วีดีโอ

I'm so glad to hear it! Honestly I feel like I could go back and do a part II on each of these novellas. So much to appreciate in this work. What a genius. Thank you so much for writing!

Ooooooh. How did I not know there is a Vargas Llosa on Flaubert and Mme!!?? Mme. Bovary really is the book that keeps on giving. My memory is sooo bad and there's plenty I don't remember of this gem, but I think I've gone back to it so many times that there are whole swaths that are now indelible. It's really something. I just bought Balzac's The Lily in the Valley. We'll see how that goes! Thank you for writing! Let me know what you think! (This is such an early lecture. In the foxed page trajectory I hope the sound is okay etc...)

The psychoanalyst thing here is very real! In part because Salinger is pretty hung up on all of it. I love a work where the author is kind of giving you permission to read all the freudian stuff you can think of!

Thank you for writing! That's so funny about the ad! I'm glad something grabbed your attention. Thanks for following along!

Omg I love this interpretation so much!! I can get totally on board with the idea that part of him is dying, but not all of him. I do really love that the book offers up so many possibilities. I read the Lispector quotations carefully, given the unusual thing of finding an echo of the epigraph at the close of the novel. I LOVED that. I also looked closely at the verb tense. The present in it made me put a little tick in the "he gets to live on and love Z" column. Same with the strawberry season. It seemed like an exhortation to enjoy the NOW, which spoke to me of not-death. But again--I love your thought! I mean, aren't parts of us dying occasionally?? And others becoming real?? Wow is this book good!!

I'm so glad you liked the dive! Fwiw, I too am conflicted about parts of the novel. I keep having really interesting conversations with friends (and my sister haha) about which parts we found sexy and which were not arousing. I'm fascinated with July saying that she wrote a lot of sexy stuff that was a real turn on, but then she jettisoned that in favor of stuff that felt more "real." I LOVE that. I mean, I'm not sure I found the "rigor mortis" masturbation scene SEXY but I did love how real it felt. I also love the idea that a man, today, would be criticized for this. I thought a LOT about men writing sex while I was reading this. I think we are in a particular moment of more discernment and awareness of the patriarchy/male-dominant heteronormative sex assumptions/description etc. (haha that's a hell of a phrase there). I look at July as a complete revolutionary when I think of the MILLENIA of men who have been writing explicitly about sex. We don't know who wrote the Kama Sutra but it seems unlikely it was a woman? And the the ancient Greeks seemed pretty progressive about a broader acceptance of sexual appetites and habits but in recent history, from The Canterbury Tales to the Marquis de Sade (although there is a lot of gay sex in there), to Lady Chatterly's Lover, to Henry Miller, to Richard Ford to Nicholson Baker (whose sex writing I LOVE, but whose Fermata is kind of problematic), and a zillion other male authors, it's been almost all males writing sex and often very explicitly! I actually think that if a man wrote explicitly like this not all that many people would notice! I mean, even the age difference between the 45-year-old woman and 20-something man wouldn't seem odd--and certainly wouldn't be anything new--in a male-written book. All of this is to say that--I must be very caffeinated to write such a long note! Ha! But I also REALLY love how this book is getting people to talk. I also assume from your name and message that you are male, and I think it's awesome that you read ALL FOURS. I think a lot of men are afraid to. And maybe they should be!! Thank you SO much for writing!

​@@thefoxedpage Oh no, thank you for making the videos! I'm really enjoying them, you have a lot of valuable discussion and critique. I feel like I'm in college again. I probably am on the outlier of the average reader of the book but I don't think growth comes from reading about your own experience. Thinking about it, I do tend to read mostly female authors so maybe that's why I'm also a bit out of touch with how men write women or sex. I haven't really looked historically at what's out there as you are supremely well-versed in it. I wanted to mention, there's a new memoir that came out called Consent by Jill Ciment that I feel like adds to more of this discussion about age/power dynamics and the institution of marriage. It's worth a look if you like memoir to add to the contemporary feminist writings that make all of this stuff around marriage and consent even more vexing.

