David Corbett
@davidcorbett
Recovering Catholic, NYT Notable author of seven novels, two writing guides, dozens of stories, numerous scripts, and too many poems. No DMs
Alternative explanation: Maybe he’ll stop acting out if I pretend he’s my friend.
My monthly offering for Writer Unboxed, in which I abandon the topic I'd meant to write about--the depiction of grief in fiction--for a far more immediate and necessary discussion of grief for Renée Nicole Good and all the things her killing renders so terrifyingly at risk. (Link in comments)
That time again: The audiobook for The Truth Against the World is now available at half-price. Narrated by the inimitable John Keating, whose other credits include Leon Uris's TRINITY, Ian McGuire's THE NORTH WATER, Benjamin Black's Quirke Series, and many more.) Buy link in comments.
For the terminally curious, may I offer a few crumbs for thought: this month's contribution to Writer Unboxed. It's titled, "The Elusive 'I' in Identity (link in comments), in which I describe recent research that establishes you are not who you think you are, and neither am I.
I have a copy of her book, Prison Notes, about being jailed in the Jim Crow south after taking part in civil rights protests. It awakens you to the hard work of defying racism and autocracy. I have always loved this photo of her by Consuelo Kanaga.
Why I love @groundnews.bsky.social -- check out the factuality and political leaning ratings at the top RH corner of each listing. I appreciate the chance to compare what I'm reading from MSM or my more left-leaning sources with what's reverberating inside the RW bubble w/o having to "go there."
Who makes the more valid point? The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, and wiser people so full of doubts. --Bertrand Russell The best lack all conviction, while the worst Are full of passionate intensity. --William Butler Yeats
"What is asserted without evidence can also be dismissed without evidence." --Christopher Hitchens
It is perhaps no better sign of the times than this has become my “comfort reading.”
We should also care because of the bad faith arguments they make, the bogus history they invoke (Clarence Thomas), and the Machiavellian hypocrisy: the right channels every case suiting their purposes through Kaczmaryk in Amarillo precisely to get a national injunction.
There's an appealing assonance in the phrases: belligerent ignorance ignorant belligerents The term came to me as I was contemplating how screwed the environment is. But the real culprits, the petrochemical industry, can't hide behind ignorance. They're cynically, hypocritically, greedily aware.
First Vance destroys Ohio State’s National Championship trophy, then he kills the Pope. And the stock market kicks off the week in the crapper, just for a little icing on the [insert scatological term of choice] #EVTD
"[T]ime does not matter in China. Four years of war is a long time. But perhaps if your history goes back four thousand years it does not seem so long. The Chinese are born patient, and they learn endurance when they start to breathe." --Martha Gelhorn, "The Canton Front" (March 1941)
"Magnanimity in politics is not seldom the truest wisdom; and a great empire and little minds go ill together." --Edmund Burke
It's Monday morning, the outrages are already piling up, and I needed to remind myself that I should be reading more poetry, to feed my seething soul. If you find yourself in the same boat, may I offer you this, from Bob Hicok, "Toward accuracy:"
I still believe one of the chief reasons behind the Temper Tantrum Tariffs is the opportunity they give Trump to strong-arm businesses, industry groups, countries and anyone else who dares defy him. It's extortion, not economics. A protection racket posing as protectionism.