Category: Archived DMs

Congrats, ye mighty ‘marching band! It’s the final week and this week’s page count target is pretty straightforward — we’re racing toward the back cover.
When you’ve finished and posted your closing comment, be sure to drop me a note at “poetry at cecilvortex dot com” with your shipping address to stake your claim on a custom magnet (not actually guaranteed but likely) to pull loose paper toward fridge doors.
Big thanks to you all for taking this ride. I’ll confess that I get a huge kick out these ‘marches, and I hope youse do too. See ya round the next bend in the trail….
-Cecil

…in which I forgo all attempts at pith to focus instead on (1) timely posting! and (2) correct categorizing! I’m still reading, enjoying, trailing behind. Hope to meet you at the finish line, perhaps while you’re all packing up your cars and/or napping under trees…..
Next Wednesday: Let’s catch up for at the end of Book Twelve, Chapter 8, along with the “indisputable one!”
(which is to say: please use this thread for comments on pages 0-715; aim to finish reading that section and shout out here by end o’ day Tuesday)

Welcome to Week 12 and my first best opportunity to make good on last week’s pledge to be late- nae-more. Let me also declare general amnesty to anyone who didn’t have a chance to comment last week. There was hardly enough time to get the keyboard, and yet somehow, astonishingly, 17 of you did. I think, by the way, this is a Deathmarch record — I can’t recall this many marchers making it this close to the end afore. Speaking of which…..
Next Wednesday: Let’s meet up at the end of Book Twelve, Chapter 1 (just a little bit less than 100 pages from the finish line), where they’re being “called up one by one.”
(which is to say: please use this thread for comments on pages 0-662; aim to finish reading that section and shout out here by end o’ day Tuesday)

I had a great day today reading 60 pages, and I’m still 30 pages behind the last target! But I pledge this to ye, my deathmarching pals: You’ve all been wildly patient with me, even a certain Old Man. From here on out, particularly as we close in on the conclusion, I’ll put the good of the many above the few, and most especially the one, which means posting on Wednesday, whether I’m with the pack or miles behind.
As regards the text, I’m in the happy-reader camp — really enjoyed Dmitri’s inquisition, all the lovely spins and dips his mind does when his mouth is moving. And the boys section is off to a wonderful start. Kolya walking down the street, messing with everyone he passes, that was an extra pure joy.
Next Wednesday: Let’s meet up at the end of Book Eleven, Chapter 6, where he’s making “his way to Smerdyakov again.”
(which is to say: please use this thread for comments on pages 0-612; aim to finish reading that section and shout out here by, dareIsay, the end o’ day Tuesday)

4/30 Update: I’m extra special behind this week but will post tomorrow. For those saying, “what the what?”, between you and me, the next target is: Book XI, Chapter 6…..
And just like that, it’s Week 10! I’m still reading, having a great time with the book, but I can’t say I’ve caught up. In my world, Dmitri just had a glorious extended freakout involving angry Poles and blood and money and at least one moment of delirium, and then the roof caved in. I can see now what everyone’s been talking about in the comments. It does feel like FD spent the first 300 pages meticulously putting his boat together, kneeling by the river’s side, and now he’s gone and thrown into the rapids. That’s right, it’s a whiterafting gumball rally! Or something like that. Very glad to have it made to this exhilirating patch, and thanks to you all for pulling me along….
Next Wednesday: Let’s meet up at the end of Part IV, Book Ten, Chapter 7 — “make sure you come! Ici….”
(which is to say: please use this Week 4 thread for comments on pages 0-562; aim to finish reading that section and shout out here by end o’ day Tuesday)

Welcome to Week 9, in which I’m late again, the gap-doth-inflate again, I’m a need-to-be-reading-more ‘march mate, again. Bewitched, bothered, and bewildered, I’ve fallen behind! I’m in a great part of the book tho — still marveling at the fact that she’s an onion. Lovely story, that.
Just think of me as the voice from your not-so-distant past, cheerfully turning pages on the dusty path ye’ve already trod. Don’t wait for me though. Charge on! Charge on! And here’s hoping I have that extra productive weekend I need to get back in the thick of the pack…..
Next Wednesday: Let’s meet up at the end of Part III, Book Nine, Chapter 7, or “I’ll probably start raving.”
(which is to say: please use this Week 4 thread for comments on pages 0-499; aim to finish reading that section and shout out here by end o’ day Tuesday)

