More specifically concerning: schedule
24.01.2001
24 January 2001, around 17.36.
Up, email, breakfast, coffee, read, library, chinaware (the only truly silent reading room available), room, books, lunch, library, Greek Literary dialects (using words such as ‘aposeosis’ – is that an anachronistic Doric sigma? – and phrases such as ‘this text goes in for unnecessary iotas every so often’ and ‘it would be syntactically cruel of […]
25.01.2001
25 January 2001, around 17.37.
Up, coffee, email, breakfast, library, Greek Religion – what role do the Greek gods play in everyday life? From whence and how did they evolve? What is structuralism? Are you a structuralist? Is Gallic subtlety any match for the brute force of History? – lunch, essay, read, breathe, bed.
26.01.2001
26 January 2001, around 17.38.
Up, coffee, essay, e-mail, breakfast, Hellenistic History with the public-school man – post-imperialist and orientalist subtexts in Greek literature after Alexander! – pretend not to suffer from nerves, lunch, Thucydides and Rhetoric (i.e., nearly two hours of sitting, staring at the floor and attempting to conjure an innovative opinion about Pericles’ funeral oration; also, if […]
1.02.01
1 February 2001, around 19.21.
Breakfast, library, J. E. Harrison, coffee, Historical Methods of Herodotus, postmodern critical article on palm-trees in Attic vase painting, Greek Religion, lunch, room, bath, computer, Social and Economic History of the Hellenistic World, email, dinner, room, bed.
2.02.01
2 February 2001, around 19.22.
(unwell) Up, coffee, breakfast, room, Herodotus, bath, Herodotus, library, lunch, library (return book), race to → class, room, bed & sleep & sleep & sleep.
3.02.01
3 February 2001, around 19.22.
(unwell) Snooze, up, coffee, library, J. E. Harrison (couldn’t even manage a full hour…), coffee, bookstore (Themis), lunch, library (Divinity and History: the Religion of Herodotus; OCM), apple-mango juice, room, much sneezing & coughing &c., Chopin, read, tea, snooze, read, Satie, bed.
4.02.01
4 February 2001, around 19.24.
(unwell) Up, coffee, laundry, library (return books), coffee & sandwich, groceries (orange juice & instant soup), room, nap, idleness.
5.02.01
5 February 2001, around 19.24.
Up, coffee, email, breakfast, library (return book), Athenian culture and society, library, coffee, groceries, lunch, room, tidy, bath, Classical Foundations of Modern Historiography, Mozart, Athenian Religion, tea, snooze, bed.
6.02.01
6 February 2001, around 19.25.
Up, coffee, Momigliano, breakfast, library, coffee, groceries, room, Athenian Religion, lunch, read, library, room, Satie, German, read, dinner, lecture, room, bed.
7.02.01
7 February 2001, around 19.26.
Up, coffee, Momigliano, breakfast, library, museum, essay, room, lunch, Greek literary dialects, library, essay, room, bed.
8.02.01
8 February 2001, around 19.26.
Up, coffee, breakfast, library, coffee, Greek religion, lunch, room, read, bed.
9.02.01
9 February 2001, around 19.27.
Up, coffee, breakfast, library, read, coffee & lunch, bookstore, class room, smirk, read, bed.
10.02.01
10 February 2001, around 19.28.
Up, coffee, read, library, coffee, bookstore (Die Fragmente der Vorsokratiker, vol. 2), brunch, talk, room, snooze, movie, room, relax, coffee, socialize, room, bed.
11.02.01
11 February 2001, around 19.29.
Up, coffee, laundry, email, room, read, coffee, cudgel poor brain about grad school, muddle, read, essay, bed.
12.02.01
12 February 2001, around 19.30.
Up, coffee, breakfast, Athenian culture and society (paideia), library (return books, browse periodicals, etc.), lunch, room, read, essay, bed.
13.02.01
13 February 2001, around 19.30.
Up, coffee, essay, breakfast, library, translate, tutorial, lunch, room, read, bed.
14.02.01
14 February 2001, around 19.31.
Up, coffee, Greek historiography, email, breakfast, coffee, museum, lunch, Greek literary dialects, room, out for dinner, room, bed.
15.02.01
15 February 2001, around 19.32.
Up, coffee, ΑΝΑΓΚΗ in Thucydides, email, breakfast, coffee, museum, read periodicals, Greek religion (also, womens’ festivals…), lunch, room, essay, read, dinner, room, bed.
