Present Joys

jason-sims:

Happy 89th birthday, Flannery.

“Anybody who has survived his childhood has enough information about life to last him the rest of his days.”

Tolle, lege: her biblography.

The campy-listening thing, I think, is false. I don’t think that there is any such thing, actually. This happens with age, that at some point you might have told yourself and others that you listened to the Backstreet Boys because it was funny. But in fact, you were enjoying it; it’s just a different kind of enjoyment for you. But I don’t think that ironic-distance appreciation is actually a different or lesser appreciation. I think most of that irony is an attempt to say, ‘These aren’t exactly my kind of people, and I don’t picture myself sounding like that, but I still like it.’ I don’t believe in ironic appreciation. I think if you like something, the core of it is you like it.