Love in the Time of Cholera
by García Márquez
Latin American literature truly is some of the greatest in the world, and García Márquez is among the very best writers from his continent. If you then add that Love in the Time of Cholera is one of his most famous and widely praised novels, it's not a massive step to deduce that this is something pretty special. Márquez has a supreme gift in writing, an amazing ability to relate narrative in a disspassionate but captivating way, and keen eye for awesome plot structure, excellent themeing and motifs, a dry and brilliant wit, and, when the occassion calls for it, a poetic genius that can cunjure stunning emotions on demand. Then you have a tale of true love and high adventure, a cast of great characters, exotic Latin flavours and a touch of charming realism. It's inspiring, really.
Tuesday, 30 December 2008
Wednesday, 17 December 2008
Film idea
Biopic of the Emperor Nero.
Nero has become one of history's most famous Roman emperors because he was extraordinarily cruel. But actually, Nero didn't start out too nasty at all. Here is the introductory paragraph to Nero's wikipedia entry:
"Nero ruled from 54 to 68, focusing much of his attention on diplomacy, trade, and increasing the cultural capital of the empire. He ordered the building of theatres and promoted athletic games. His reign included a successful war and negotiated peace with the Parthian Empire (58–63), the suppression of the British revolt (60–61) and improving relations with Greece. The First Roman-Jewish War (66-70) started during his reign. In 68 a military coup drove Nero from the throne. Facing execution, he committed suicide."
Doesn't sound too bad, does it? From the information there, you might well fashion the idea of a noble and peaceful ruler cruelly undone by his scheming generals. Attention to diplomacy, trade and cultural capital? What about attention to death, excess and perversion? Strangely, the not-so-nice side to the emperor's reign is only mentioned cautiously, alongside statements about the dubious reliability of the sources that tell us about such things. From what my old Latin teacher taught me, which seems the most likely (and film-friendly) scenario, Nero started out as an idealist who sought to boost Rome's appreciation for true culture. Unfortunately, it wasn't too long before absolute power began to corrupt absolutely, and emperorship clearly started to stroke the old ego. Nero began to believe that appreciation of true culture really meant appreciation of Nero's culture, and he forced his minions to applaud his own taste and even his own creations (apparently he fancied himself a great composer). And this was when the whole mum-killing thing probably started. Anyways, I reckon that if you didn't Hollywoodise it too much, it would be an awesome story for a film.
Nero has become one of history's most famous Roman emperors because he was extraordinarily cruel. But actually, Nero didn't start out too nasty at all. Here is the introductory paragraph to Nero's wikipedia entry:
"Nero ruled from 54 to 68, focusing much of his attention on diplomacy, trade, and increasing the cultural capital of the empire. He ordered the building of theatres and promoted athletic games. His reign included a successful war and negotiated peace with the Parthian Empire (58–63), the suppression of the British revolt (60–61) and improving relations with Greece. The First Roman-Jewish War (66-70) started during his reign. In 68 a military coup drove Nero from the throne. Facing execution, he committed suicide."
Doesn't sound too bad, does it? From the information there, you might well fashion the idea of a noble and peaceful ruler cruelly undone by his scheming generals. Attention to diplomacy, trade and cultural capital? What about attention to death, excess and perversion? Strangely, the not-so-nice side to the emperor's reign is only mentioned cautiously, alongside statements about the dubious reliability of the sources that tell us about such things. From what my old Latin teacher taught me, which seems the most likely (and film-friendly) scenario, Nero started out as an idealist who sought to boost Rome's appreciation for true culture. Unfortunately, it wasn't too long before absolute power began to corrupt absolutely, and emperorship clearly started to stroke the old ego. Nero began to believe that appreciation of true culture really meant appreciation of Nero's culture, and he forced his minions to applaud his own taste and even his own creations (apparently he fancied himself a great composer). And this was when the whole mum-killing thing probably started. Anyways, I reckon that if you didn't Hollywoodise it too much, it would be an awesome story for a film.