16.02.01
16 February 2001, around 19.33.
Up, coffee, essay, email, breakfast, room, read, lunch, class (‘You’ve stunned them,’ this following a long silence when I’d read my essay; no constructive comments thereafter — no comments at all, in fact), sulk, room, tea, Ulysses, dinner with company, room, bed.
17.02.01
17 February 2001, around 19.34.
Up, coffee, Ulysses, bathe, putter, send letters, email, brunch.
18.02.01
18 February 2001, around 19.34.
Up, coffee, letter, Thucydides, coffee & lunch, bookstore, room, The Third Policeman, tea, bed.
19.02.01
19 February 2001, around 19.35.
Up, coffee, Greek historiography, Kagan YCS 24, send letters, breakfast, library (return books), Athenian culture (the oikos, the womens’ sphere, pederasty), coffee, library (return books, renew, and borrow Arethusa 11), groceries (bread, milk, etc., no honey), room, At Swim-Two-Birds, email, lunch, package, treats, novel, bath, At Swim-Two-Birds, bed.
20.02.01
20 February 2001, around 19.36.
Up, coffee, At Swim-Two-Birds, email, breakfast, library (return books), coffee, museum (periodicals, course reading), library (Thucydides, etc.), The Blessing, lunch, room, The Blessing, bread, Thucydides, bed.
21.02.01
21 February 2001, around 19.37.
Up, coffee, Greek historiography, email, breakfast, library, coffee, milk, room, Thucydides Mythistoricus, lunch, Euripides as social critic (‘question authority’ — I can’t believe I skipped two hours of discussing the Boeotian elements of Pindar to attend), room, generally well-disposed to world and lacking any desire to indulge in excessive criticism (this state being induced by […]
22.02.01
22 February 2001, around 19.38.
Up, coffee, email, breakfast, library (return book), bookstore, coffee, library (request books), Greek religion (the importance of myth!), lunch, bread & milk, room, read, dinner, room, bed.
23.02.01
23 February 2001, around 19.39.
Up, coffee, email, breakfast, library (return book), library II (read), library III (return book & photocopy), coffee & sandwich, room, read, class, which put in mind of Meredith: …one is not altogether fit for the battle of life who is engaged in a perpetual contention with his dinner… …which holds true for Thucydides as well; […]
24.02.01
24 February 2001, around 19.40.
Up, coffee, bath, Love in a Cold Climate (it troubles me somewhat, being clever and charming and not especially brilliant, the characters remain, as intended I suppose, card-board cut-outs — Cedric, for instance, is an insult to one’s intelligence — though it is entertaining to ponder the actual schedule of the narrator), library (Greek Religion, […]
25.02.01
25 February 2001, around 19.42.
Up, coffee, languish (a sleepy stupidity tucked amongst the blankets, watching the light seep across the wall and hiding from the sharpness of out-of-doors), laundry, email (a process which, with some manipulation, can be made to consume an hour and half), room, coffee & sandwich, grocery store (for the purchase of weekly necessaries such as […]
26.02.01
26 February 2001, around 19.43.
(unwell) Up (after a night of heated sleep, not tossing and turning, but trapped in the stillness inimical to rest), coffee, Ulysses, email, breakfast, library (return books & borrow Greek Prose Style), Athenian Culture, museum (return & borrow books), bookstore (check on religion books in cheap paperbacks), library (translations & TLS), email, lunch, room, tea, […]
27.02.01
27 February 2001, around 19.46.
(unwell) Up, coffee, essay, email, breakfast, library, essay, tutorial, buy books, coffee, purchase tea, room, tea, Ulysses, meet to arrange Latin, room, Ulysses, library (return books), dinner, room, bed.
28.02.01
28 February 2001, around 19.46.
(unwell) Up (after a night broken by coughing), coffee, Ulysses, email, breakfast, library, coffee, pick up tickets, room, rest, lunch, room, read, essay, rest, bed.
01.03.01
1 March 2001, around 14.50.
(unwell) Up (after a night broken by coughing), coffee, Ulysses, e-mail, breakfast, Bodley, coffee, pick up tickets, room, rest, lunch, room, read, essay, rest, bed.
02.03.01
2 March 2001, around 14.52.
(unwell) Up, coffee, essay, breakfast, email, essay, snooze, deliver essay, room, bed, A Room with a View, talk to Mama, mint tea, drift in & out of wakefulness, sleep.
