12 August:
Richter/Kondrashin, Liszt’s 1st piano: a
blistering performance converts bluster into music.
Philosophy refreshes life, in all its aspects.
Celibidache Bach Mass: wonderful. The Scherchen too. He says a lovely Mass.
13 August:
Yesterday’s kerfuffle over the grey ghost text behind the translation
in the art catalogue has made me realise that what I long for, deep down, is to
be just a bit wicked. Mateyness with colleagues: they always smelled it a mile
off. (The Uses of Literacy.) No more.
- Also, seeing the obits made me realise that my name could never appear bathed
in such a warm eulogistic glow. My initial envy was soon tempered by a mistrust
of the writing that lies behind these
memorialisings. And, this morning, a dislike of the celebratory subtext of the
way some of the schools have deified writing. - I am tired of being good,
because I am not. - I am anxious about everything, still. I will never not be
anxious. Given this, I have nothing to lose. - No more ethics.
‘Reason’: the name given by Enlightenment to its prejudices.
It is a sunny morning. Online I saw some photos of Siena.
There is a restless rustling in the leaves.
Reality is not rectitude. - The world alone is accurate and precise: human beings are a
smear, a smudge.
Smile.
This procedure is dangerous (madness, hell).
The things for which I am (or was) usually praised make me shudder.
(Or at least: rebel.)
The Poem of Ecstasy. Mine!
Turn of the century, again!
Learning language is essentially about freedom, not about
rules. - All the world’s tongues.
Roussel, Symphony no. 4. A magical opening, then too much
that is routine and noisy. (The fate of so much magic: Faust.)
Scriabin, however, despite the apparent formlessness…
