Ex Libris Kirkland

Ex Libris Kirkland is my entirely self-centered way to keep track of what I read, what I enjoy, and what I want to remember.


📖 Recent Quotes 📖

  • [A lot of rays of light coming from toes and toenails in this book.]

    some, like the beauty of a day in the rainy season,
    wearing garments brilliant with the colors of the rainbow;
    some had feet, with the sprout-like rays
    from their white toe-nails shining forth,

    an excerpt from Princess Kadambari, Vol 1, written by Bana Bāṇabhaṭṭa in 650

  • The multitude of pleasures a kingdom brings
    is a perpetual nightmare, a sleep
    from which there's no waking when night ends.
    So I must tell you about it at some length.
    To be rich from birth, to be very young,
    to have matchless beauty and more than human might
    this is indeed a series of disasters.
    Any one of these is the home of all bad behavior.
    How much more their conjunction!

    an excerpt from Princess Kadambari, Vol 1, written by Bana Bāṇabhaṭṭa in 650

  • [Before this there was several pages describing the king sporting with his harem, in serious but poetic detail:]

    What more need be said? Whatever was really pleasing,
    just to his taste, and not counter
    to his present and future interest,
    with those things he occupied himself,
    not that he became obsessed with them—
    it was because hed completed his other duties
    in respect of the world, not through any addiction.
    For a king who has made his subjects rejoice
    and completed all his duties in respect of his kingdom,
    the playful enjoyment of the objects of the senses is an ornament,
    though in the case of someone else
    it would be somewhat disgraceful.

    an excerpt from Princess Kadambari, Vol 1, written by Bana Bāṇabhaṭṭa in 650

📓 Recent Notes 📓

  • Anthology of four short stories, grouped in a frame narrative; each with its own mock-detective 'did they even really commit a crime' reveals. Like four little Manalives!

    an note about Four Faultless Felons, written by G. K. Chesterton in 1930

  • Today we'd call this GK's "autobiographical faith journey."

    an note about Orthodoxy, written by G. K. Chesterton in 1908

  • The usual Chestertonian arguments that no, scientists do not really know everything, and yes we should restrain them from making big societal changes. Especially when it comes to messing with human life.

    an note about Eugenics and Other Evils, written by G. K. Chesterton in 1922

Looking for more recent books? Check out the Personal Timeline.



Ex Libris Kirkland is a super-self-absorbed reading journal made by Matt Kirkland. Copyright © 2001 - .
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