I'm reading Brothers Karamozov right now.....MANNN.
Of all the world renowned authors I've slept with, like laid next to hand in hand and fallen asleep with "slept with", allegorically, I've never loved any of them like Dostoevsky. He's one of my own. He says the things already present in my soul, but he says them in a way that your heart understands them intuitively, not in the way you would communicate them through words. Watch: "stood under the sky" = "over him the heavenly dome, full of quiet, shining stars, hung boundlessly." This is the magic of Dostoevsky.
Words are a damned nuisance, I can't seem to transcend them. But I'm a poet at heart. The way I figure, it's just something you're born with--you observe closer, you love deeper, you miss more acutely. It's kind of a curse.
And on top of this, I aspire to be a writer. So I know how essentially impossible it is to communicate that "something" in a way that represents accurately, while still capturing essence. But this is the writers job. This is what we must do. (Incidentally....Shakespeare and Dickens failed here....I would propose. WHERE IS THE ESSENCE RIGHT? Gah. Shakespeare is an affected fop. And reading Dickens is like trudging through dark, murky water in the hopes of finding...what was it again?)
Read Pushkin. Read Pushkin's musing about his old lover's feet. Thennnn tell me Shakespeare got humanity, in a way that's fresh and honest, not contrived.
"Ah, dearest feet, where have you vanished? What vernal flowers do you tread? You left no prints, no pressings tender, upon our mournful northern snow."
