About
I formerly blogged at turinhurinson.wordpress.com. This new site has a more limited, and more literary, focus. The title is a quotation from the final chapter of Herman Melville’s Moby-Dick
As one might expect, Melville, Hopkins, and Tolkien were not arbitrary choices. They have influenced the way I look at literature more than any other writers, and together, they help me triangulate what I’ve called this journal’s “aesthetic center.” What I mean by that I leave purposefully vague, but suffice it to say that it does not simply inform what literary works I discuss here; it has an effect on every post I make.
I use tags to group my posts according to content and categories to group them according to form. I use many tags, and often introduce new ones; the ones used most often can be seen in the tag cloud in the sidebar. I have fewer categories, and they’re more or less fixed, though I may decide in the future to add or subtract from their number. They are as follows:
- Reviews: These willl be about everything I read, including popular novels, literary fiction, academic writing, and television and film. They would perhaps be better called “reading journals,” since I won’t try to give a comprehensive evaluation of the text and whether or not it’s worth reading, but they should give some idea of whether I liked it or not.
- Commentaries: When a poem particularly strikes me I’ll write briefly about why it does so, posting the full text of the poem followed by a (in theory) brief analysis of the poem and its importance.
- Definitions: I’ll keep track of the words that influence the way I think about things and write a little about each one, where it comes from, and what effect it has.
- Quotations: Sometimes a quotation from poetry or prose strikes me and I’ll post it with little or no explanation.
- Links: I’ll post links to interesting articles I read, often including a brief explanation so I’m not just piggy-backing on what others have written.
- Series: Certain topics require more attention than I can give them in a single post; these will have a “part x” in the title and be filed under the category “series” as well as under whatever other category might apply.
- General: Any post that does not obviously fit in one of the above categories will be marked “general.”
Finally, I’m required to say: “Joseph Simmons is a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to amazon.com.” This means that when I talk about books or movies and link to them on Amazon, I’ll get a cut of the proceeds if you follow the link and buy the item. I only make such links when I like the book/movie enough to think it worth buying.
Thanks for visiting.
