Drunken Notes about Books

Sometimes I read things.  A lot of times I'm drunk.  Sometimes I read things while I'm drunk. 

[drunkennotesaboutbooks]

In regards to building in the Classical style

"Fidelity to the canon was what mattered; repetition was the norm." Was this a 'why reinvent the wheel moment?'

[drunkennotesaboutbooks]

"What is a beautiful building?" Yes, what IS beautiful? "How can anyone claim to know what is attractive?" Yes, WHO claims this? We do!

[drunkennotesaboutbooks]

"It means conceding that we are inconveniently vulnerable..." Is being vulnerable ever convenient?

[drunkennotesaboutbooks]

"We might, and quite aside from all other requirements, need to be a little sad before buildings can properly touch us." My response: eh

[drunkennotesaboutbooks]

"Architecture may well possess moral messages; it simply has no power to enforce them." Substitute architecture with 'tradition'

[drunkennotesaboutbooks]

A practice in self preservation...?

"... we may find ourselves arguing that, ultimately, it doesn't much matter what buildings look like, what is on the ceiling or how the wall is treated - professions of detachment that stem not so much from an insensitivity to beauty as from a desire to deflect the sadness we would face if we left ourselves open to all of beauty's many absences."

[drunkennotesaboutbooks]

Ok, I love this. As a person who has taken a multitude of art history classes and never really understood or appreciated still-life works of art: "... draw attention to the intricacy and beauty of everyday things." I mean I know this to be true, but it's such a simple idea. A still-life of eggs and lemons can be such a beautiful thing.

[drunkennotesaboutbooks]

Yessssssss

"Over the years, its owners have returned from periods away and, on looking around them, remembered who they were." We know ourselves based on the spaces we create.

[drunkennotesaboutbooks]

I'm digging the active verbs used to describe a house: grown, party to, watched, observed, surprised, experienced, provided. Homes are spaces we do things in. We don't often think of them as active beings, both physically or socially.

[drunkennotesaboutbooks]

I was compelled to underline the words "buttery" and "grainy" in the first paragraph. He's describing the color of the interior walls and the feel of the exterior brick. Buttery... Sounds yummy

[drunkennotesaboutbooks]

Architecture has been an underlying theme in my academic career. I wrote my thesis on architecture at a Maya site, from an archaeologist's perspective. Currently I'm studying building preservation and restoration, from a tradesperson's perspective. This book (I'm only 57 pages in) seems to connect the 2 fields, and my way of thinking, beautifully.

[drunkennotesaboutbooks]

I find myself consuming an increasingly amount of bourbon ever since the election, so I've decided to finally (drunkenly) read The Architecture of Happiness by Alain de Botton

[drunkennotesaboutbooks]

hamilton: a summary

burr: i am the only sane person here

hamilton: i am the only sane person here

jefferson: i am the only sane person here

washington: *is the only sane person there*

[wordsnquotes]

If you asked me now who I am, the only answer I could give with any certainty would be my name. For the rest: my loves, my hates, down even to my deepest desires, I can no longer say whether these emotions are my own, or stolen from those I once so desperately wished to be.

Evelyn Waugh, Brideshead Revisited (via wordsnquotes)

[drunkennotesaboutbooks]

Washington: I love all my officers equally... There's Alexander Hamilton, John Laurens, Marquis de Lafeyette, and (looks at smudged writing on hand) Air Bud

[drunkennotesaboutbooks]

Are you delighted delighted? Or confused delighted?

"...delight lies somewhere between boredom and confusion." I am delighted, but more on the confused side of delighted.

[drunkennotesaboutbooks]

Don't get creative...get simple! It's easier!

Order and standardization allows for interchangeability... Simmer down Henry Ford