I remember / je me souviens
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For those limbic bursts of nostalgia, invented by Proust, miniaturized by Nicholson Baker, and freeze-dried by Joe Brainard in his I remember and by Georges Perec in his Je me souviens.

But there are no fractions, the world is an integer
Like us, and like us it can neither stand wholly apart nor disappear.
When one is young it seems like a very strange and safe place,
But now that I have changed it feels merely odd, cold
And full of interest.
          --John Ashbery, "A Wave"

Sometimes I sense that to put real confidence in my memory I have to get to the end of all rememberings. That seems to say that I forego remembering. And now that strikes me as an accurate description of what it is to have confidence in one's memory.
          --Stanley Cavell, The Claim of Reason


Saturday, February 01, 2003
I remember how shockingly bad marzipan is.

I remember first hearing about it on an episode of Lost in Space. Dr. Smith knows of a beautiful ageless alien princess, and somehow betrays the Robinsons into captivity while preparing to meet her. He might be releasing her from a planet where she is imprisoned. She turns out to be fat and middle aged, which sends him back to his friends in horror. Her explanation is that she's had nothing to do but eat marzipan for a thousand years.


posted by william 12:06 AM
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