03.03.01
3 March 2001, around 14.54.
Up, coffee, Baroque, Women in Ancient Persia (559–331 BC), Brahms, tea, notecards, Elgar, African Civilizations, brunch, groceries, room, Omeros, tea, continue reading, call M, Bach, bed.
04.03.01
4 March 2001, around 14.55.
Up, coffee, laundry, email, bread, Ulysses, tea, relax, bed.
05.03.01
5 March 2001, around 14.58.
Up, coffee, Women in Ancient Persia…, email, breakfast, letters, Athenian Culture, library (kinship diplomacy), library II (return book, renew books on Greek cults & borrow book on Roman Rhetoric), coffee, bookstore, bread & milk, room, settle, lunch, write letters, tea, Bach, Ulysses, &c., talk (dreadful and dull), room, bed.
06.03.01
6 March 2001, around 14.59.
Up, email, breakfast, library (kinship diplomacy), coffee, museum, bookstore, post-office (stamps for letter & forms), room, read, St. John’s Passion, tea, read, Ninth, read, email, dinner, room, bed.
07.03.01
7 March 2001, around 15.00.
Up, tea, email, breakfast, library (kinship diplomacy), coffee, room, read, idleness, bed.
08.03.01
8 March 2001, around 15.03.
Up, tea, email, breakfast, library (kinship diplomacy — finished at last), coffee, Greek Religion, room, read, coffee, collections, dinner (which invariably causes indigestion), concert, stroll, room, bed.
09.03.01
9 March 2001, around 15.03.
Up, email, breakfast, coffee, read, museum, bookstore, bread & juice, room, Lucky Jim, coffee, pita, read, class (medicine; more dreadful silences and skirting the essentials), room & mirth, potluck, taxi, room, bed.
10.03.01
10 March 2001, around 15.02.
A fine day today, overcast, with a light rain whispering the warmth of spring (to be purple about it). Finished Lucky Jim in the morning, which was adequate so far as novels go, but nothing out of the ordinary. Into college to, idle before the morning meal, which last I spent in moderate socialization with […]
11.03.01
11 March 2001, around 15.01.
Overcast toneless gray, neither warm nor cold. Reading The Ambassadors, then up, out and to coffee. Purchased litre of orange juice, email, return to room, where reading Hellenistic history, Sophocles & Antiphon whilst trying to organize my bibliography. Dull and stupid, partook of tea & more Henry James, then tired at last, to bed.
12.03.01
12 March 2001, around 15.00.
After a night of nausea, day dawned bright and clear, no frost, but chill preceding spring. Spent much of the day in bed, feeling not well enough for anything, though did stumble through more of The Ambassadors. To sleep early, with thanks.
13.03.01
13 March 2001, around 14.58.
Dark smoke-blue sky and evidence of rain, to which was added the sound of car alarm. Naturally. Organizing bibliography, &c., but in no humor for nearly anything.
14.03.01
14 March 2001, around 14.57.
Awoke to sunshine and roseate light brushing across the plaster walls. In a good humor, surprisingly, and spent much of the morning in the Bod. reading about Cicero, which was curiously enough entertaining. Much caffeine required thereafter, though. Finished The Ambassadors, and greatly pleased thereat; so spent the rest of the day in useful reading […]
15.03.01
15 March 2001, around 14.56.
To see ‘The Genius of Rome: 1592–1623;’ or, in other words, to see paintings by Caravaggio and … some other guys. Then wandered around the city feeling young and disillusioned, everyone and everything seeming uglier and stupider and slower than they should be. Two elderly ladies on the bus into town and St John the […]
16.03.01
16 March 2001, around 14.54.
Up to a mist & general laziness, very nice. Spending too much time in writing letters and making notes, which does little use. Have yet to complete summary to my satisfaction and so idle for inspiration.
17.03.01
17 March 2001, around 14.53.
Spent the day in search of books on modern Greece, which, strangely enough, are more difficult to find than books on ancient Greece. I find it somewhat strange that books on Greece tend to be shelved with ‘Western Europe’ while the ‘Balkans’ and the former Yugoslavia are under ‘Eastern Europe.’ Also purchased a cheap copy […]
18.03.01
18 March 2001, around 14.52.
More laundry and packing and reading of A Concise History of Greece. Tidying things up in general, as a means of distracting myself from Roman history and the minutiae of Greek grammar. Also looking wistfully at the three library books I must return tomorrow; I’ve had them for six weeks, but have scarce made a […]
17.04.01
17 April 2001, around 18.32.
Idled in coffee-shops & the library, and read and read and read. Such pleasure. Day started clear, but now overcast. Perfect.
