tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12182416786071835352024-02-18T15:40:15.194-08:00The Sounding[sound-ing] - noun: 1.) the act of measuring the depth of water; - verb: 2.) the making of a particular noise.David Newsomhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02698845610286763351noreply@blogger.comBlogger60125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1218241678607183535.post-83465160060275981242024-01-06T18:42:00.000-08:002024-01-06T19:32:03.833-08:00The People We Stumble Upon in This Portable Magic: Reading in 2023<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjmXvN-pz6Q-zJSR8ikKcITA9rDfVOwr635gJpfLP81UneA2mdsYXbSYjgDyjtWrMb8pRZske4CwZQemfTPyhZUirG4Hhwb0S_5F0soW3ZrVCHwprjcLrzJZsCbKuTCIWbvsBElPGKGNxVUU3xGQb65nca5tfT6kO2rs6-2R53Q7j9ESDlcr959531bo5Q/s2048/IMG_9741.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1383" data-original-width="2048" height="270" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjmXvN-pz6Q-zJSR8ikKcITA9rDfVOwr635gJpfLP81UneA2mdsYXbSYjgDyjtWrMb8pRZske4CwZQemfTPyhZUirG4Hhwb0S_5F0soW3ZrVCHwprjcLrzJZsCbKuTCIWbvsBElPGKGNxVUU3xGQb65nca5tfT6kO2rs6-2R53Q7j9ESDlcr959531bo5Q/w400-h270/IMG_9741.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">Books are good company in sad times and happy times, for books are people--people who have managed to stay alive by hiding between the covers of a book."</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">-- <i>E.B. White</i></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">"Books are a uniquely portable magic."</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">-- <i>Stephen King</i></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">________________</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><b><span style="font-size: medium;">* The following books are listed alphabetically, by the authors' last names.</span></b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;"><b><br /></b></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;"><b>10 FAVORITE READS OF 2023</b></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><b><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><b><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><b><span style="color: #e06666; font-size: large;"><i>You are Beautiful and You Are Alone:</i></span></b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="color: #e06666;"><b><span style="font-size: large;"><i>The Biography of Nico </i>(2021) </span></b><b><span style="font-size: large;">-- Jennifer Otter Bickerdike</span></b></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj25A6lcW-RshWy1rWq3913rimISDDe1QZrFGjfv_rTUapUZkZAn6y7_NM5ohQr1gtEnT9qD8KXKnT9R_PZzFf8TfB0zA0ebaqO3v934Y1zoEyCkkOQ3P5Hbq2XqU7t3eoNiWZLQV9ZctUk3YVeTB3y3Cq8EZ_kx-ya8CmTzXQ8-9tKivprj62MwpL89_8/s1000/IMG_9581.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1000" data-original-width="662" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj25A6lcW-RshWy1rWq3913rimISDDe1QZrFGjfv_rTUapUZkZAn6y7_NM5ohQr1gtEnT9qD8KXKnT9R_PZzFf8TfB0zA0ebaqO3v934Y1zoEyCkkOQ3P5Hbq2XqU7t3eoNiWZLQV9ZctUk3YVeTB3y3Cq8EZ_kx-ya8CmTzXQ8-9tKivprj62MwpL89_8/s320/IMG_9581.jpeg" width="212" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Full disclosure: I must admit for the longest time I knew next to nothing about the tall, blonde ingenue singer/songwriter/musician Nico, with her unique baritone voice and stubborn, thick German accent, and her finely chiseled cheekbones (giving hint to her days as a former fashion model), and her involvement, throughout the 1960s, with the likes of Andy Warhol and his Factory art studio in New York City, and her (relatively brief) involvement in the Velvet Underground, and her legendary notoriety of drug addiction, etc.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">I was aware of some things about her: I remember one of my most cognizant associations with her (aside from hearing some of her tracks with Lou Reed, John Cale, and the Velvet Underground) came from filmmaker Wes Anderson's famous needle-drop of Nico's version of Jackson Browne's "These Days" during the wonderful Green Line Bus scene in <i>The Royal Tenenbaums</i> (2001). <i>[Aside: Unforgettable.]</i></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Born Christa Paffgen in post-Hitler Germany and eventually renaming herself Nico, she would dip her toes into modeling and acting, landing a significant part in Federico Fellini's <i>La Dolce Vita</i> (1960). She was rumored to have a bisexual affair with the French actress Jeanne Moreau, as well as relationships with Ernest Hemingway, Lou Reed, French actor Alain Delon, Leonard Cohen, and Bob Dylan (who purportedly wrote the song "I'll Keep It With Mine" for her). She recorded several solo albums, toured, slipped ever deeper into heroin addiction, and died in 1988. She was only 49. </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Bickerdike's book is not always particularly well-written or fair-handed, I think. The author is often quick to smooth over some of the uglier parts of Nico's character (including accusations of recurring, violent attacks of anti-Semitism and racism). Nico was and is a difficult and complicated subject for a biographer--she is sometimes, oftentimes, hard to like. She is sad. She is tragic. But her story--and Bickerdike's unfolding of that story--is undeniably readable and hard to set aside. Love her or hate her, Nico was groundbreaking and important.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="color: #e06666;"><b><span style="font-size: large;"><i>American Prometheus: The Triumph and Tragedy of J. Robert Oppenheimer</i> (2005) </span></b><b><span style="font-size: large;">-- Kai Bird and Martin J. Sherwin</span></b></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhQPQyLIKn-8tThfChslovnBOx1EAWUECDU75D3Suxdw_U_ksf8DrKbrRqS4xLKvZEpK6JA5N7Vx7CYIRxXE4hHP1tki5pz2gQZuA_q1LYdL-V5OEy-B6635HYTzMgTaAFc9Ii7qUy2_LY7ppq087B4Cj1GVy9TsCeK8i8DAcEYl9mcYOrehQzRGvdZyJs/s500/IMG_9571.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="500" data-original-width="323" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhQPQyLIKn-8tThfChslovnBOx1EAWUECDU75D3Suxdw_U_ksf8DrKbrRqS4xLKvZEpK6JA5N7Vx7CYIRxXE4hHP1tki5pz2gQZuA_q1LYdL-V5OEy-B6635HYTzMgTaAFc9Ii7qUy2_LY7ppq087B4Cj1GVy9TsCeK8i8DAcEYl9mcYOrehQzRGvdZyJs/s320/IMG_9571.jpeg" width="207" /></a></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div>Like Nico above (ironically), I knew only the vaguest details about this person called Robert Oppenheimer. I knew of the Manhattan Project, of course, and of the Trinity test site in the desert of New Mexico, and of the twin horrible mornings of August 6, 1945, in Hiroshima, Japan, and August 9, 1945, in Nagasaki, Japan.</div><div><br /></div><div>Oh, and I also knew of the name Oppenheimer and his "deadly toy" from Sting's 1985 hit, "Russians." <i>[Aside: Such is my life.] </i></div><div><br /></div><div>This is one of the most intensely thorough and well-written biographies I've ever read. Published in 2005 but started 25 years before, historian Martin J. Sherwin eventually recruited the aid of fellow writer and historian Kai Bird to assist in the researching, and the interviewing, and the writing, and the rewriting of the massive undertaking. Sherwin would not live to see the publication of the book, but Bird would follow on and see the long project through to its completion. The book, an eventual Pulitzer Prize winner, resurfaced this past year, of course, serving as much of the skeleton of Christopher Nolan's critically acclaimed 2023 film, <i>Oppenheimer</i>. I wanted to read the book to learn more about the enigmatic, prickly genius in the desert, so I could--if nothing else--perhaps have a better understanding of the man and of his resultant "tragedy" before going into the film.</div><div><br /></div><div>I'm glad I did.</div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><b><span style="color: #e06666; font-size: large;"><i>The Shards</i> (2023) -- Bret Easton Ellis</span></b></div><div><br /></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh09ltc9dRU6A4KcoOzITtIpdAO6ZPDAk2UcWtdp6NHzTLWUacemJsZXPxrEXT6qrIzvPBQsCAKnnYWOwacHhXdaZtOAYW4f1P9Sl0HJwy54pepST3xKRpnBfL2N-Ld3F3QuWoP-GCIKSzEs56jT1kAG8OGGr5HiWc8NTar0TI8UooZcbINPWS5fZsMCug/s1000/IMG_9572.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1000" data-original-width="684" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh09ltc9dRU6A4KcoOzITtIpdAO6ZPDAk2UcWtdp6NHzTLWUacemJsZXPxrEXT6qrIzvPBQsCAKnnYWOwacHhXdaZtOAYW4f1P9Sl0HJwy54pepST3xKRpnBfL2N-Ld3F3QuWoP-GCIKSzEs56jT1kAG8OGGr5HiWc8NTar0TI8UooZcbINPWS5fZsMCug/s320/IMG_9572.jpeg" width="219" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Bret Easton Ellis, a young writer who came of age in the early-mid 1980s as a member of the Gen X "literary Brat Pack," published his first novel, <i>Less Than Zero</i>, in 1985 when he was only 21 years old. He was immediately on the cultural map of the day, thrust into the chaos of instant stardom and celebrity. Other books would follow, including 1991's notorious <i>American Psycho</i>--to date still his most successful novel, as well as his most controversial. Though embraced by some readers upon its initial release, <i>American Psycho</i> was generally reviled and misunderstood and labeled as misogynistic trash. (This reader, however, still regards Ellis' third novel highly: I would rank it as one of the most important books of the 1990s decade, not to mention one of the greatest sustained satires in contemporary American fiction since Joseph Heller's <i>Catch-22</i>. Seriously.)</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">But all of that aside, Ellis' writing career since his heyday has grown spotty at best. It's been 13 years since the publication of <i>Imperial Bedrooms</i> (2010), a sequel to his famous 1985 debut. And then in 2023 we saw the arrival of <i>The Shards</i>, a fictional-memoir of Ellis' senior year in high school in the Hollywood Hills of 1981. Ellis himself (or at least a fictionalized version of himself) is the book's main character and narrator, recounting events that occurred involving a series of brutal murders in the area, and growing to include, eventually, him and his intimate circle of friends.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">It is an odd mixture, in a way, of his two most famous novels, and though at times the plotting is a bit slow, a bit stretched out, a bit too gratuitous and fantastical, it becomes apparent that there is method at work to the telling of the tale. And Ellis tells it well. He is still a skillful and assured writer, and this is a compelling "comeback."</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="color: #8e7cc3;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><b><span style="color: #e06666; font-size: large;"><i>The Last Chairlift</i> (2022) -- John Irving</span></b></div><div><br /></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh31Bl__RvVJWBZBrSyucCAmyJQpR-0RBAcN5WYhnpXebVv-4hexxKdX06LNAGm9fiNF2MF4tB9o5Yi6SscRskfwgkdt1NCISAKb9yq76lJbxCJn_oXGXMBvpLCNo1NteXHV51n5oCJUq7uqjVbkl_ZrFR1uPBO3s034IllFbokEVeADwigSBeDwkcy0Nk/s1000/IMG_9573.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1000" data-original-width="668" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh31Bl__RvVJWBZBrSyucCAmyJQpR-0RBAcN5WYhnpXebVv-4hexxKdX06LNAGm9fiNF2MF4tB9o5Yi6SscRskfwgkdt1NCISAKb9yq76lJbxCJn_oXGXMBvpLCNo1NteXHV51n5oCJUq7uqjVbkl_ZrFR1uPBO3s034IllFbokEVeADwigSBeDwkcy0Nk/s320/IMG_9573.jpeg" width="214" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">John Irving has always been a friend to left-wing politics and policies in this country. His novels are replete with the often disenfranchised, overlooked, misunderstood, mistreated, and misfit characters from the outlying world of the "perverse," of the taboo, of the socially unacceptable. From his breakout fourth novel and his first masterpiece, <i>The World According to Garp</i> (1978), in which he dealt with gender issues (primarily women and transgender...long before "transgender" was a catchword in the culture); to another masterpiece, <i>The Cider House Rules</i> (1985), in which he took on the issue of incest and the argument, again, of women's rights--particularly, this time, abortion; to yet another masterpiece (and still one of my favorite novels), <i>A Prayer for Owen Meany</i> (1989), taking aim, among several other things, at the Vietnam War and the 1960's counter-culture/Anti-War movement at home.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">He is, without a doubt, one of my favorites. I think he is an American treasure. At 81 years of age, this--his latest novel--is "only" his 15th. He doesn't put books out quickly. Some of this is because: 1.) He is, by his own admission, a slow writer, agonizing over the work, shaping it, perfecting it, beginning--quite literally--with the last chapter and the last scene of each book, knowing, in detail, how the story will end, and then working backwards from there; and 2.) Many, if not most, of his greatest novels are long novels, densely packed with characters, and plot, and detail. It is no secret, in fact, that one of his favorite authors, and a great influence on his own writing, is the 19th-century English writer Charles Dickens. This affection for classical 19th-century European novels is of huge importance to Irving's writing. He is a modern 19th-century artist at his core; but whereas his hero, Dickens, could turn out massive tomes with the ease of breathing, it would seem, Irving labors over a book. He takes his time.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">My point is, I don't know how many more novels Irving has left in him. He has said, in interviews for this book, that he thinks of each of his novels in terms of trains: He envisions them sitting on rails at a station, awaiting their time. Some of these trains are shorter and some are longer. <i>The Last Chairlift</i>, he claims, is his last "long train." He doesn't have any more long books in him. And so the novel does--admittedly--read a bit like a Greatest Hits sort of novel, in a way. I don't mean that disparagingly, either. I say it with love and admiration of the man's lifework. But it is a book that clocks in at 900 pages. (Yes, that's not a typo.) And it is filled to the brim with "John Irving characters" living out their lives, working through their conflicts, and struggling their way through the densely-wrought construct of a "John Irving novel."</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">And I loved every last bit of it.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><b><span style="color: #e06666; font-size: large;"><i>The Ministry of Truth: The Biography of George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four</i> (2019) -- Dorian Lynskey</span></b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi4BM0o4qZbet536w7YYnBXVMHtLvKK-Ec5D7qI6sg9lZkF59oNPaxgAittmOSiJQP1oWgRz3MjAOc-twVOip7e2kkg7ZhmQUCjnZVEV_C9OgPzH-d_JCZEsBQpYstFcfpLONe8wvm6nKeqMMhYKcaLLnFpLJnZdB378ZbcA1jj2mXj4euaAK6_EcG-AdI/s1000/IMG_9574.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1000" data-original-width="657" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi4BM0o4qZbet536w7YYnBXVMHtLvKK-Ec5D7qI6sg9lZkF59oNPaxgAittmOSiJQP1oWgRz3MjAOc-twVOip7e2kkg7ZhmQUCjnZVEV_C9OgPzH-d_JCZEsBQpYstFcfpLONe8wvm6nKeqMMhYKcaLLnFpLJnZdB378ZbcA1jj2mXj4euaAK6_EcG-AdI/s320/IMG_9574.jpeg" width="210" /></a></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div>Reportedly, when Donald Trump won the election to the U.S. Presidency in 2016 and summarily took office, sales of George Orwell's classic science fiction/dystopian novel <i>Nineteen Eighty-Four</i> saw an increase in sales of 9,500%.</div><div><br /></div><div><i>[Aside: Let's just stop and think about that number for a moment....]</i></div><div><br /></div><div>Spurred on, partly, by such a cultural phenomenon, author Dorian Lynskey took on the task of writing: 1.) A deep-dive exploration into Orwell's literary precursors and influences: 2.) A mini-biography of Orwell himself and his subsequent involvement as a journalist in the Spanish Civil War (indispensable to the formation of the young writer's political leanings and artistic temperament); and 3.) a short but incisive literary disentanglement of Orwell's classic political novels <i>Animal Farm</i> (1945) and most particularly (obviously) <i>Nineteen Eighty-Four </i>(1949), as well as their possible connections to our current day, since, after all, "Who controls the past controls the future; who controls the present controls the past...." (<i>Nineteen Eighty-Four</i>).</div><div><br /></div><div>Not only for book-nerds and literary-buffs, Lynskey's book is accessible, readable, enjoyable, and highly thought-provoking.</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><b><span style="color: #e06666; font-size: large;"><i>Rememberings</i> (2021) -- Sinead O'Connor</span></b></div><div><br /></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgV_ChRE6QJ5BiQgudKxlSe8A20nCL58AHh6VzdjDkKojxMmnExyplVqZIZtiU4LfJHA6p2FGaX1l2T7UqKtgu2ZbTSIgiHdivsRP_1RGA9wsXqcSBoU7WnFWxX-aHxMeJkG3tS0s5XvB3BJDy-FlZCWT-Wubl6LviiRE2i90FF81DObi3nH5ZjfYf2K58/s500/IMG_9576.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="500" data-original-width="333" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgV_ChRE6QJ5BiQgudKxlSe8A20nCL58AHh6VzdjDkKojxMmnExyplVqZIZtiU4LfJHA6p2FGaX1l2T7UqKtgu2ZbTSIgiHdivsRP_1RGA9wsXqcSBoU7WnFWxX-aHxMeJkG3tS0s5XvB3BJDy-FlZCWT-Wubl6LviiRE2i90FF81DObi3nH5ZjfYf2K58/s320/IMG_9576.jpeg" width="213" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">This is a true story: </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">It was 1990. I was a 23-year old young man, without--presumably--a care in the world, lounging around one afternoon and watching MTV. Suddenly a face appears on the television screen--a woman's face, a young woman, finely sculpted, wearing a black turtleneck, standing in front of a black background, her hair buzzed short, and her eyes...oh my God the most amazing piercingly-blue wide eyes staring directly into the camera, directly beyond MTV, directly through the television screen, and directly at me. And the voice, her voice, that begins to sing over a simple resonant chord, eventually joining with a drumbeat and backing music and vocals, comes out of her mouth and suddenly makes whatever I thought I was doing that afternoon seem completely, utterly meaningless....</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">The song/video was "Nothing Compares 2 U." The singer, I would come to find out, was a young Irish artist by the exotic and sexy name, Sinead O'Connor. And all I could help thinking at the time was: "<i>Who the fuck is this</i>?!"</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">I immediately rushed out and snatched up a copy of her then-current CD, <i>I Do Not Want What I Haven't Got</i> (still, to this day, one of my favorite albums; a great collection of songs, with not one weak link in it), and soon picked up her previous album, as well, <i>The Lion and the Cobra</i> (1987). For months--a long stretch of 1990 and into the following year--O'Connor's CDs were on constant rotation in either my car or on my home stereo. I could not get enough of her.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">And then the bottom fell out when she made her infamous October 3, 1992 appearance on <i>Saturday Night Live</i> and sang Bob Marley's 1976 protest song, "War" (complete with some of her own original lyrics related to child abuse), finishing off the performance with yelling into the microphone, "Fight the real enemy!", and tearing up a photo of Pope John Paul II (taken from her mother's bedroom years before), and dropping the pieces to the stage floor in stunned silence. <i>[Aside: I remember watching all of that too....]</i></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">In an age before "cancel culture" was a nominal thing, Sinead O'Connor was promptly, summarily "canceled." </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">When I saw in the bookstore a new memoir from her a few years ago, I knew I had to have it. I hadn't heard anything from her or about her for a while. I was curious. And I let the book sit on my shelf for a time, until this past year when I decided to pull it down and give it a read.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Literally weeks upon finishing her book and closing the back cover, the news came out last summer about her sudden, untimely death. And amidst the sadness of her life, and her career (both its highs and lows), and her early ending, there was and is and always will be her music and her voice. And it reminds us of her raw, primal talent. And it leaves us wanting exactly what we haven't got.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><b><span style="color: #e06666; font-size: large;"><i>Wading in Waist-High Water:</i></span></b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><b><span style="color: #e06666; font-size: large;"><i>The Lyrics of Fleet Foxes</i> (2022) -- Robin Pecknold</span></b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiWiYsp7LTRCzAPb9A8FB-vKDMJMPtwlBZHeQKS7-i7QrCPSUsKNQrkMAzVdVJ4uZ4K2RT3H9_lZ_7q0tbOz8bKmeDwlWgGjgwbJ2n-OYu-kxpFezJx7y8peTZmvBa5_ZTNK92QkiEiFOUkbUZOYjdHP9wp6GLJT2Z6XN7sLcNTp-Ne4U8Y2UB6_uNw86I/s1000/IMG_9577.