Old cool band #1
Dominic Miller
Sting's guitarist, Miller has a small but wonderful solo career, playing enchanting acoustic guitar rhythms which cunjure the emotions of all kinds of places, from La Boca to an 'eclipse'. Check out his first album, First Touch.
[I should probably mention that the titles 'old' and 'new' cool bands do not refer to the age of the band, but how recently I've got into them. Thus I first encountered Miller in about 1999, but The Cinematic Orchestra (see previous post) only came to my ears a few days ago. Both are operational bands today.]
Sting's guitarist, Miller has a small but wonderful solo career, playing enchanting acoustic guitar rhythms which cunjure the emotions of all kinds of places, from La Boca to an 'eclipse'. Check out his first album, First Touch.
[I should probably mention that the titles 'old' and 'new' cool bands do not refer to the age of the band, but how recently I've got into them. Thus I first encountered Miller in about 1999, but The Cinematic Orchestra (see previous post) only came to my ears a few days ago. Both are operational bands today.]
Scottish goths
Just back from Edinburgh. I so was not expecting it to be the gothic capital of the universe. At least two towers could have been built by Sauron, there were several contenders for best Adams Family mansions, lots of Victorian alleyways and burnt-black buildings. I half expected a cart to come round the corner any minute with someone yelling 'bring out yer dead!' It was an awesome town; I plan on returning!
Monday, 15 December 2008
New Cool Band #2
The Cinematic Orchestra
Just got their 2007 album Ma Fleur. Sounds very nice...kinda cinematic and orchestral. Looked like it could be a bit pretencious, but I think it just carries it off. Excellent emotion-music, in the best sense of the term. Hails from the UK, though you could be forgiven for thinking it was Scandanavian. Sigur Ros meets Sidewaytown.
Just got their 2007 album Ma Fleur. Sounds very nice...kinda cinematic and orchestral. Looked like it could be a bit pretencious, but I think it just carries it off. Excellent emotion-music, in the best sense of the term. Hails from the UK, though you could be forgiven for thinking it was Scandanavian. Sigur Ros meets Sidewaytown.
Sunday, 14 December 2008
Facing the facts of the welfare conundrum
Karen Matthews has achieved far more with her life than she possibly could have hoped. She's sparked a vicious debate across the country about whether she should have happened or not. Suddenly, everyone has abandoned the welfare state, throwing it overboard in order to keep their personal ship of street-knowledge afloat. Everyone wants to show that they can clearly see, and have known all along, that this ridiculous hand-out system is destroying our nation from the inside and creating a do-nothing underclass that will be the undoing of us all!
Oh! What happened to the mighty left of British politics? Those great socialists who created the glorious welfare system that marks us as true altruists? It was buried under the Blatcher plastic face of centre-right boredom.
So here we are, on the point of dismantling welfare forever. We're friggin Victorians again. Not a soul is speaking in defence of philanthropy. Which is why I was so delighted to see the noble Diane Abbot, a Brownite by the way, protest just a little the other night. She pointed out the key flaw in the hand-out abolition argument, which is: what is the alternative?
No one denies that benefits can destroy ambition, drain the economy and build a culture of sloth and underachievement. But what are you going to do instead? This is one of those political issues that it is impossible to solve. Utterly impossible. And it would be foolhardy in the extreme to take action for action's sake. If you take away benefits, what happens to the people who genuinely need them? The single mother, who through no fault of her own, finds herself raising three toddlers and without a second to spare for even looking for work, let alone pinning down a full time job. The unskilled men who live in communities where all the factories are long-gone and the and no one will employ them, desperately saving so they can move to somewhere more prosperous. What happens to these people? And any kind of middle ground is futile too. If you keep benefits but allocate them according to deservingness only, who determines how deserving someone is, and who decides which of the deserving have to starve? You're dividing the poor into the damned and the saved, and bam! you're a Victorian again.
It's insolvable, I'm telling you. We should at least recognise this before we crucify the big-hearted welfare state, betrayed by the Judas of social outrage and mob-mentality.
