Tim Barrus: This is how I visualize the idea of obscurity. I do not know why. Papercuts: The New York Times I doubt that the moderator at Paper Cuts will allow this. They rarely let me in. They're not receptive to real reciprocity. They want one or two words. They love lists. Not ideas. I submit there anyway. So allow us to briefly explore the definition of and the dynamics related to the word: OBSCURE. Wouldn't that be more productive than simply listing the names of a couple of books printed in 1902. Or is real discussion frowned upon. I don't understand what the word obscure means. The New York Times and book publishing are driven by numbers and lists. It is a pretense to insist that any other attribute (such as the word literary) could possibly be relevant. I note that book publishing itself is becoming much more honest, truthful, unimpeachable, authentic, and precise about everything from numbers of books sold to the unvarnished, unexaggerated, unerring, and unaffected stories it tells as all who toil and sweat in this scrupulous business strive as best we can to maintain the veracious sheen-of-sham and hocus pocus so inherently attached like Superglue to our equivocated reputations for flimflam and fiddle-dee-dee. If certain books are obscure whose fault is it, and how can we change that. Blame... The publishers in their comfortable New York offices and Manolo Blahniks. The editors in their comfortable New York offices and Manolo Blahniks. Or the agents in their comfortable New York offices and Manolo Blahniks. Perhaps what we really need is a list of books that deserve to be obscure. Obviously, my books would be at the top of that distinguished computer print out. It is always enough to rattle off the names of a couple of books we read in 1925 on blogs that aren't really invested in any reciprocity between blog and reader. Why is it we never want to look underneath that literary skin too deeply. What makes a book obscure. I would suggest that the process begins with t...