18.04.01
18 April 2001, around 18.32.
Wandered around town, easing into habits. Babbitt-dom is still distant, one hopes. Vague unease, unsettled, unsure, balancing only barely. As usual. Spent too much money on books. Again.
24.04.01
24 April 2001, around 18.30.
Overslept and the morning passed while my brain was still leaden; an hour at the Bod., then coffee, the Ashmolean, lecture & lunch. In a frenzy to finish my essay for tomorrow & attend a lecture on Roman religion this evening.
29.04.01
29 April 2001, around 18.30.
Broken blue sky and translucent clouds after a night of rain. A typical Sunday, doing laundry, reading, preparing for another week. Churchbells call to all good Christians; the response, if any, is hidden from my window.
1.05.01
1 May 2001, around 18.39.
Tuesday. A heavy day, with mind weighted, wandering through the hours without leisure and without interest. Reading, too, for my essay, attending lecture, and a seminar (on the 18th century: curious how I had never viewed the 1700s as being ‘wedged’ between the monoliths of early modern and late modern history, but have always thought […]
2.05.01
2 May 2001, around 18.46.
Up early, and in good humor, scampering too and fro with mind at ease; taking great care not to overburden the old brain, which might crumble without warning. ‘…and though the merriment was rather boisterous, still it came from the heart and not from the lips: and this is the right sort of merriment, after […]
15.05.01
15 May 2001, around 18.43.
The morning in the Bod, nodding over libertas (& eleuthería), then to the Ashmolean for a few articles. Lecture as usual. Too sunny for comfort; in a malaise, if you like. Still, the afternoon listening to Bach & Beethoven & Mahler, a pleasant change, and pondering that most ideal of monarchs, Nero.
17.05.01
17 May 2001, around 18.41.
One of those very strange mornings, indecisive rain and sunshine, which last shone in (when it shone at all) an eerie perfect white upon the shadowed wall. Spent the early morning reading Seneca’s De Clementia and scrupulously avoiding any thought of Cicero.
18.05.01
18 May 2001, around 18.41.
After the ever-entertaining lecture on the city of Rome – the lecturer condescending to swear at the slide projector, which had a disposition to be willful — went to the Ashmolean. God’s gallery was shut for construction and conservation work, the red walls and the tops of paintings barely visible over a temporary divider; so, […]
02.06.01
2 June 2001, around 8.14.
Sunrise of broken light, white through the varying gray clouds. Nothing unusual, watching the rain fall occasionally, listening to Monteverdi, browsing through the Historia Augusta. A useful day, but not out of the ordinary, which, at times, is nice.
1.11.01 – Thursday
1 November 2001, around 15.53.
Much of the day spent in reading – Agora excavations and Dreiser’s The ‘Genius’. Waited late into the night in the language center for befuddled first-year Latin students to seek help; apparently, on Thursday nights, beginning Latinists have no difficulties with the lingua. I was left, then, to amuse myself as best I could, which […]
18.11.01 – Sunday
18 November 2001, around 15.56.
Lulled, gently, into the certitude of reading. Carefully writing out ideas and quotations on 3×5 cards, printing neatly, citing assiduously. Met J. at the Haymarket, chattering away about the month of October (where did it go? what happened? what did you do?) and the inchoate, incomprehensible fear of application (both to one’s studies and to […]
29.11.01 – Thursday
29 November 2001, around 16.03.
The library. Dusty concrete steps to metal stacks and weak green-blue light. Reciprocity – sincerity – altruism. Walking. Cafés. Leading. Following. Chasing. Darkness. How the history crowds around one, pressing in on all sides, heading towards some incontrovertible truth.
2.02.02 – Saturday
2 February 2002, around 7.40.
Read Zelda Fitzgerald’s novel; one gets the sense of scene and character, but the plot does not hang together particularly well and the flourishes can be heavy-handed. Immensely clever, but lacking something, some artistry, some polish, some ineffable thing, which might have made it very good indeed. Poor kid. Listening to Haydn string quartets as. […]
11.02.02 – Monday
11 February 2002, around 7.53.
Fevered. Sit in bed and scribble and sip water and stare out at the falling snow. Sibilance. A certain slowness of wit.