@@WayneSmith This is so interesting. And I'll check out the Ciment. I also think it's good to read outside of your experience. Oddly, I've spent a LOT of time doing that. Such an interesting way to understand someone else. And thank you for the kind words about feeling like you're in college again. I am VERY happy to feel like I am too haha!

She's so amazing. Thanks for listening and for writing!

I'm glad you like it! I think she doesn't get quite the attention she deserves from the wider readership because of the short fiction thing? I mean, I personally really wish she had been able to write a NOVEl-novel (blasphemy, probably haha!). I'm also interested in these writers (like Munro) who are SO revered in academic and writerly circles but who aren't read more widely. I mean--it makes sense in some ways, but still. She really IS a writer's writer in lots of ways. You have good taste!

That is so kind! And good for you--filling those gaps. Thank you for writing!

Right?? He's amazing!!

Thank you for this! I have to admit that my memory is so bad that I can't remember what my question was! This was originally recorded in the fall. Too many books in my head! But thank you so much for listening and for taking the time to write! (Also--could the name "Eliza Western" be any more McCarthy-esque??)

I'm so glad you liked it! Sometimes it's weird to listen to people talking about your favorite work--just because you know it so well and have strong feelings--so I'm extra glad it resonated with you! I looove this book. It's so so good.

haha!

That is so nice! I will! haha but also, really I will

Thanks for tuning in!

Sadly, I didn't do a lecture on Vita Nostra. In fact, I've never heard of Dyachenko! I'll have to check it out! Thanks so much for listening!

I love the idea of the coloring book as God's. It's an interesting question: whether King's work leads us more to a vision of predestination or free will etc. Such an interesting question! And that observation about Royal Knob is so astute! I have a feeling King might also be playing with phalic references there. He's so good!

Thank YOU for tuning in!

I'm so glad! What a BOOK!

I'm so glad you're liking the channel! I must admit that with my crazy memory--and the sheer volume of lectures--I can't remember exactly which point you mean haha. I do, though, LOVE Borges, so I hope that I wasn't stealing something of his and passing it off as my own. What an incredible thinker he was! Thanks for writing!

I was just checking comments and saw that I misspelled shear! I have been such a good speller my whole life then I turned 54 and can't spell homonyms any more! Haha Thanks, menopause!

So glad you liked it!

There are a spate of real "dude" books coming soon! As much as I'd love to not believe in gendered writing, there is, in my experience, a lot of gender in writing!

There was so much inventiveness in this guy. Loved it. I still need to get over to Stanford to find out why all those physicians are so good! (To be honest, North Woods was by far my favorite over Covenant of Water. That was good too but this is in a whole different class!)

I'm so glad! Milkman was so deeply affecting for me. Burns is such a genius! Thank you so much for writing!

Also, omg, note that just below your comment is a comment from THE ANNA BURNS. Honestly, her words were the ultimate highlight of all this foxed page work! (Although your comments are good too haha)

Wish it were mine! haha

Yes! Thank you! I learned this later from a Claire Keegan book.(And was reminded of it from the reader/listener below in the comments here.) I wish I had remembered when I was thinking about this one! The meaning of it (the free bird overtones) are so excellent. Yet more proof that Haien is the real deal. I'm glad you liked it! Thank you for writing!

Let's bring back hats!

@@thefoxedpage Great idea! I'll start with a beret and work my way up to a top hat. I have a beautiful straw brim somewhere, that'll be finally coming out this summer! 🥰

My children are grow up all have own family

Mam you know I have a true story it's happened to me year 1987 some woman reading my palm all she said it's happened in 2 years we came here she send me here in alaska her spirit are they transfer to a woman pilipina and she told me if I know her I said no mam and she told me im her mama virgin Mary im honest mam I tell a little true story im so very lucky can you believe to me im not degree holder but I am a employee of highest government in the Philippines I work at Central Bank of the Philippines 15 years in service im not graduating im under graduating but they hore me cause im hard working and honest employee

Mam they have David and Goliath in your book

This is such an interesting question to me. The idea of writing for men or women. I remember reading Richard Ford or John Updike decades ago and thinking it was so interesting to get into the minds' of men. Pynchon, DeLillo, Foster Wallace, McCarthy, Vonnegut... the list goes on and on for me. In an age when we are so skeptical of sex and gender differences, (and having just done a whole Jane Austen bender haha), I continue to be interested in this. Thanks for writing!

