lost connectives (true copies) / sour grapes

horsemouth (as you know) is very fond of quoting people.

but he's not above improving the quote either through the use of ellipsis (...) to remove clauses, sentences, whole paragraphs that are off-topic or through the use of brackets  (to indicate a modifying thought or an object or an outcome).

horsemouth hopes you will forgive him. his excuse is that these are not reference documents (but tendentious arguments). take herling's criticism of brodsky and his over valuation of readers and reading as if it were a sufficient political program  - 'replacing the state with a library' -  would it not be better rendered as;

    'replacing the state (with a library)'

as his friend enza points out he does this sort of thing rather a lot. 

horsemouth has been reading lost connections  by johann hari (why you're depressed and how to find hope - powerscroft road book-box). johann did have a brilliant career (and now he has regained it). when he was young he won a young journalist competition (and shone brightly) but then he fell foul of the textual fidelity police, he was caught improving quotations from his interviews of the great and the good.  he was then sent for re-education to a derridean close-reading institution. 

his particular sin was the contraction (with or without ellipsis)... to reveal the argument being made better. 

but now he is back and attempting to cure us all of our loss of connection with our fellow humans and thus our depressions and anxieties. powerful friends cluster round on the cover to lend support - elton john and hillary clinton on the front cover, zoe ball, davina mccall, russell brand on the back (ok ok horsemouth is being a bit snobby here - there's also naomi klein and the guardian). he has left matt haig and dr. max pemberton off these lists because he doesn't know who they are. 

this is all sour grapes from horsemouth. mere jealousy. though of course hari's actual experiences of depression, anxiety and medication horsemouth is not envious of.  

today a wander about. maybe a bout of shopping. 

the paragraph where he talked about the songs he was going to play at max's gig (in support of his new book gorst)  has vanished into the ether (popped connection).

ok on with the day.