Oh! What happened to the mighty left of British politics? Those great socialists who created the glorious welfare system that marks us as true altruists? It was buried under the Blatcher plastic face of centre-right boredom.
So here we are, on the point of dismantling welfare forever. We're friggin Victorians again. Not a soul is speaking in defence of philanthropy. Which is why I was so delighted to see the noble Diane Abbot, a Brownite by the way, protest just a little the other night. She pointed out the key flaw in the hand-out abolition argument, which is: what is the alternative?
No one denies that benefits can destroy ambition, drain the economy and build a culture of sloth and underachievement. But what are you going to do instead? This is one of those political issues that it is impossible to solve. Utterly impossible. And it would be foolhardy in the extreme to take action for action's sake. If you take away benefits, what happens to the people who genuinely need them? The single mother, who through no fault of her own, finds herself raising three toddlers and without a second to spare for even looking for work, let alone pinning down a full time job. The unskilled men who live in communities where all the factories are long-gone and the and no one will employ them, desperately saving so they can move to somewhere more prosperous. What happens to these people? And any kind of middle ground is futile too. If you keep benefits but allocate them according to deservingness only, who determines how deserving someone is, and who decides which of the deserving have to starve? You're dividing the poor into the damned and the saved, and bam! you're a Victorian again.
It's insolvable, I'm telling you. We should at least recognise this before we crucify the big-hearted welfare state, betrayed by the Judas of social outrage and mob-mentality.
Saturday, 13 December 2008
New Cool Band #1
Explosions in the Sky
As awesome as any British post-rockers, these guys deserve special recognition for being from Minnesota/Texas and still making really good epic-experience-art-rock-with-no-singing. Kinda 65daysofstatic meets The Cooper Temple Clause.
As awesome as any British post-rockers, these guys deserve special recognition for being from Minnesota/Texas and still making really good epic-experience-art-rock-with-no-singing. Kinda 65daysofstatic meets The Cooper Temple Clause.
Quote #1
"You westerners have your watches. But we Taliban have time."
-Rolling Stone article by Nir Rosen
-Rolling Stone article by Nir Rosen
The Greatness of Britain
Britain, as everyone knows, is a thoroughly miserable place. It was would be hard to find another collection of individuals quite so horrendously unhappy in such depressing surroundings. British people are also, as Eric Idle once pointed out, entirely mad (more so when they are not in Britain itself - I suspect being outside of their private world of squalor they lose the last remenants of sanity they might once have had). It is a combination of these two qualities - misery and lunacy - that makes Britain so Great.
Yes, Britain is Great, despite the worst drinking culure in the world (it prides itself on being the only country in the world where it's cool to be UNable to hold your drink), a useless democracy, an antiquated and deep-rooted class structure, and simultaneously the most morally strict and morally vacant society ever, ruled by the Daily Mail underbelly of humankind. Not to mention a history full of the most horrific bigotry, crass obsession with wealth and class, relentless, shameless capitalism, and repeated, thoughtless genocide and culture-destruction of the most appauling kind. Yet, Britain is Great.
When I identified misery and lunacy as the sources of this greatness, I neglected one other significant cornerstone - the weather. Only in a country of perpetual greyness could they have invented tea and post-rock. From the weather, the misery takes a grim but awesome shape, and the lunacy moves to genius. Nowhere else on earth is as conductive to interesting creativity and unprecedented depth of thought. Nowhere else have I been so inspired, nor felt the effects of inspiration so accutely. There is nothing in the world so heart-warming as seeing the poor inhabitants of these sorry isles finding such joy in such misery, and there is nothing that brings one so close to God as doing this oneself.
Yes, Britain is Great, despite the worst drinking culure in the world (it prides itself on being the only country in the world where it's cool to be UNable to hold your drink), a useless democracy, an antiquated and deep-rooted class structure, and simultaneously the most morally strict and morally vacant society ever, ruled by the Daily Mail underbelly of humankind. Not to mention a history full of the most horrific bigotry, crass obsession with wealth and class, relentless, shameless capitalism, and repeated, thoughtless genocide and culture-destruction of the most appauling kind. Yet, Britain is Great.
