I am still poking my way along through Auden’s Dyer’s Hand and it is so glorious that over the weekend I decided to buy my own copy. It should arrive on Thursday.
In a wonderful essay called “Making, Knowing and Judging” there were many bits that caught my fancy but two especially that I thought I’d share.
First, Auden cites Edward Lear but an editor’s note says it is really Samuel Butler. Auden paraphrases:
the true test of imagination is the ability to name a cat
Ha! So true! I am rather pleased with the names Waldo and Dickens for my current cats. They fill them well. My previous cat, Kamir (as in “come here” run together) was also well named by Bookman. When I was three we found a stray 10-week old or so kitten in our garage. She was all black, not a speck of white on her. My mom tried calling her Midnight and all other kinds of black cat names but I refused to call her anything but “Cat-Cat.” The name stuck and she carried it with pried until she died 20 years later. T.S. Eliot was quite good at naming cats. The evidence is in Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats, the series of poems that the very well known musical was based on.
Then there is this:
Fashion and snobbery are also valuable as a defense against literary indigestion. Regardless of their quality, it is always better to read a few books carefully than skim through many, and, short of a personal taste which cannot be formed overnight, snobbery is as good a principle of limitation as any other.
Yes, I am a snob, but according to Auden, it helps keep me from literary indigestion. If one should get literary indigestion, is there the literary equivalent to Alka-Seltzer? I’d like to know so I can stash a copy in my medicine cabinet just in case.
Apologies for the short post. Bookman is going to visit his parents in Las Vegas for a couple days so we are getting him ready to go. I have to get up at 4.30 in the morning to take him to the airport. Then I get to come home and get ready for work. So if I don’t post tomorrow or if I do and it is entirely incoherent, you will know I am either sleeping or struggling valiantly to read a bit before I crash into to bed.
Hi, maybe the antidote to literary indigestion is writing a bad review – like throwing up the bad stuff!!
Oh boy, I hate those early morning airport trips. Do hope Bookman has a lovely easy journey, though. I think the literary equivalent of alka-seltzer is Edith Wharton! Well, she works for me. Delighted you are enjoying the Auden, though; kind of thought you might!
Kathleen, oh maybe you’re right, a sort of “better out than in” approach
Litlove, when I pick him up in a few days I’ll have to stay up really late. My poor internal clock is going to get all goofed up. Edith Wharton just might do the trick! I have a mass market paperback of House of Mirth. I’ll put it in the cabinet next to the aspirin. I didn’t expect to like Auden’s essays so much since he is not a favorite poet of mine but his prose is so very different than his poetry.
A good dose of Wilkie Collins or Charles Dickens, taken at regular intervals, usually works like the literary equivalent of plop-plop-fizz-fizz for me. I see that a famous singer (whose name I can’t remember) just had a baby and named him after – of all things – my cat Blue! Imagine that! He is really quite honored, and is in fact getting very full of himself – carrying his tail ever so high. His sister, Tallulah (aka Lulu) is getting quite miffed. I need to get the Auden book.
Love this post. I actually had a hermit crab named Kamir (for the same reason). Spelled the same too. Funny. My beloved kitty Tiger Lily was perfectly named, as was Cleo (Cleocatra or Cleopetra, alternately). Thomas completely inhabits his name, though it might seem pedestrian. I’ve never been altogether sure of Finn’s name for him, but I do call him Finnegan and that seems to fit. I kind of wanted to name him Wilkie. I love naming cats.
There really is an art to naming cats–it is hard to know which will be just right for the personality. I have two–Dulce and Chispa–Dulce really is a sweet cat, and Chispa is very much like a spark–now I wonder if the names simply fit or if the cats have adopted behavior to fit the names? Had I known I would have chosen something more peaceful and laid back for Chispa since she is such a naughty girl. Her nickname is Nochispa.
Ha, Stefanie, I’d say TS Eliot was VERY good at naming cats (almost as good as you!) Love those poems … as for literary indigestion, I’m still trying to digest that one! But, I do agree about reading carefully. I feel, particularly as a blogger, a pressure almost to whip through books and onto the next one but that’s not how I like to read. I like to savour and digest … hear the words, think about how they’re connecting with what I’ve just read. Of course, it could be that everyone does this but that my brain does it more slowly! Whatever, slow careful reading tends to be my style so I think I’d like Auden!
Grad, I will have to put a Collins and a Dickens next to the aspirin too then. My little cabinet is going to fall of the bathroom wall if I am not careful! I believe the singer is Beyonce, and your cat Blue has every right to be proud of having a baby named after him. You’ll have to start sending out emails to pregnant celebrities on behalf of Tallulah so she can become famous too
Wherethereisjoy, seriously? You had a hermit crab named Kamir? That’s too funny! thomas does appear to completely inhabit his name. I like Finn/ Finnegan I’m sure it suits him and his fuzziness
Danielle, dogs are easy to name but cats, cats definitely take some thought. I love your cats’ names and Chispa’s “nickname” cracked me up
Whisperinggums, I love those poems too, much better than the musical! I know what you mean about feeling pressure to whip through books. I feel it too, and while I often wish I could read faster, I always enjoy slow and careful more.
I got my first (and only, since then we found out I was allergic) cat when I was four. I immediately insisted on naming her Rosedust, which made all the grownups looks at me a bit strangely, but they went with it.
The only TS Eliot I’ve read it The Wasteland, but I’ll get around to his Cats stuff at some point. I have a feeling it’s a bit different.
MJ, Rosedust, I like it! And yup, Practical Cats is nothing like The Wasteland.