Quick gusts, Leerin' at the Gits

The first week back to work has been one of quiet determination. I have read three books since i posted last, thought a great deal about Stalin, about the Hundred Year War and upon those alleged civil wars - ours and Russia's. I am going to read DJ Taylor's bio of Orwell while I decide whether Rybakov deserves attention and I have thought of reading a slew of novels for the new year -- Vanity Fair and Middlemarch, to begin matters.

Here's to Malaparte and his haunting image of sppoked Russian horses escaping the flames of war only to freeze in a Finnish lake. The very typing of that sentence recalls the indelible impresions of Nabokov. Here's to Joel and a joint reading of the Death of Virgil.