R.I.P. “proto-modernism”

If you’ve ever taken a college-level English course on literature written before 1900, the odds are pretty good that you’ve encountered a strange beast known as “the proto-modernist text.” Very often, this is… Read More →

Here at The Kugelmass Episodes…

…we play your requests, as The Constructivist knows. Ben Wolfson‘s asked for copies of my current reading for my upcoming qualifying exams in literature. The exams are based on three lists and accompanying… Read More →

The Solution Is The Soapbox

The conversation about art, pleasure, discipline and craft is afoot at The Valve, and I thought I’d reprint my long comment from there over here, redacted slightly. I like how it ends. -JK… Read More →

The Assault on Hedonism, Part 2: Nietzsche, Pater, Marcus

(x-posted to The Valve) At the end of my last post on hedonism, I wrote: “At least, since we have to start somewhere, to start by tackling the relationship between consumption and pleasure,… Read More →

On Decadence

In a remarkable new post at Is There No Sin In It?, A White Bear gives us her “half-assed” (not really) theory of decadence. She writes, I hold that decadence is taking pleasure… Read More →