Wednesday reading, plus some art

[asakiyume]

I've done only a very little reading this week.

Long form:

I read a little more of The Winged Histories, but this may just be something I need to come back to at a later date. Will keep reading a bit more, though, because I do love the writing, so casual and graceful with insights:

I put down my things, and he noticed the swordbox. "Oh! Ha, ha! Did you bring that thing? Ha, ha!" he wheezed, leaning on a couch. "A joke," he explained to my Aunt Firvaud, who regarding me with a searing stare. "Our Tavis used to be so fond of swordplay."

"I still am," I said, though I did not feel fond of anything. I thought I would never be fond of anything again."

How Tavis feels: you know it so entirely from those last two sentences, and you know how the aunt feels, and you can sense the impotence of the uncle .... yeah, you know writing this is persuading me to read on.

I also started reading WEB DuBois's The Souls of Black Folks, which I've been meaning to read for years. I had to open up a document to store all the quotes I wanted to remember--it's going to be most of the book, I can tell already.

For the first time he sought to analyze the burden he bore upon his back, that dead-weight of social degradation partially masked behind a half-named Negro problem. He felt his poverty; without a cent, without a home, without land, tools, or savings, he had entered into competition with rich, landed, skilled neighbors. To be a poor man is hard, but to be a poor race in a land of dollars is the very bottom of hardships.

WEB DuBois grew up in Great Barrington, Massachusetts, and earlier in the chapter he shares this memory--and it feels shamefully fresh:

I was a little thing, away up in the hills of New England, where the dark Housatonic winds between Hoosac and Taghkanic to the sea. In a wee wooden schoolhouse, something put it into the boys’ and girls’ heads to buy gorgeous visiting-cards—ten cents a package—and exchange. The exchange was merry, till one girl, a tall newcomer, refused my card,—refused it peremptorily, with a glance. Then it dawned upon me with a certain suddenness that I was different from the others; or like, mayhap, in heart and life and longing, but shut out from their world by a vast veil.

Short form:

You can read this flash story in under five minutes, but it's both funny and profound and may lift your spirits: "Addison and Julia Tell the Truth to Pemaquid Beach"

And here's some fan art I made for This Is How You Lose the Time War. It's a moment when Blue saves the life of child-Red, though Red doesn't realize it at the time.

Comments

[sartorias]

Love the blue beastie!

[asakiyume]

I had such a vivid image of her from the description; I really needed to draw it!

[sovay]

And here's some fan art I made for This Is How You Lose the Time War.

That is extremely good fan art. I hope the authors have seen it.

[asakiyume]

One has! I don't know about the other.

[kore]

DuBois is amazing, and so neglected, really.

[asakiyume]

I'm in chapter two now, and it's an education about during and directly after the Civil War--*way* more than I learned in high school. And yeah: he writes like a dream.

[mallorys_camera]

Your fan art is very lovely.

[asakiyume]

Aww, thank you! I really do love to draw: it's something I let myself do without having any ambition about it.

[minoanmiss]

My high school was located on the Housatonic, and now you've reminded me of reading that bit as I sat where I could look at the river, and understanding in a dreadful flash so much of my trouble making friends at that wretched place.

[asakiyume]

And that's it, right? There we are: you went to high school like 100 years after WEB DuBois, and the atmosphere had not substantially changed. And yet I sincerely believe that it doesn't have to be this way.

[teenybuffalo]

I love your picture! I just read and enjoyed this book so the timing is perfect for me.

[asakiyume]

Wasn't a good book! Little Springtime just finished reading it too. I'm glad you like the picture ^_^