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savaging's review against another edition
3.0
"Today was very full, but the problem isn’t today. It’s tomorrow. I’d be able to recover from today if it weren’t for tomorrow. There should be extra days, buffer days, between the real days."
As a compulsive journaler I deeply related to this tiny book. But then as a compulsive child-avoider, I fully alienated myself from her story of motherhood. These two movements were disorienting.
Also, I found the book a little dull. All ideas. The only drama was birthing and rearing, and, well...
As a compulsive journaler I deeply related to this tiny book. But then as a compulsive child-avoider, I fully alienated myself from her story of motherhood. These two movements were disorienting.
Also, I found the book a little dull. All ideas. The only drama was birthing and rearing, and, well...
spicymeatballs's review against another edition
reflective
fast-paced
4.0
"Look at me, dancing my little dance for a few moments against the background of eternity."
bibliobrandie's review against another edition
3.0
I liked parts of it, didn't like others. Interesting, but not really my thing.
shibbypills's review against another edition
This book reminds of those 1-2 min brill songs which you love so so so deeply, and listen to over and over again all the while wishing it was longer
katellison's review against another edition
4.0
i love manguso's economical prose but then the book becomes pro-baby/parenthood which is gross
"Shortly after the turn of the millennium, I read the diary from beginning to end. Finding nothing of consequence in 1996, I threw the year away.
I'd already shredded the volumes I wrote in high school--not to keep them from others but to keep them from myself. So it seems I didn't want to remember everything.
I wanted to remember what I could bear to remember and convince myself it was all there was."
"Shortly after the turn of the millennium, I read the diary from beginning to end. Finding nothing of consequence in 1996, I threw the year away.
I'd already shredded the volumes I wrote in high school--not to keep them from others but to keep them from myself. So it seems I didn't want to remember everything.
I wanted to remember what I could bear to remember and convince myself it was all there was."
beanusminimus's review
challenging
emotional
reflective
5.0
beautiful. clear, thoughtful, reflective.
thrilled's review against another edition
3.0
this little book could have gone further, in my opinion, but that's not to say i didn't find sparks of beauty.
like this:
"now i am old enough to know what i'll never accomplish. i will never be a soldier, a physicist, a thousand other things. it feels like relief."
or this:
"for just a moment, with great effort, i could imagine my will as a force that would not disappear but redistribute when i died, and that all life contained the same force, and that i needn't worry about my impending death because the great responsibility of my life was to contain the force for a while and then relinquish it."
and this:
"look at me, dancing my little dance for a few moments against the background of eternity."
like this:
"now i am old enough to know what i'll never accomplish. i will never be a soldier, a physicist, a thousand other things. it feels like relief."
or this:
"for just a moment, with great effort, i could imagine my will as a force that would not disappear but redistribute when i died, and that all life contained the same force, and that i needn't worry about my impending death because the great responsibility of my life was to contain the force for a while and then relinquish it."
and this:
"look at me, dancing my little dance for a few moments against the background of eternity."