This sounds like a very solid biblical reading. I wish I had more biblical context to REALLY appreciate all Ward's nuance...

I so appreciate these corrections! Thank you! I am an American who is learning all she can about Ireland and Irish but it's obviously daunting to keep everything straight and pronounce everything correctly. I also choose to spend most of my time immersed int he text not in the bio details so I'm not surprised that I misspoke about her biography. I often make disclaimers--citing the large volume of stuff I read and say--to be sure that listeners don't take me as the final final authority on any of this stuff (I mean, who is the final final authority haha) but maybe I didn't disclaim enough here. I also draw a parallel between the story and Puritanism but maybe not clearly enough (and maybe not in this lecture!) I'm so interested in why you say it's set in Ireland but isn't intrinsically Irish. Could you tell me more of what you mean? Again--thank you for these thoughts!

Also I can't believe I said her NAME wrong. That's crazy! Apologies. I certainly don't claim to be perfect but that's bonkers.

@@thefoxedpage Thanks for your kind reply. I do realize that you have a huge library of books you speak of. When I said the work is not intrinsically Irish, I meant that the themes are universal: subjective morality, seclusion and apartness, adaptation to severe and unusual circumstances, but most importantly what happens when a listener is drawn in by a story. Father Declan is drawn in by Enda... despite his vows of celibacy and supposed objectivity... just as we the readers are drawn in by this book. The priest's emotional undoing is the real plot line here... not the story of Enda&Kevin, nor of the fishing. I would say that Ireland was a good choice for the location because of the tradition of the Catholic priest in conjunction with a lonely and secluded part of the world. It could have been rural Maine, but for the absence of the Catholic religion.

I couldn't agree more! I do think the universal feel of it is part of its very deep allure. As an American I am weirdly fixated on the long shadow of Puritanism and all the ways I think it harms us. I am similarly fascinated by Catholicism. I'm interested in what it would be like to grow up in a country that was so dominated by what I personally see in the people I know who are devout Catholics--shame, guilt (also a lot of fun! and the good things of faith!). I think I was getting at the idea of the Catholic nature of that country. It seems like fair game here--the Catholicism--given the presence of the priest. In that sense I was reading it as uniquely Irish in that Ireland has such a strong Catholic piece.@@DeeDee-cw9fv

@@thefoxedpage What I find interesting though is Enda's lack of piety re: Catholicism - she doesn't seem in the least concerned about what Father Declan is horrified by. And she is very clear that she is "explaining" to the priest than confessing - almost teaching him that the church's ironclad teachings are often not applicable to real life. Also, of course, she obviously wants to tell her story to someone, and doesn't feel that anyone else can hear it. (No therapists in her town, I guess!) There's not a shred of guilt in her, but also no apparent concern about what she needs to do to go to heaven. She is a secular character, and in the end I see Father as such also.

Oooooh. I love it! Will do!

I honestly can't remember what I say in this clip (haha--my memory is terrible) but these recommendations are pulled from the longer lecture. I DO find the first sentence highly instructive, but I also, of course, read the rest of the work too.

@@thefoxedpage Ah, sorry I wasn't clear -- what I meant was that the entire first paragraph is one sentence, and you only read half of it.

ah-ha! I wonder if I read the whole thing in the lecture? I try to fit lots into these little recommendations. I hope I did! I looooove a good run-on@@DeeDee-cw9fv

@@thefoxedpage You read about half of it. ;)

CRIMINAL! haha@@dianediane4541

I'm so glad you liked it!

This is the BEST! I'm so glad you're liking it! Thank you so much for writing!

This is so kind! Thank. you so much for writing. I'm not sure how I didn't see this earlier!

Omg haha apparently I DID see this and did respond. My brain these days!

Wow. SUCH a compliment. I'm so glad you're TUNING IN!

Thanks!