I spent most of last week wishing I had an internet connection, because I had some frigging awesome Facebook update statuses planned. Now they're lost to the ether...
Actually, in our always-connected world, I think it's healthy to take some time off from social media, un-social media, anti-social media, and MySpace (I've been taking a break from that one since at least 2011. Seriously, I have no idea how to get into MySpace anymore, but I don't really care). Granted, that break is easier to manage when libraries are shut down and you're not too keen on the idea of bringing your laptop to the library parking lot and accessing the free WiFi. Also, the other people who usually loiter in said parking lot doing that scare the bejesus out of you (it's like all the pill-heads of Oconee County congregate in the parking lot...but I digress). But I have opinions on current events that must be shared!
First off: cops getting killed is always a tragedy, but it doesn't mean that the police union reps get to use that as an excuse to settle a personal beef with the mayor. I thought it was classless what the patrolmen did to de Blasio, turning their backs on him. Real good look for you guys, especially considering that you're not exactly living up to the "protect" part of "to protect and serve." Cops are like anyone else, there are good ones and there are bad ones. It just seems like the bad ones are hellbent on not being held accountable for it, and their feelings are hurt because the mayor of New York sided with the protestors. To equate peaceable demonstrations with the madman who gunned down two cops because he happened to say that's why he was doing it is pretty shitty.
Anyway, I spent a good chunk of last week working my way thru The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle by Haruki Murakami. I realize that, as Murakami writes in Japanese and has to be translated into English in order for me to read him (because I don't even know where to begin to learn Japanese), I probably miss something in the translation. But what I get in return is a very exciting, challenging, and beautiful novel. I have to think most of what Murakami does gets translated into the works, so if I did miss anything I still got to have a wonderful experience with the book. I highly recommend it, or really anything he's done (which can be iffy because I've only read four of his books, but based on those four I can recommend him highly).
I also drove to my "new favorite bookstore" in Greenville last week, though I didn't end up buying anything that day. I did go to another bookstore just a short drive back in the direction I'd come, and there I found a biography of Lester Bangs. Rock critics in general don't seem like the kind of guys whose lives are interesting enough to merit a full-scale biography, but Bangs was the exception to that rule. He paid the price for that, in a sense, but I've been a fan of his since receiving a copy of the posthumous collection Psychotic Reaction and Carburator Dung. One of the things Bangs stressed in his work was to not automatically worship someone just because they happened to be a talented singer or whatever; it's a lesson that we should all take to heart, really. The book (Let It Blurt, by Jim DeRogatis) was awesome.
Anyway, I have a cold now, so my New Year's plans include hopefully recovering in time to welcome in 2015 healthier than I am right at this moment. I might also want to look into getting WiFi at my house...or not. Like I said, taking breaks from this online crap is probably healthy, from time to time. Just so long as North Korea doesn't hack me, I'll be fine.
Monday, December 29, 2014
Sunday, December 21, 2014
Battle Beyond the Stars
How Star Wars Conquered the Universe is the book that conquered my attention span this past week (well really, the last three or four days), it's an insightful, illuminating, and just plain fun book about everyone's favorite space fantasy (well, those of us with good taste anyway), no matter how many times George Lucas has tried to screw it up. I kid, but really...the prequel trilogy is like a Litmus test for whether I really want to be friends with someone.
I think the sense of letdown that I and many of my ilk (i.e., long-term Star Wars fans) felt at the time of the first prequel (and which in no way was assuaged by the two follow-ups) is born in some ways of our own failure to see the original trilogy for what it was (a kid's movie). Anyone born between 1977 and 1983 who grew up with Luke, Leia, Han and Chewie, didn't know what to make of Anakin, Boring Obi-Wan, and Padme (really, "Padme?" What the hell, George...what the hell?), much less that freak Jar-Jar Binks. I remember when my friends and I left the theater way back in 1999, we tried to console ourselves that it was somehow better than we'd thought. It was cool, I guess, to see "that son of a bitch split in half" (as my cousin Brandon says some esteemed film critic behind him exclaiming when Darth Maul was sliced in two), but two and a half hours of Trade Federation and blockade talk does not a space epic make. I think it's why I responded far more favorably to the recent Star Trek reboot than I ever did to the original series of films: that one had action and whiz-bang special effects (and a pretty decent story, to boot).
