“Memory, in short, is engraved not merely by the life we have led but by the life of the mind…by all the lives we so nearly led but missed by an inch, and—if we grant enough leeway to the imagination—by the lives of others, which can cut into ours every bit as sharply as our own experience.” – Anthony Lane, writing about W.G. Sebald in The New Yorker (May 29, 2000)
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Category Archives: COUNTRIES OF LOST THINGS
Jam in my purse—and unsticking the novel
Rule number one, never put jam in your purse, even if you think it will come in handy for the Dramamine your son needs in order not to throw up. When it comes down to it, would you rather have … Continue reading
Posted in COUNTRIES OF LOST THINGS, DOWN THE STREET..., Memory, War, Writing & Reading
Tagged adultery, bosnia, Countries of Lost Things, fiction, motherhood, parenting, writing
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Superstorm Sandy—grains of sand
Lately, I’ve been composing more blog posts while running by the East River than here in the tangible world of type and technology. Today, I want to try to bring them back together. This weekend I returned to the East … Continue reading
Posted in COUNTRIES OF LOST THINGS, Grief & grieving, Memory, Motherhood, Writing & Reading
Tagged 9/11, blackout, disaster, East River, eastern seaboard, electricity, Manhattan, memory, power, Sandy, superstorm
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Of secrets, silence, and despair—veteran suicides, Russian teens, the power of the novel
I’ve had my head in the sand as much as possible this month, a rather nice (and terribly necessary) place to be as a writer. But emerging for air—or simply to attend to surrounding noise—tends to create something akin to … Continue reading
“Welcome to Girl Land, my good little girls!”—Thank you Marlo Thomas and Friends
Caitlin Flanagan has a new book out. When a writer of a certain standing (read: excellent agent and/or energy-filled editor and publicist) is about to publish (again or for the first time), her name begins to pop up, there and … Continue reading
Posted in COUNTRIES OF LOST THINGS, Grief & grieving, Memory, Motherhood, Writing & Reading
Tagged 1970s, Caitlin Flanagan, divorce, Girl Land, grief, housewife, Joan Didion, motherhood, writer, writing
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Lots of latkes…Oh, Christmas tree…oh, Hanukkah, oh Hanukkah
Happy holidays, everyone! I’ve been consumed again by domesticity over the written word the past few weeks. (Is this a bi-annual event?) But amidst the Thanksgiving feast and Hanukkah festivities and upcoming Christmas celebrations, I’ve been thinking a lot about … Continue reading
Witness—the Holocaust, suicide, and memory (coincidence redux)
A few weeks ago, someone recommended the book Spectral Evidence to me, which, among other things, includes World War II photos from the Łódź Ghetto, the Nazis’ Jewish quarter in this major Polish city. I wrote the book title down … Continue reading
War, suicide, aggression—hope
In the autumn of 1992, having just returned from a semester in Moscow, I enrolled in my senior seminar, where I had the good fortune to study with Lawrence Weschler, then a staff writer with The New Yorker. Almost twenty … Continue reading
Antidepressants—and Sex & Motherhood—in the News
During the notorious summer lull in “serious” books, I have found a number of interesting articles to feed my brain in recent weeks on topics as varied as depression, divorce, subjectivity, sex, and motherhood. These essays—and their subjects—overlap and bump … Continue reading
Memory as moving target
Memory is intrusive. And I am constantly surprised by it. Even the bad memories, perhaps especially the bad ones, are interesting. Brain food. As you’ve read here before, I think of memory as a frequency (a channel), something we have … Continue reading
Posted in COUNTRIES OF LOST THINGS, Memory, Russia, Suicide, Writing & Reading
Tagged Countries of Lost Things, divorce, memory, reading, suicide, writing
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Synchronicity: coincidence, literature, & suicide, or A brain of one’s own
This past November, I was fortunate to attend a fantastic conference (clmp’s Literary Writers’ Conference) hosted at The New School, where I heard the poet Gabrielle Calvocoressi speak (and others too; more on that another time). I had been thinking … Continue reading
Posted in COUNTRIES OF LOST THINGS, Memory, Motherhood, Suicide, Writing & Reading
Tagged motherhood, suicide, writing
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Kara Krauze 