Past updates
It's been a rough week, folks, so today's newsletter is another old trick I remember from my Livejournal days: the current round-up.
Currently reading or just finished:
Child of the Sun, an obscure novel from the year of my birth about the short-lived Roman emperor who became known after his assassination as Elagabalus, after Elah-gabal, the Syrian sun god for whom he was the hereditary high priest. I read this gem of mediocrity for the sole reason that I discovered it in my mother's possession when I was a kid and peeked into it, certain that she would not want me to read it. It is definitely not as spicy as I remember it, and rather dull considering its subject. Elagabalus was notoriously decadent in his tastes, fanatical in his religious devotion, and effeminate in his ways, perhaps even what we would now understand as transgender.
Fire from Heaven, the first of Mary Renault's novels of Alexander the Great. I've never read Renault till now, and I'm sorry I waited so long. She is an exquisite stylist, with a spareness to her writing that reminds me of Le Guin, and a real feel for the landscapes and cultures of the ancient Greek world, especially for the differences in mores between their cultures and ours.
Passions of the Soul by Rowan Williams, the former Archbishop of Canterbury, a set of brief lectures on the early Christian notion of the passions in spiritual formation. Williams is certainly a fine writer, and I must look into his poetry someday.
Currently listening to:
Hozier, of course
the wind quintets of Franz Danzi, which always seem to calm my nerves when they are frayed
Apollo's Fire, a splendid Baroque ensemble with period instruments, and in particular their new recording of the Mystery Sonatas or Rosary Sonatas by the gloriously named Heinrich Ignaz Franz von Biber, inspired by the mysteries of the Rosary. The violin soloist is a veritable prodigy, a young man and already a virtuoso of his instrument.
Currently watching... nothing, really, except for short videos of Hozier or cockatiel antics on Instagram. Bits of things on YouTube, but no movies or television series.
The Sunny report:
It's been quite warm for much of the past week, with temperatures into the seventies (F). So when I noticed Sunny splashing a bit at his water dish, I got out the spray bottle and gave him a good spritzing. This is typically the way cockatiels like to bathe (conures will splash under running water, given a chance, and many tiels do enjoy a shower), and I think he enjoyed himself. He followed it up with a thorough floof and preen and then a nap.
And that's all for now, except to wish you a happy feast of Saint Patrick and birthday of one tall Irishman named Andrew Hozier-Byrne. Love to all.
Rembrandt's wife is Merri-Todd Webster