And you know who directed that one? J.J. Abrams, who is behind the helm of the new planned Star Wars trilogy. In a time when Peter Jackson might as well call his Hobbit trilogy "The Quest for More Cash," Lucasfilm is now under the banner of the All-Mighty Mouse and being revisited in an attempt to...well, I don't know what (unless you count "nearly killing beloved American treasure Harrison Ford in a freak doorway accident" as motivation for revisiting the galaxy a long time ago and far, far away). I have the uneasy mixture of dread and "please god, don't let it suck" that a lot of my fellow fans surely must feel since 1999 (or 2002, or 2005). I'll probably go see the new Star Wars movies; I'd be a fool not to. But right now, I'm not sure how I'll feel about it.
The prequels have a reputation (justly in some cases, unjustly in others) of being awful. Just plain crap, really, and a lot about the prequel trilogy falls under that label. But for better or worse, Star Wars helped birth the recent trend of multi-movie epics with comic-book heroes or Hobbits from Middle Earth....and I don't mean the classic trilogy, either. As the book points out, the prequels made money; they were virtually critic-proof, and they proved that a story presented in multiple entries didn't need to worry about losing audiences (even if those audiences came to hate the very thing they were seeing). You wouldn't have Lord of the Rings without the prequels, nor would you have Twilight (if you know me, you know which of the two aforementioned properties I favor and which one makes my skin crawl). The prequel trilogy, shoddy and ineffectual as it was in furthering the story of Anakin Skywalker, did a lot for making studios aware of how profitable multi-part epics were.
I'm also less inclined, after reading the book, to think of George Lucas as the Evil Emperor. The book confirmed, for one thing, my theory that the Ewoks were the Viet-Cong (okay, maybe it wasn't my theory alone, but I'd like to think I was one of the first to see shades of Vietnam in the trilogy's depiction of a primitive rebellion standing up to a major technological enterprise). It also reminded me that, at heart, Lucas might never get around to making the small, independent films he set out to do, but he did start out wanting to make movies outside of the Hollywood system, and as much as Star Wars has helped to further that, it was never his intention. He was an artists first and foremost, looking to stay true to his vision. In the wake of Sony caving to North Korea, we need more artists like Lucas (even if they have the annoying habit of going back and adding digital effects that add nothing to the story).
I will always be a Star Wars nerd; it's just part of who I am, ladies. But I do think that some of the aspects of the "Expanded Universe" are just plain silly or not worth my time. I read the Timothy Zahn trilogy back in the day, but subsequent encounters with lesser Star Wars novels reminded me that the movies were great. The books, not so much. Star Wars fandom has certainly gained more cultural cache in recent years; it's okay to be a dork who wants to dress up as Boba Fett, I guess. And I celebrate that, I do. But I hope that J.J. Abrams doesn't screw it up. I really hope so. Because the last thing anyone wants is another Jar-Jar Binks roaming around doing stupid shit.
I think the sense of letdown that I and many of my ilk (i.e., long-term Star Wars fans) felt at the time of the first prequel (and which in no way was assuaged by the two follow-ups) is born in some ways of our own failure to see the original trilogy for what it was (a kid's movie). Anyone born between 1977 and 1983 who grew up with Luke, Leia, Han and Chewie, didn't know what to make of Anakin, Boring Obi-Wan, and Padme (really, "Padme?" What the hell, George...what the hell?), much less that freak Jar-Jar Binks. I remember when my friends and I left the theater way back in 1999, we tried to console ourselves that it was somehow better than we'd thought. It was cool, I guess, to see "that son of a bitch split in half" (as my cousin Brandon says some esteemed film critic behind him exclaiming when Darth Maul was sliced in two), but two and a half hours of Trade Federation and blockade talk does not a space epic make. I think it's why I responded far more favorably to the recent Star Trek reboot than I ever did to the original series of films: that one had action and whiz-bang special effects (and a pretty decent story, to boot).