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1000" data-original-width="706" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiWiYsp7LTRCzAPb9A8FB-vKDMJMPtwlBZHeQKS7-i7QrCPSUsKNQrkMAzVdVJ4uZ4K2RT3H9_lZ_7q0tbOz8bKmeDwlWgGjgwbJ2n-OYu-kxpFezJx7y8peTZmvBa5_ZTNK92QkiEiFOUkbUZOYjdHP9wp6GLJT2Z6XN7sLcNTp-Ne4U8Y2UB6_uNw86I/s320/IMG_9577.jpeg" width="226" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Exactly as the title of the collection promises, this is Robin Pecknold's compiled poetry/lyrics of 55 songs, spanning the current studio albums (unbelievably only 5 to date) from Pecknold and his Seattle, WA band, Fleet Foxes. Formed in 2006 and releasing its first album in 2008, the band has gone on to accrue a devoted and finely focused fanbase. Its musically diverse arrangements, and fluid time signatures, and poetic lyrical content, and tight, harmonic vocals have given Fleet Foxes an almost impossible-to-categorize style. Suffice to say, I have heard the band's music labeled as "Prog Folk." (And that seems pretty accurate to me.)</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">I have listened to the band from the beginning. I have seen them live. I have followed their performances online. I know these songs front and back.... Or at least I thought I did. And what this book makes clear is that there are layers to these songs--lyrically, metaphorically, tonally--that I had not noticed before nor even thought about before. What becomes clear reading the songs' lyrics this way--turning the book's pages, absorbing the songs' recurring imagery, metaphor, subject matter--is just how close all of this really <i>is</i> to poetry, and subsequently how closely all of the songs work together to form a complete body of work. Themes of love, destiny, family, loss, nature, friendship, and finding a way to lead an honest, authentic life are all floating through the ether of Pecknold's poems.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Reading this slim volume made me appreciate even more a band that I already loved. What a great little book.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><b><span style="color: #e06666; font-size: large;"><i>Amusing Ourselves to Death:</i></span></b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><b><span style="color: #e06666; font-size: large;"><i>Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business</i> (1985)</span></b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><b><span style="color: #e06666; font-size: large;">-- Neil Postman</span></b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEin5sTWYIwei-4FT_1FduANURF_PLAwa3rWzhUBRGh6JRj9UtpoWrFZkrzugy020_XLdxI7eT7jD992T4TdsXGzGn5vzebQi9bcXmu6tE_XjjG30pH4fG5kS2S-K9ZCDDX91Bmliv2ukhti49EZuTSdSreLui4cPL_VjZxqbVBJaIbjFScyDKmdfglhGAs/s1242/IMG_9578.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1242" data-original-width="810" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEin5sTWYIwei-4FT_1FduANURF_PLAwa3rWzhUBRGh6JRj9UtpoWrFZkrzugy020_XLdxI7eT7jD992T4TdsXGzGn5vzebQi9bcXmu6tE_XjjG30pH4fG5kS2S-K9ZCDDX91Bmliv2ukhti49EZuTSdSreLui4cPL_VjZxqbVBJaIbjFScyDKmdfglhGAs/s320/IMG_9578.jpeg" width="209" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">A bombshell when it first appeared in 1985, this book originally grew from a talk given by Neil Postman (a former educator) a year earlier in 1984--that strange "Orwellian year"--when he was asked to participate on a panel regarding the novel <i>Nineteen Eighty-Four</i> and its relation to the contemporary world. Postman chose to hold up in comparison the two classic British dystopian novels of the mid-20th century, Orwell's novel (1949) and Aldous Huxley's <i>Brave New World</i> (1932). His thesis then was that it is, in fact, Huxley's novel that reflects most closely the times we find ourselves in. As Postman points out, it is Huxley's future nightmare that sees society satiated, bored, contented, numbed with state-controlled entertainment and amusement, as opposed to Orwell's future nightmare that sees society numbed by state-controlled secrecy, propaganda, fear, torture, terrorism, violence, and death. According to Postman, it is a Huxleyian world we inhabit more than an Orwellian world.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Of course all of this was originally written and published almost 40 years ago, in the dusky past of Reagan's 1985, when the advent of 24-hr. cable news (CNN) and sports (ESPN) and entertainment (MTV) was in the ascendancy. Postman was talking about TV and its malignant threat to society--the dumbing-down, the lowering of standards, the dependence on technology, the demise of creativity, of rationality, of human intention and ambition and thought....</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">It doesn't take a genius to read Postman's pronouncements from 1985 and make the leap to 2023, where we all have instant, around-the-clock access to--forget about simple television--a viable computer now in our pocket, at our fingertips, ready to go at all times, listening to us, watching us, directing us, making decisions for us, entertaining us, filling our days, guiding our lives.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">We're in trouble, and Postman saw it 40 years ago. This is a book that, frighteningly, is maybe even more relevant today than when it was first published. Essential reading for anyone who cares.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><b><span style="color: #e06666; font-size: large;"><i>The Human Stain</i> (2000) -- Philip Roth</span></b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjmXEw0npcsD3yNIYMiUBx6aeTk5_leRW5-Q_u60icYA9yWeVZDnGlyWht5MvP_H83ufmHXEQnSdj0yHcHzK03bnittEV7i11B1Xlx9daxwvKbm09iXzZ_s_O2CpHvC_f7fEd-5CmwfoFT5Hrs90rDU6U6EmSY1MBTc1rcm7brItifGlqzWqqwwWK3Bhb8/s1000/IMG_9579.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1000" data-original-width="648" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjmXEw0npcsD3yNIYMiUBx6aeTk5_leRW5-Q_u60icYA9yWeVZDnGlyWht5MvP_H83ufmHXEQnSdj0yHcHzK03bnittEV7i11B1Xlx9daxwvKbm09iXzZ_s_O2CpHvC_f7fEd-5CmwfoFT5Hrs90rDU6U6EmSY1MBTc1rcm7brItifGlqzWqqwwWK3Bhb8/s320/IMG_9579.jpeg" width="207" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">I use phrases a lot when talking about writers I admire: "One of the great living writers," I might say; or "A great contemporary author," possibly; or "One of the best writers of the past 50 years," etc.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">But if I'm asked to choose a "greatest" among American writers who has either recently passed or who is still alive and writing, I believe Philip Roth will be one of three who--in times to come--will be mentioned as one of the great American novelists of the last half of the 20th century and the opening decades of the 21st century. I believe he will be mentioned the same way we talk about great, foundational writers of the (fairly) recent past--novelists like Steinbeck, and Fitzgerald, and Hemingway, and Faulkner. The legends. The heavyweights. The artists.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">I think Roth is that good, that important, that lasting.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><i>The Human Stain</i>, published in 2000, forms the third part of a loose "trilogy," of sorts (more like a triptych, I suppose), starting with the great <i>American Pastoral</i> (1997) and continued one year later with <i>I Married a Communist </i>(1998).</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">The book's narrator, the writer Nathan Zuckerman (who appears in several earlier Roth novels and is at times considered to be a fictional stand-in for Roth himself) is the common thread that runs through the three novels. In <i>The Human Stain</i>, Zuckerman is approached by Coleman Silk, a retired eminent classics professor at a prestigious East-coast college, who left his teaching career in disgrace after being accused, by some students, of making a racially insensitive slur in his classroom. Silk, who resigned in disgrace then (in order to avoid scandal) enlists Zuckerman to tell his story.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">And the story of Silk's life is a stunner. As is Roth's novel, here. His writing is so clear, and crisp, and potent, and powerful. Roth was an absolute master, and this is yet another late-career work of art from him. It is a work of genius.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><b><span style="color: #e06666; font-size: large;"><i>The Queen's Gambit</i> (1983) -- Walter Tevis</span></b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><b><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></b></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg0Mq0fyuHUKKHM2ZiLsJ6yXC2WTnlGJbbdGWwcbMEt5qW6SF4XqE_hWb_Bkr_XXKtPtVa4j8TbbUCfik5v9a-nMpOLMqdIZrXI2gFyWroyv-EgzNNXlJAL7w8TM4pDRujlKoaehu8OcU6Sm7FE3ZenqQUHTPlr81Xwv2efmHvD89ID84mg6eICCu-Vsis/s1000/IMG_9580.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1000" data-original-width="648" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg0Mq0fyuHUKKHM2ZiLsJ6yXC2WTnlGJbbdGWwcbMEt5qW6SF4XqE_hWb_Bkr_XXKtPtVa4j8TbbUCfik5v9a-nMpOLMqdIZrXI2gFyWroyv-EgzNNXlJAL7w8TM4pDRujlKoaehu8OcU6Sm7FE3ZenqQUHTPlr81Xwv2efmHvD89ID84mg6eICCu-Vsis/s320/IMG_9580.jpeg" width="207" /></a></div><div><br /></div><p style="text-align: left;">Let's be clear: While I suppose there is some perverse desire deep inside me to foster a misguided notion in people that I'm an avid chess player--and not only an avid chess player but a <i>good</i> avid chess player--the truth is that while, yes, I have played chess before, and yes, I have read books about chess, and while I am interested in the game and can sit before a board and move pieces around and literally "play" chess, I am not a good chess player; I am certainly not an avid chess player; and if I'm really pressed to be honest, I don't even know if I can claim that I fully understand the game.</p><p style="text-align: left;">But I know I would like to. I have always wanted to <i>be</i> a chess player. For some reason I have always wanted to be <i>that guy</i>--the one who knows the game, who can talk about classic matches, classic moves, classic openings, classic endings.</p><p style="text-align: left;">But I'm not. And I'm okay with that. (I guess.) And so while I'm being honest I will admit that, like many readers, I suppose, I came to Walter Tevis' "little chess novel" by way of its 2020 miniseries on Netflix, starring Anya Taylor-Joy in the lead role of Beth Harmon.</p><p style="text-align: left;">That movie adaptation was fantastic, I thought. Tevis' book is even better. Possibly most well known for his tough, classic 1959 debut novel, <i>The Hustler</i> (turned into the equally great film starring Paul Newman and Jackie Gleason), Tevis would also gain notoriety for subsequent novels (as well as their popular film adaptations) like 1963's <i>The Man Who Fell to Earth</i> (with its psychedelic, trippy sci-fi fantasia starring David Bowie), and his sequel to <i>The Hustler</i>, 1984's <i>The Color of Money </i>(which would, in turn, be translated to the screen by the great Martin Scorsese).</p><p style="text-align: left;">But back to <i>The Queen's Gambit</i>, for the moment<i>--</i>a quiet, unassuming, brilliant, perfectly written little novel, with every word in its right place, nothing absent, nothing wanting, complete. Read it.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div>David Newsomhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02698845610286763351noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1218241678607183535.post-30375194055129959542024-01-03T21:39:00.000-08:002024-01-06T06:52:15.909-08:00Rumors of Cinema's Death Have Been Greatly Exaggerated: Movies in 2023<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgkJVjMYReFaQO3PokNTYSmeL4bfwlyOU8QSrB8C_oTLILocA2x4z_b_00nVpoY9VV8TVaosFhJX20jMDSZhPXgxf8bTvqyWjrLhQmZAAPBLo4J1Vm5h8PHkzKCahnYUSPk02_o432p5FUAwL19qVxm_2k7tRwOK4JmwoOtU-H1lXpytMX9cNJzp-d3VEk/s1024/IMG_9545.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="768" data-original-width="1024" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgkJVjMYReFaQO3PokNTYSmeL4bfwlyOU8QSrB8C_oTLILocA2x4z_b_00nVpoY9VV8TVaosFhJX20jMDSZhPXgxf8bTvqyWjrLhQmZAAPBLo4J1Vm5h8PHkzKCahnYUSPk02_o432p5FUAwL19qVxm_2k7tRwOK4JmwoOtU-H1lXpytMX9cNJzp-d3VEk/w400-h300/IMG_9545.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div><br /></div>All told, 2023 shaped up to be an important and integral year of movies. <p></p><p>Audiences came back to the movie theaters in droves, and the movie theaters repaid audiences with an array of smart, edgy, expressive films, taking on a variety of subjects, and styles, and stories. A respected filmmaker like Martin Scorsese could, earlier in the year, speak to the press regarding what he saw as trends in the movie industry hinting at the destruction of the movies--his interviews and published statements read like a veritable Jeremiad warning of the possible demise of cinema as an art form--only to release, later in the year, his own new film, putting his words into action. Rather than simply <i>telling</i> people what the problems are in today's films, Scorsese <i>showed</i> people what he meant. He showed, through his own art, what a great film still looks and sounds like. He demonstrated how to keep the art of cinema alive.<i> [Aside: What balls....]</i></p><p>Looking back over the year that was is always a fun endeavor as a cinephile. Sometimes there's no discernible reason why you like something; you just do. Sometimes it's maybe the way you felt at the time and how it all comes back to you upon review. Sometimes it's the craft and the care of the thing in question. Sometimes it's the story, or the form, or the sound, or the look, or the style, or the overall feel that washes over you as you think back on it.</p><p>The traditional end-of-year "Best Of" lists are always subjective and often pointless. It is a ridiculous notion to rank "The Best" movies of a year just recently past when you're obviously dealing with a list of titles from an array of different filmmakers, and different stories, and different visions. </p><p>Because such an undertaking is grounded in each viewer's personal taste, there's certainly no perfect science to it. There's no real method involved, other than some primal, instinctual "gut" feeling for those films that stirred something in you, that moved you, made you laugh, made you think, made you wonder, and made you feel. And that's obviously going to be different for everyone.</p><p>For what it's worth, then, here are some of my favorite memories at the movies in 2023. Notice I'm not referring to it as a "Best Of" list, ranked in order of preference. I'm not going to do that. </p><p><i>[Aside: I'm not (darn it) a professional film critic. I don't get paid to go to movies and to then review them. (Dammit...) I do this kind of thing because I love movies and always have. And I love discussing movies and always have. And while I saw a lot of new films this past year and loved a lot of what I saw, I by no means saw everything. There are some titles--as of this writing--that I either haven't yet had a chance to see or that haven't yet been released in the United States: Movies like the great Kelly Reichardt's </i>Showing Up<i>, Cord Jefferson's </i>American Fiction<i>, Aki Kaurismaki's </i>Fallen Leaves<i>, the legendary Victor Erice's "coming-out-of-retirement" film </i>Close Your Eyes<i>, Jonathan Glazer's </i>The Zone of Interest<i>, Yorgos Lanthimos' </i>Poor Things<i>, and the masterful German director Wim Wenders' latest film, </i>Perfect Days<i>. Had I already seen a few of these films--and others that come to mind--I feel fairly certain they would be appearing somewhere on the list below. As it is, though, I haven't seen everything, and so several fine films are unavoidably absent. This is the way.]</i></p><p>Maybe some of these films--most of them--could be considered some of the <i>best</i> movies of the year, across the board. But maybe not.... Whatever the case, these are the ones I liked the most. In a year that turned out to be chock full of great movies, these are the movies I thought were the greatest--the films that worked most effectively (for me, anyway) at keeping the wonderful art of cinema alive.</p><p style="text-align: center;"><b>____________________</b></p><p style="text-align: center;"><b><br /></b></p><p style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: medium;">* The films below are listed alphabetically, by the filmmakers' last names.</span></p><p style="text-align: center;"><b><u><br /></u></b></p><p style="text-align: center;"><b><span style="font-size: large;">10 FAVORITE FILMS OF 2023</span></b></p><p style="text-align: center;"><b style="font-style: italic; text-align: left;"><i><b><i> </i></b></i></b></p><p style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: #e06666; font-size: large; text-align: left;"><b><i>Asteroid City</i> -- Wes Anderson</b></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; font-style: italic; font-weight: bold; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg6oheZfZKrIhjuRjdE4l6Bkzr02asdzbTQ6Y_fhQB-Tswx4RLZOwcrkFUCNU1JhQ4icNfzfh4KSwbVBzcAwmBA8B5Yrz1YmqOc_rweN3OpDpcniBKsyvpXf6Vf0NuaDgMw90YfwytOmrcfc4t8u6wLBcvOu4k0VhoeYjkIG3M5gzX_ZsDEGHjWafuWa7k/s1200/IMG_9454.webp" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="765" data-original-width="1200" height="204" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg6oheZfZKrIhjuRjdE4l6Bkzr02asdzbTQ6Y_fhQB-Tswx4RLZOwcrkFUCNU1JhQ4icNfzfh4KSwbVBzcAwmBA8B5Yrz1YmqOc_rweN3OpDpcniBKsyvpXf6Vf0NuaDgMw90YfwytOmrcfc4t8u6wLBcvOu4k0VhoeYjkIG3M5gzX_ZsDEGHjWafuWa7k/s320/IMG_9454.webp" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; font-style: italic; font-weight: bold; text-align: left;"><b><i><br /></i></b></div>Anyone who knows me (a little or a lot) probably knows what a fan I am of Wes Anderson's films. If we're close and we've "talked film" before, there's a chance his name and his work has come up in conversation. If someone has followed this blog for any time and has read my year-end movie reviews in the past, you will possibly recognize my devotion to Anderson's films in my annual list of the year's favorites. I don't do this just to be stubborn or because I feel I need to live up to some precedent set by myself. I do it because I genuinely admire him as a distinct film artist (one of the most distinct film artists--with one of the most distinctive visions and visual styles of storytelling--working in the world today). His work is entertaining, thoughtful, and important to me.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">But my opinion of him and of his films is not shared by everyone. I know that. And I understand why. The vaunted "Wes Anderson Style"--practiced and perfected since his debut in 1996 with <i>Bottle Rocket</i>, the elaborated feature-film version of his original college-student short--has, for many viewers, really grown tiresome and thin over the decades. But I'm a holdout: I'm still a big fan. I'm still all in. And Anderson's 11th feature film this past year sees him hitting a new benchmark, I believe, in visual storytelling, narrative structure, and thematic exploration of many of his familiar concerns (loss, grief, family, loneliness, despair, community, acceptance, love).</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><b style="font-style: italic; font-weight: bold;"><br /></b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><b><b><span style="color: #e06666; font-size: large;"><i>Priscilla </i>-- Sofia Coppola</span></b></b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><b><b><br /></b></b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; font-weight: bold; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjetSvCU-vCXrUJxShy6LrVxQdk9nYXSNk8_0uhakkYuaA4onAnE_ndVO26jS8LlZCCUijqMr90uWGqEaFpyLby8oSA5WC26oMRt8xD6DTcd3dSXy9-xTSl1G-4EybE1ZPUzSa71KRL-v7TyXZHuIAomZYl3WFNfOCEOyVaUsBZet9w2vTrHkMRR4YOlls/s3000/IMG_9455.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1688" data-original-width="3000" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjetSvCU-vCXrUJxShy6LrVxQdk9nYXSNk8_0uhakkYuaA4onAnE_ndVO26jS8LlZCCUijqMr90uWGqEaFpyLby8oSA5WC26oMRt8xD6DTcd3dSXy9-xTSl1G-4EybE1ZPUzSa71KRL-v7TyXZHuIAomZYl3WFNfOCEOyVaUsBZet9w2vTrHkMRR4YOlls/w320-h180/IMG_9455.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div style="text-align: left;">Sofia Coppola's dizzyingly lovely-and-tough interpretation of Priscilla Presley's 1985 memoir, <i>Elvis and Me</i>, is wonderful, charming, disarming, sad, and impressive as hell. Like the book it's based on, Coppola's film offers a close look at the relationship between Priscilla and the King of Rock-and-Roll, spanning the years of 1959 (when 14-year old Priscilla Beaulieu was first introduced to the world's biggest music star of the day...10 years her senior <i>[Aside: yes, the creepiness factor of 24-year old Elvis grooming the young, beautiful freshman in high school is a little hard to watch in 2023]</i>), to 1973, when Priscilla decides to leave Elvis in the depth of his drunken, drugged-out stupor of fame and celebrity. It is a smart, clever, stylish, insightful film--familiar trademarks of Coppola's finest work--with top-shelf acting from its leads (Cailee Spaeny and Jacob Elordi), ethereal cinematography from Philipe Le Sourd, and Coppola's usual brilliance as director.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">Like Wes Anderson above, Sofia Coppola is a somewhat divisive filmmaker who can separate audiences into at least two different camps. You either buy into her dreamy, shoe-gazey, poetic visuals and her light-as-air narrative style, or you don't. I love her work. And <i>Priscilla</i>, her 8th feature film, is no exception. It's a strong return to form for her. It's one of her best films in years.