Welcome to Week 8, my very own week-of-DM-shame, as the days have slipped past and now I’m suddenly a week behind. I blame the Cannonball Run references from a few weeks back, which inspired me to go on a 750-mile trek throwing my DM schedule into mad array! But don’t wait for me. March on! March on! I’ll aim to catch up with ya before the next bend.
Next Wednesday: Let’s Gumball Rally our way to the end of Part III, Book Nine, Chapter 2, “after a long but, I believe, necessary explanation.”
(which is to say: please use this Week 4 thread for comments on pages 0-456; aim to finish reading that section and shout out here by end o’ day Tuesday)

Welcome to Week 7! From a sort of outrageous 70 or 80 marchers, we’re now down closer to a still impressive as hell ~30. Another fun and thoughtful batch of comments this past week. I was particularly gratefully to Cookie for catching this (as So-Called-Bill pointed out) impossibly timely line:
“We are assured that the world is becoming more and more united, is being formed into brotherly communion, by the shortening of distances, by the transmitting of thoughts through the air. Alas, do not believe in such a union of people.”
I’m not sure how I missed that one, though I have this theory that whenever there’s duels and murders and stinking corpses, I’m fully engaged, and then when things switch to religious philosophy and/or 20-page prose interpretations of poems about religious philosophy, I black out.
Fortunately, we’ve been ending of late on these lovely pivot points in the action that leave me looking forward to the trail just ahead. Here’s hoping that string continues!
Next Wednesday: Let’s zip on by the midpoint and catch up with Mitya at at the end of Part III, Book Eight, Chapter 4, where he appears to be running “like a madman.”
(which is to say: please use this Week 4 thread for comments on pages 0-395; aim to finish reading that section and shout out here by end o’ day Tuesday)

Welcome to Week 6, and let me just say: yikes. I’m talking to you, pages 246-264 in the Pevear and Volokhonsky translation. There are brains made to absorb an endless prose description of a religious poem about faith and free will (and aftermath chit-chat) like the one we experienced this past week. Some of those brains are among us, as evidenced by this week’s excellent comments section. But I’ll confess, I have that other kind of brain. To me it all sounded like the same three sentences over and over and over again. And I say: here’s to all the ‘marchers! Because I’m sure I would have been left by the wayside had it not be for the lure of the trail and the shame of constructing magnets for others whilst having no BKDM magnet to call my own.
Fortunately, Smerdyakov was waiting on the far side of this maddening section. Good old broth-making, scurrilous, creepy, super-dooper compelling Smerdyakov. Fyodor’s beard-behavioral analysis lay just beyond that. And the Brothers Karamazov Cannonball Run was on again….
Next Wednesday: Let’s meet up at the end of Part III, Book Seven, Chapter 2, “because it’s very opportune for us.”
(which is to say: please use this Week 4 thread for comments on pages 0-343; aim to finish reading that section and shout out here by end o’ day Tuesday)

Happy Week 5! I’m about 8 pages behind, but trucking along. Did I fall asleep today in a public place with the book on my lap? And did they almost take an embarrassing picture of me, but then I woke up just in time? Counsel has advised me to neither confirm nor deny.
This one has been feeling to me a little more like a “Cannonball Run” or a “Gumball Rally” than a “Deathmarch” for some reason. Not that it’s easy or even zany. Just something about the rhythm — the book is racing along. And then I get stopped by the cops and Sammy Davis Junior has to dress up like a monk. Something like that. It’s not a bad thing though — “The Brothers Karamazov Gumball Rally” has a pleasant ring to it.
I’ve been especially enjoying the conversations characters keep having with themselves while other people watch, letting their thoughts tumble out like grapefruits from a busted shopping bag: “I don’t want an ice cream cone. Oh, you can see I want an ice cream cone, can’t you? It’s written on my face! Yes! I do want an ice cream cone! But I won’t have one. Unless you give me one. Will you give me an ice cream cone? I’m such a lowly creature! And yet, an ice cream would be fantastic right about now!” he said.
I’m guessing this may in part be because people interrupted each other a lot less back in 19th century Russia. Also, they were mostly insane.
This coming week let’s go for a slightly more slenderized serving, to give those marchers-just-a-wee-bit-behind a chance to catch up, so we can march toward page 300 with a mighty trailwind at our backs.
Next Wednesday: I’ll see ya at the optimistic juncture at the end of Book V, where “never had his heart bathed in sweeter hopes…”
(which is to say: please use this Week 4 thread for comments on pages 0-282; aim to finish reading that section and shout out here by end o’ day Tuesday)