And you know who directed that one? J.J. Abrams, who is behind the helm of the new planned Star Wars trilogy. In a time when Peter Jackson might as well call his Hobbit trilogy "The Quest for More Cash," Lucasfilm is now under the banner of the All-Mighty Mouse and being revisited in an attempt to...well, I don't know what (unless you count "nearly killing beloved American treasure Harrison Ford in a freak doorway accident" as motivation for revisiting the galaxy a long time ago and far, far away). I have the uneasy mixture of dread and "please god, don't let it suck" that a lot of my fellow fans surely must feel since 1999 (or 2002, or 2005). I'll probably go see the new Star Wars movies; I'd be a fool not to. But right now, I'm not sure how I'll feel about it.
The prequels have a reputation (justly in some cases, unjustly in others) of being awful. Just plain crap, really, and a lot about the prequel trilogy falls under that label. But for better or worse, Star Wars helped birth the recent trend of multi-movie epics with comic-book heroes or Hobbits from Middle Earth....and I don't mean the classic trilogy, either. As the book points out, the prequels made money; they were virtually critic-proof, and they proved that a story presented in multiple entries didn't need to worry about losing audiences (even if those audiences came to hate the very thing they were seeing). You wouldn't have Lord of the Rings without the prequels, nor would you have Twilight (if you know me, you know which of the two aforementioned properties I favor and which one makes my skin crawl). The prequel trilogy, shoddy and ineffectual as it was in furthering the story of Anakin Skywalker, did a lot for making studios aware of how profitable multi-part epics were.
I'm also less inclined, after reading the book, to think of George Lucas as the Evil Emperor. The book confirmed, for one thing, my theory that the Ewoks were the Viet-Cong (okay, maybe it wasn't my theory alone, but I'd like to think I was one of the first to see shades of Vietnam in the trilogy's depiction of a primitive rebellion standing up to a major technological enterprise). It also reminded me that, at heart, Lucas might never get around to making the small, independent films he set out to do, but he did start out wanting to make movies outside of the Hollywood system, and as much as Star Wars has helped to further that, it was never his intention. He was an artists first and foremost, looking to stay true to his vision. In the wake of Sony caving to North Korea, we need more artists like Lucas (even if they have the annoying habit of going back and adding digital effects that add nothing to the story).
I will always be a Star Wars nerd; it's just part of who I am, ladies. But I do think that some of the aspects of the "Expanded Universe" are just plain silly or not worth my time. I read the Timothy Zahn trilogy back in the day, but subsequent encounters with lesser Star Wars novels reminded me that the movies were great. The books, not so much. Star Wars fandom has certainly gained more cultural cache in recent years; it's okay to be a dork who wants to dress up as Boba Fett, I guess. And I celebrate that, I do. But I hope that J.J. Abrams doesn't screw it up. I really hope so. Because the last thing anyone wants is another Jar-Jar Binks roaming around doing stupid shit.
Friday, December 19, 2014
Well, I *Was* Going to See If Anyone Wanted to Go See "The Interview"
This week saw a triumph of totalitarian fear-mongering over the most sacred right that we as Americans enjoy with such abandon here in the States. Brought to its knees by a ruthless clan of hell-spawned mouth-breathing tyrants, a major entertainment facility bowed to pressure and decided to let said tyrants run rampant on them.
But enough about the Keeping Up with the Kardashians marathons on the E! network. This is more important.
The internet can be an amazing and disgusting thing. It's amazing in that you can connect with people the world over, eschewing the traditional boundaries of borders and geopolitical conflicts to really get to know people a world away. But then they hack one of your country's major movie studios, at the behest of the world's most obvious candidate for "asshole thuggery as form of government," and suddenly you're reminded that the internet is full of trolls. And sometimes these trolls work for North Korea.
