The absence of Annie Dillard sentences in this edition comes from the fact I was out of town and did not have access to my copies of her books. Most of you have probably run into the "give it away" sentence at this point in remembrances of her (a good line, but not even my favorite from her). Dillard's work taught me so much about appreciating sentences and the work of crafting them. I hope you go read some of her work in the coming days.
But those felt like accidents, in a life next door to mine.
"Annie Dillard and the Writing Life", Alexander Chee for The Morning News
Runner-up:
From the things Annie circled in my drafts, it was clear one answer to my problem really was, in a sense, Maine.
Michael, I have great affection for you and you live a very rich and interesting life, but you're a bag man not an attorney.
Michael Clayton, screenplay by Tony Gilroy
My mom finished radiation treatment this week but was still feeling pretty low so re-watching this movie had to suffice for "celebrating."
Sadly, the mere fact that something is annoying doesn’t mean it can be dismissed.
"13 theses on agentic AI and regulation", Dan Davies for his newsletter Back of Mind
A sentence I unfortunately have to put on a big piece of paper at my desk so that I can continue to participate in the broader discourses of technology and society.
So far, the fly is not very good at Doom, he concedes.
"Is There Anything a Fruit Fly Brain Can’t Do?", Michael Levenson for The New York Times
In 1869, while doing experiments searching for the location of the soul, German physiologist Friedrich Goltz demonstrated that a frog that has had its brain removed will remain in slowly heated water, but an intact frog attempted to escape the water when it reached 25 °C.
Wikipedia entry for boiling frog
Submitted by Kira.
This motivates the question we have just posed: Can the waterwheel squeak?
The Alibi of Capital, Timothy Mitchell
In 2014, the online market for people who were (somehow!) both attractive and depressed had not yet reached saturation.
"Why Cat Frazier matters", Brian Feldman for Oakland Review of Books
Cat Frazier and Annie Dillard passing in short succession may not seem resonant when merely judging their works on aesthetics, but I think that both were artists who grasped craft, poetics, and the necessity of doing the work.
I tucked nature into a weeklong canoe trip in early August.
"How A Creative Mind Lives in Nature", Dan Sinykin for The Nation
One of the aims of democratic society is to prevent you from needing to know the proclivities of particular individuals in the Bay Area.
"Is METR A Meaningful Check On Anthropic?", SE Gyges in their newsletter Very Sane AI Newsletter
Submitted by Isaac.
Designs were either spiritually beige or psychotically trendmaxxed.
"Are Clothes Actually Worse Now? An Investigation", Madeline Hirsch for InStyle
I was built for the long haul; my Amazonian frame bulges with slow-twitch muscles and petty grudges.
"I Don't Know Why", Laura Lippman for the newsletter Oldster
Submitted by Peter.
You just read issue #195 of Perfect Sentences. You can also browse the full archives of this newsletter.
