ORIGINAL POST DATE: August 17, 2006

The title for the post comes from the following quote by Alfred North Whitehead:

"The vitality of thought is in adventure. Ideas won't keep. Something must be done about them."

This is a combination post of "Quotes for Your Notebook" and "Moleskinei Creations" themes, brought about by my need for a notebook to have handy to toss various ideas into. I generally use my Moleskine Pocket Daily Diary to record stray thoughts and brief ideas - of the more random and passing nature of made up movie titles or simple plot outlines for stories I will never get around to writing.

I also needed a notebook that would provide the space for larger ideas, where I could write several pages compared to the several sentence lengths in my daily diary. I chose a Moleskine large kraft Cahier with squared pages, but since I have several of these floating around for different uses I wanted the idea book to stand out from the others.

I started by making the painting of the light bulb in my pocket size Moleskine Watercolor Reporter notebook. I used watercolor colored pencils and Pitt brush markers to paint the image, and then removed the page from the notebook. I cut a hole in the cover of the large Cahier in the shape of the light bulb, and then used a combination of glue stick and tape to secure the watercolor page inside the front cover. I am happy with the results, and it is easy for me to find this notebook among the clutter on my desk.

If Alfred North Whitehead's words are to be followed, then something indeed needs to be done to keep our ideas - and the pages of a humble Cahier might be just the place for those vital intellectual adventures to work themselves out.

ORIGINAL POST DATE: February 8, 2006

My only association with Oliver Wendall Holmes, Sr. is from my high school English class, and having to read The Autocrat at the Breakfast Table. I don't recall anything about that book, but it must have been better than reading James Fennimore Cooper (whom I dubbed "James Fenimore Awful"), since I didn't bother to come up with a derisive nick-name for Holmes. Here instead is someone who speaks deeply to one of the major conundrums of my life:

"What refuge is there for the victim who is oppressed with the feeling that there are a thousand new books he ought to read, while life is only long enough for him to attempt a hundred?" -Oliver Wendall Holmes, Sr.

Consider too that Holmes lived in a time that didn't produce the millions of new titles every year that we are faced with having to prioritize our reading lists from. The task is daunting.

Take for example one area of reading that I enjoy: Mythology. I had recently reached a place of comfort having acquired a selection of books by Joseph Campbell, and a few titles by Mircea Eliade, thinking I had enough good titles on mythology to stop looking for any more. Yesterday I discovered that Karen Armstrong has published a new book, this time on the subject of mythology, called A Short History of Myth. I have read many of Karen Armstrong's books, so now I feel compelled get that one too, since I am very curious to read what she has to say about mythology. Just when I thought I had at least one subject covered, I add another book to the pile. Is there no end?

I like the nostalgic feeling the Holmes quote provides, with the thought that reading 100 books in a lifetime is as much as is attainable. There was a time then, when reading 100 books (although clearly not enough) seemed like what was achievable in a lifetime. From the perspective of Holmes' time period I am doing pretty well, having read at least 100 books by now (likely many more than that), and (unless something unsuspected occurs) with many years still ahead of me.

I haven't read much the last few days. I suffered a serious brain cramp on Monday after reading a particularly mind expanding bit of Jungian psychology. It actually made my brain hurt. It was a good pain, the sort of "feel the burn" sensation that lets you know you have expanded your capacity to think, but still, the kind of pain that lets you know when it's time to back off. I decided to give it a rest and to allow these new ideas sink in and mellow among the other collected ideas from my lifetime of reading. I have taken refuge, for a few days anyway, in the understanding that I am doing a pretty good job, at least by 19th century standards, of getting my fill of books.

That is, of course, until the Karen Armstrong book arrives from Amazon.

ORIGINAL POST DATE: November 16, 2005

This latest quote is from the book Assassination Vacation by Sarah Vowell, and addresses the "Grandfather Paradox"" concerning time travel.

ORIGINAL POST DATE: November 2, 2005

This latest quote from the pages of my Moleskinei pocket diary is from the beginning of the book Mysteries of the Alphabet by Marc-Alain Ouaknin:

"The magical alphabet, the mysterious hieroglyphic, merely reach us incomplete and distorted, either by time or by those very people who have a vested interest in our ignorance; let us find the lost letter or obliterated sign, let us re-create the dissonant scale and we shall gain strength from the world of the mind." - Gérard de Nerval (1808 - 1855)

It is precisely the mysterious aspect of ancient scripts that makes them compelling to the artist and poet alike. Nerval was a French poet and bohemian, a friend of Baudelaire. I am not sure what larger context this quote is taken from, but I gather from reading his short biography HERE that he was the kind of writer that was drawn into the mysteries of ancient signs and symbols. As an artist it has always been interesting for me to try to see beyond the commonplace usage of language to the deeper symbols embedded in the words and letters themselves. Nerval's quote is a call to examine this magical aspect of the alphabet, and he even tempts us with a touch of conspiracy theory suggesting that there are deliberate means that keep us from knowing the truth. The challenge is finding something within the symbols of letters, whether contemporary or ancient, that carries deeper meaning for ourselves, since the original meaning attributed by the first writers of these alphabets are forever lost to us. Perhaps it was the way the first writing tools fit the hand that influenced their forms, that the charcoal stick or quill played an integral part in their development and left their own natural imprint into this human communication. Whatever the origin, whatever the form, Nerval's quote asks us to take time to contemplate these letterforms as a way to strengthen our minds. Considering that many early Greek philosophers felt that writing weakens the mind by removing the need for memorization, it may be good advice indeed!

Magical Alphabet Quote from my Moleskine Diary

Here are a few good books on the history of the alphabet:

Mysteries of the Alphabet by Marc-Alain Ouaknin

The Alphabetic Labyrinth: Letters in History and Imagination by Johanna Drucker

Magical Alphabets by Nigel Pennick

The Alphabet Abecedarium: Some Notes on Letters by Richard A. Firmage