eight days later---the day last Saturday did not really lead anywhere, as I remember it. A kind of torpor---tired---but that usually happens on days where I have no major places to be. Cant remember anything else about it---oh yes, went for dinner to the diner on 17th and 3rd---a good place for me to be. Watched baseball game---I think Seattle against Toronto in the wild card series. They are both out of it noblw---but the diner---with its nice tuna fish, is a laid back place, and I can watch sports there, and not think about not ordering alcohol.
But enough of that---I actually wanted to talk about today. Restless---I have one tutoring session but it begins at 5, so there is a lot of time to kill. Financially I am tough on myself---refuse to let myself see a movie early in the afternoon---so how will I kill time? Probably will go to the Lincoln Center library and do some browsing there. Always return to Tony Tanner's amazing book, Prefaces to Shakespeare. He discusses every play--great inisights and yet very easy to follow. Last Elizabethan play that I read not written by Shakespeare, or at least not attributed to him, was The Spanish Tragedy, by Thomas Kyd. Interesting play, some strong echoes of later Shakespeare plays, but very convoluted plot---like so many plays by Shakespeare's contemporaries, it jumps from event to event, but never really gets inside it, nor does it take time for incisive character work. You can see how Shakespeare grabbed the form and pushed it inward---almost forced personal issues of the character to come out. Anyway, the next Elizabethan play I would like to read (or actually re-read) is Marlowe's Edward II. Ironically, though they have his other plays on the shelf, for whatever reason, that one is not there. So I wait.
On Sundays, I tutor an adult student who lives in Jackson Heights. I go out there and work with him at his apartment. A block from the 7 train, I find myself entering a world of stately apartment houses---set up completely different from those in the other boroughs. I wish I could describe the soft energy that I feel as I walk towards my student's house. I am transported, absorbed by the tranquility of the streets that i find myself on. I really love going out there---next time probably in two weeks.
Time to finish, and get back to the real world. Will report soon.
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