an immense unchildish misery and sorrowful appeal. Svidrigaïlov knew that girl; there was no holy image, no burning candle beside the coffin; no sound of prayers: the girl had drowned herself. She was only fourteen, but her heart was broken. And she had destroyed herself, crushed by an insult that had appalled and amazed that childish soul, had smirched that angel purity with unmerited disgrace and torn from her a last scream of despair, unheeded and brutally disregarded, on a dark night in the cold and wet while the wind howled
The Blog
A Very Short Stack 
What’s wrong with the Washington Post blog Short Stacks? First of all, it’s not a blog. It’s a weekly column – except it’s not even a weekly column, it’s only a weekly list of books matching a theme. If I was being nice, I would say that Short Stacks is trying to expand what a […]
Read More Roundup Sir Arthur Conan Doyle Remembering the ghosts of Arthur Conan Doyle, in the Times Literary Supplement (via Light Reading) Over at LitKicks, Levi asks whether the political ideologies of Tanenhaus are expressed through the selection of books that are selected for the NYTBR. Chelsea – the literary journal published since 1958 – appears to be folding, since it says […]
Read More Norman Mailer: RIP The reports about his hospitalization had been drifting in for weeks, but even though it’s not a surprise, Norman Mailer’s death is still depressing. RIP: 1923 – 2007. One of his lesser known books – The Fight – nonetheless has a special place in my heart. Mailer chronicles the lead-up and fight between Muhammad Ali […]
Read More Houellebecq Fervor Mark over at The Elegant Variation has a wonderfully hilarious mock summary of a conference about the books of Michel Houellenbecq. It manages to spear both literary theory (oh, the titles of the papers!) and Houellebecq’s obsession with sexuality. Funny, funny stuff.
Read More Steve Erickson: Review of Zeroville Steve Erickson’s books are not, usually, an easy read. Or the reading itself isn’t difficult, it’s just the understanding part. He’ll employ unorthodox typography with the frequency of Mark Danielewski and use a Haruki Murakami-esque technique of channeling the narrative into the hyper-personal psychic journey of the hero. The result is always intellectually delightful to […]
Read More Judith Freeman on Raymond Chandler High, high praise for Judith Freeman’s new biography of Raymond Chandler – “The Long Embrace” – in the new LA Times Book Review: Frank MacShane published the standard Chandler biography more than 30 years ago, and until now, no other book has made us view this great American writer afresh. “The Long Embrace” does. The […]
Read More Writers Strike Back! So the vote for the Writers Guild of America to go on strike was 90% in favor, God bless ’em. The strike will happen on Monday – picket lines in both Los Angeles and New York. I must say that I didn’t think the executives would let it go so far – I pictured an […]
Read More Benjamin Percy: Refreshing I once heard a senior editor at a publishing house say that book reviews, even in major newspapers and magazines, have a negligible impact on a book’s sales (and went on to cite figures that showed hardly a hump in sales numbers, much less a spike, in the week after the review). That’s myopic and […]
Read More Banned Books Even though I’m a couple weeks late on banned books week, I’ve been reading, apropos of nothing, a number of banned books. I just finished Nabokov’s Lolita and am reading Joyce’s Ulysses – both wonderful, wonderful books (although so far my favorite is Lolita – Nabokov is a genius). I also have a longstanding fascination […]
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