When I identified misery and lunacy as the sources of this greatness, I neglected one other significant cornerstone - the weather. Only in a country of perpetual greyness could they have invented tea and post-rock. From the weather, the misery takes a grim but awesome shape, and the lunacy moves to genius. Nowhere else on earth is as conductive to interesting creativity and unprecedented depth of thought. Nowhere else have I been so inspired, nor felt the effects of inspiration so accutely. There is nothing in the world so heart-warming as seeing the poor inhabitants of these sorry isles finding such joy in such misery, and there is nothing that brings one so close to God as doing this oneself.
Friday, 12 December 2008
Song ideas #s 1&2
E-----------------
B-----------------
G---------0------
D-----3-----3----
A---3---3-----3-
D-3--------------
and
E-----------------
B-----------------
G---------0------
D-----3-----3----
A---3---3-----3-
D-0--------------
also, use 2 and 3 on G, and 0 on A.
Perhaps?
--
Also, on piano, try C, Am, and Dm, all with a big F in the bass. Then G with a E in the bass.
B-----------------
G---------0------
D-----3-----3----
A---3---3-----3-
D-3--------------
and
E-----------------
B-----------------
G---------0------
D-----3-----3----
A---3---3-----3-
D-0--------------
also, use 2 and 3 on G, and 0 on A.
Perhaps?
--
Also, on piano, try C, Am, and Dm, all with a big F in the bass. Then G with a E in the bass.
Erm, mission statement continued?
Yes well I should prabably explain the two lame references on this blog before I go any further, because I could quite easily forget them myself.
Human not human enough is an attack on Nietzsche (there's nothin' he couldn't teach ya!), who had one of his first books, an intriguing collection of aphorisms, entitled "Human all too human". Nietzsche had some great insights on lots of things of varying importance, but one of his guiding beliefs, a disillusionment with human nature mixed with rejection of God and religion, is utterly unacceptable as far as I'm concerned. More on this issue I'm sure will appear in later posts (this is one of few ideas of mine that I'm sure I won't forget), suffice to say that, obviously, all the bits of "human nature" which are bad (and there are a great many, make no mistake) are NOT part of true human nature, i.e. the essence of the human species. True human nature is by definition good, and is principally ruled by empathy, which distinguishes it from any other kind of nature.
The dark fourth is a pathetic take off of Pure Reason Revolution's debut album The Dark Third, my favourite album released since the Beatles.
Human not human enough is an attack on Nietzsche (there's nothin' he couldn't teach ya!), who had one of his first books, an intriguing collection of aphorisms, entitled "Human all too human". Nietzsche had some great insights on lots of things of varying importance, but one of his guiding beliefs, a disillusionment with human nature mixed with rejection of God and religion, is utterly unacceptable as far as I'm concerned. More on this issue I'm sure will appear in later posts (this is one of few ideas of mine that I'm sure I won't forget), suffice to say that, obviously, all the bits of "human nature" which are bad (and there are a great many, make no mistake) are NOT part of true human nature, i.e. the essence of the human species. True human nature is by definition good, and is principally ruled by empathy, which distinguishes it from any other kind of nature.
The dark fourth is a pathetic take off of Pure Reason Revolution's debut album The Dark Third, my favourite album released since the Beatles.
Gérard de Nerval
This is an old one, but a classic.
Gérard de Nerval was a French Romantic writer, and inspiration for the likes of Artaud and Pure Reason Revolution (who stole some of his lyrics). He was a lunatic, who couldn't distinguish his waking state from his dreaming one. He ate ice cream out of human skulls and famously had a pet lobster. They just don't make them like that nowdays. (Reminds me of a Monty Python sketch....)
Gérard de Nerval hung himself, leaving a note saying
"Do not wait up for me, for the night will be black and white."