Let me say this up front: chances are, The Interview wasn't going to sweep the Oscars next time around. Rogen/Franco productions rarely aspire beyond the level of stoner comedy that is best exemplified by Pineapple Express (a film which, as the years go by, I wonder about: suppose the second half of the movie, after Dale takes a hit of the title weed and then witnesses a real-life hit, was a fever dream of pothead paranoia? It would certainly explain the ratcheting up of violence and cartoonish situations that the film becomes). They're funny in parts (not always all the way through, but likeable enough), and while I still find Seth Rogen's laugh grating I do have a fondness for his persona onscreen. I was likely going to wait for the DVD release, to be honest.
But then...in case you've been living under a rock, The Interview concerns the fictional assassination of a very real figure in global politics (the spoiled fat rich kid from Pee-Wee's Big Adventure...I'm sorry, I mean Kim Jong Un). And perhaps understandably, the North Korean government (based on a "cult of personality" system that contains stories perhaps apocryphal but none the less amusing/horrifying such as the suggestion that state media told the people that their team had won the recent World Cup) was a little upset about this. Not understandably, a group of hackers (widely reported as having been enabled by North Korea to do so) hacked into the system of The Interview's parent studio Sony and had a field day releasing private emails that painted the executives in petty, unflattering lights. But then shit got real: these same hackers (whose choice of acronym as "Guardians of Peace," GOP, couldn't help but make this Obama Liberal chuckle a little) threatened "9/11 style attacks" on movie theaters that showed the movie. And so Sony, who didn't negotiate with terrorists, backed down.
The movie is in limbo as of this writing.
As someone who fancies himself an artist (or perhaps more accurately, an appreciator of other's art), I can't help but think that this chilling effect on the film industry doesn't do much for the idea of America being a land of free speech. After all, campaigns mounted in opposition of something usually have the opposite of the desired effect. And chances are that, had Sony not backed down, The Interview would be judged as a movie, not as a political statement (albeit one that hasn't been made yet). The merits of the movie will forever be lost to time, because even if it does get a wide release it won't be seen just on its own terms. Chaplin made The Great Dictator about Hitler, but he wisely chose to name his Hitler something different (and perhaps in a lesson that the filmmakers behind The Interview could have chosen to heed, didn't kill him off). The film has certain iconic moments that merit its inclusion in any discussion of film history, and it's a brave film for its time and ours. But Chaplin made the film in 1939 and 1940, when the true horrors of the Holocaust weren't known or even enacted yet. He said that if he'd known such facts at the time he wouldn't have made the film, which would be history's loss. It's not a completely successful film (the "Jewish ghetto" screams Hollywood backlot), but enough of it works and enough of it is still relevant to make it something that deserves to be seen.
I thought of Chaplin when the news about The Interview came down, but it's not the only film to have that kind of impact (and safe to say, a movie critical of Hitler while the USA was still on the sidelines didn't escape unscathed from criticism, though I don't think the Nazis ever tried to blow up theaters showing it). Monty Python's Life of Brian and The Last Temptation of Christ both tackled religion, and while I can't speak to the latter film I have seen the former. It's actually a critique of religion's ability to warp the human psyche, to make us all followers of people who often don't merit our devotion. Think of all the charismatic TV preachers in the Eighties who were exposed as money-grubbing sex fiends and you see how prophetic Life of Brian was. Controversy is often a boost to a film or album or book's profile: if you haven't offended anyone, the thinking goes, you're not doing your job.
I don't know if The Interview will ever be fully released. Kim Jong Un has to die sometime, though not likely at the hands of James Franco and Seth Rogen. I don't unilaterally condemn Sony for deciding to do what they did, they had to think about the threat and take it much more seriously than they might have, had the magic phrase "9/11" not entered the mix. It's just a damn shame, is all. Even if the movie was terrible, the marketplace needed to be the decider of that, not some big baby with his chubby finger on the nuclear trigger (oh great, now I've pissed off the North Koreans; I fully expect to be hacked now). Kim Jong Un can go fuck himself, for all I care. Yeah, I said it...please don't hack me!
I wonder what this means for my screenplay in development, Chokin' the Putin (in which a Canadian comedian goes to Russia to strangle Vladimir Putin)
But enough about the Keeping Up with the Kardashians marathons on the E! network. This is more important.