</div></div><p style="text-align: center;"><b><span style="font-size: medium;"><i><br /></i></span></b></p><p style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: #e06666; font-size: large;"><b><span><i>Spider-Man: Across the Spider-verse -- </i>Joaquim Dos Santos, </span></b><b>Justin K. Thompson, </b><b>Kemp Powers</b></span></p><p style="text-align: center;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgFYcPT_68Uh6NHuQq3oYe6QHaDe1VvLgwnRdlCZkf6vAH49A17ivuXyZjndkpOGpgAmJZGEd1IuWRLeEm8XkrD3CT_ue2tCuDfDMxya4VLNLVComzeBJ5ngBfkh7hrHYEmdfkCKIUOldGYABPiWTDsx2xnxbfVZNm2IzqZ0fryEbPWlnJ8OnyJbLkO4eI/s768/IMG_9457.webp" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="432" data-original-width="768" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgFYcPT_68Uh6NHuQq3oYe6QHaDe1VvLgwnRdlCZkf6vAH49A17ivuXyZjndkpOGpgAmJZGEd1IuWRLeEm8XkrD3CT_ue2tCuDfDMxya4VLNLVComzeBJ5ngBfkh7hrHYEmdfkCKIUOldGYABPiWTDsx2xnxbfVZNm2IzqZ0fryEbPWlnJ8OnyJbLkO4eI/s320/IMG_9457.webp" width="320" /></a></div><br />I don't know that I found any movie more entertaining than this one in 2023. This thing is just flat-out fun, a laser-light fireworks show of all that contemporary animation can do. From beginning to end, wall-to-wall, the movie is packed--every corner of every frame--with details and delights that reward with each rewatch. But it's the human story--the characters' arcs, their journeys, their relationships with one another (husbands and wives, fathers and mothers, sons and daughters, young love, obligations, parents, children, responsibilities, fear, anger, resentment, reconciliation)--that really makes this movie pay off. <div><br /></div><div>The second "Act" of any classical 3-part story structure is generally the most important to a well-told story. A third film (Act III) of this <i>Spider-verse</i> story is currently under production. I can't imagine how the filmmakers are going to top this installment of the trilogy. (But I look forward to finding out.)</div><div><br /><p></p><p style="text-align: center;"><b><span style="color: #e06666; font-size: large;"><i>May December -- </i>Todd Haynes</span></b></p><p style="text-align: center;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjo5dANyN7rZTnBFPXIxxiwfI2avu0PpVSa27o46HN6O23orKQQNjfKhijIOnmXToBuysJH4PQJISMYSvraayFiCtoSfM6jJk1OdO4q9ovtWYyx33L5ENgnuK6VIMBgxuCPsMpQql1-Hv-yP0BN4dl9CAFZ_WGk8-EkgEhIg03nixa96odxTtFBLWCcsH0/s1280/IMG_9458.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="720" data-original-width="1280" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjo5dANyN7rZTnBFPXIxxiwfI2avu0PpVSa27o46HN6O23orKQQNjfKhijIOnmXToBuysJH4PQJISMYSvraayFiCtoSfM6jJk1OdO4q9ovtWYyx33L5ENgnuK6VIMBgxuCPsMpQql1-Hv-yP0BN4dl9CAFZ_WGk8-EkgEhIg03nixa96odxTtFBLWCcsH0/s320/IMG_9458.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><br />It's possible the same could be said of filmmaker Todd Haynes what American novelist/essayist John Updike once famously said of fellow author J.D. Salinger (of <i>The Catcher in the Rye</i> fame): "He loves his characters more than God does."</div><div><br /></div><div>From <i>Safe</i> (1995), to <i>Velvet Goldmine</i> (1998), to <i>I'm Not There</i> (2007), to <i>Carol </i>(2015), to 2023's <i>May December</i>, Haynes has consistently explored risky, or dangerous, or transgressive themes and characters and narratives. He does the same here in his examination of truth and artifice, as well as the artifice in truth, and the truth in artifice. And running through all of it are the strong performances that one has come to expect in a Haynes film--particularly this time from the two female leads, Julianne Moore and Natalie Portman, both of whom have received their share of much-deserved pre-Awards buzz.</div><div><br /></div><div><p></p><p style="text-align: center;"><b><span style="color: #e06666;"><i><span style="font-size: large;">The Boy and the Heron</span></i><span style="font-size: large;"> (original Japanese title:</span></span></b></p><p style="text-align: center;"><b><span><span style="color: #e06666; font-size: large;"><i>How Do You Live?</i>) -- Hayao Miyazaki</span></span></b></p><p style="text-align: center;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgxvw7emj7bgL_ZWQfgjWy_fnG_TSHTctQLkBGXZ1B-frIbabHfr4MbiJXe-f0AYd3CcI8_ZgUmVCJfd82PpXH2LODOrI8evzBTNXRLgmxKtZbjlHCxTzmAzPD6etk6gBbUI1nv_vohCm6uAwNvOty-IXjAys_U4gMe2O5UAK-kxtO8NUkZEKClBEY-gqs/s1200/IMG_9459.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="675" data-original-width="1200" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgxvw7emj7bgL_ZWQfgjWy_fnG_TSHTctQLkBGXZ1B-frIbabHfr4MbiJXe-f0AYd3CcI8_ZgUmVCJfd82PpXH2LODOrI8evzBTNXRLgmxKtZbjlHCxTzmAzPD6etk6gBbUI1nv_vohCm6uAwNvOty-IXjAys_U4gMe2O5UAK-kxtO8NUkZEKClBEY-gqs/s320/IMG_9459.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><br />Legendary Japanese director Hayao Miyazaki supposedly announced his retirement in 2013, following the release of his own Studio Ghibli's 20th feature film, <i>The Wind Rises</i>--an animated historical biopic with some (not entirely uncommon) autobiographical touches from the film's then 72-year old writer/director.</div><div><br /></div><div>Regarding retirement, Miyazaki changed his mind. And now, 10 years later, the 82-year old filmmaker has released his latest concoction of autobiography, dream imagery, myth, fantasy, war, love, familial strains, friendship, atonement. It's all here on display. Familiar themes, familiar character types, familiar plot devices, familiar imagery. And while for some this may come across, finally, as a bit derivative and less-than his greatest work, I find it to be the same thing that a great artist like Monet was getting at with his countless waterlilies, and train stations, and haystacks in the rolling pastures of rural France. Miyazaki is an old master at his craft, and he is one of the world's great living filmmakers. And <i>The Boy and the Heron </i>is a late-career celebration of the man's unique vision and artistry--an important addition to his oeuvre.</div><div><br /><p></p><p style="text-align: center;"><b><span style="color: #e06666; font-size: large;"><i>Oppenheimer</i> -- Christopher Nolan</span></b></p><p style="text-align: center;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjFm8ROcIca_Y3_bULwvqvUdgVJSU-3RP4-eVSXQ4JaknSjrAvQnL2tM-pamlBfrPiWeapWyuhPkas7QLgaT0r6s2VV_SNNo_MasTRt-KQCvredlMPbvXWYNsuRZiQ2Zg4ixq9l2UI3K3O0Od5LvQFrPCJPDCvvQL-zrDnqNz_APNy1rxtQUuj3cD0cKXY/s1296/IMG_9460.webp" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="730" data-original-width="1296" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjFm8ROcIca_Y3_bULwvqvUdgVJSU-3RP4-eVSXQ4JaknSjrAvQnL2tM-pamlBfrPiWeapWyuhPkas7QLgaT0r6s2VV_SNNo_MasTRt-KQCvredlMPbvXWYNsuRZiQ2Zg4ixq9l2UI3K3O0Od5LvQFrPCJPDCvvQL-zrDnqNz_APNy1rxtQUuj3cD0cKXY/s320/IMG_9460.webp" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">No lesser Hollywood heavyweight than legendary writer/director Paul Schrader declared Christopher Nolan's latest film, <i>Oppenheimer</i>, to be "the greatest film of the century."</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Now, that is a lot.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">And while in many ways such a statement is more than likely a case of recency-biased hyperbole, you will swear--while sitting in the audience for Nolan's 3-hour intimate epic of the man and his "device" that changed the world--that maybe Schrader is onto something....</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">This is a damned good film. It's a great film. I believe this is Nolan's best work. And Cillian Murphy, unforgettable in his performance of the title character, is almost sure to win awards. It's a monumental achievement all the way around. If it's not the "movie of the century," it certainly feels like it.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><p></p><p style="text-align: center;"><b><span style="color: #e06666; font-size: large;"><i>The Holdovers</i> -- Alexander Payne</span></b></p><p style="text-align: center;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjOuNl3hVQuZTHpSLn0xGLIYhdJjwAaAPjJNi7c3a_XSlqB3PsO_9laNdyBFp-AFSTPWusKUD23Ldwab2gPdSDKin1b04rCebvKRvvCBes3b_jiaRAph6uDaNovvLFUqyv0CZAJxUmZB3q7H5OeFIbdZ4xody0M5f85DIGI7K7RW8uuKbqWIieu1ntSMG4/s744/IMG_9462.webp" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="495" data-original-width="744" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjOuNl3hVQuZTHpSLn0xGLIYhdJjwAaAPjJNi7c3a_XSlqB3PsO_9laNdyBFp-AFSTPWusKUD23Ldwab2gPdSDKin1b04rCebvKRvvCBes3b_jiaRAph6uDaNovvLFUqyv0CZAJxUmZB3q7H5OeFIbdZ4xody0M5f85DIGI7K7RW8uuKbqWIieu1ntSMG4/s320/IMG_9462.webp" width="320" /></a></div><br />I love Alexander Payne's films. More than likely, if the average, casual filmgoer were asked to mention a handful of the great American movies over the past 25 years, chances are Payne's filmography would not come to mind. (And therein, ironically, lies part of the secret of his artistry and his greatness.)</div><div><br /></div><div><i>Citizen Ruth</i> (1996). <i>Election</i> (1999). <i>About Schmidt</i> (2002). <i>Sideways</i> (2004). <i>The Descendants</i> (2011). <i>Nebraska</i> (2013)....</div><div><br /></div><div>Payne hails from the center of the country itself--the plains of Nebraska--and it is decidedly this quiet, unassuming, not-wanting-to-draw-attention-to-itself Midwest sensibility that informs all of his films and makes them the quiet, unassuming, masterful works of art that they are. You will not find flashy camera movement in his movies. Nor edgy editing or narrative playfulness. And this surface "simplicity" and minimalistic storytelling approach is deceptive. Because every one of those titles listed above is a great film. Payne makes distinctly American films, yes, but they are also saturated with his love of 1960's French and Italian films, as well as his love of the films from the great early-1970's cinema renaissance in America. Even in this work, his latest, you feel vibes from the likes of Jean-Luc Godard, and from Hal Ashby, and from Michelangelo Antonioni, and from Robert Altman. It doesn't unnecessarily call attention to itself, but these influences are all over <i>The Holdovers</i>. It is its lifeblood.</div><div><br /></div><div>This is a wonderful film. I love this movie.</div><div><br /></div><div><p></p><p style="text-align: center;"><b><span style="color: #e06666; font-size: large;"><i>Killers of the Flower Moon</i> -- Martin Scorsese</span></b></p><p style="text-align: center;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgEpOeNP1-oM7NnZwvTHeIPsWQ59WYvzo2SvsJpEX_f7T82KQzRP8po7B33d-_xW1RenRqlgBGruX5k5DmjtbE0r1JTJ8hTcHZFtlrfqqbrvbeug0R1s2vUn-dd2e0mJ4TwehDIBl-WGolMyGQfd4NfWfLfrdF8AUVDGPD9ZM5Uq0wtbxhHjXQz6cxZmx0/s2560/IMG_9463.webp" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1707" data-original-width="2560" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgEpOeNP1-oM7NnZwvTHeIPsWQ59WYvzo2SvsJpEX_f7T82KQzRP8po7B33d-_xW1RenRqlgBGruX5k5DmjtbE0r1JTJ8hTcHZFtlrfqqbrvbeug0R1s2vUn-dd2e0mJ4TwehDIBl-WGolMyGQfd4NfWfLfrdF8AUVDGPD9ZM5Uq0wtbxhHjXQz6cxZmx0/s320/IMG_9463.webp" width="320" /></a></div><br />I texted friends, upon seeing Martin Scorsese's film adaptation of David Grann's great 2017 book of journalistic reportage of the same name, something along the lines of: "I don't know if this is the best American film of the year, or if it's the equivalent of the mythic 'Great American Novel,' but it certainly is, quite possibly, 'The Great American Movie.'"</div><div><br /></div><div>With a sweeping statement like that, I didn't mean that Scorsese's latest is <i>the greatest American film ever made</i> (although the proverbial "jury" is still out, I suppose). I meant, more, that it is--philosophically, maybe--the greatest film about America ever made....</div><div><br /></div><div>(Again...the jury is out. But we'll see.)</div><div><br /></div><div>This is a beautiful, harsh, ugly, lovely, sensitive, painful, violent, honest, terrible, wonderful movie about the truth at the heart of the "greatness" that a country like America has always (vocally, anyway) aspired to. Scorsese has dedicated the bulk of his storied career to studying, in depth, the painful beauty of greed, and sin, and hatred, and love. At 81 years of age, he has never stopped pushing the envelope. He is a risk-taker, a maverick, a genius. And this is one of the best films of his legendary career. It is a late masterpiece.</div><div><p style="text-align: center;"><b><span style="font-size: medium;"><i><br /></i></span></b></p><p style="text-align: center;"><b><span style="color: #e06666; font-size: large;"><i>Past Lives</i> -- Celine Song</span></b></p><p style="text-align: center;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiWlDQwsQ2x3jGi4knTLlwFpgUEtBY-HIgq_zx6JgTwAtYqrQ3tePdkftYK7JsAFpeNx6UsEbeWMtmHob3hPXYz6TJxBap35YEcK3h8vykRdaCLrbaGFSUAwL6BXxQDTxL_HEYQuCgiiz6IrQUGTPEPqpmPHPX1sJEliGc4Urw8Rhnffl45BwYAAaskGqo/s1200/IMG_9464.webp" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="630" data-original-width="1200" height="168" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiWlDQwsQ2x3jGi4knTLlwFpgUEtBY-HIgq_zx6JgTwAtYqrQ3tePdkftYK7JsAFpeNx6UsEbeWMtmHob3hPXYz6TJxBap35YEcK3h8vykRdaCLrbaGFSUAwL6BXxQDTxL_HEYQuCgiiz6IrQUGTPEPqpmPHPX1sJEliGc4Urw8Rhnffl45BwYAAaskGqo/s320/IMG_9464.webp" width="320" /></a></div><br />This is the one movie that genuinely moved me more than any film this past year. It is simple in its presentation. It is minimalistic in its style and its approach. It is narratively straight-forward in the layout of its story, and its characters, and its "conflict."</div><div><br /></div><div>But...wow...does this thing work. It sneaks up on you. It's so affecting and so graceful and so powerful in its unmannered manner. The humanity expressed within its carefully regulated story. The scale of emotion--both expressed and repressed--among its trio of central characters. It's enough to make you hold your breath for fear that you might knock the whole thing over.</div><div><br /></div><div>And then the film's last moments....</div><div><br /></div><div>Suffice to say, the closing scene knocked my (emotional) legs out from under me. I was a wreck in the movie theater. (I'm man enough to admit that.) </div><div><br /></div><div><i>Past Lives</i> could very easily be my favorite movie of the year. Period. End stop. (A masterpiece. Undoubtedly.) Hailing from the theater, this is, amazingly, Celine Song's film debut as writer/director. I look forward to whatever she does next.</div><div><br /><p></p><p style="text-align: center;"><b><span style="color: #e06666; font-size: large;"><i>Anatomy of a Fall</i> -- Justine Triet</span></b></p><p style="text-align: center;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi0PHNL6nnuwx5T0SUkWQe4VMY7cS0kIVF_78vigL6zWzCIXMxCYkOzaPdMF6xdLfOWSOJyyKzUTZCFthBdPan2PX4iLo1e1kCLCusCokc2hykdPo3ciQVqtT7HAK5edTKe5cizD2d9xrpKo_utxqWvDSVuQFxZgOhoTnU-Rdl8ZZOxcsR8eEyIb5Hpd48/s768/IMG_9465.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="539" data-original-width="768" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi0PHNL6nnuwx5T0SUkWQe4VMY7cS0kIVF_78vigL6zWzCIXMxCYkOzaPdMF6xdLfOWSOJyyKzUTZCFthBdPan2PX4iLo1e1kCLCusCokc2hykdPo3ciQVqtT7HAK5edTKe5cizD2d9xrpKo_utxqWvDSVuQFxZgOhoTnU-Rdl8ZZOxcsR8eEyIb5Hpd48/s320/IMG_9465.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><br /><br /><p></p><p style="text-align: left;">Courtroom dramas are naturally designed to play out as great theater. All the classic narrative structures and character types are naturally in place--the conflict, the archetypal antagonist and protagonist--as well as the arcs of the various people in the story. It's all there: A perfect display of Storytelling 101.</p><p style="text-align: left;">French film writer/director Justine Triet is at the top of her game here with the deceptively simple/complicated study of love, hatred, marriage, parenthood, children, vengeance, love, and dogs (Oh my God, Snoop....)</p><p style="text-align: left;">In many ways, this movie haunted me like no other. It wouldn't leave me alone in the days and weeks after viewing it--a masterful film. And lead actress Sandra Huller delivers (I think) the greatest acting performance of the year. She is phenomenal. I hope she is recognized at awards time.</p><p style="text-align: left;">This is a great movie. I <i>still</i> can't stop thinking about it.</p><p style="text-align: left;"><b><br /></b></p><p style="text-align: center;"><b>___________________</b></p><p style="text-align: left;"><b><br /></b></p><p style="text-align: center;"><b><span style="font-size: large;">HONORABLE MENTIONS</span></b></p><p style="text-align: center;"><b><br /></b></p><p style="text-align: center;"><b><span style="color: #e06666; font-size: large;"><i>Four Short Films: Roald Dahl</i> -- Wes Anderson</span></b></p><p style="text-align: center;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiAGrGKxt94IYOI2aob5Pf95SRrfVErwKHLdgKijxbLSy9-R5jD7SVZiy3H_E_1Zk8Dws0zoHjUvD_czzVTsxASknKxTPfCXvZ4KMjC2yPfR75dZ_5cqO-lSx35K7aXfw8gBYOzGywhPiaAy5l2oB5TCl1ZUbQ03o34-HY8TQOF0Kjts37pv2bncOKX66s/s900/IMG_9466.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="600" data-original-width="900" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiAGrGKxt94IYOI2aob5Pf95SRrfVErwKHLdgKijxbLSy9-R5jD7SVZiy3H_E_1Zk8Dws0zoHjUvD_czzVTsxASknKxTPfCXvZ4KMjC2yPfR75dZ_5cqO-lSx35K7aXfw8gBYOzGywhPiaAy5l2oB5TCl1ZUbQ03o34-HY8TQOF0Kjts37pv2bncOKX66s/s320/IMG_9466.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><br />A hell of a year for Anderson. Stylistically, visually, and narratively brilliant. Check it out. (To my knowledge, only available on Netflix.)</div><div><br /><p></p><p style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: #e06666; font-size: large;"><b><i>Squaring the Circle: The Story of Hipgnosis</i> -- </b><b>Anton Corbin</b></span></p><p style="text-align: center;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjm_Il-meisdCJwOgQRDD6TbZAvyU7QXvK5fARr-hjJ5awu9q9I2KpQZvM_HNNctfybAkdcKChxZQPKEhd135GW9qqQtJ5Zl2thJ3zuoLcZy3na6WHS_4MpXngHZXosd2G7O-227Vdp3M9BhXs1RrHxX3C_e6FfOjIdwTuyrrya04mNXmQoNEdNDk4q_OE/s2156/IMG_9467.webp" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1267" data-original-width="2156" height="188" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjm_Il-meisdCJwOgQRDD6TbZAvyU7QXvK5fARr-hjJ5awu9q9I2KpQZvM_HNNctfybAkdcKChxZQPKEhd135GW9qqQtJ5Zl2thJ3zuoLcZy3na6WHS_4MpXngHZXosd2G7O-227Vdp3M9BhXs1RrHxX3C_e6FfOjIdwTuyrrya04mNXmQoNEdNDk4q_OE/s320/IMG_9467.webp" width="320" /></a></div><br />As a lifetime fan of Pink Floyd, The Alan Parsons Project, Peter Gabriel, etc., I was naturally drawn to this documentary film about the history of the London art-design company that created some of the most memorable, historic, iconic rock album covers of all time.</div><div><br /></div><div>Fascinating.<br /><p></p><p style="text-align: center;"><b><span style="color: #e06666; font-size: large;"><i>The Iron Claw</i> -- Scott Durkin</span></b></p><p style="text-align: center;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgiBtvetP8aJw6mMTfE39lyBHtRIxF-ePWrBwRUGP0tqtZB-Ky-7HPQiOuDwZa-__sPyL-n1OZaVQkPi9K_u2D429JpDGa8GF6Zlk53ZJZKsMzXssp2PgqQ73eWOav36rMuGHgxhBH-EFpn4mJA9BU7alyDu88sl3CLKndNnLtqDHKyJPn6u1iXDhtwnMA/s500/IMG_9468.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="281" data-original-width="500" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgiBtvetP8aJw6mMTfE39lyBHtRIxF-ePWrBwRUGP0tqtZB-Ky-7HPQiOuDwZa-__sPyL-n1OZaVQkPi9K_u2D429JpDGa8GF6Zlk53ZJZKsMzXssp2PgqQ73eWOav36rMuGHgxhBH-EFpn4mJA9BU7alyDu88sl3CLKndNnLtqDHKyJPn6u1iXDhtwnMA/s320/IMG_9468.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><br />Maybe only fellow filmmaker Christopher Nolan held he same passion to make his film this year as did Scott Durkin in his loving telling of the tragic true story of the doomed Von Erich family from the 1980s world of professional wrestling....</div><div><br /></div><div>Quite simply, if this story weren't real, you wouldn't believe it. (Seriously.) This is heartbreaking stuff--breathtaking, moving, and great.</div><div><br /></div><div>Good storytelling. Good acting. Good filmmaking. I like it.</div><div><br /><p></p><p style="text-align: center;"><b><span style="color: #e06666; font-size: large;"><i>Barbie</i> -- Greta Gerwig</span></b></p><p style="text-align: center;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjEkuPdf8BTcsbPMXQ1MLeF9Ov96RJCbcagc31Vu3UBW_psn5Zqy7mj7IromPrbpBXx1wDTfJy6DRnE_AiLHX6X7nzVR_oO17BGWS3wdZJ7IjFcWePNtO75GmckXbJVhOHLfB4GMVTTH9Lf2VuZitsYnN9HwwGEzv3VOAtZ8dtSM4X0sQCj29Eo93rDx08/s1000/IMG_9469.webp" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="562" data-original-width="1000" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjEkuPdf8BTcsbPMXQ1MLeF9Ov96RJCbcagc31Vu3UBW_psn5Zqy7mj7IromPrbpBXx1wDTfJy6DRnE_AiLHX6X7nzVR_oO17BGWS3wdZJ7IjFcWePNtO75GmckXbJVhOHLfB4GMVTTH9Lf2VuZitsYnN9HwwGEzv3VOAtZ8dtSM4X0sQCj29Eo93rDx08/s320/IMG_9469.webp" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Okay. Here it is: The one everyone's been waiting for.... (I know. This film is supposed to be higher up on the list, right?)</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Anyway, I did not forget this film, the ridiculously popular pink-half of the "Barbenheimer" phenomenon that defined "Summer 2023" at the movies.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">To be clear: I liked this movie. (Notice I did not say I <i>loved</i> it, though.) It is a funny movie, It is bright. It is intelligent. It is witty. It is self-referential and self-parodying. (But, in my opinion, for all its strengths, it gets a little too serious and sanctimonious for a movie with the name <i>Barbie </i>in the title.) Still, though, its screenplay, its production design, its performances, it direction...this movie works, for the most part, and is a fun memory of the year that was.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><p></p><p style="text-align: center;"><b><span style="color: #e06666; font-size: large;"><i>The Makanai: Cooking for the Maiko House</i></span></b></p><p style="text-align: center;"><b><span style="color: #e06666; font-size: large;">-- Hirokazu Kore-eda</span></b></p><p style="text-align: center;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg5HytmkEWQkf6MwqR6KVO8U3Ek1Dp_Nt0Nlc1yQY9UZXAYUCWG5oWVUH9NEmIrwsvfbq6Rskz7WGQO45reqCdWmsrZ_vERembsTDgnwdFpPtWd8bdTauTwna0jLd941Ckqj0cQD-P0_SR1sQ8A988WFtDuIe3tJuC49t8WJjOmrT39rSct2WUEX-ueHTU/s750/IMG_9471.