Derik Badman's Journal

2021-01-10 10:03

Picked up Borges' Collected Fictions to read a bit as I wait for the next thing to read. I've read a few of them and am feeling a bit blah about them, not as excited as when first encountering them (and subsequent rereads) back in college. They are clever and intelligent, but no longer surprising.

Been reading one lecture a night from Barthes' The Preparation of the Novel, a book of his (quite detailed) notes from two lecture series he did back in 1978-1980 right before he died. So far they are focusing on haiku, which is an unexpected starting point for a discussion of the novel. I am not sure what if anything I am retaining from these, beyond a desire to read more haiku.