The internet can be an amazing and disgusting thing. It's amazing in that you can connect with people the world over, eschewing the traditional boundaries of borders and geopolitical conflicts to really get to know people a world away. But then they hack one of your country's major movie studios, at the behest of the world's most obvious candidate for "asshole thuggery as form of government," and suddenly you're reminded that the internet is full of trolls. And sometimes these trolls work for North Korea.
Let me say this up front: chances are, The Interview wasn't going to sweep the Oscars next time around. Rogen/Franco productions rarely aspire beyond the level of stoner comedy that is best exemplified by Pineapple Express (a film which, as the years go by, I wonder about: suppose the second half of the movie, after Dale takes a hit of the title weed and then witnesses a real-life hit, was a fever dream of pothead paranoia? It would certainly explain the ratcheting up of violence and cartoonish situations that the film becomes). They're funny in parts (not always all the way through, but likeable enough), and while I still find Seth Rogen's laugh grating I do have a fondness for his persona onscreen. I was likely going to wait for the DVD release, to be honest.
But then...in case you've been living under a rock, The Interview concerns the fictional assassination of a very real figure in global politics (the spoiled fat rich kid from Pee-Wee's Big Adventure...I'm sorry, I mean Kim Jong Un). And perhaps understandably, the North Korean government (based on a "cult of personality" system that contains stories perhaps apocryphal but none the less amusing/horrifying such as the suggestion that state media told the people that their team had won the recent World Cup) was a little upset about this. Not understandably, a group of hackers (widely reported as having been enabled by North Korea to do so) hacked into the system of The Interview's parent studio Sony and had a field day releasing private emails that painted the executives in petty, unflattering lights. But then shit got real: these same hackers (whose choice of acronym as "Guardians of Peace," GOP, couldn't help but make this Obama Liberal chuckle a little) threatened "9/11 style attacks" on movie theaters that showed the movie. And so Sony, who didn't negotiate with terrorists, backed down.
The movie is in limbo as of this writing.
As someone who fancies himself an artist (or perhaps more accurately, an appreciator of other's art), I can't help but think that this chilling effect on the film industry doesn't do much for the idea of America being a land of free speech. After all, campaigns mounted in opposition of something usually have the opposite of the desired effect. And chances are that, had Sony not backed down, The Interview would be judged as a movie, not as a political statement (albeit one that hasn't been made yet). The merits of the movie will forever be lost to time, because even if it does get a wide release it won't be seen just on its own terms. Chaplin made The Great Dictator about Hitler, but he wisely chose to name his Hitler something different (and perhaps in a lesson that the filmmakers behind The Interview could have chosen to heed, didn't kill him off). The film has certain iconic moments that merit its inclusion in any discussion of film history, and it's a brave film for its time and ours. But Chaplin made the film in 1939 and 1940, when the true horrors of the Holocaust weren't known or even enacted yet. He said that if he'd known such facts at the time he wouldn't have made the film, which would be history's loss. It's not a completely successful film (the "Jewish ghetto" screams Hollywood backlot), but enough of it works and enough of it is still relevant to make it something that deserves to be seen.
I thought of Chaplin when the news about The Interview came down, but it's not the only film to have that kind of impact (and safe to say, a movie critical of Hitler while the USA was still on the sidelines didn't escape unscathed from criticism, though I don't think the Nazis ever tried to blow up theaters showing it). Monty Python's Life of Brian and The Last Temptation of Christ both tackled religion, and while I can't speak to the latter film I have seen the former. It's actually a critique of religion's ability to warp the human psyche, to make us all followers of people who often don't merit our devotion. Think of all the charismatic TV preachers in the Eighties who were exposed as money-grubbing sex fiends and you see how prophetic Life of Brian was. Controversy is often a boost to a film or album or book's profile: if you haven't offended anyone, the thinking goes, you're not doing your job.