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="500" data-original-width="750" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg5HytmkEWQkf6MwqR6KVO8U3Ek1Dp_Nt0Nlc1yQY9UZXAYUCWG5oWVUH9NEmIrwsvfbq6Rskz7WGQO45reqCdWmsrZ_vERembsTDgnwdFpPtWd8bdTauTwna0jLd941Ckqj0cQD-P0_SR1sQ8A988WFtDuIe3tJuC49t8WJjOmrT39rSct2WUEX-ueHTU/s320/IMG_9471.png" width="320" /></a></div><div><br /></div>Based on the long-running manga series of books, <i>Kiyo in Kyoto</i>, masterful Japanese filmmaker Hirokazu Kore-eda (<i>After Life </i>[1998], <i>Still Walking</i> [2008], <i>Shoplifters</i> [2018]) brings to life this simple story told simply in his typically beautiful, humanistic style. An extended series presented on Netflix over the past year, this "movie" is a touching, thought-provoking, sensitive, and moving portrayal of good people being good people and doing good things for one another.</div><div><br /></div><div>(This thing made me smile and tear up more than once, I must admit....)<br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><p></p><p style="text-align: center;"><b><span style="color: #e06666; font-size: large;"><i>Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny</i> -- James Mangold</span></b></p><p style="text-align: center;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjGlwFXBgi-hyec_4_sab9Gh1DQE47LKy9l51zstoZZ_3WPowNdV2-WVG5TMoIArL1nBJkKCYC0_fYPJdWgykbnnWTIwqa5_sltaN6rcnrhuqJF6H9omWvCfmdqdGfS9c0szpkzjRFg5ObN_Nbin931Gwuflc257YSia4yEhgKfoLP0f8EvWN3lIxhrB4g/s681/IMG_9473.webp" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="383" data-original-width="681" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjGlwFXBgi-hyec_4_sab9Gh1DQE47LKy9l51zstoZZ_3WPowNdV2-WVG5TMoIArL1nBJkKCYC0_fYPJdWgykbnnWTIwqa5_sltaN6rcnrhuqJF6H9omWvCfmdqdGfS9c0szpkzjRFg5ObN_Nbin931Gwuflc257YSia4yEhgKfoLP0f8EvWN3lIxhrB4g/s320/IMG_9473.webp" width="320" /></a></div><br />I know. I know.... Stop it. (I'm sure I'm the only person to include this movie on an end-of-year "Favorites" list, I know. Still....) In my defense, I will say only this:</div><div><br /></div><div>I enjoyed this movie. Was it perfect? No. Was it great? No. Were there weak spots and faults? Of course--absolutely. And yet....</div><div><br /></div><div>The movie was good. Did it make me smile and laugh? Yes. Did it make me choke up a time or two (seriously)? Yes, it did. Did it make me happy to have witnessed the arc of Harrison Ford's development/resolution of this classic film character that he helped to create over the past 40 years, resulting in a somewhat reasonable and satisfying close?</div><div><br /></div><div>Yes. Yes. And definitely yes. (I don't apologize for this.)</div><div><br /></div><div><p></p><p style="text-align: center;"><b><span style="color: #e06666; font-size: large;"><i>Godland</i> -- Hylanur Palmason</span></b></p><p style="text-align: center;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgvZGajUeZu9Og0f2xYz2_y0KCrPdQNxb5FXks4zrFqWSvVwB3Jd8UoBufvoQOE2fioTyAo8XjoEPAk-4WBdzHFBPAjSFkbquYh-U8yAPgIIpK4mEh40Vm-fH3FgbX67U-kI8_EtQKFI9qrcLAnEg9SecY6f5SLt00dst65i9U37xeJeYeAAyjEFacdG3Q/s1442/IMG_9476.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="860" data-original-width="1442" height="191" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgvZGajUeZu9Og0f2xYz2_y0KCrPdQNxb5FXks4zrFqWSvVwB3Jd8UoBufvoQOE2fioTyAo8XjoEPAk-4WBdzHFBPAjSFkbquYh-U8yAPgIIpK4mEh40Vm-fH3FgbX67U-kI8_EtQKFI9qrcLAnEg9SecY6f5SLt00dst65i9U37xeJeYeAAyjEFacdG3Q/s320/IMG_9476.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">A young Danish priest in the late-19th century--with an old-fashioned camera (tripod, and black-caped hood, etc.)--travels through the rural lands of Iceland to start a church in a far-flung no-man's land corner of the country, taking posed photos of the locals along the way.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">A startlingly stark, vivid, ephemeral, tense, and visually stunning film. The cinematography, alone, is some of the best I saw in 2023. The landscapes are astounding, and the compositions throughout the film are beautiful, and harsh, and threatening, and breathtaking, and unforgettable.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><p></p><p style="text-align: center;"><b><span style="color: #e06666; font-size: large;"><i>Godzilla Minus One</i> -- Takashi Yamazaki</span></b></p><p style="text-align: center;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiNFGaPB9-sPSiLxsUvuLwx1C7FQMFvjURBY5Afzi9TA6w_2clkW6Zr_O7nyWa6zcsLyGtY8vfBntxH6Ern9IYv97NjvpcdTIlar71uAbWw5XOpA6cOYUHD9vmIEPBsjuNs9l540Pra8CSGy_8ynagtQ6NS_xO36aweDABQB2ZEhtp1ZtwFqH-2oea8H94/s640/IMG_9477.webp" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="360" data-original-width="640" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiNFGaPB9-sPSiLxsUvuLwx1C7FQMFvjURBY5Afzi9TA6w_2clkW6Zr_O7nyWa6zcsLyGtY8vfBntxH6Ern9IYv97NjvpcdTIlar71uAbWw5XOpA6cOYUHD9vmIEPBsjuNs9l540Pra8CSGy_8ynagtQ6NS_xO36aweDABQB2ZEhtp1ZtwFqH-2oea8H94/s320/IMG_9477.webp" width="320" /></a></div><p style="text-align: left;">Maybe the biggest pleasant surprise of the past year for me in the movie theater--this is a surprisingly wonderful and exhilarating film. I'm a film buff, yes, but admittedly was never a huge fan of the legendary <i>Godzilla</i> series; nevertheless, this new film takes up the mantle of resurrecting--with a perfectly straight face and a disarmingly affecting human story on the side--the atomic-age monster-from-the-deep and his requisite tale of rage and revenge.</p><p style="text-align: left;">Minimal budget. Fun screenplay. Great direction, and acting, and production values, etc. And the result is timeless. As strange as it may sound in 2023, this is a fantastic <i>Godzilla</i> movie.</p><p style="text-align: left;"><b><br /></b></p><p style="text-align: left;"><b><br /></b></p><p style="text-align: left;"><b><br /></b></p><p style="text-align: left;"><b><br /></b></p><p style="text-align: left;"><b><br /></b></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p></div>David Newsomhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02698845610286763351noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1218241678607183535.post-21560943465651229682023-05-19T12:13:00.017-07:002023-06-23T19:13:29.456-07:00Artificial Intelligence<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="text-align: left;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="text-align: left;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">"Beauty is truth, truth beauty,--"</div><p></p><p> -- John Keats, "Ode on a Grecian Urn"</p><p><br /></p><p>"Death is the mother of beauty; hence from her,</p><p>Alone, shall come fulfillment to our dreams</p><p>And our desires...."</p><p> -- Wallace Stevens, "Sunday Morning"</p><p><br /></p><p style="text-align: center;">----------</p><p><br /></p><p>I bought an artificial houseplant,</p><p>so new its green the kind of green--</p><p>leaf and stem, unwashed and unused to</p><p>soil and sunshine and soft</p><p>fickle nature of nature,</p><p>still-life, sedate, unchanging, unmoved--</p><p>it lacks only, it seems, a passion of life.</p><p>No need for watering this kind of plant,</p><p>with no deepening roots to drink the air,</p><p>no open-mouth yawn for sunlight,</p><p>no biology exploding deep unseen</p><p>in its burning furnace of life,</p><p>no miracle of science and wild.</p><p><br /></p><p>I moved the plant from its place,</p><p>this false fern play-pretending at truth</p><p>turned a slight rotation only, a hairbreadth change of angle.</p><p>And it was then I saw</p><p>a spot--</p><p>a single black streak on leaf,</p><p>something colorless, shapeless,</p><p>an ungreen something</p><p> unplanned,</p><p> a mistake in design,</p><p> functionform</p><p> meaningless,</p><p>no defined purpose,</p><p> definition undefined.</p><p>Something real,</p><p>this spot,</p><p>left turned away from the sun now,</p><p>facing outward now</p><p>this stain,</p><p>this imperfection,</p><p>this blemish in production,</p><p>this reality,</p><p>the author's mark now</p><p>facing me.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p>David Newsomhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02698845610286763351noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1218241678607183535.post-86535864123975509802023-01-06T20:40:00.009-08:002023-01-07T11:09:39.961-08:00Finding Our Way Back: Watching Films in 2022<p><br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjo4GyJeb-Lrk848MzMigSsMChzkr58nA708dF_9gzCzs7OdQ2n-WWy_Z3UFtGLjU460O8i7dqORnDvZuClQcyaqXHMnzc5EM0cjal8COzMBepWhWYQzDybAZSpPlgaSc965bnTzGwleM_mIKxJwlc1BwJMyClYRGiY68PMDju_DvlA6PaHzYXwj8cm/s3500/Movie%20Theater%202.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2589" data-original-width="3500" height="296" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjo4GyJeb-Lrk848MzMigSsMChzkr58nA708dF_9gzCzs7OdQ2n-WWy_Z3UFtGLjU460O8i7dqORnDvZuClQcyaqXHMnzc5EM0cjal8COzMBepWhWYQzDybAZSpPlgaSc965bnTzGwleM_mIKxJwlc1BwJMyClYRGiY68PMDju_DvlA6PaHzYXwj8cm/w400-h296/Movie%20Theater%202.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div><br /></div><div>"To find something, anything, a great truth or a lost pair of glasses, you must first believe there will be some advantage in finding it."</div><div><br /></div><div>-- Jack Burden, <i>All the King's Men</i> (1949), Dir. Robert Rossen</div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div>"Big things have small beginnings...."</div><div><br /></div><div>-- T.E. Lawrence, <i>Lawrence of Arabia</i> (1962), Dir. David Lean</div><div><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">____________________</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">It's happening.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">It began slowly enough, tentatively at first, just a few smatterings of "lines" and "crowds" <i>[Aside: if we stretch the meanings of those words a little, I suppose]</i> beginning to gather at the local multi-screen movie theaters. In the days, weeks, and months during the height (or low-point, if you'd rather) of the COVID-19 pandemic, movie theaters resembled haunted ghost towns more than they did the sprawling, colorful, bustling home of communal movie-watching that we perhaps remembered from days gone by.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">Movie theaters stayed open during the pandemic--most of them anyway--and being the cineaste that I am I kept sniffing them out, checking online every week to see what was currently showing. During the days, weeks, and months of COVID-19, theaters were half-staffed (if that)--still open...but barely. At the time, your local movie-house was offering a few new films (made and released before the industry was shut down, obviously), as well as a few second-run offerings (a chance to catch a movie that you perhaps didn't see when it was initially released). </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">In a few instances, as well, theaters were showing revivals of some older classics: Perhaps it was Michael Curtiz's <i>Casablanca</i> (1942); or Billy Wilder's <i>Some Like It Hot</i> (1959); or Orson Welles' <i>Citizen Kane</i> (1941); or Mel Stuart's <i>Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory</i> (1971); or Ridley Scott's <i>Alien</i> (1979); or Carol Reed's <i>The Third Man</i> (1949); or Robert Mulligan's <i>To Kill a Mockingbird</i> (1962); or Victor Fleming's <i>Gone With the Wind</i> (1939); or Stanley Kubrick's <i>2001: A Space Odyssey</i> (1968); or Hiyao Miyazaki's <i>Spirited Away</i> (2002).... </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">Not bad.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">I remember one such weekend I was sitting in the semi-darkened theater shortly before the start of William Friedkin's 1973 <i>The Exorcist</i>--along with, literally, two or three other people <i>[Aside: obviously two other sad, pathetic, boring "cineastes" such as myself, with nothing better to do, I guess, on a Sunday afternoon]</i>--and I had a fleeting moment of thinking: "<i>What in the hell am I doing? What is going on here</i>?"</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">Still, movie theaters survived. It might have seemed like they were on life-support at times--intubated, themselves--but in one form or another they pulled through the COVID-19 pandemic.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">The first signs I saw of the EKG's little heartbeep-blip for movie theaters was with the 2021 release of the less-than-spectacular <i>Godzilla vs. Kong</i>. Though a ridiculous movie, it was still kind of fun in its over-the-top, "we-know-this-is-terrible-but-just-sit-back-and-enjoy-yourself-anyway" sort of way. For the first time since the pandemic began and the theaters saw a precipitous drop in business, there was a legitimate crowd at the theater for this movie. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><i>[Aside: Leave it to two of the greatest classic movie monsters of all time to drag audiences back into public space, back to the movies. As bad as</i> Godzilla vs. Kong <i>was--and it was bad--there was something about what it accomplished that couldn't help but put a smile on your face.]</i></div><div style="text-align: left;"><i><br /></i></div><div style="text-align: left;">In the meantime, of course, many things were happening around the world on the movie-watching front--and all of it outside and away from the local movie theaters. As if to build on Aristotle's classical theory of physics, <i>horror vacui</i> (or "plenism")--which has something to do with nature hating a vacuum (otherwise known as "an empty space") and thereby nature rushing in to fill it--online streaming services have exploded in popularity and availability. Everyone's home is now literally a personal movie theater: practically anything you want to watch, at anytime, is merely the click-of-a-button away. It could not be easier.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><div>There is even the weird hybrid these days, too, of movies being released in theaters and on streaming services concurrently, or else released in the theaters for a few weeks and then released on streaming.</div><div><br /></div></div><div style="text-align: left;">And while it's true that even though something is gained from this easiness of staying at home and watching movies in your sweatpants and your recliner, something is inevitably lost, as well. Many of the movies that I list below were watched at home. (So, I get it.) But several of the movies were watched in the theater, too. Not just because I'm some kind of annoying purist romanticizing the big-screen, communal experience found at the local movie-house (although there is something to all of that.) I still have maintained my love for "going to the movies" at the local movie theater simply because....</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">Well, just because.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">And I don't seem to be alone in that passion for the "going-to-the-movies" experience. It seems to be making a drastic comeback, this idea of returning to the movie theater. We seem to be returning to at least that sort of "normal," anyway. At least a little bit. It may never return to what it was in pre-pandemic days (because at-home movie-streaming is here to stay and will only continue to grow), but with huge recent hits like <i>Top Gun: Maverick</i> and <i>Avatar: The Way of Water</i> movie theaters are crowded again, and showings are filled and/or sold out, and the buzz around seeing certain extravaganzas on the biggest screen possible with the greatest sound possible is once again a thing.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">Who knows what direction all of this is going? But enthusiasm seems to be back for the movies. Either that or it never went away. Regardless, as audiences wanting and needing and loving to fill up on movies, we seem to be getting our share--one way or another. And one way or another, either by literally "going to the movies" again or by staying home and letting the movies come to us, we are finding our way back.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">* * The following list is in two parts--favorite films I saw in 2022, as well as a handful of others that I liked a great deal for reasons of their own.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">* * The following movies are ordered alphabetically by their titles.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">____________________</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><b>(1). 2022 Films: "Best Of"</b></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgiG6Y7IoYqLizVSrv2hQhvyT_i95mjgdZZGUR0S2lAZoZtt-Ardhm3GXadFegNUF7grF7v61AeIR-HFbdW5Xi7HQv4JbBajmHQeUd5f92ABs47gSp-u6rl1qAa-6p90WM_tMhCd45f-QB6GMoG0O2Q0wvae9rWzZ4cs4ohleKc2tJZXPZCcCoYDQFL/s2222/All%20Quiet.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2222" data-original-width="1500" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgiG6Y7IoYqLizVSrv2hQhvyT_i95mjgdZZGUR0S2lAZoZtt-Ardhm3GXadFegNUF7grF7v61AeIR-HFbdW5Xi7HQv4JbBajmHQeUd5f92ABs47gSp-u6rl1qAa-6p90WM_tMhCd45f-QB6GMoG0O2Q0wvae9rWzZ4cs4ohleKc2tJZXPZCcCoYDQFL/w270-h400/All%20Quiet.jpg" width="270" /></a></div><br /><div style="text-align: left;"><b><i>All Quiet on the Western Front</i> (2022) -- Dir. Edward Berger</b></div><div style="text-align: left;"><b><br /></b></div><div style="text-align: left;">Erich Maria Remarque's timeless 1929 novel <i>All Quiet on the Western Front</i> possibly created the whole "anti-war" genre with the desperation, sadness, despair, futility, and death running through its brutally realistic scenes of the insanity and horror of W.W. I trench-warfare fought along the "western front" bordering Germany and France.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">The novel has been adapted for the screen--large and small--many times (sometimes more successfully than others). Berger's film is visually and emotionally stunning. It is devastating, of course, as any film carrying this title should be. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">I was struck, though, by just how different this adaptation is from Remarque's source-material: While Berger's film keeps many of the same characters and certain key scenes and plot points of the novel, much of it really isn't Remarque's novel at all. Through most of the film, I felt this <i>All Quiet on the Western Front</i> had more in common with Sam Mendes' 2019 W.W. I masterpiece <i>1917</i> than the original novel of which it is loosely based and shares a title.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">None of this is a criticism or a complaint, however, merely an artistic observation. In the end Berger's film is a creative re-molding/re-telling of Remarque's famous book; it maintains the spirit of the written source, and by its close you will feel the same horror, the same emptiness, the same revulsion, the same sense of waste, the same hatred of war that Remarque wanted you to feel in his original work. This is an <i>All Quiet on the Western Front</i> for 2022. Many of its scenes and images will linger with you long after the film is over. It will have an effect on you. You may be shocked. You may find yourself sickened. And by its inevitable, inescapable closing scenes you may even cry. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><b><i><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiSsV8Bx3mQI5y6ruGpGWnn8-1M_xf5YvGggj4wZEORcLDmhYHV6mMsh80hieUo9YC2PvxZ1P_eHv15zgyd9ta6MqvZcTUB1_Y76_jbuvuFZKb303KB25UtFMtA2d3TWOwxrh-c5uWEAm-U91eCUlELoLitGH9Wr2lJa01w0n-VsfGUErF8etqCKxlT/s277/Inisherin.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="277" data-original-width="182" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiSsV8Bx3mQI5y6ruGpGWnn8-1M_xf5YvGggj4wZEORcLDmhYHV6mMsh80hieUo9YC2PvxZ1P_eHv15zgyd9ta6MqvZcTUB1_Y76_jbuvuFZKb303KB25UtFMtA2d3TWOwxrh-c5uWEAm-U91eCUlELoLitGH9Wr2lJa01w0n-VsfGUErF8etqCKxlT/w263-h400/Inisherin.jpg" width="263" /></a></div><br />The Banshees of Inisherin (2022) </i>-- Dir. Martin McDonagh</b></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">The son of Irish parents, Martin McDonagh was raised in London and first made his name as a young, burgeoning playwright on the London theater scene. With plays like <i>The Lonesome West </i>(1997), <i>The Cripple of Inishman</i> (1997), and <i>The Pillowman</i> (2003) he gained notice for his wordplay, his wit, and his ability to turn his stories and his characters on a dime, revealing uncharted depths not yet explored.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">He soon made a name for himself in the movies as well, writing and directing his own screenplays, including <i>In Bruges</i> (2008), <i>Seven Psychopaths</i> (2012), and the Academy Award-nominated <i>Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri</i> (2017). </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">2022's <i>The Banshees of Inisherin</i> is his first film since <i>Three Billboards</i>, and (seeing as how I thought <i>Three Billboards</i> was ridiculously overrated) this is the far superior film--perhaps his masterpiece, in fact.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">The unique McDonagh dialogue--the sharp Irish wit, the turns-of-phrase, the joy, the sadness, the ability to leave an audience wanting to use the word "feck" in all of its wonderful grammatical forms--is just right throughout the film. The stunning cinematography. The performances--leading and supporting--as well as the music by Carter Burwell all set the stage for a warm, menacing, uplifting, tragic, funny, sad rumination on the nature of friendship, of community, of love, and longing, and loss, and faith, and revenge, and war.