Gérard de Nerval was a French Romantic writer, and inspiration for the likes of Artaud and Pure Reason Revolution (who stole some of his lyrics). He was a lunatic, who couldn't distinguish his waking state from his dreaming one. He ate ice cream out of human skulls and famously had a pet lobster. They just don't make them like that nowdays. (Reminds me of a Monty Python sketch....)
Gérard de Nerval hung himself, leaving a note saying
"Do not wait up for me, for the night will be black and white."
Thursday, 11 December 2008
The positivist church of Brazil
Father of sociology, Auguste Comte also created a blueprint for a religion which effectively advocates all the morals of any major religion, whilst shunning belief in any kind of deity. Brilliant, eh? You got to admire the progressiveness of someone who doesn't flinch at the idea of a secular religion. Sadly, the only other people who thought it was a good idea were a few Brazilian revolutionaries.
As good an idea as it is, would religion honestly be any fun if you didn't have to believe in something unprovable? Seems like a flaw to me. However, if we agree with Durkheim's analysis that a religion is a definition of a social values and an expression of social solidarity at the subconscious level (i.e. adherents think they're worshipping a god, when in fact they're worshipping their own society), then what kind of society would have to exist to follow a religion like this? A friggin utopian one.
Plus, their motto is "Love as principle, Order as basis, and Progress as aim". Admit that that's cool. If only people today could be as ridiculous as this and get taken seriously.
Check out the Church of Humanity's website:
http://www.igrejapositivistabrasil.org.br/english/
As good an idea as it is, would religion honestly be any fun if you didn't have to believe in something unprovable? Seems like a flaw to me. However, if we agree with Durkheim's analysis that a religion is a definition of a social values and an expression of social solidarity at the subconscious level (i.e. adherents think they're worshipping a god, when in fact they're worshipping their own society), then what kind of society would have to exist to follow a religion like this? A friggin utopian one.
Plus, their motto is "Love as principle, Order as basis, and Progress as aim". Admit that that's cool. If only people today could be as ridiculous as this and get taken seriously.
Check out the Church of Humanity's website:
http://www.igrejapositivistabrasil.org.br/english/
A child is the father of the man
A diamond necklace played the pawn/Hand in hand some drummed along, oh/ To a handsome man and baton/A blind class aristocracy/Back through the opera glass you see/The pit and the pendulum drawn/Columnated ruins domino/
Canvass the town and brush the backdrop/Are you sleeping?/
Hung velvet overtaken me/Dim chandelier awaken me/To a song dissolved in the dawn/The music hall a costly bow/The music all is lost for now/To a muted trumperter swan/Columnated ruins domino
Canvass the town and brush the backdrop/Are you sleeping, Brother John?
Dove nested towers the hour was/Strike the street quicksilver moon/Carriage across the fog/Two-Step to lamplight cellar tune/The laughs come hard in Auld Lang Syne
The glass was raised, the fired rose/The fullness of the wine, the dim last toasting/While at port, adieu or die/
A choke of grief hard-hardened I/Beyond belief a broken man too tough to cry
Surf's Up/Aboard a tidal wave/Come about hard and join/The young and often spring you gave/I heard the word/Wonderful thingA children's song
Child, child, child, child, child/A child is the father of the man
***These are the lyrics of the Beach Boys' "Surf's Up", potentially the greatest song ever written. Who knew that the 'Boys had lyrical value beyond girls, sun and surfing? But some of their less famous albums, such as Sunflower and Surf's Up are incredibly poetic, with lyrics as intruigling as any post-rocker today.
The last line is probably a reference to Gerard Manley Hopkins, in turn a reference to Wordsworth. Good old Romantics, still live n' kicking.
Mission Statement
I've had enough with thinking good thoughts and good ideas, stumbling across amazing inspirations, and abandoning them in the tip of my awful memory. So here is a convenient place to store them. And since there is a potential trip-wire of other people actually seeing this stuff, it just might force me to watch my step a little in terms of presentation and accuracy, which can only be good for any retrievals I may wish to make in the future. Plus, I'll be adding to the glorious milieu of human interaction and creation and generally helping along the advancement of the species blahblahblah. Excellent, then we're agreed.
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