I don't know if The Interview will ever be fully released. Kim Jong Un has to die sometime, though not likely at the hands of James Franco and Seth Rogen. I don't unilaterally condemn Sony for deciding to do what they did, they had to think about the threat and take it much more seriously than they might have, had the magic phrase "9/11" not entered the mix. It's just a damn shame, is all. Even if the movie was terrible, the marketplace needed to be the decider of that, not some big baby with his chubby finger on the nuclear trigger (oh great, now I've pissed off the North Koreans; I fully expect to be hacked now). Kim Jong Un can go fuck himself, for all I care. Yeah, I said it...please don't hack me!
I wonder what this means for my screenplay in development, Chokin' the Putin (in which a Canadian comedian goes to Russia to strangle Vladimir Putin)
Tuesday, December 9, 2014
What To Read (When You're Between Semesters) for Fun
You may have noticed that a certain Southern US university has been in the news lately for what can best be described as "the stupidest fucking thing I've personally ever seen privilaged white kids do with too much time on their hands, as well as a frankly offensive view that the African-American community in this country can be reduced to crude stereotypes and it's okay because it's a tradition to do so, and also let's face it these self-involved brats probably think it's hilarious and won't learn a goddam thing about how to be senstive to others because they're programmed from the outset to be jerks what with their 'fraternal' organization which codifies gay panic as 'hey, bros just gotta hang out, dude, who knows what could happen am I right?' and which cover their ass with 'service commitments' which in no way excuse their borderline asinine behavior." But I'm not going to talk about that, because it's Christmas. And Christmas is the season of ignoring idiots who will be running used-car dealerships in twenty years.
No, I'd like to take the time to exult in the fact that, after this week is over, I and my fellow grad students can go back to something I'm sure we've all missed (even those of us who snuck in an occasional George Saunders short-story collection or a critical look at Derrida through cartoons): reading for fun. I already have a few things picked out, but allow me to highlight some works that I think some of my peers should check out, assuming that they have similar reading tastes as I (or they just have time on their hands and nothing in particular picked out). At any rate:
Civilwarland In Bad Decline (George Saunders): Read this when I was supposed to be reading other things, it's absolutely batshit crazy and hilarious and moving all at once.
The Financial Lives of the Poets (Jess Walter): Just finished this one over the weekend, it's the story of a guy down on his luck who tries to become a drug dealer so that he can support his family. I've never seen Breaking Bad, so I don't know if this is "Breaking Bad as comedy" per se, but it's pretty good.
A Fan's Notes (Frederick Exley): Actually, this is one that I read way, way back, I mentioned it in a paper for one of my classes and thought "damn, I'd like to read that again." Hard to describe, really.
The Fortress of Solitude/Dissident Gardens/Motherless Brooklyn (Jonathan Lethem): This was "The Year of Reading Lethem" for me, and these three titles did not disappoint. I ran into the dreaded "wall of self-imposed indifference towards my original topic" when I tried to make a paper topic about the use of music in Fortress, but it's still worth the trip. The other two are similarly beautiful.
The Man in the High Castle (Philip K. Dick): Lethem's always talking about this guy, I found a copy with a hilariously misleading "old timey science-fiction" cover, but it's fantastic overall. Think Pynchon/Vonnegut, minus the sense of humor.
Vineland (Thomas Pynchon): This feels like a dry run for the much more awesome (and soon to be a major motion picture) Inherent Vice, but that's not a bad thing.
True Grit/The Dog of the South/Masters of Atlantis/Norwood/Gringoes (Charles Portis): Really, you can't go wrong (even his "not that great" books are good in parts).
Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World (Haruki Murakami): Mind-bending as always, this is a fantastic treasure of a book.
I would list more, but I'm running low on what else I've read or re-read over the past year that could bear mention here. All as a way of talking about those certain idiots who did some stupid shit and put a certain university in the news. But really, these books are all fantastic ways to kill time during the Christmas break, if you're so inclined.
No, I'd like to take the time to exult in the fact that, after this week is over, I and my fellow grad students can go back to something I'm sure we've all missed (even those of us who snuck in an occasional George Saunders short-story collection or a critical look at Derrida through cartoons): reading for fun. I already have a few things picked out, but allow me to highlight some works that I think some of my peers should check out, assuming that they have similar reading tastes as I (or they just have time on their hands and nothing in particular picked out). At any rate:
Civilwarland In Bad Decline (George Saunders): Read this when I was supposed to be reading other things, it's absolutely batshit crazy and hilarious and moving all at once.