09.03.02 – Saturday
9 March 2002, around 21.19.
10 a.m. – overcast – damp concrete and asphalt – buildings and cars reduced to slick darkness. The taste of old coffee settles, permanent, in my mouth, ashen, dull. I woke up late and my only desire was to read about history – Chinese history, architectural history: history. Anyway. Then, after noon. Appeareth the sun, […]
Wednesday
13 November 2002, around 16.24.
Hellenistic figure of a mime Louvre (from Rostovtzeff, SEHHW) Seminar (1) Of John the Baptist: ‘he was as clean as a baby.’ ‘Stupidity is also a blemish.’ Rapid, fluid interchange: ‘ ‘No, not boring…’ ‘You have too good manners to say that.’ ‘Or indeed to feel it, in such a case as this.’ ’ The […]
The thing is
25 November 2002, around 16.39.
That it seems nothing is happening. I spend each and every day following the same routine, the dull rhythm of the week waxing and waning, more timely than the moon. Waking up at 5:30 in the morning, the darkness still swirling like the fog, I stumble, tumble down the stairs, make dark coffee and a […]
Simplicity
13 January 2003, around 9.50.
It was very simple once; just a chronicle, a chronological exuberance bogged down in the details. E.g.: 13.01.2003 — Monday — Up late, then to the Bodleian, Gorgias, Blackwell’s (Sylvie & Bruno, £9.99 — cash), coffee, groceries, room, read… &c. But that is not quite right, is it? For who really wants to make of […]
Impossible Epistles
24 February 2003, around 7.59.
The letters arrived two weeks apart, sent by two different people; each requires a response, and yet I cannot think how to reply to them. The first letter was a love story; a year ago she’d met a young man, parted as friends, wrote to each other, talked on the telephone, fell in love at […]
My prophetic soul
4 March 2003, around 20.14.
…we defy augury: there’s a special providence in the fall of a sparrow. If it be now, ’tis not to come; if it be not to come, it will be now; if it be not now, yet it will come: the readiness is all: since no man has aught of what he leaves, what is’t […]
somnium alienae
27 March 2003, around 7.41.
It was a strange dream. Of course, it was a strange sleep as well—dozing in the middle of the afternoon over Tristram Shandy and half-a-cup of tepid coffee, only to wake to the first signs of dawn at five in the morning. It was, I say, a strange dream. A restaurant in some unknown country, […]
a Record of Consumption
10 April 2003, around 21.18.
Including: Sterne; Novalis; Keats; too many Brontës; Chopin; R.L. Stevenson; Chekhov; Modigliani; Kafka; etc. Among other things: Vico, The New Science; A.A. Cooper (Earl of Shaftesbury), Characteristics of Men, Manners, Opinions, Times; Pepys Diary: 1665 (ed. Lantham et al., vol. 6); Dos Passos, U.S.A.; dental floss; shampoo; oat cakes; muesli; rice crackers. Also: tea (whole […]
logorrhea
9 August 2003, around 8.10.
The Most Illustrious Purpled Person will choose to hear the rogue’s confession of his crime. —Don Tarquinio, chapter xvii It is a hot, and it is summer, and there is soymilk and milk made of almonds, and there is also water purchased in blue plastic containers, and I too sometimes think there should be ‘Society […]
not at home
27 August 2007, around 0.30.
At home in the evening, planning escapades. The books read and unread gathering coffee stains and toast crumbs. The at one time unimaginable, commonplace. Things moving slowly. The sense of progress, though: gears turning, ticking well-oiled shiny. Intangible, unavoidable, inescapable. Backed into imagined corners that flatten and fade and open onto unexpected vantages. Yet continuance […]
27.12.2007
27 December 2007, around 18.35.
Up, coffee, tofu, e-mail, cook lunch, read book about world with no people, bicycle to work in the rain, make rude gesture at driver who runs stop sign at cross street, data entry, knit, drink hot chocolate, data entry, eat lunch, read book about emotionally confused people, shuffle papers, knit, shuffle papers, data entry, bicycle […]
elision
2 December 2010, around 8.42.
Watch the sunrise. Up and coffee, mending the lining of a jacket,1, attend sessions at conference, re-pack bags,2 knit on the fuzzy short-sleeve pullover, go out to coffee and read, finally finish all the tagging & categorizing on this very site that I have put off for two years already.3The fabric is almost rotten, and […]
loose ends
11 July 2014, around 16.10.
Out and about. It’s been warm and that brings with it vexation. I’ve been filling out paperwork for other people and then carrying it hither and thither because it can’t be emailed, but only faxed; fax machines and I have a long-standing disagreement, so walking it is.1 I could use the exercise, anyway. I sometimes […]