incredible

depressing indeed, but not Easley surprising—amphetamines & heroin don’t really make already screwy & self-absorbed & insecure people more pleasant

this is inversely true for dive bars though—like I’m pretty sure The Library in NYC (no idea if it’s still there) maybe had a couple books on a shelf in the back or something. If it’s called The Aquarium solely bc there’s an empty, dusty goldfish bowl next to the whiskey bottles, that’s a Good Bar

it’s a naked devil lady, innit

(that said, I’m surprised I never noticed the poem in there, & also where the hell did I put the book)(& meanwhile the fluggin’ John Ashbery “Illuminations” is like deliberately—?—clunky in its own right… I shoulda kept taking French)

ah, he’s one of the ones I have, think it’s the complete works (& letters), but it’s more recent & I think he redid a lot of the translations. But a) doesn’t have French text & b) he decided to rearrange Illuminations into verse form (or something like it), so there’s also that

unrelated, since I know you like PK Dick: Centipede Press just did another set of some of his stuff. Nothing I can afford, but they (or really he: Jerad) make lovely books, so if you collect stuff or want to splurge for holidays, you might be interested

www.centipedepress.com/sf/pkdset2.h...

ah damn, how did I not know this. Any preferred translations/translators? (I remember just barely enough high school French to get perennially annoyed by stuff that I can see is messed with but can’t y’know actually really read untranslated) (so like: literal/direct is always preferable)

He’s never been a subtle boy