The Financial Lives of the Poets (Jess Walter): Just finished this one over the weekend, it's the story of a guy down on his luck who tries to become a drug dealer so that he can support his family. I've never seen Breaking Bad, so I don't know if this is "Breaking Bad as comedy" per se, but it's pretty good.
A Fan's Notes (Frederick Exley): Actually, this is one that I read way, way back, I mentioned it in a paper for one of my classes and thought "damn, I'd like to read that again." Hard to describe, really.
The Fortress of Solitude/Dissident Gardens/Motherless Brooklyn (Jonathan Lethem): This was "The Year of Reading Lethem" for me, and these three titles did not disappoint. I ran into the dreaded "wall of self-imposed indifference towards my original topic" when I tried to make a paper topic about the use of music in Fortress, but it's still worth the trip. The other two are similarly beautiful.
The Man in the High Castle (Philip K. Dick): Lethem's always talking about this guy, I found a copy with a hilariously misleading "old timey science-fiction" cover, but it's fantastic overall. Think Pynchon/Vonnegut, minus the sense of humor.
Vineland (Thomas Pynchon): This feels like a dry run for the much more awesome (and soon to be a major motion picture) Inherent Vice, but that's not a bad thing.
True Grit/The Dog of the South/Masters of Atlantis/Norwood/Gringoes (Charles Portis): Really, you can't go wrong (even his "not that great" books are good in parts).
Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World (Haruki Murakami): Mind-bending as always, this is a fantastic treasure of a book.
I would list more, but I'm running low on what else I've read or re-read over the past year that could bear mention here. All as a way of talking about those certain idiots who did some stupid shit and put a certain university in the news. But really, these books are all fantastic ways to kill time during the Christmas break, if you're so inclined.
Sunday, December 7, 2014
Semester's End
The regular semester ended last week (i.e., classes meeting during their regular times), and exam week is coming up. Grad students apparently don't do exams (yay!) but they do do papers (boo!). So while an entire library's worth of undergrads surround me, freaking out about which bone connects to the thigh bone or whether Shakespeare meant for The Merchant of Venice to be a satire or taken at face value, I'm working on a text analysis project that so far has delivered nada. So I'm taking a breather to record my thoughts at the official end of my first full semester back in school.
Suffice it to say, it's both been harder and easier than I originally envisioned. I took some good classes this semester, some more challenging than I'd thought. And I discovered something about myself in one of my classes that I never thought would occur, at least not since my undergrad days: I enjoy writing fiction.
Back when I was an undergrad, I took a couple of workshop classes because I thought I could write fiction. Those workshops didn't convey to me the message that I sucked at fiction writing, per se, but they made me realize that it was harder than I was willing to put the effort into at the time, and so my fiction-writing career stalled on the tracks of my own inherent laziness. I was an essay-writing guy, I said (there's probably a word for that, but I'm too lazy to type it up), and my essays would be my route to historical significance as one of the most original thinkers of Western civilization.
Did I mention how much of a pretentious asshole I was back then?
Anyway, before taking a workshop class this semester, purely because I needed a fourth class to fill out my required hours, I thought fiction-writing and I were done. But I started to enjoy the idea of writing fiction, because there's something about it that trumps most non-fiction writing: it can be about whatever the fuck you want it to be. As long as it makes sense (and sometimes not even then: try reading Barry Hannah sometime), it can be good. And something that I didn't really get about workshop my previous run-through in college: it's okay if what you turn in isn't worked out just yet. That's why it's called "workshop," you work on it. The feedback I got for my three stories was encouraging, helpful, and enthusiastic. So they're all to blame when I assault the world with my book of short stories.
Kidding (about the blaming. The book of short stories? That might just become a reality).
I'm signed up for another workshop in the spring, and I'm hoping to work on some stuff over the Christmas break so that, while not being first to volunteer, I can at least be in the second or third week to turn in my first story. Never thought I'd say this again, but I want to write fiction.