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><b><i><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgEWjpsDMfdwq55mKe8_rpLaM6MAjtabeYVvqRjPEL4ou9mwKrrHDmCEA_EQOrbU5G5yDjmO7Fbb3ucDMyE9_PxEAYJVXc4WWAV4xRnWmm6V5lCCCRdlYmrfJmYw9E4AIjUsdBW2mZ8AKmlYy2tG-WPOYzyO2mM0IOJOul-hVYTGo4nBTpksJ61COCn/s2560/Everything.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2560" data-original-width="1768" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgEWjpsDMfdwq55mKe8_rpLaM6MAjtabeYVvqRjPEL4ou9mwKrrHDmCEA_EQOrbU5G5yDjmO7Fbb3ucDMyE9_PxEAYJVXc4WWAV4xRnWmm6V5lCCCRdlYmrfJmYw9E4AIjUsdBW2mZ8AKmlYy2tG-WPOYzyO2mM0IOJOul-hVYTGo4nBTpksJ61COCn/w276-h400/Everything.jpg" width="276" /></a></div><br />Everything Everywhere All at Once</i> (2022) -- Dirs. Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert</b></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">Full disclosure: When I first saw this movie, I wasn't sure I liked it. I wasn't sure what to think of it, to be honest. I wasn't sure what I was thinking at all, really, particularly during my initial viewing. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">So much comes at the viewer so quickly, without let-up, without time to catch up on whatever plot development or character development you might have just missed, there is no time to process, to fully absorb, to think even. Images, ideas, movement, sound, all coming at you--literally--everything, everywhere, all at once (to coin a phrase).</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">I've heard it said that this is possibly the first feature film to fully attempt replicating the experience of what being on the internet is like. (If we want to go back a bit further to 1999, it could be argued that <i>The Matrix</i> might have been the first film to seriously scratch the surface of this idea, possibly....)</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">Don't get me wrong: I like this movie. I wasn't sure that I did at first, but on a repeated viewing--after having some time to think about the film, and to talk about it with others, and to process it, the film began to take on a shape for me--it clicked into place, more and more.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">The movie is kind of like the experience of being online, to be sure, which is a very strange thing for these bright, young filmmakers to have accomplished. And then to do all of the technical/editing wizardry while at the same time telling a very human, ultimately moving family drama. (This is, in fact, the movie's most impressive accomplishment, I think. For example: The quiet, meditative scene with the rocks overlooking the canyon is on a shortlist of one of the greatest film moments of the year.)</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">What brought the biggest smile to my face at the movies this year, though, was the return of Michelle Yeoh (garnering the most glowing reviews of her esteemed career), the return of veteran actor James Hong (always a delight), and the celebrated return of Ke Huy Quan ("Short Round" for fans of <i>Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom</i> as well as "Data" for <i>The Goonies</i> fans)--and all of them sharing moments onscreen together.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">The movie can be exhausting (it's true), but it is finally, also, exhilarating. That is a rare combination. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><i>[Aside: But, then again, see RRR below.]</i></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><b><i><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgOAfVVOedO2Met4NpcVvNPNp4y5PfXVVqMDzG0iFWpJ64FX9biFrWze2oD3i-NdrvVlxu33exhtqDzj-RQ9Bu3-H3upnA4lUUuxOg2ZV0o4WS2EYF2xd_NSDR4hUHDK9TESk4PEhSvqQJhfXjkPXAGuJL2plkCdX7GqGZwJPx-25GxDAlEOmPwUhZ1/s1582/Fabelmans.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1582" data-original-width="1000" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgOAfVVOedO2Met4NpcVvNPNp4y5PfXVVqMDzG0iFWpJ64FX9biFrWze2oD3i-NdrvVlxu33exhtqDzj-RQ9Bu3-H3upnA4lUUuxOg2ZV0o4WS2EYF2xd_NSDR4hUHDK9TESk4PEhSvqQJhfXjkPXAGuJL2plkCdX7GqGZwJPx-25GxDAlEOmPwUhZ1/w253-h400/Fabelmans.jpg" width="253" /></a></div><br />The Fabelmans</i> (2022) -- Dir. Steven Spielberg</b></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">It is no secret that over the long course of his career, Steven Spielberg has threaded personal elements of his own life into the body of his work, addressing various memories, thoughts, emotions, fears, angers, and anxieties, working them out onscreen, and resolving them with a Hollywood ending at times--a full emotional outpouring of grace, forgiveness, hope, and redemption, eliciting a sense of closure and meaning that, let's face it, usually only happens in the movies.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">Themes of divorce, broken families, lost children, abandonment, the saving grace of one's imagination, of one's dreams, the power of hope. This is all in the fabric of his films over the years: <i>The Sugarland Express</i> (1974); <i>Close Encounters of the Third Kind</i> (1977); <i>E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial</i> (1982); <i>The Color Purple</i> (1985); <i>Empire of the Sun</i> (1987); <i>A.I. Artificial Intelligence</i> (2001).... </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">I could go on.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">He is certainly no stranger to incorporating autobiographical elements into his art. But never before has Spielberg so intentionally set about detailing (albeit still a shadowy "fiction," of sorts) the story of his youth--his growing up in Arizona, and his parents' splintered marriage, and their eventual divorce, and his early love of movies, and his grappling with his Jewishness and the pervading anti-Semitism of his teenage years, and always his preternatural gifts of experimental, homemade filmmaking beginning at an early age. A form of escape for him, yes, but also--and more importantly--a way for him to control the uncontrollable and to fashion the world the way he wanted it to be.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">This is a uniquely personal movie--even for a filmmaker like Steven Spielberg who has spent his life making unique, personal movies.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><div><b><i><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhN24jGqTGTaiEnX-K82cuVW7SJ_Cp-my9sMp1M6M7fo9XIiqZ__zL4cKL1zugVRwNJmey9cq_Nqj0_XeQThirMeW3Wn2lnpcpc0WIVLam2r4ao_f91-Va5I7XGf4Uc1OBQutZB6M7aNOwAIo-gVEUZYoG5QPpwRusyFyRbitMqNi0GQEQrGQ5Ql_EQ/s1200/Fleishman.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="822" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhN24jGqTGTaiEnX-K82cuVW7SJ_Cp-my9sMp1M6M7fo9XIiqZ__zL4cKL1zugVRwNJmey9cq_Nqj0_XeQThirMeW3Wn2lnpcpc0WIVLam2r4ao_f91-Va5I7XGf4Uc1OBQutZB6M7aNOwAIo-gVEUZYoG5QPpwRusyFyRbitMqNi0GQEQrGQ5Ql_EQ/w274-h400/Fleishman.jpg" width="274" /></a></div><br />Fleishman is in Trouble </i>(2022) -- Prod. Taffy Brodesser-Akner </b></div><div><b><br /></b></div><div>Journalist/editor/novelist Taffy Brodesser-Akner published this, her first novel, <i>Fleishman is in Trouble</i>, in 2019, and I loved it. At the time I was reading it I felt she had either been looking over my shoulder since my divorce in the long-ago days of 2004 or had somehow found a way to tap into my mind--my thoughts, my memories, my bank of feelings regarding the whole expansive universe of divorce: rejection and pain and sadness and loss and lostness... I thought the book was extraordinary. I thought it was an honest and revealing contemporary take on a tricky subject matter.</div><div><br /></div><div>But it's what Brodesser-Akner accomplishes about 2/3 of the way through her novel that impressed me even more--a "flipped-script" meta plot-twist that I did not see coming and that (as a reader) changed my perception of everything that preceded and followed it.</div><div><br /></div><div>Brodesser-Akner oversaw the movie-adaptation of the novel and decided on the long-form storytelling approach. (When I was young, classics like <i>Roots</i>, and <i>Shogun</i>, and <i>The Winds of War</i> created the template for something called the "mini-series." Now, in today's streaming world, the same thing is more commonly referred to as a "limited series.") Whatever you want to call it, this 8-part, episodic retelling of her novel is fantastic. </div><div><br /></div><div>The writing, carried out by Brodesser-Akner herself, is brilliant. The directing--from various contributing filmmakers--is spot on. And the casting is perfect. The film's three leads shine--Jesse Eisenberg (giving some of the most heartfelt work of his career), and Lizzy Caplan (whom I had to look up because I wasn't familiar with her), and most notably Claire Danes (whom I have always loved and who impresses me here in ways she's never done before; she is exceptional in her turn as Rachel Fleishman, and I hope she is recognized for her work at awards time).</div><div><br /></div><div>I know this isn't the typical sort of film normally mentioned this time of year in the same breath as most movies rounded up for "best-of" lists. But all the same, I'm including it. (And come to think of it, Ingmar Bergman released some of his finest late-career films--including <i>Scenes from a Marriage</i> and <i>Fanny and Alexander</i>--originally as multi-episode series on Swedish television. So if those movies are accepted as "great films," in whatever form they take, then maybe the rulebook can go out the window.)</div><div><i><br /></i></div><div>Regardless of whatever type of movie we want to call it, <i>Fleishman is in Trouble</i> moved me, made me laugh, made me shake my head knowingly, made me cringe, made me care, played upon my expectations, played with filmic structure, and--put simply--was one of my favorite movie-watching experiences of this past year.</div><div><br /></div></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><b><i><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjFpXT9IGUXLsCGg_88_M13qGyh8_qn68kc3By6oI9d9jZzj-FS4fWoiCaw1V1bmQAFpV7ciWeZo_Bhs7Mz4eiRsPRIbquRPdBfLWVX66NieZdQ_smWQsgKWy-zRpCjlukYYwZJVntDcDkh5sBJ-VfMAedwjnkgS-Dt2fEsffWEDOt39l_5KLCWvVAk/s2560/Glass%20Onion.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2560" data-original-width="1786" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjFpXT9IGUXLsCGg_88_M13qGyh8_qn68kc3By6oI9d9jZzj-FS4fWoiCaw1V1bmQAFpV7ciWeZo_Bhs7Mz4eiRsPRIbquRPdBfLWVX66NieZdQ_smWQsgKWy-zRpCjlukYYwZJVntDcDkh5sBJ-VfMAedwjnkgS-Dt2fEsffWEDOt39l_5KLCWvVAk/w279-h400/Glass%20Onion.jpg" width="279" /></a></div><br /><br /></i></b></div><div style="text-align: left;"><b><i>Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery</i> (2022) -- Dir. Rian Johnson</b></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">Rian Johnson's <i>Knives Out</i> (2019) was one of my favorite movies of that year. A wickedly fun tribute to the classic Agatha Christie murder-mystery template, Johnson's first contribution to Christie's original world saw a typically dysfunctional group of crackpots assembled in a country mansion, an untimely murder, followed by Johnson's own Hercule Poirot, Daniel Craig's wonderful Shelby Foote-by-way-of-Foghorn Leghorn world-class detective, Benoit Blanc.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">Johnson's follow-up three years later (delayed by the pandemic) is an unsurprisingly fun return to the files of Benoit Blanc and its exaggerated milieu of madness, murder, and mayhem.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">I'm not sure this one is quite as much fun as the original film, but I'm also not sure if that's because <i>Knives Out</i> came out first and has the benefit of originality bias. Whatever the case, this is a wonderful return to Johnson's take on the "Whodunnit?" genre. As long as Rian Johnson is willing to churn out these stories and Daniel Craig is willing to return as this great comedic sleuth, I'm all in.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><b><i><br /></i></b></div><div style="text-align: left;"><b><i><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiBFEBwwbPP-nGqqbjFO5bWkrfOS3KjYNnVkPR0SqZbqIBjvqpAtlECyWLGlb5pWv2v-n5sDwG0DtSTUFMKrglKKj0kTQg3Xp5mlPgL4l9Hve82iwkK6Qc1mcpO3p5lnlsWeuJ_w4oDnDQq0TWGYuflCweo1xcMbULjkrufBTJkDR-ohmJryUu26xm_/s1500/Nope.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1500" data-original-width="995" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiBFEBwwbPP-nGqqbjFO5bWkrfOS3KjYNnVkPR0SqZbqIBjvqpAtlECyWLGlb5pWv2v-n5sDwG0DtSTUFMKrglKKj0kTQg3Xp5mlPgL4l9Hve82iwkK6Qc1mcpO3p5lnlsWeuJ_w4oDnDQq0TWGYuflCweo1xcMbULjkrufBTJkDR-ohmJryUu26xm_/w265-h400/Nope.jpg" width="265" /></a></div><br />Nope</i> (2022) -- Dir. Jordan Peele</b></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">This is a thought-provoking and mysterious meditation from Jordan Peele on our popular culture of passive audiences quietly feeding on a steady diet of "spectacle" via the media, the internet, and even films themselves. Peele is hitting his stride here as an insightful, challenging filmmaker--a provocateur, in every sense of the word. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">With <i>Nope</i>, only his third film, he is in fine form. In his brief filmography, Peele really hasn't hit a wrong note yet. 2017's <i>Get Out</i> surprised everyone with its razor-sharp satirical take on race relations in America in the guise of a slow-burn, old-fashioned horror tale. <i>Us</i> (2019) upped the ante a bit, perhaps--wider in its reach yet no less lacerating in what it had to say about a fractured modern society, all in the guise, again, of contemporized terror.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">This time, the horror is front and center, hitting us hard from the film's shocking opening and not letting up with its growing sense of hovering (literally) dread and unease. This is a movie about the weight of trauma, the inability to elude memory, and our attempts to control the modern-day terrors of our everyday world. Peele is on a roll.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><div><b><i><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjKtGiVeMdVp5fKgS-8HzS4-E8tevh4nL_D3H0lrdUA7mSaNvXYFSdZpr54-dVtBwlKMjbmOJHML2ZtNXsiXhDWFhwzKgi-Ab7tAzxaxk12Lmf-knUkyxo69wE1lbxXxgAuvyULsaDGm2ajnBqbvmCfSil2AuFFdW4aMWrN0JYZnkfWSEtH3z787jZL/s800/Northman.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="800" data-original-width="540" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjKtGiVeMdVp5fKgS-8HzS4-E8tevh4nL_D3H0lrdUA7mSaNvXYFSdZpr54-dVtBwlKMjbmOJHML2ZtNXsiXhDWFhwzKgi-Ab7tAzxaxk12Lmf-knUkyxo69wE1lbxXxgAuvyULsaDGm2ajnBqbvmCfSil2AuFFdW4aMWrN0JYZnkfWSEtH3z787jZL/w270-h400/Northman.jpg" width="270" /></a></div><br />The Northman</i> (2022) -- Dir. Robert Eggers</b></div><div><b><br /></b></div></div><div style="text-align: left;">You don't just watch a Robert Eggers movie, you live in it for a while. You get used to its rhythms, its paces, it ways of talk, its movement, its mannerisms, its compositions, its colors and shadings, its music, its melodies, its whispers, its screams, its heavens, and its horrors....</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">And then you come out of it and you suddenly are forced to re-enter your own world again. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">Like Jordan Peele above, here we have another young filmmaker with this, only his third feature, following the remarkable one-two debut punch of <i>The Witch</i> (2015) and <i>The Lighthouse</i> (2019). Put simply, Eggers makes movies today that are distinctly his own; it is safe to say that his filmography, to date, is not quite like any other living director's. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">His scripts and production designs are deeply and thoroughly researched into the histories and the locales and the cultures of the stories he tells. They are detailed, and dense, and you need to pay attention, and you need to follow closely, and you definitely can benefit from watching them more than once. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><i>The Northman</i>, his "Viking epic," is no exception--it is extraordinarily rich. And Eggers is supposedly following it with a retelling of F.W. Murnau's 1922 silent German-expressionist horror classic <i>Nosferatu</i>. (This sounds to me like a perfect fit of story and storyteller.)</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><i style="font-weight: 700;"><br /></i></div><div style="text-align: left;"><i style="font-weight: 700;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhVJGyIGE7hyTQwdVJL0Vp46Y6gxwVvlsF5rUQNW1Ql_4HSHs5q59qnJVGry0oyOVmYOTYNug28kJTqYvnX1UAPcLuBgG8_p3gRlnCwQUZs80ahR1XtbKWEPAtuG3YRVrDuusyJnCuyMYCsOfPe2Bnko2aLTYypc-7grLb2etADIn8JMNRHJ_2MBL0Z/s1000/RRR.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1000" data-original-width="750" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhVJGyIGE7hyTQwdVJL0Vp46Y6gxwVvlsF5rUQNW1Ql_4HSHs5q59qnJVGry0oyOVmYOTYNug28kJTqYvnX1UAPcLuBgG8_p3gRlnCwQUZs80ahR1XtbKWEPAtuG3YRVrDuusyJnCuyMYCsOfPe2Bnko2aLTYypc-7grLb2etADIn8JMNRHJ_2MBL0Z/w300-h400/RRR.jpg" width="300" /></a></div><br />RRR</i><span style="font-weight: 700;"> (2022) </span><span style="font-weight: 700;">-- Dir. S.S. Rajamouli</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">I really had no idea what to expect with S.S. Rajamouli''s <i>RRR</i>, beyond the positive buzz I'd heard and read leading up to seeing it.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">I had no way to predict how much fun this movie would be, how entertained I would be from beginning to end, and how much I would smile during its 182-minute runtime.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">And the moustaches... Did I mention the moustaches?</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">This movie is unlike anything I saw this past year. <i>[Aside: Hell, I think this movie is unlike anything I've </i>ever<i> seen....]</i> Part historical period-piece, part romance, part bromance, part family drama, part coming-out-of-nowhere "Bollywood" musical, and full-on 120% action extravaganza, <i>RRR</i> is like a pure shot of adrenaline directly to the heart. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">I don't recall the last time I've been this surprised by a film, nor the last time I've had so much fun with a three-hour epic, nor the last time I've bothered all my friends with repeatedly saying, "I know you're going to think I'm crazy, but...you've GOT to see this thing to believe it!"</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><b><i><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjnDFHFcy1kUGNEaHu7slCAyBpv2J5bJ5NjgrBo7USzcsK2ISzkNKixn0z_tCbvUu1zgqoXIM6ES0D-QjqIO_FSQDf9SCeP5dC07xdOIx7OB8mnoK-bwTZj8CkhVe4vTOfkXQObT5PlVH_oaUp1W-5exFe0I3NUmcj4xRWteDQOoog9_xYEW50zA7_T/s755/TAR.webp" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="755" data-original-width="510" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjnDFHFcy1kUGNEaHu7slCAyBpv2J5bJ5NjgrBo7USzcsK2ISzkNKixn0z_tCbvUu1zgqoXIM6ES0D-QjqIO_FSQDf9SCeP5dC07xdOIx7OB8mnoK-bwTZj8CkhVe4vTOfkXQObT5PlVH_oaUp1W-5exFe0I3NUmcj4xRWteDQOoog9_xYEW50zA7_T/w270-h400/TAR.webp" width="270" /></a></div><br />TAR</i> (2022) -- Dir. Todd Field</b></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">A recurring theme among some of this year's better films seems to be: A brilliant filmmaker releases a great third film to the world in 2022....</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">Add writer/director Todd Field to the list. With a film resume' like <i>In the Bedroom</i> (2001), <i>Little Children</i> (2006), and now what I think is his masterpiece, <i>TAR</i>, a few things are apparent: Todd Field is certainly eclectic in the subjects of his films; he is not (obviously) going to be hurried to make his art; and he damn well knows what he's doing.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><i>TAR</i> is another one of those movies that is mysterious, and humorous, and disturbing, and intriguing on its first watch, and on its second watch you notice things, see things, hear things that you either missed before or weren't able to piece together before. (I imagine this only increases with each repeated viewing.)</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">Much has been said about Cate Blanchett's celebrated Lydia Tar, and deservedly so. It's been called her "best work" and a "career-defining performance." Such accolades are not wrong. She is phenomenal here--it's fun (and also frightening) to watch her sink her teeth in this role. Blanchett is a seasoned actor--one of the greatest that we have-- digging into character, fully committed, fully giving all of herself for the dark, twisted performance of a lifetime.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><b><i><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div></i></b></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><b>(2.) 2022 Films: Honorable Mentions</b></div><div style="text-align: center;"><b><br /></b></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><b><i><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjTYfLzEVBVaHGsL5WzGJgbBuf8smML8gLSHcqbhS8oscb-FLMl6BSt6JWv8c-7WmDM45vZChKUQGPCMJyYPHT8_jBoAhnTBNghed2tF1xqcj8mUwPE1t1ki7DVaeUlSYTWQSERm_k0qtN-JRNe7jmroKo83TEiPEddSDxSPhIdB0MoXSixsd2Ahr0t/s1670/Apollo.