Paulo Seabra

Feliz ou infelizmente, acontece-me muitas vezes deixar de gostar de qualquer coisa que em tempos adorei. Filmes, séries, músicas, e neste caso, livros. No meu secundário fizemos uma visita de estudo a Évora a propósito deste livro de Vergílio Ferreira, uma visita que eu adorei ainda que não por motivos minimamente académicos, até porque ainda não tinha lido uma única página disto. Mais tarde, no primeiro ano de universidade decidi comprar e ler Aparição, e fi-lo quase que viciado, abrindo o livro só para ler umas dez ou quinze páginas mas acabando por perder noção do tempo e das páginas. Numa palavra, adorei, e mais tarde quando fui gradualmente desfazendo a minha coleção de livros, este foi um daqueles que sobreviveu quase todas as eliminatórias. Eventualmente foi-se, até que estes dias fiquei com vontade de reler e até de comprar uma cópia nova para a tratar com um certo respeito. Mas ainda bem que não o fiz, porque tendo agora acabado de reler, fico em parte desapontado, e noutra p...

The great philosopher of our time, and maybe of all time too, Norman Gene Macdonald, was fond of having his disciple ask comedians of all stripes where they get their ideas from. It ain't much of a question because nobody knows exactly how to answer it, or if they know they might not be so inclined to tell for many a-reason, a neat one of them being that a thing is often ruined by finding out where it came from. Ibn Taymiyyah considers how creatures who travel through the passage of urine twice should, by virtue of exactly that, be denied any form of pride and arrogance. But that's another story... For now I feel I might as well wallow in pride and arrogance for a lil' while, because the reason for this meandering piece is that I recently took a class I thought might be cool if only the teacher played it in a way that allowed us crazy kids to show off our work and exchange ideas. I often thought, and deliberately told people as some kind of proof, that if the teacher fumble...

While back I somewhat impulsively decided to watch Dominion. I say it was impulsively because I did it during a pretty boring online class during which I literally had nothing else to do, so I figured I'd seize the moment. But I also say it was somewhat impulsively because I had a vegan youtuber tell me to watch it, and that if I were to do so and write something about it he would be glad to read it. He ain't read it, or at least he ain't responded to it, but it don't matter because I still feel it was worth it to have written what I wrote. Either way, recently I decided to impulsively watch Earthlings, and while I didn't write any notes during, and while I'm not too sure what to write now, I figured I'd write something. At the very least it makes for some symmetry, with the two essays being posted side by side, though written quite a ways apart. So here I go, improvising, because of one particular image that won't so easily leave my mind. Last time a...

I think I can safely say I'm not a sociopath. That may be a funny way to start an essay, and an even funnier way to start a date, but I feel it is worth mentioning here. I think I'm a little strange as far as empathy goes, not because I don't feel it but because I don't feel it all that immediately. It's as if there's a delayed reaction, sometimes lasting months or years. For instance, I remember once when I was in school, I must have been thirteen or so, I saw this sorta nerdy girl running along the hallway, she tripped, fell down, and all the contents of her backpack went flying over her head. And everyone laughed... I didn't, in all honesty, I never found that kind of thing to be all that funny, though I do have a strange sense of humor nonetheless. So no, I didn't laugh, but I also didn't much care for it, that is until many years later when I was writing something down and this girl's fall came to me out of nowhere, and only then did I feel...