D. A. Hosek

Just another writer

  • Dewey Decimal Project: 464.342 DIO Las Puertas Retorcidas

    The 460s are Spanish and Portuguese. I was hoping to find something in an intermediate reader since I have at least a decent reading knowledge of Spanish. I thought Las Puertas Retoricidas would be that book, but it turns out it’s a somewhat absurdist story at the service of teaching little lessons of vocabulary and grammar.…

  • Beautiful Sentences: Ernest Hemingway

    “It’s all nonsense. It’s only nonsense. I’m not afraid of the rain. I’m not afraid of the rain. Oh, oh, God, I wish I wasn’t.” She was crying. I comforted her and she stopped crying. But outside it kept on raining. Ernest Hemingway, A Farewell to Arms.

  • Dewey Decimal Project: 458.242 ADR Italian in 32 Lessons

    As I worked my way through the 400s, the inevitable could no longer be postponed: I’m going to read a language textbook (for most of a year, it turns out), “learning” Italian. I picked Italian in 32 Lessons primarily because it was a slender volume and I figured I could work through 32 lessons in a…

  • Beautiful Sentences: Elie Wiesel

    Why does the Torah begin with the second letter, beth, rather than the first, aleph? Because the latter was already in exile. Elie Wiesel, The Judges.

  • Trying to Say God—Saturday and it’s over

    The day started with “The future of Catholic publishing” which was tied up closely with the future of publishing in general. It was observed that the devotional and catechetical sides of the business (for the publishers associated with religious orders) are doing well, but the trade side of the business is diminishing.  Greg Wolfe’s observation is…

  • Trying to say God—Friday afternoon and evening

    After lunch, I heard Valerie Sayers talking about the genesis of her novel, The Powers, talking about the use of photographs, not only in the research for the book but in the final novel itself. When asked about her timeline for her books, she said that she spends more time on them now, but when she…

  • Beautiful Sentences: William Faulkner

    My Mother is a fish. William Faulkner, As I Lay Dying.

  • Trying to Say God—Friday morning

    The morning  egan with Randy Boyagoda’s talk, “Trying to say God without sounding like Marilynne Robinson.” Boyagoda’s thesis was that the first and primary purpose of literature i to increase charity and towards that end he did a dive into a novel by Mary McCarthy, The Group and a story by David Constantin, “The Loss.” This was…

  • Opening day of the Trying to Say God conference

    After a two hour trip on the South Shore Railroad (“The most uncomfortable seats on rails”™), I ended up at the South Bend Airport (“both taxis in South Bend are already here”™) and made my way to  otre Dame University for the “Trying to Say God” conference. This is a conference whose animating spirit is “revitalizing…