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1670" data-original-width="1125" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjTYfLzEVBVaHGsL5WzGJgbBuf8smML8gLSHcqbhS8oscb-FLMl6BSt6JWv8c-7WmDM45vZChKUQGPCMJyYPHT8_jBoAhnTBNghed2tF1xqcj8mUwPE1t1ki7DVaeUlSYTWQSERm_k0qtN-JRNe7jmroKo83TEiPEddSDxSPhIdB0MoXSixsd2Ahr0t/w270-h400/Apollo.jpg" width="270" /></a></div><br />Apollo 10 1/2: A Space Age Childhood</i> (2022) -- Dir. Richard Linklater</b></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">If all one knows of contemporary American filmmaker Richard Linklater is his 1993 breakout hit, <i>Dazed and Confused</i>, which follows the graduating class of 1976 on the last day of school in Austin, Texas, that would probably be okay. But then you would be missing out on Linklater's amazing catalog of filmwork--a catalog of movies ranging from his indie-defining debut three years earlier, <i>Slacker</i> (1990), filmed on a 16 mm Arriflex camera with a budget of only $23,000, to his <i>"Before" Trilogy</i> (1995-2013), starring Ethan Hawke and Julia Delpy, to his ambitious, 12-years-in-the-making intimate epic <i>Boyhood</i> (2014), etc.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><p>Linklater is a chameleon of a filmmaker; he is comfortable in various genres, exploring different types of films, and expanding his already expansive oeuvre. As a result, then, he is often misunderstood. He has--from the beginning--been a film artist concerned with profound things: the notion of time, the passage of time, and our perception--unfixed and changing--of our passing through time, as well as our memories of it.</p><p>This "little" film--his latest--is a delightful and touching bit of animated autobiography (to a degree) from Linklater, reminiscing about a Texas boyhood, and big dreams of a world away, all set in the summer of the Apollo moon landing.</p></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; font-weight: bold; text-align: left;"><i><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div></i></div></div></blockquote><div style="text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><b><i></i></b><div class="separator" style="clear: both; font-style: italic; font-weight: bold; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh8zNIBhpHIUyb6e6LirTZ0XEc08mzx_5LsNg62zpEfd3CPSLVr-ZgDER6fa3SfBCR45GI5uWIvx4ZYRlVtnmjnxSFtwoYV5vgdLokQ1_ZjWdwM1Ng9VKdxzb5xRFD7Bmp5R7l2FKxXqBKCKe-tOeaWhTWQP78_nc1JsnLBhncbENqxn_2E5CB35JBv/s1800/The%20Batman.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1800" data-original-width="1185" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh8zNIBhpHIUyb6e6LirTZ0XEc08mzx_5LsNg62zpEfd3CPSLVr-ZgDER6fa3SfBCR45GI5uWIvx4ZYRlVtnmjnxSFtwoYV5vgdLokQ1_ZjWdwM1Ng9VKdxzb5xRFD7Bmp5R7l2FKxXqBKCKe-tOeaWhTWQP78_nc1JsnLBhncbENqxn_2E5CB35JBv/s320/The%20Batman.jpg" width="211" /></a></div><div style="font-style: italic; font-weight: bold; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="font-weight: bold; text-align: left;"><span style="font-style: italic;">The Batman (2022) </span>-- Matt Reeves</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">When I first saw the trailer for this--the inevitable latest iteration of Bob's Kane's midnight vigilante--I thought, "<i>Oh my God, another one? Again? So soon?</i>"</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">I was not entirely looking forward to this. Even though Robert Pattinson has come into his own in recent years and is impressing me as an actor who can hold his own with anybody onscreen (i.e. Robbert Eggers' 2019 <i>Persona</i>-esque masterpiece <i>The Lighthouse</i>). And even though I have been a fan of Matt Reeves' work, going back to 2008's <i>Cloverfield</i>. And even though this new <i>Batman's</i> trailer looked kind of interesting and even pretty cool...still, I had reason to be hesitant.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">And then I heard that Cat Woman would be played by Zoe Kravitz. And The Riddler, played by Paul Dano. And The Penguin, played by Colin Farrell. <i>[Aside: Colin Farrell--let's just say it--had one hell of an impressive year at the movies. Go ahead...Google it. Not only this film but also </i>The Banshees of Inisherin <i>(see above), </i>Thirteen Lives<i>, and </i>After Yang<i>. Remarkable.]</i></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">But along with an impressive cast like this, though, I also heard that the film's proposed running time would be close to 180 minutes, which prompted my next thought: "<i>No movie with the word '</i>Batman<i>' in the title needs to be three hours long.</i>"</div></div></div><div style="text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">And then the movie came out. And (although I still stand by my rule on the relationship between the word "Batman" and a film's length) I was more than pleasantly surprised. </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; font-weight: bold; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; font-weight: bold; text-align: left;"><br /></div></div><div style="text-align: left;"><b><i><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiQxWjegcplfWygE2rXmrxeOgc6H_tGxQiDaA89uu8eDsdDlSd2yGN86hnC9LoQcbNpQJ8fiW3YaUWgiHr4uLiGUYRVYduRPnNl-4DoZeryuBc_uq4No43baDqg-TpewFMWdfwEknRURu5oLJVapdzZFA_B2E-0ZgBtW7CZ06ePXZyTFQKeS4HCeNFd/s1481/Blonde.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1481" data-original-width="1000" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiQxWjegcplfWygE2rXmrxeOgc6H_tGxQiDaA89uu8eDsdDlSd2yGN86hnC9LoQcbNpQJ8fiW3YaUWgiHr4uLiGUYRVYduRPnNl-4DoZeryuBc_uq4No43baDqg-TpewFMWdfwEknRURu5oLJVapdzZFA_B2E-0ZgBtW7CZ06ePXZyTFQKeS4HCeNFd/w270-h400/Blonde.jpg" width="270" /></a></div><br />Blonde</i> (2022) -- Dir. Andrew Dominik</b></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">This is undoubtedly the most controversial film on my list this year, and I would be surprised if it is mentioned among others' favorite movies of 2022.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">And yet...here it is for me.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">It is an imperfect film: It is too long; there are scenes and sequences that could be trimmed (if not cut altogether); I have questions about some of the film's pacing, as well as questions regarding one or two particularly notorious shots/edits. (Yes...those.)</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">But still.... I think the storm of controversy that exploded around the film is unfair and misplaced. I think what Andrew Dominik was setting out to do was brave and brilliant. And for the most part I feel he succeeded.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">Based on the 2000 novel by Joyce Carol Oates, the film intimately portrays the sad, tortured life and career of Marilyn Monroe (a.k.a. "Norma Jean"). For me, the movie is a post-#metoo takedown of patriarchal, chauvinist, sexist, privileged, power-elite, Harvey Weinstein Hollywood. Though criticized for its supposedly unfair handling and "male-gazing" treatment of its star subject, I find the accusations to be off-the-mark.--particularly attacks against Ana de Armas and her portrayal of Monroe. She is strikingly brave in her performance here. (Though the film may have its flaws, she is not one of them. She is wonderful as Monroe and deserves to be recognized for her work.)</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">Dominik's 2007 <i>The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford</i> is a great movie, one of my favorite films of that year. He has shown before an inclination to explore themes of the cult of fame and the nature of celebrity--what it is, what some will do for it, and what it will inevitably do to them. He is still chasing after those themes.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><b><div class="separator" style="clear: both; font-style: italic; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><div style="font-style: normal; font-weight: 400;"><b><i><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEigyHBbYGfKC7VQ-ab7Ov8TXOR5LNGS7i2RDwuDuE9XvU1UQ4DqJ_qRLVywguIuExARkL8Cm7Zwx0RsThw3lkqhCHd7tdOvNTmU62KYP26z0aOV6bzAJH8DULaxMFysmEsLupiy9PvcSEiWbtwdMlFLLxK39C6U9Cx7k0mwmf7IUjnvcYKSZXDoeEFQ/s2088/Crimes%20of%20the%20Future.webp" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2088" data-original-width="1432" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEigyHBbYGfKC7VQ-ab7Ov8TXOR5LNGS7i2RDwuDuE9XvU1UQ4DqJ_qRLVywguIuExARkL8Cm7Zwx0RsThw3lkqhCHd7tdOvNTmU62KYP26z0aOV6bzAJH8DULaxMFysmEsLupiy9PvcSEiWbtwdMlFLLxK39C6U9Cx7k0mwmf7IUjnvcYKSZXDoeEFQ/w274-h400/Crimes%20of%20the%20Future.webp" width="274" /></a></div><br />Crimes of the Future</i> (2022) -- Dir. David Cronenberg</b></div><div style="font-style: normal; font-weight: 400;"><br /></div><div style="font-style: normal; font-weight: 400;">It's fair to say there are not many directors like David Cronenberg. At 79 years old, he is still hard at work and still just as polarizing a filmmaker as ever. Originally from Toronto, Canada, Cronenberg emerged from "the Great White North" with some arty student films in the early 1970s but soon made his name (sort of, for those who saw it anyway) with his first feature release <i>Shivers</i> (1975).</div><div style="font-style: normal; font-weight: 400;"><br /></div><div style="font-style: normal; font-weight: 400;">From the beginning, his films were known for their low budgets, their weak "acting," and their cheap-looking effects. But despite that, his films were also known for their innate ability to create an incomparable feeling of dread and disgust--what would later come to be known as its own underground genre of "body horror."</div><div style="font-style: normal; font-weight: 400;"><br /></div><div style="font-weight: 400;">Bigger, more expensive, more expansive, and more successful films would soon follow: <i>Scanners</i> (1981); <i>Videodrome</i> (1983); <i>The Dead Zone</i> (1983); <i>The Fly</i> (1986); <i>Crash</i> (1996); <i>A History of Violence</i> (2005); <i>Eastern Promises</i> (2007); et al. </div><div style="font-style: normal; font-weight: 400;"><br /></div><div style="font-style: normal; font-weight: 400;">Like every artist, over the years some of his work has "landed" and some has not. But over the course of his career Cronenberg has never swerved from his dark, brooding, "body horror" vision. And this past year he returned in full glory with a film that only could have come from the mind of David Cronenberg.</div><div style="font-style: normal; font-weight: 400;"><br /></div><div style="font-weight: 400;"><i>[Aside: Reportedly, Cronenberg would even be considered (briefly) by George Lucas to direct </i>Return of the Jedi<i> (1983). That would, of course, not come to pass...which is probably for the best. For David Cronenberg's career, not to mention for </i>Star Wars<i>, as well. (Dear God...can you imagine?)]</i></div><div style="font-style: italic;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; font-style: normal; font-weight: 400; text-align: center;"><br /></div></div></div></b></div><div><b><br /></b></div><div><b><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh0qx4nNbIBS3nIe7DcT3wZZKj8AZA8XW0TAlwhFLgEqS4uWGUnoyV3GroRUDmxiaF3Ypmd3rNWSagvzQv_8Plhzwo0uwT1nwJZ2I4PajVZD_CTJZ8EK2rLrBhVoNEHj0_DyMDXR7HtF2UmYcjlig9pe0sPQC9ZpCOxkWPCgZ3ZY7AOR1iZ1yudE7oe/s1778/Pinocchio.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1778" data-original-width="1200" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh0qx4nNbIBS3nIe7DcT3wZZKj8AZA8XW0TAlwhFLgEqS4uWGUnoyV3GroRUDmxiaF3Ypmd3rNWSagvzQv_8Plhzwo0uwT1nwJZ2I4PajVZD_CTJZ8EK2rLrBhVoNEHj0_DyMDXR7HtF2UmYcjlig9pe0sPQC9ZpCOxkWPCgZ3ZY7AOR1iZ1yudE7oe/w270-h400/Pinocchio.jpg" width="270" /></a></div><br /><i>Guillermo del Toro's Pinocchio</i> (2022) -- Dir. Guillermo del Toro</b></div><div><b><br /></b></div><div>Literally decades in the making, if this film doesn't define the terms "life's commitment" and "determination," I'm not sure what does.</div><div><br /></div><div>Guillermo del Toro set his sights on the classic 1883 novel from Italian writer Carlo Collodi many years ago, knowing that he wanted to do his own movie-version of the famous, often-told tale.</div><div><br /></div><div>And...wow...when Guillermo del Toro puts his name to the title of a film, he is not kidding. </div><div><br /></div><div>Visually stunning, yes, as you would expect from del Toro. But perhaps the most amazing thing about this stop-motion animated film--almost an impossibility, really--is that while watching it you are able to momentarily forget the famous (and infamous) screen iterations of <i>Pinocchio</i> over the years, and you feel, strangely, as if you are watching it all for the very first time.</div><div><br /></div><div>All told, that is quite an accomplishment.</div><div><br /></div><div><b><br /></b></div><div><b><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div></div></b></div>David Newsomhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02698845610286763351noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1218241678607183535.post-57479476035379156062022-12-30T09:58:00.013-08:002022-12-31T05:31:03.500-08:00A Dream of Escaping from Ourselves: Reading in 2022<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhNHbsOZICbSYCkPp6_l0Acf8oeecjRG-vPIBTsm8DDS1pWW5n5fuWXM6HYOo7FVlVzIqwq3k6INLte-lQCOU-BHwzFdnp0oyZpS-hLur0Wkhif5-O3M_ESeyzUQaaAvYYMAVzGA2O7eaeWimChCG7WTefD-fWm7fS8Lv8nyvUiJvIdMThrFbRDi2IT/s500/Memory.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="333" data-original-width="500" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhNHbsOZICbSYCkPp6_l0Acf8oeecjRG-vPIBTsm8DDS1pWW5n5fuWXM6HYOo7FVlVzIqwq3k6INLte-lQCOU-BHwzFdnp0oyZpS-hLur0Wkhif5-O3M_ESeyzUQaaAvYYMAVzGA2O7eaeWimChCG7WTefD-fWm7fS8Lv8nyvUiJvIdMThrFbRDi2IT/w400-h266/Memory.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><p>"The bonds between ourselves and another person exist only in our minds. Memory as it grows fainter loosens them, and not withstanding the illusion by which we want to be duped and which, out of love, friendship, politeness, deference, duty, we dupe other people, we exist alone. Man is the creature who cannot escape from himself, who knows other people only in himself, and when he asserts the contrary, he is lying.... [The] memory of a particular image is but regret for a particular moment...."</p><p>-- Marcel Proust, <i>In Search of Lost Time</i></p><p style="text-align: center;">____________________</p><p>Story is memory. Whether it's a true story you're after or a made up story, every story is a carefully selected collection of images pulled from somewhere in our conscious and subconscious minds; every story is a meticulously controlled fabric knitted from either first-hand memory, or second-hand memory, or an objective memory (gathered from interview and research), or a hybrid fictionalized memory, balancing the delicate territory between real and make-believe until the line between the two grows clear enough for us to see that there is no such thing as an entirely true story, nor is there anything entirely a product created from imagination.</p><p>Memory doesn't work like that. Memory won't work like that. Memory won't leave us alone. And memory has more than just a passing interest in what we choose to do with it.</p><p>A true story is not true in the sense that most of us think of the word "true." And a make-believe story is not make-believe in the way most of us learn that idea in childhood. A story is never all true, and a story is never all untrue.</p><p>It can be both. It is often neither. It will always be all of the above.</p><p>None of this is news. For as long as writing has existed it's been pretty straightforwardly understood that writing--either fiction or nonfiction--is based upon truth. Writers write what they know, after all, as the rule goes. And if a writer doesn't know, then he/she finds out. And what is gleaned from those who do know combines, then, with the memories of the writer to form the story--all of which will at some point, hopefully, connect with the selective memories of the reader. And from this there will be Truth uncovered and distilled.</p><p>All of this occurred to me as I was looking over a list of the various books I've read during the past twelve months. When filtering through them with the idea of selecting some of my favorites, I noticed some random classifications or relationships among my "best reads" of 2022:</p><p></p><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>1 collection of short stories</li><li>1 collection of poetry</li><li>1 work translated into the English language</li><li>1 collection of letters/correspondence</li><li>1 work by a renowned humorist/essayist</li><li>2 works written by stand-up comedians/actors</li><li>2 works (one fiction and the other nonfiction) either by or about musicians</li><li>2 works of postmodernist metafiction</li><li>2 "comeback" novels--after 16 years of unpublished silence--from one of the great living novelists</li><li>2 novels whose plots hinge crucially on the world of higher mathematics</li><li>2 nonfiction oral histories</li><li>2 works (written independently and both nonfiction) by a husband and his wife</li><li>8 novels</li><li>10 works of nonfiction</li></ul>In itself, none of this means anything, I know. But I also noticed in these titles I've selected this year the importance of the notion of memory, as discussed above. In each of the books I've chosen for this list the theme of memory breathes in and out. It is a part of them. It is inside them. It is alive in them. The theme of memory is central to all of these books.<p></p><p>If it's true that all story is memory, and if Marcel Proust is correct when he suggests that man is a helpless solipsist, viewing all of life and our interactions with others only through the lens of how it affects us, then memory is a lie that we tell ourselves. It is our version of events to satisfy us, to satiate us, to seduce us into believing that either our memories are better than they ever were or that we are better people than we actually are. Either way, we are drunk, dazed, "duped," as he puts it. This is our Truth; and though we may dream of escaping the Truth through our concocted memories, escape is finally impossible. </p><p>Memory is our regret, Proust says. Memory is our self-imposed exile. Memory is our fate.</p><p><i>[Aside: It would take the great French author a multi-volumed masterpiece detailing one madeleine cake dipped in tea, spread out over the length of seven long novels (all totaling nearly 1.5 million words), to say what contemporary American singer/songwriter-turned-novelist Josh Ritter sums up in the span of two short, poetic paragraphs from his recent novel </i>The Great Glorious Goddamn of It All <i>(look for it in my list below):</i></p><p><i>"I know how memory works. I know what happens to it. Some people pine for the past so bad that if you give them even a glimpse of an ear they'll grab hold of it and hang on, telling you stories about the past as if the present were drowning them.... Memory has a way of growing things, of improving them. The hardships get harder, the good times get better and the whole damn arc of a life takes on a mystic glow that only memory can give it.... I will say this because there are some things that defy memory's special magic. There are the things that get stuck in our heads that for some goddamn reason don't improve or grow out of all proportion. Nothing sticks to these memories, nothing accrues to them. Maybe the first time you saw your lover's face is one. Maybe the night you caught the winning touchdown is another, or the cold afternoon you buried your father. You can't figure out just why, but they remain crystal clear when everything else in life is clouding over, turning to long shadows and receding into the mist of fucking unreality and tall tale. I know how memory works. I know how wily it is." (49-50)]</i></p><p>** The following books are ordered alphabetically by the authors' last names.</p><p style="text-align: center;">____________________</p><p style="text-align: center;"><br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgJUhU3Lm1rW425J5YP7h3X4rWvFZ8L_szc5EqdGicoRSdmEWTh5DPtXqj7Mh0PBZe9915jQWA8Enr2OzCjnOYzNyZ7FOP5B0X4JxoFcQaazLzLI0SZ8M2eInpvYbtzEdsWiBGrI6JAjJrc_X8qEU1I6JGt_bcl0XeOMs4nGIOuU9XPaJlTrMEwjwJZ/s500/Musical.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="500" data-original-width="331" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgJUhU3Lm1rW425J5YP7h3X4rWvFZ8L_szc5EqdGicoRSdmEWTh5DPtXqj7Mh0PBZe9915jQWA8Enr2OzCjnOYzNyZ7FOP5B0X4JxoFcQaazLzLI0SZ8M2eInpvYbtzEdsWiBGrI6JAjJrc_X8qEU1I6JGt_bcl0XeOMs4nGIOuU9XPaJlTrMEwjwJZ/w265-h400/Musical.jpg" width="265" /></a></div><p style="text-align: left;"><b><i><br /></i></b></p><p style="text-align: left;"><b><i>Musical Tables: Poems</i> (2022) -- Billy Collins</b></p><p style="text-align: left;">I've said before that I would read anything Billy Collins sees fit to publish--even his grocery list, if it comes to that. And I suppose his latest book of poems puts my words to the test. I wasn't sure I would enjoy this new collection of poetry, seeing as how the poems in it are all, in his own terminology, "short poems."</p><p style="text-align: left;">But I gave the new book a try, of course, because...well, it's Billy Collins. And what do you know?</p><p style="text-align: left;">(Why was I doubtful?....)</p><p style="text-align: left;">In Collins' own words, from the Afterword, he explains it better than I can:</p><p style="text-align: left;">"Small poems are drastic examples of poetry's way of squeezing large content into tight spaces.... Its length, or lack of it, is its only formal requirement.... The small poem is a flash, a gesture, a gambit without the game that follows. There's no room for landscape here, or easeful reflection, but there is the opportunity for humor and poignancy." (139-40)</p><p style="text-align: left;"><br /></p><p><i></i></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgZkGQLf2DToEDUeruD4at2BxfNFCYb3FT6ddvN3OYbd_2xd4MEvOTXXXRR11F3QBqCEJTEWXp5DyGAnEWiNglQxGVdsqmtja6D0tj_po-bHjVAzrnhc6Drk2jqURq57RkzkbqWkHAXq9XmogltM7qveTeZ_3oP8kcx1mE9nlKCYxMUdTJxV_Wf6GtS/s400/Rock%20Springs.