{"id":32993,"date":"2011-01-06T09:26:38","date_gmt":"2011-01-06T09:26:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.3ammagazine.com\/3am\/?p=32993"},"modified":"2011-01-06T09:26:38","modified_gmt":"2011-01-06T09:26:38","slug":"3am-top-5-against-resolutions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.3ammagazine.com\/3am\/3am-top-5-against-resolutions\/","title":{"rendered":"3:AM<\/em> Top 5: Against resolutions"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"arebours\"<\/div>\n

It may well be the month for self-improvement<\/a>, and though Virginia Woolf’s New Year resolutions<\/a> are quite charming, we prefer to take a leaf out of Mark Twain<\/strong>‘s book (no, not that one<\/a>): “Total abstinence is so excellent a thing that it cannot be carried to too great an extent. In my passion for it I even carry it so far as to totally abstain from total abstinence itself.”<\/em> So, here are 3:AM<\/em>‘s Top 5 anti- self-improvement books:<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\"everydaydrinking\"<\/div>\n

1)<\/strong> Kingsley Amis’ Everyday Drinking<\/a><\/em>
\n“If asked what you think [about the wine], say breezily, ‘Jolly good,’ as though you always say that whatever it’s like. This may suggest that your mind’s on higher things than wine, like gin or sex.”<\/em><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\"smokingdiaires\"<\/div>\n

2)<\/strong> Simon Gray’s The Smoking Diaries<\/a><\/em>
\n“The deep, dark swirling pleasures of the smoke being sucked in to fresh, pink, welcoming lungs, it took me just three or four cigarettes to acquire the habit.”<\/em><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\"againstnature\"<\/div>\n

3)<\/strong> J.-K. Huysmans’ Against Nature<\/a><\/em>
\n“Under the lowering sky, in the dull air, the walls of the houses drip black sweat and the cellar-openings stink; loathing of life is strong within the soul and the spleen is a torment to the flesh; the seeds of filthiness that every man has in his heart begin to bud; cravings for foul pleasures trouble the austerest and in the brain of respectable folks criminal desires spring up.”<\/em><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\"onwineandhashish\"<\/div>\n

4)<\/strong> Charles Baudelaire’s Artificial Paradises<\/a><\/em>
\n“You are sitting and smoking; you believe that you are sitting in your pipe, and that your pipe is smoking you; you are exhaling yourself in bluish clouds. You feel just fine in this position, and only one thing gives you worry or concern: how will you ever be able to get out of your pipe?”<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\"keithrichardslife08-10\"<\/div>\n

5)<\/strong> Keith Richards’ Life<\/a><\/em>
\n“I realised, I’m running on fuel and everybody else isn’t. They’re trying to keep up with me and I’m just burning. I can keep going because I’m on pure cocaine. I’m running on high octane, and if I feel I’m pushing it a little bit, need to relax it, have a little bump of smack.”<\/em><\/p>\n

And two bonus reads:<\/p>\n

6)<\/strong> William Burroughs’ Naked Lunch<\/a><\/em>
\n“Our national drug is alcohol. We tend to regard the use of any other drug with special horror.”<\/em><\/p>\n

7)<\/strong> DBC Pierre’s Lights Out in Wonderland<\/a><\/em>
\n“With him as my wingman I’ll turn these last hours into a perfect miniature of the age I leave behind, nothing less than a last wanton plunge to oblivion.”<\/em><\/p>\n

[Image: <\/strong> Arthur Zaidenberg<\/a>‘s illustrations for \u00c3\u20ac Rebours<\/em> (1931)]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It may well be the month for self-improvement, and though Virginia Woolf’s New Year resolutions are quite charming, we prefer to take a leaf out of Mark Twain‘s book (no, not that one): “Total abstinence is so excellent a thing that it cannot be carried to too great an extent. In my passion for it […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":119,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-32993","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-buzzwords"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.3ammagazine.com\/3am\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32993","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.3ammagazine.com\/3am\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.3ammagazine.com\/3am\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.3ammagazine.com\/3am\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/119"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.3ammagazine.com\/3am\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=32993"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.3ammagazine.com\/3am\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32993\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.3ammagazine.com\/3am\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=32993"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.3ammagazine.com\/3am\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=32993"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.3ammagazine.com\/3am\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=32993"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}