Literary theory, however...I recognize it's super-important if you're going to talk about literature and junk. But I have my bullshit detector on at all times when dealing with Derrida, Foucault, etc. That's just how it has to be. I did end up reading Roland Barthes for fun, as well as Walter Benjamin (his name kept cropping up, though we never covered him in class). And I liked being challenged, even if I felt like the challenge sometimes was too challenging.
I'm looking forward to the break, to a chance to read for fun full-time again (I snuck in a few fun-reading things here and there, like someone on a strict diet of fruits and berries might go for the occasional hamburger when no one's looking). One of the books I read when I was supposed to be reading for class was by a friend, Becky Adnot-Haynes. If you haven't bought her debut story collection The Year of Perfect Happiness, do so. Seriously, stop reading this and go to your local bookstore (or if they don't have it, try online) and get it. I can wait...
Okay, so: one semester down, fiction writing a go, reading for fun...oh yes, be sure to have a good holiday season (whatever you celebrate, or even if you celebrate nothing at all). I got stuff to do between now and Friday. And as has often been the case this past semester, that can sneak up on you before you know it.
Oh yeah...how 'bout them Lamecocks, huh? Sorry, I had to represent for my Tigers...:-)
Suffice it to say, it's both been harder and easier than I originally envisioned. I took some good classes this semester, some more challenging than I'd thought. And I discovered something about myself in one of my classes that I never thought would occur, at least not since my undergrad days: I enjoy writing fiction.
Back when I was an undergrad, I took a couple of workshop classes because I thought I could write fiction. Those workshops didn't convey to me the message that I sucked at fiction writing, per se, but they made me realize that it was harder than I was willing to put the effort into at the time, and so my fiction-writing career stalled on the tracks of my own inherent laziness. I was an essay-writing guy, I said (there's probably a word for that, but I'm too lazy to type it up), and my essays would be my route to historical significance as one of the most original thinkers of Western civilization.
Did I mention how much of a pretentious asshole I was back then?
Anyway, before taking a workshop class this semester, purely because I needed a fourth class to fill out my required hours, I thought fiction-writing and I were done. But I started to enjoy the idea of writing fiction, because there's something about it that trumps most non-fiction writing: it can be about whatever the fuck you want it to be. As long as it makes sense (and sometimes not even then: try reading Barry Hannah sometime), it can be good. And something that I didn't really get about workshop my previous run-through in college: it's okay if what you turn in isn't worked out just yet. That's why it's called "workshop," you work on it. The feedback I got for my three stories was encouraging, helpful, and enthusiastic. So they're all to blame when I assault the world with my book of short stories.
Kidding (about the blaming. The book of short stories? That might just become a reality).
I'm signed up for another workshop in the spring, and I'm hoping to work on some stuff over the Christmas break so that, while not being first to volunteer, I can at least be in the second or third week to turn in my first story. Never thought I'd say this again, but I want to write fiction.
Literary theory, however...I recognize it's super-important if you're going to talk about literature and junk. But I have my bullshit detector on at all times when dealing with Derrida, Foucault, etc. That's just how it has to be. I did end up reading Roland Barthes for fun, as well as Walter Benjamin (his name kept cropping up, though we never covered him in class). And I liked being challenged, even if I felt like the challenge sometimes was too challenging.
I'm looking forward to the break, to a chance to read for fun full-time again (I snuck in a few fun-reading things here and there, like someone on a strict diet of fruits and berries might go for the occasional hamburger when no one's looking). One of the books I read when I was supposed to be reading for class was by a friend, Becky Adnot-Haynes. If you haven't bought her debut story collection The Year of Perfect Happiness, do so. Seriously, stop reading this and go to your local bookstore (or if they don't have it, try online) and get it. I can wait...
Okay, so: one semester down, fiction writing a go, reading for fun...oh yes, be sure to have a good holiday season (whatever you celebrate, or even if you celebrate nothing at all). I got stuff to do between now and Friday. And as has often been the case this past semester, that can sneak up on you before you know it.
Oh yeah...how 'bout them Lamecocks, huh? Sorry, I had to represent for my Tigers...:-)
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