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="400" data-original-width="261" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgZkGQLf2DToEDUeruD4at2BxfNFCYb3FT6ddvN3OYbd_2xd4MEvOTXXXRR11F3QBqCEJTEWXp5DyGAnEWiNglQxGVdsqmtja6D0tj_po-bHjVAzrnhc6Drk2jqURq57RkzkbqWkHAXq9XmogltM7qveTeZ_3oP8kcx1mE9nlKCYxMUdTJxV_Wf6GtS/w263-h400/Rock%20Springs.jpg" width="263" /></a></i></div><i><b><p><i><b><br /></b></i></p>Rock Springs: Stories</b></i><b> (1987) -- Richard Ford</b><p></p><p>As an art form, the short story holds a unique and distinctly important place in American literature.</p><p>Depending on whichever critic or reader you ask, it could be possible that no writer has yet, still, penned the supposedly fabled "Great American Novel." But our canon is replete with one finely crafted, impeccable, perfect short story after the next. And yet the short story--despite its role in the history of writing--is a dying art form. It perhaps doesn't hold the status it used to. Still, it can be a delight to pick up a book of stories and be carried away to that special place where great writing takes you.</p><p>This collection of short stories from Ford appeared at the height of his powers in the mid-1980s and early-1990s--falling between his heralded novel, <i>The Sportswriter</i> (1986) and his Pulitzer Prize-winner, <i>Independence Day</i> (1995). </p><p>There is not one false, weak, disingenuous moment in this great little book of stories. Taken as a whole, it is a contemporary masterpiece.</p><p><br /></p><p><i></i></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhjAqb1JAoTgWfnS1QeI6d_sFUZCy7lFhxw-EHZmAUZNpRzcnRAcrW40ZR74MZsGns2WnM5yXkibSnATUhb86G_I3ro7lZkzQ-QXZMyHmA30DK7Bg9C5STMkll1r6MAbj0X8LTUljfM-_j6u73odKbRiqrxXFxTZZQNTVMOj36umFspBITMs7R7TIhu/s500/Crossroads.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="500" data-original-width="333" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhjAqb1JAoTgWfnS1QeI6d_sFUZCy7lFhxw-EHZmAUZNpRzcnRAcrW40ZR74MZsGns2WnM5yXkibSnATUhb86G_I3ro7lZkzQ-QXZMyHmA30DK7Bg9C5STMkll1r6MAbj0X8LTUljfM-_j6u73odKbRiqrxXFxTZZQNTVMOj36umFspBITMs7R7TIhu/w266-h400/Crossroads.jpg" width="266" /></a></i></div><i><b><p><i><b><br /></b></i></p>Crossroads</b></i><b> (2021) -- Jonathan Franzen</b><p></p><p>With only his second novel, 2001's <i>The Corrections</i> (cited already by some critics as one of the great novels of the 21st century), Jonathan Franzen exploded the zeitgeist of the contemporary literary scene. And of course it would have been easy for him to stop there with his career and to rest on such well-earned laurels.</p><p>Undoubtedly, many readers did stop there with Franzen. But if they did, they have missed one of America's great, living "Gen X" authors, consistently feeling for--and finding--the pulse of this country and its culture. This, his sixth novel, is the first volume of what Franzen plans as a trilogy (tentatively titled <i>A Key to All Mythologies</i>), in which, in his own words, he hopes "to span three generations and trace the inner life of our culture through the present day". </p><p>In this first volume of the trilogy, we meet the typically Franzenesque dysfunctional family, the Hildebrandts, in 1970's suburban Chicago.</p><p>And I can't wait to see where he goes next with his twisted tale.</p><p><br /></p><p><i></i></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEit6cNqwtXyVgt5-SzIOn7m5aotCDnh3owwUSxdIaD2aGOhcmUl8hCKuL75GYUwhbn_GEIlXr9HIgG5KID6RYJ4QzgZ_g-MStAMKmbcew4kL6bdLG4aQn9hOMXbUMJtBeOy_aqyL5YtHqvCpfMXiyE7i3WHvWsVjHAs2HwkHMJlgZn7nRTH5nu_MfOL/s500/Sticky%20Fingers.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="500" data-original-width="336" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEit6cNqwtXyVgt5-SzIOn7m5aotCDnh3owwUSxdIaD2aGOhcmUl8hCKuL75GYUwhbn_GEIlXr9HIgG5KID6RYJ4QzgZ_g-MStAMKmbcew4kL6bdLG4aQn9hOMXbUMJtBeOy_aqyL5YtHqvCpfMXiyE7i3WHvWsVjHAs2HwkHMJlgZn7nRTH5nu_MfOL/w269-h400/Sticky%20Fingers.jpg" width="269" /></a></i></div><i><b><p><i><b><br /></b></i></p>Sticky Fingers: The Life and Times of Jann Wenner and Rolling Stone Magazine </b></i><b>(2017) -- Joe Hagan</b><p></p><p>Reportedly, <i>Rolling Stone Magazine </i>founder-and-publisher Jann Wenner is not a fan of Joe Hagan's 2017 fully licensed, in-depth, tell-all biography--so much so that Wenner saw fit just this past year to publish his own autobiography, <i>Like a Rolling Stone: A Memoir</i>. (To set his own story straight, I guess...as straight as his story can be set.)</p><p>It is no surprise that Wenner was ultimately upset with Hagan's book. The portrait painted of Wenner here is--on the whole, I must confess--that of a bloated, belligerent, bullying, coke-fueled, sexually-fluid, narcissistic man-child...who also happens (it is equally fair to say) to have been a genius in the world of publishing and pop-culture. </p><p>In his own way, Wenner set about to change the world. And so he did just that.</p><p>Love him or hate him, Jann Wenner's story is a distinctively American one. And despite his subject's after-the-fact objections, Hagan tells it well.</p><p><br /></p><p><i></i></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj6rkMUUB3iPYmoEsNAlzJkFaeY5ASlKnfHLfMLwEOxAzyfaCF3FBRwTE8cl8JG7Rnf9d--9A616kbsVMm5qUss5KbPohwvFeumDxlg2jASk_m_SP1E9u2RmWO-BDzxy7wFEE70aNfYx--Gz7mxlWKmDx3TkQ3YKD332QziewopINw2N_1KDQGDRswh/s500/Charing%20Cross.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="500" data-original-width="301" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj6rkMUUB3iPYmoEsNAlzJkFaeY5ASlKnfHLfMLwEOxAzyfaCF3FBRwTE8cl8JG7Rnf9d--9A616kbsVMm5qUss5KbPohwvFeumDxlg2jASk_m_SP1E9u2RmWO-BDzxy7wFEE70aNfYx--Gz7mxlWKmDx3TkQ3YKD332QziewopINw2N_1KDQGDRswh/w241-h400/Charing%20Cross.jpg" width="241" /></a></i></div><i><b><p><i><b><br /></b></i></p>84, Charing Cross Road</b></i><b> (1970) -- Helene Hanff</b><p></p><p>In 1949, New York City author Helene Hanff was searching for British classics and hard-to-find titles in English literature when she first reached out to Marks & Co. Antiquarian Booksellers, at the eponymous address, in London, England.</p><p>From her first correspondence--an overseas letter in the mail--she was introduced to Frank Doel, the store's quiet, unassuming, and brilliant book-buyer and dealer. Proving himself more than apt he wrote Hanff back, promising to help her. And so the two's long-distance letter-writing friendship was born.</p><p>While their relationship began as strictly business--and would remain so for the next 20 years, completely platonic and virtuous--their correspondence continued in a delightfully gentle, lovely, charming way. They got to know one another as bibliophiles, certainly, but also as complex people leading complicated lives. They would remain long-distance friends and "pen-pals" (a concept alien in today's world) until Doel's sad, untimely death in 1968.</p><p>I needed to read this book in 2022--a short, inspired, beautiful reminder that people are basically kind and good. How refreshing.</p><p><br /></p><p><i></i></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjLVU8qeHvVYGC7yC2m11ho5pjkw4vFbXCVvVvpeClDzwtAcp2p8X9xMFlnug7A4NIq4r2J_OlEasYsvNLlowIA6gjluC-AH34dXrL6u4MHrZD0IrVm8tjr9CWYDpsxVkjQ4LkMUms1xyar2C75XvVMgeZNu7R1BD2I4d0rRzi3V_Hrz59yDWMAB7Fo/s2128/Fairy%20Tale.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2128" data-original-width="1400" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjLVU8qeHvVYGC7yC2m11ho5pjkw4vFbXCVvVvpeClDzwtAcp2p8X9xMFlnug7A4NIq4r2J_OlEasYsvNLlowIA6gjluC-AH34dXrL6u4MHrZD0IrVm8tjr9CWYDpsxVkjQ4LkMUms1xyar2C75XvVMgeZNu7R1BD2I4d0rRzi3V_Hrz59yDWMAB7Fo/w264-h400/Fairy%20Tale.jpg" width="264" /></a></i></div><i><b><p><i><b><br /></b></i></p>Fairy Tale: A Novel</b></i><b> (2022) -- Stephen King</b><p></p><p>In regards to new novels by Stephen King (still churned out at least once per year--an admittedly amazing output, by any measure) I feel somewhat like weakened, forlorn, haunted Michael Corleone in <i>The Godfather: Part III</i>: "Just when I think I'm out, they pull me back in!"</p><p>Whenever I say to myself I'm done with him, another year goes by, and a new Stephen King novel appears. And so I stubbornly read it, beginning it--each time--with the hope of seeing glimpses of the old King in fine form. <i>Does that happen here this time?</i> Yes, in large amounts throughout the story.</p><p><i>And what of the story this time? What is the plot?</i></p><p>Are you kidding? Does it matter? Look at the book's cover: His name looms large over the title. You are reading, after all, Stephen King. The plot, characters, conflicts, resolutions are all secondary. Almost interchangeable at this point</p><p><i>Is it still fun, though? Is this book worth it? </i>Yes. I liked it. <i>Is it great?</i> No. But it's damned entertaining. <i>How could it be better?</i> Well...we'll have to wait 'til next year.</p><p><br /></p><p><i></i></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj9icsryzBd48RgYvVQTT0HdvZM64lQxDLAwYVu2bch6TjfTwuOqVVRueW2pNzDVY_9EjYVeBxyL1MP5NPqAZusY9Uz6u0dp7laUQDxjexK3sce2ThAWpKifNZdaNn8719zDG8mJ9c78jFMr1nbA7SsxGoRhD-jE647L7DpQfpkqVYRT9XoTl60_Fcv/s500/The%20Nineties.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="500" data-original-width="333" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj9icsryzBd48RgYvVQTT0HdvZM64lQxDLAwYVu2bch6TjfTwuOqVVRueW2pNzDVY_9EjYVeBxyL1MP5NPqAZusY9Uz6u0dp7laUQDxjexK3sce2ThAWpKifNZdaNn8719zDG8mJ9c78jFMr1nbA7SsxGoRhD-jE647L7DpQfpkqVYRT9XoTl60_Fcv/w266-h400/The%20Nineties.jpg" width="266" /></a></i></div><i><b><p><i><b><br /></b></i></p>The Nineties: A Book</b></i><b> (2022) -- Chuck Klosterman</b><p></p><p>If you are a reader and a writer, it is inevitable, I suppose, to form a list of other writers you enjoy reading, other voices you enjoy "hearing" on the page, other styles, other ways of doing this writing thing.</p><p>One of those writers for me is Chuck Klosterman.</p><p>Put simply: I wish I could do what he does. </p><p>I've read everything I can get my hands on of Klosterman's. I have taught some of his essays in my college classes over the years. He is so good. He is incredibly good, in fact, at doing his "Chuck Klosterman" thing, which is on full display here. (It's fair to say that I wish I thought and wrote like him, in fact.)</p><p>From politics, to music, to sports, to movies, to popular culture, to the news headlines of the 1990s, Klosterman dissects the eponymous decade like no one could. (And, let's be honest, it is, ironically, a decade known for its embrace of irony that would give a book like this a tossed-off shrug, and a "Whatever" eye-roll, and a sarcastic shrug. As if to say, "What's the big deal? Get over yourself.")</p><p>Which, after all, is the point, goddammit. And which makes this book as perfect as it is.</p><p><br /></p><p><i></i></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiMr9CG67CwEha2a-BKQoWLZ96BBoJ_KSlJqXWdlhXGfY73bQzcnmlYAbUbN_G3uHkfeQ8mtXINIoGlfSSixD-83vOaGadsV5k4P2lexRQmEDXtGmFF4JJxmYotZS3A7fTSl-u4DdO3wA5gDOxIYw5v8A_iMxm-N4I-8CbB9wowf4UaaY9YgRJfiObc/s500/Immortality.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="500" data-original-width="332" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiMr9CG67CwEha2a-BKQoWLZ96BBoJ_KSlJqXWdlhXGfY73bQzcnmlYAbUbN_G3uHkfeQ8mtXINIoGlfSSixD-83vOaGadsV5k4P2lexRQmEDXtGmFF4JJxmYotZS3A7fTSl-u4DdO3wA5gDOxIYw5v8A_iMxm-N4I-8CbB9wowf4UaaY9YgRJfiObc/w265-h400/Immortality.jpg" width="265" /></a></i></div><i><b><p><i><b><br /></b></i></p>Immortality</b></i><b> (1990) -- Milan Kundera</b><p></p><p>In 1988 I saw Philip Kaufman's wonderful film adaptation of famed Czech writer/dissident Milan Kundera's 1984 novel <i>The Unbearable Lightness of Being</i>. And immediately after seeing the movie four things happened in succession: 1.) I became convinced that Kaufman's movie is one of my favorite films of all time; 2.) I became convinced that Juliette Binoche is not only one of the most luminous, graceful, beautiful creatures on our planet, she also happens to be one of our greatest actors; 3.) I became convinced that Daniel Day-Lewis is one of our greatest actors, as well; and 4.) I searched out the 1984 source-novel of Kundera's--having never even heard of him before or never having read a word of his--and I read it, and I quickly became convinced he is one of our greatest writers of the 20th century.</p><p>(34 years later, by the way, I still stand by those four convictions.)</p><p>And yet I'd never read <i>Immortality</i>, published only two years after I first became introduced to Kundera's work. I remember the book when it first came out. I bought it, brand new, hardback, and I put it on my bookshelf....where it has sat, for some inexplicable reason. So this past summer I decided to dust it off and re-enter the magical, ephemeral, tragic, existentially dense yet poetically light-as-a-feather prose of one of the world's great masters of the craft.</p><p>It was like revisiting an old friend. I still love Kundera's writing. And I love this book.</p><p><br /></p><p><i></i></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiVe1rIjBYu1daAy9U1Uvq5YMoV_BWZiWBMZMzjWW2G_IWQgQTGFDmoepH9Cix61Up5LhBETSGx4C2f9wl4Q2D7_MYx71OWM4L9t7FCB2vCuavhyCW5qgCGmTKR47WtA16OCXUqP6i4l7SQjRSkd0mbc1BwA0D_tM6Cj7DPMnByz0fF9bGgdbqT04V6/s500/Alright.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="500" data-original-width="333" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiVe1rIjBYu1daAy9U1Uvq5YMoV_BWZiWBMZMzjWW2G_IWQgQTGFDmoepH9Cix61Up5LhBETSGx4C2f9wl4Q2D7_MYx71OWM4L9t7FCB2vCuavhyCW5qgCGmTKR47WtA16OCXUqP6i4l7SQjRSkd0mbc1BwA0D_tM6Cj7DPMnByz0fF9bGgdbqT04V6/w266-h400/Alright.jpg" width="266" /></a></i></div><i><b><p><i><b><br /></b></i></p>Alright, Alright, Alright: The Oral History of Richard Linklater's Dazed and Confused </b></i><b>(2020) -- Melissa Maerz</b><p></p><div><p>If all one knows of contemporary American filmmaker Richard Linklater is his 1993 breakout hit, <i>Dazed and Confused</i>, which follows the graduating class of 1976 on the last day of school in Austin, Texas, that would probably be okay. But then you would be missing out on Linklater's amazing catalog of filmwork--a catalog of movies ranging from his indie-defining debut three years earlier, <i>Slacker</i> (1990), filmed on a 16 mm Arriflex camera with a budget of only $23,000, to his <i>"Before" Trilogy</i> (1995-2013), starring Ethan Hawke and Julia Delpy, to his ambitious, 12-years-in-the-making intimate epic <i>Boyhood</i> (2014), etc.</p><p>Linklater is a chameleon of a filmmaker; he is comfortable in various genres, exploring different types of films, and expanding his already expansive oeuvre. As a result, then, he is often misunderstood. He has--from the beginning--been a film artist concerned with profound things: the notion of time, the passage of time, and our perception--unfixed and changing--of our passing through time, as well as our memories of it.</p><p>Melissa Maerz (the wife of Chuck Klosterman, by the way, for trivia's sake) is exploring young Linklater, immediately following his impressive/confounding breakout indie debut and suddenly feeling pressure from a studio to now make something more accessible, more comfortable for more people in theater seats, something more broadly popular. A portrait of the artist as a young man, indeed, Maerz traces Linklater's attempts to "make a hit" while still staying true to his artistic ideals. It's a fun read.</p><p><br /></p><p><i></i></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjjmb45hCPj5utatgQFvBT4Cwcs6Xv0p02MQ0RiOPffB-LZ04i7NU5WHKTp8gX9dkO-xB5K-bZoyV6IXaDZHuCqOQlamqWcrQo30U-49b_IJyFM4AXCVI-UIc9KjGqfppMNLoYUOYxnWvmFtR5Vvo5yK_wxhMeKrsCw6M17VIECxjSWvZFs2valQVFS/s500/The%20Passenger.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="500" data-original-width="338" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjjmb45hCPj5utatgQFvBT4Cwcs6Xv0p02MQ0RiOPffB-LZ04i7NU5WHKTp8gX9dkO-xB5K-bZoyV6IXaDZHuCqOQlamqWcrQo30U-49b_IJyFM4AXCVI-UIc9KjGqfppMNLoYUOYxnWvmFtR5Vvo5yK_wxhMeKrsCw6M17VIECxjSWvZFs2valQVFS/w270-h400/The%20Passenger.jpg" width="270" /></a></i></div><i><b><p><i><b><br /></b></i></p>The Passenger</b></i><b> (2022) -- Cormac McCarthy</b><p></p><p>Cormac McCarthy has always been a bit of an outlier in the stratified air of those living writers shortlisted as "the greats." His writing has always been a bit of an acquired taste, in a way. (And I would imagine he does not care.)</p><p>From <i>Blood Meridian</i> (1985)--a novel mystifying and under-the-radar at the time of its publication but which has grown in estimation with many critics now embracing it as one of the greatest American novels of the 20th century--to his National Book Award-winning <i>All the Pretty Horses</i> (1992), to <i>No Country For Old Men</i> (2005), made into the Oscar-winning Best Picture by brothers Joel and Ethan Coen, and to his Pulitzer Prize-winning <i>The Road </i>(2006), regarded by many as his career's dark, apocalyptic magnum opus.</p><p>And then...nothing, for the past 16 years. Until 2022, to be more specific, and the sudden surprise appearance of not one but two new novels (or more fittingly a single novel--sort of--published in two parts).</p><p>The first part--<i>The Passenger</i>--traces the plight of Bobby Western and, in short interstitial chapters, his younger sister Alicia. The two are the troubled, grown children of their father, a contributing scientist/engineer on the American team that developed the atomic bomb. Bobby is a salvage diver investigating an airplane crash as the novel opens, while his sister Alicia (a math prodigy from an early age struggling now with schizophrenia and haunting hallucinations) is visited by deformed, nightmarish personages who appear to her and converse with her in the days, weeks, and months before her eventual suicide.</p><p>This is a thoughtful and tricky novel. To be honest, there is much to think about within its pages, and I'm still thinking about it. I don't know that I can fully explain all of the novel yet, let alone understand all of it yet. (Call it a "work in progress.") But this is a thought-provoking and brilliant late-career surprise by a master.....</p><p><br /></p><p><i></i></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEggriKo6FqMNRFlIlbeAUVha5PrrXbrGBDcWNkAnwX8_XI0oHLHT6d4CBdBwYUpBcFChR1hOtgqOscwARAhveTvHVvJlN9JNEpCCmDeAHEy68i_OeDfhWIkewG2c20LOvNvT8ynA7p-q3TUovf4Lt-80JduUcDuoDvcVM7irzKuYJQYXTMzaalcsFSE/s500/Stella%20Maris.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="500" data-original-width="335" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEggriKo6FqMNRFlIlbeAUVha5PrrXbrGBDcWNkAnwX8_XI0oHLHT6d4CBdBwYUpBcFChR1hOtgqOscwARAhveTvHVvJlN9JNEpCCmDeAHEy68i_OeDfhWIkewG2c20LOvNvT8ynA7p-q3TUovf4Lt-80JduUcDuoDvcVM7irzKuYJQYXTMzaalcsFSE/w268-h400/Stella%20Maris.jpg" width="268" /></a></i></div><i><b><p><i><b><br /></b></i></p>Stella Maris</b></i><b> (2022) -- Cormac McCarthy</b><p></p></div><div><p>....followed a month later, of course, by the equally surprising publication of <i>Stella Maris</i>, the "sister novel" (pun intended, I guess) of <i>The Passenger</i>.</p><p>This short novella focuses solely on Alicia Western, told in true McCarthyesque style from the supposed transcriptions of Alicia's therapy sessions at a private psychiatric clinic in Wisconsin. It is 1972. She is a troubled young woman, struggling with her past as an astonishing math prodigy--a young genius, to put a fine point on it--her deteriorating mental state, her conflicted feelings for her father and his life's work, and her guilt-ridden feelings for the troubling relationship (to put a fine point on it) with her beloved brother Bobby.</p><p>This book is loaded end-to-end with dense discussions between Alicia and her therapist as they probe her haunted life and turn, often, to talk about quantum physics and top-shelf mathematics (well beyond my reach, to be honest).</p><p>This book is slim, but what it lacks in page-count it more than makes up for with its deep philosophical discourse, and its fast-paced turns-of-phrase, and its quick-witted wordplay, and its forensic autopsy into Alicia's tragic young life and her tortured soul. It is a sad book, haunted and haunting. </p><p><br /></p><p><i></i></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhRzgBKMH2IVqGUK6_4r9A6-j5eoGilvExVLqkYppSH_OPMqZklldx4ieG7KTBOeT2i7nl7MZ-O51Qq1Jm8N-ROap3jRGMtw_QTK4xuGLJIo7p38TI0Dk0A0DZ1RRl-bcasDUuDVu9NcVFfmAmQa1eh8Qnc53npcUJ8TiiB7BmjYq9NHTFIqYYLxpHA/s500/Tender%20Bar.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="500" data-original-width="324" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhRzgBKMH2IVqGUK6_4r9A6-j5eoGilvExVLqkYppSH_OPMqZklldx4ieG7KTBOeT2i7nl7MZ-O51Qq1Jm8N-ROap3jRGMtw_QTK4xuGLJIo7p38TI0Dk0A0DZ1RRl-bcasDUuDVu9NcVFfmAmQa1eh8Qnc53npcUJ8TiiB7BmjYq9NHTFIqYYLxpHA/w259-h400/Tender%20Bar.jpg" width="259" /></a></i></div><i><b><p><i><b><br /></b></i></p>The Tender Bar: A Memoir</b></i><b> (2005) -- J.R. Moehringer</b><p></p></div><p>Despite the "tender" in the book's title, this is a tough book, a nonfiction <i>bildungsroman</i> tracing young John Joseph Moehringer (shortened to J.R. by his family) and his growth along his own "road of trials" into the world of men and learning to navigate the cultural minefield of masculinity and what it really means to be a man.</p><p>The precocious son of a single mother, young J.R. soon finds himself spending his days in Manhassett, New York, whiling away his time at his uncle's local bar. He befriends all the bar's regulars--grown men with distended bellies and bellowing voices, telling jokes, reveling in one another's company, arguing, bickering, challenging one other, forgiving one another, helping one another, giving of themselves to one another, and all the while shaping young J.R.'s consciousness and awareness of not only what a man is but also what a man should be.</p><p>All of this is charming and reads like a dream. But Moehringer's early life-lessons are put to the test as he grows up, goes off to college, falls in love, has his heart broken, and finds his life's passion in the world of journalism and the lure of the written word, struggling with his first jobs as a cub newspaper reporter, and growing into his own type of man first laid out for him in those days of his youth at his uncle's bar.</p><p>This is a lovely and loving tribute to family, friendship, and faith in one's self. It's a wonderful read.</p><p><br /></p><p><i></i></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiE0dWRjfjTFGUTeHVwfHXR5XSLN4v3Fd2ihENTVqYZ4vpnvewA6UroSFpvxEpCi6pZlrKNbT6bmpT_gwVARn7fEw0hEVLUj4HagP0HfZJO51_RTCy95CGaSp_FhZv0oY31j6_q8bhZ50MfQ3LxDh4cUPYV_06qlS55UKWyBB0JWkjc1YtD_6hboqdE/s500/Comedy.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="500" data-original-width="331" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiE0dWRjfjTFGUTeHVwfHXR5XSLN4v3Fd2ihENTVqYZ4vpnvewA6UroSFpvxEpCi6pZlrKNbT6bmpT_gwVARn7fEw0hEVLUj4HagP0HfZJO51_RTCy95CGaSp_FhZv0oY31j6_q8bhZ50MfQ3LxDh4cUPYV_06qlS55UKWyBB0JWkjc1YtD_6hboqdE/w265-h400/Comedy.jpg" width="265" /></a></i></div><i><b><p><i><b><br /></b></i></p>Comedy Comedy Comedy Drama: A Memoir</b></i><b> (2022) -- Bob Odenkirk</b><p></p><p>Bob Odenkirk's memoir is slim, tightly written, honest, humble, snarky, funny (as you would expect), and joyous. He details his beginnings as a stand-up comedian, his early days cutting his teeth as a staff writer on such big shows as <i>The Ben Stiller Show</i>, <i>Late Night with Conan O'Brien</i>, and <i>Saturday Night Live</i> (the latter a gig most comedy writers would kill for but one which Odenkirk generally despised). He doubled as a comic actor during these days, as well, making the occasional appearance on Garry Shandling's great <i>The Larry Sanders Show</i> during its run in the 1990s. </p><p>It was around this time he and fellow comedian-and-muse David Cross joined forces to form HBO's underground cult-favorite sketch show <i>Mr. Show with Bob and David</i> (1995-98). Odenkirk would, of course, go on to land the plum role of his career when showrunners Vince Gilligan and Peter Gould offered him the opportunity to play smarmy/loveable criminal lawyer Saul Goodman on <i>Breaking Bad</i>. This would pay off even bigger when in 2015 Gilligan and Gould created a spin-off prequel of the character, <i>Better Call Saul</i>, featuring Odenkirk in the titular role, of course.</p><p>If you are a fan of the <i>Breaking Bad/Better Call Saul</i> universe, then you already know all of this, and if you're not a fan, then it probably doesn't matter. Suffice to say, though, Odenkirk comes across in his book as a genuinely affable, likeable sort of guy (albeit with the occasional tough, homegrown, Chicago-style prickliness to his nature maybe). He is someone who has not forgotten his Midwest roots. He is someone who is lucky, and talented, and humble enough and smart enough to be able, still, to recognize the difference between those two things.</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><p></p><p><i><b></b></i></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i><b><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhZnao59nyoGDQnpkRFTx-yVdciKff5ZQS_nZCDuKRqYo7YxlN7dzISoJBssShtu_S_26nT7UenWjyK4mK7itcsVyRJec8p4Hre73rLzHQ2Zr6UJruZJmp-fyE3lx7iZdM7rHBSTQPD2G5Ky7g4m-FiMasOsZwYhVoLYRfGbRlqTqaOgp3aQhTdtcKr/s475/Time%20Being.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="475" data-original-width="314" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhZnao59nyoGDQnpkRFTx-yVdciKff5ZQS_nZCDuKRqYo7YxlN7dzISoJBssShtu_S_26nT7UenWjyK4mK7itcsVyRJec8p4Hre73rLzHQ2Zr6UJruZJmp-fyE3lx7iZdM7rHBSTQPD2G5Ky7g4m-FiMasOsZwYhVoLYRfGbRlqTqaOgp3aQhTdtcKr/w265-h400/Time%20Being.jpg" width="265" /></a></b></i></div><p><i><b><i><b><br /></b></i></b></i></p><i><b>A Tale for the Time Being</b></i><b> (2013) -- Ruth Ozeki</b><p></p><p>This is the first book of Ruth Ozeki's I've read, and it won't be the last. She first came to my attention, I must admit, with her 2021 novel, <i>The Book of Form and Emptiness</i>. Before diving into her newer writing, though, I chose to first read this earlier novel.</p><p>Consisting of two seemingly disparate narratives (that of course begin to mirror one another and play off one another in a hinted multiverse/metafictional sort of way) there is the novelist Ruth Ozeki living with her husband in British Columbia, c.a. 2011, who discovers a book washed ashore on the beach outside their house. The book turns out to be the diary of a young teenage girl, Nao Yasutani--a Japanese-American transplant from California to Tokyo, where her father moved her family in a return back to the homeland, where he sinks into a crippling depression, leaving Nao to embrace her memories, her imagination, and her will to survive.</p><p>Assuming the diary is an artifact of the destructive 2011 tsunami which wiped out much of coastal Japan, the novel's Ruth Ozeki--a writer herself--sets off on a personal interior-journey of her own, researching the girl's story as she reads it, and reflecting on her own life, her own identity as an Asian immigrant herself, a transplanted writer--like Nao--searching for the sense of her own life's story, for the sense of her own Asian-<i>ness</i>, for her own sense of who she is.</p><p><br /></p><p><i></i></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi5JNZT2FuLavaAXAEVTHoEf5_KiPJsE3GjCW-GaiErUVlouqdjS3ol2J_Lhd-qww6GzfHkU2IJLKfLr5Q6x_oiyPWoEXX3p3cJ5KbsrUBiyS172m6qCeMGu06bqVTWsqtInscKcKKw7zI6I5hqP6fwAML9nTz-dInp6Dis6OibvLEaESSZqL4NDBGz/s473/V..jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="473" data-original-width="328" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi5JNZT2FuLavaAXAEVTHoEf5_KiPJsE3GjCW-GaiErUVlouqdjS3ol2J_Lhd-qww6GzfHkU2IJLKfLr5Q6x_oiyPWoEXX3p3cJ5KbsrUBiyS172m6qCeMGu06bqVTWsqtInscKcKKw7zI6I5hqP6fwAML9nTz-dInp6Dis6OibvLEaESSZqL4NDBGz/w278-h400/V..jpg" width="278" /></a></i></div><i><b><p><i><b><br /></b></i></p>V.</b></i><b> (1963) -- Thomas Pynchon</b><p></p><p>Where does one begin to talk about a novel by Thomas Pynchon? (I've tried this before when writing an essay about my experience reading the infamous <i>Gravity's Rainbow</i>, and it turned out to be a monumental undertaking--both the reading of the novel and the writing about the reading of it.)</p><p>Pynchon is--I think it's fair to say--possibly one of those writers who people say they've read, or they say they have his book(s) on their bookshelves, or they say they fully intend to one day get to reading him, but the number of people who actually read his book(s) is woefully small. In fact it may even be fair to say that he--like James Joyce, like Marcel Proust (see above), et al.--is one of the most unread "great" authors that we've ever had.</p><p>It's not hard to understand why. Pynchon's books are an undeniably difficult and challenging read. It's a workout. But, like the best of workouts, ultimately worth the effort.</p><p>This is his debut novel, and I find that fact extraordinary. The level of sheer confidence he demonstrates here--confidence in himself as a young writer, as a storyteller, as a player with words and ideas, as a sculptor, as a weaver weaving all the various strands of characters and plots and subplots and images and themes into a singular thing--is impressive, to say the least. <i>V.</i> is an amazing accomplishment by a young genius-author just getting started.</p><p><br /></p><p><i></i></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghfs0jjo3Nqvuvm1AAPparhKz2MUr5GehisGO8FIrRodA8uLpyti2Cvqndk-hzGaKeJAijPh-kwf614U9EpwZ18-O3t89xQiaF0ldg8i2xAb9JPInUmcCAGaNK63AkKsDBSdA-ABs7MsaXUVuznU7USSoVlKXHI9WISEc2L-gIeOxqvm-XdwpYh_ZH/s500/Great%20Glorious.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="500" data-original-width="330" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghfs0jjo3Nqvuvm1AAPparhKz2MUr5GehisGO8FIrRodA8uLpyti2Cvqndk-hzGaKeJAijPh-kwf614U9EpwZ18-O3t89xQiaF0ldg8i2xAb9JPInUmcCAGaNK63AkKsDBSdA-ABs7MsaXUVuznU7USSoVlKXHI9WISEc2L-gIeOxqvm-XdwpYh_ZH/w264-h400/Great%20Glorious.jpg" width="264" /></a></i></div><i><b><p><i><b><br /></b></i></p>The Great Glorious Goddamn of It All</b></i><b> (2021) -- Josh Ritter</b><p></p><p>American singer/songwriter Josh Ritter is also a novelist (see, as well, his 2011 debut novel <i>Bright's Passage</i>). As a songwriter, his narrative/poetic gifts have earned him accolades from critics and audiences over the years. Possibly one of my favorite examples is from his 2006 album <i>The Animal Years</i> and its mesmerizing song, "Girl in the War." <a href="https://youtu.be/kqLssKusGzM">https://youtu.be/kqLssKusGzM</a></p><p>Ritter as a novelist--and with this his sophomore effort--is equally impressive. In the spirit of full disclosure, though, I suppose I should admit that at first, through the beginning of this book, I wasn't so sure how I felt about it. But gradually, through Ritter's firm vision and astute control of voice--that of 99-year-old Weldon Applegate recounting his rough-and-tumble life as a lumberjack in the remote mountain landscape of Cordella, Idaho--I began to fall into the book's rhythms, its patterns, its manners, its vulgarity, its roughness, its toughness, its beauty, its poetry.</p><p><br /></p><p><i></i></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgJ-eGJUxY6HCGxajRaUvuLJVZiZFUrZMblTh8x1ygBPYwn9oOzul94vIRUbfisfe9zYkjMxEQQNOhXpZv5kDKEgDYkIPDLRsL0fxRPIXJ0q7PLHTGYXptagQQwtRTFB0C9nrhUSyHK5PLAUN0emGbrBALfv_g-rGyGXqiVxNJhvG6BQvJKU1Hv3087/s500/Happy.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="500" data-original-width="324" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgJ-eGJUxY6HCGxajRaUvuLJVZiZFUrZMblTh8x1ygBPYwn9oOzul94vIRUbfisfe9zYkjMxEQQNOhXpZv5kDKEgDYkIPDLRsL0fxRPIXJ0q7PLHTGYXptagQQwtRTFB0C9nrhUSyHK5PLAUN0emGbrBALfv_g-rGyGXqiVxNJhvG6BQvJKU1Hv3087/w259-h400/Happy.jpg" width="259" /></a></i></div><i><b><p><i><b><br /></b></i></p>Happy-Go-Lucky: Essays</b></i><b> (2022) -- David Sedaris</b><p></p><p>If you're having a bad day, I suggest you pick up a book by David Sedaris, turn to any of his essays about the angst-driven absurdities of contemporary life, and begin reading. Any combination of the following three things (or all of them) will more than likely happen: 1.) You will find yourself smiling, nodding your head, and laughing out loud; 2.) You will turn the page and find yourself still smiling, nodding, and laughing; 3.) You will finish reading the book and begin looking for more by Mr. Sedaris.</p><p>As time goes on, it becomes blissfully apparent that David Sedaris is the preeminent humorous voice for our existentially absurd 21st-century existence. His observations (though obviously tinted through the lens of his millionaire/humorist/famous-writer/celebrity sort of life) are always grounded in reality. Yes, his life is obviously different from mine in too many ways to count. And yet the things that happen to him, his reactions to those things, the thoughts that occur to him in the wake of those things that happen are all relatable, and insightful, and sometimes moving, and almost always ridiculously funny. </p><p>This, his latest book of essays detailing his life during the COVID-19 pandemic (among other things), does not disappoint.</p><p><br /></p><p><i></i></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiW_qt-rsXYFcfsMq6q3OT8Ai7_Q2vzNSrHKwDW_0k5_jPlfCLrCzxJEuW4oZ3QW2f4-4DoTQ53rJSQV49SeD-5jtNmaXGQsJ25HdoIza5krZyMWpEMCzwABxoPXgwQH7QSjwI7H35kS_Pd0bG14xTK031U_ShJG5ZiqWXkrhdsot3u2LDtZRYKqvBb/s500/Is%20This.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="500" data-original-width="329" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiW_qt-rsXYFcfsMq6q3OT8Ai7_Q2vzNSrHKwDW_0k5_jPlfCLrCzxJEuW4oZ3QW2f4-4DoTQ53rJSQV49SeD-5jtNmaXGQsJ25HdoIza5krZyMWpEMCzwABxoPXgwQH7QSjwI7H35kS_Pd0bG14xTK031U_ShJG5ZiqWXkrhdsot3u2LDtZRYKqvBb/w264-h400/Is%20This.jpg" width="264" /></a></i></div><i><b><p><i><b><br /></b></i></p>Is This Anything?</b></i><b> (2020) -- Jerry Seinfeld</b><p></p><p>Though I read a lot, I have to confess that I find most praise heaped upon a book in the midst of garnering its "15 minutes of fame" to be just another case of unjustified overhype. If I'm told that a book will scare me, I doubt it; I can only recall one (maybe two) instances of actually being frightened by an author's prose--the example that comes to mind most clearly is Shirley Jackson's <i>The Haunting of Hill House</i>.</p><p>Similarly, when I'm told that a book is funny or that I will "laugh out loud" (you know...literally LOL), I have my doubts. (The only instances I can recall of laughing out loud while reading a book was--at many points--deep into Bill Watterson's beloved <i>Calvin and Hobbes</i> collections.)</p><p>Anyway...all of that is to say that this book by Jerry Seinfeld--a collection of his stand-up bits and routines from his early days up to the present--as well as Sedaris' latest book (see directly above), made me laugh out loud on more than one occasion.</p><p>You hear Seinfeld's voice as you read these comedic gems; you hear his inflections, his timing, his signature Seinfeldian delivery, and that is clearly a huge part of his "act." His simple, dry observations of daily life--with all its inherent, insipid stupidities--are so spot-on and insightful. He is obviously a living legend in the world of comedy. And this is a masterful little primer showing how a great comedic mind thinks and how it first works its humor out onto the blank page.</p><p><br /></p><p><i></i></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-8BQjg1S1J7BXweMg1R7aiqxPRQYdxJkYGEFRhkr1j5GOJWdP0xfUw1CbXBlhvZ92-xW5on29R5gwrdyQmPWkvKL_oiMsayKPqWAswjgDEFEP6IBcbzIulXM1z6JxjkcrxVfQEHhJbEKr-Shs1CCujDugBe57wBrjlFUlsx36nhCYrkas8EpZB2ll/s900/Zeppelin.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="615" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-8BQjg1S1J7BXweMg1R7aiqxPRQYdxJkYGEFRhkr1j5GOJWdP0xfUw1CbXBlhvZ92-xW5on29R5gwrdyQmPWkvKL_oiMsayKPqWAswjgDEFEP6IBcbzIulXM1z6JxjkcrxVfQEHhJbEKr-Shs1CCujDugBe57wBrjlFUlsx36nhCYrkas8EpZB2ll/w274-h400/Zeppelin.jpg" width="274" /></a></i></div><i><b><p><i><b><br /></b></i></p>Led Zeppelin: The Biography</b></i><b> (2021) -- Bob Spitz</b><p></p><p>It is probably prudent to address the proverbial "elephant in the room" right from the start: Why would you want to read a "biography" of the band Led Zeppelin?</p><p>I can only tell you why I read it: 1.) I am a longtime fan of the band's music (although I know it is not particularly fashionable to admit such a thing nowadays considering the band's legendarily reprehensible and allegedly criminal behavior throughout its history); and 2.) I am a fan of pop-culture historian/journalist/biographer Bob Spitz.</p><p>I became familiar with Spitz through his great little 1979 10th-anniversary in-depth history <i>Barefoot in Babylon: The Creation of the Woodstock Music Festival, 1969</i>, as well as his massive <i>The Beatles: The Biography</i> (2005).</p><p>I mean, who has the balls to write a "biography" on a band--particularly a constellation-sized band like The Beatles? And then to not even subtitle the book "<i><b>A</b> Biography</i>" but "<i><b>The</b> Biography</i>"?</p><p>Well...Bob Spitz has the balls, obviously. And so he's done it again. This time the band in question is (arguably, depending on who you ask) of equal constellation-size as his earlier subject. Love them or hate them, though, the Zeppelin inarguably changed the popular music landscape--they helped to usher in the age of "album rock" instead of simply selling singles/hits for the studios; they were instrumental in leading the way for the creation of the "hard rock/heavy metal" movement in pop music; they helped to evolve the rock 'n roll live concert tour and stage performance; and they helped to launch the role of FM radio throughout its heyday-decade of the 1970s.</p><p>And, oh yes, there were drugs. And women (sometimes, reportedly, underage girls, to be exact). And there was abundant abhorrent "bad-boy" behavior from a bunch of grown adults who obviously should have known better. And there were more drugs. And there was alcohol. And binge-drinking. And vomitus. And in-fighting. And out-fighting. And dust-ups, and breakups, and patch-ups. And there were more drugs. And there was more drinking. And trashed hotel rooms. And mudsharks...sadly. And good times, and bad times, and stairways to heaven paved with good intentions but destroyed with bad choices.</p><p><i>Yes, but the legends, the myths.... Did it really all happen the way we've heard? Is the band's legend deserving of its music, and vice versa? </i>And finding the answer to an inquiry like that is exactly why someone might want to read this book. I recommend doing so. It's brilliant.</p><p><br /></p><p><i></i></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiihSeeBfPEg-A3A8QUwjkkRTnJ15IQPJpSpPINhcUDmIqPPxX_opTZkQs3DbCUV7cE3a0ow3-watDJQp-pnq6b4oiBs-6DOBgySLh2tCDxHRVucqZa9U8HHsx5hhZxxsPPxGGq0pfark44KtHnr4qh3_5rrrUsMEojt5lrfI0jm3ImGthwcHruoHZD/s500/Bourdain.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="500" data-original-width="331" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiihSeeBfPEg-A3A8QUwjkkRTnJ15IQPJpSpPINhcUDmIqPPxX_opTZkQs3DbCUV7cE3a0ow3-watDJQp-pnq6b4oiBs-6DOBgySLh2tCDxHRVucqZa9U8HHsx5hhZxxsPPxGGq0pfark44KtHnr4qh3_5rrrUsMEojt5lrfI0jm3ImGthwcHruoHZD/w265-h400/Bourdain.jpg" width="265" /></a></i></div><i><b><p><i><b><br /></b></i></p>Bourdain: The Definitive Oral Biography</b></i><b> (2021) -- Laurie Woolever</b><p></p><p>Like the rest of the world, I always felt as if I knew Anthony Bourdain. I mean, I felt like I <i>really</i> knew him. Like we were friends, in fact, and like he was someone I could call or text and hang out with over a beer, and talk to him, and hear that inimitable, nasally, sarcastic voice rant and rave about his favorite travels, his favorite meals, his favorite memories of the days working the line in New York City....</p><p>I didn't know Anthony Bourdain, but I felt that I did. ("Ahhh, celebrity," he might say.) He was beloved around the country, around the world. And though we all felt we owned a little piece of him, which gave us the right to feel that we knew him, of course we didn't. No one did. Not really.</p><p>Woolever's book is undoubtedly a celebration of the icon--his joyousness, his exuberance, his mythic lust for the perfect meal, the perfect drink, the perfect turn-of-phrase, the perfect wording to perfectly record the perfect moment in life.</p><p>But life is not perfect. Life is messy, and perfection is not real. And Woolever's book pulls no punches in taking, at times, a critical look at her subject--the man's imperfections; his inability to really, truly "live in the moment" and to enjoy life; his sadnesses; his disappointments; his mood swings; his regrets; his depression....</p><p>Anthony Bourdain was a giant in the world of cooking, and writing, and travel, and television journalism. (Notice I use the word "journalism" instead of "entertainment." This is a fine point raised throughout the book and one I particularly agree with: Bourdain was one of the finest--if not in fact <i>the finest</i>--cultural chroniclers/journalists of our time, even though he sadly never saw himself that way.)</p><p>In the end, he was as beloved and as well-known a popular celebrity as we've had. And yet in a crowded room he felt alone, unloved, and unknown. And finally, in the end, his anger, his sadness, his loneliness, his desperation, his despair took control of his carefully controlled life.</p><p>A joyous read throughout, it is a loving remembrance of a highly respected and much-celebrated public figure. And by its closing pages it is probably the most crushingly sad thing I've read in quite some time. </p><p>Now, this is a book.... </p><p><br /></p>David Newsomhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02698845610286763351noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1218241678607183535.post-66622030852439225072022-04-06T09:56:00.035-07:002022-04-27T09:19:27.882-07:00...Except After C: a song<p><b><span> </span></b></p><p><b><span> </span>(1)</b></p><p>She held her daddy's hand</p><p>walking slow the first day of school.</p><p>New faces, new friends, a new world.</p><p>Hug through tears, kiss goodbye.</p><p>She hung back by the wall,</p><p>afraid to climb, afraid to fall,</p><p>until a warm smile let her in,</p><p>and she played, danced, and sang.</p><p>Laughing stories to her daddy,</p><p>skipping brightly all the way home.</p><p><br /></p><p><b><span> </span>(Chorus)</b></p><p>It's A leads to Z.</p><p>One plus two equals three.</p><p>Things are greater-than, less-than, or equal.</p><p>Recess games that you choose,</p><p>though it hurts when you lose,</p><p>it's better than hurting for real.</p><p>Names in order all the time.</p><p>Know your place in the line.</p><p>Take turns, be nice, and play fair.</p><p>"Mine," "yours," "you," and "me."</p><p>And the truth sets you free.</p><p>Still, it's "i before e, except after c."</p><p>And hear the piper, to lead you as one.</p><p><br /></p><p><span> </span><b>(2)</b></p><p>She always knew she felt different inside somehow.</p><p>though words never came close to her heart.</p><p>So she kept to herself, </p><p>through smiles and the fears,</p><p>hanging back by the wall,</p><p>afraid to climb, afraid to fall.</p><p>Growing up is hard enough on its own.</p><p>Days went by, one by one.</p><p>Loneliness part of her skin.</p><p>Dreaming dreams at night far from her home.</p><p><br /></p><p><b><span> </span>(Chorus)</b></p><p>And it's A leads to Z.</p><p>One plus two equals three.</p><p>Things are greater-than, less-than, or equal.</p><p>Recess games that you choose,</p><p>though it hurts when you lose,</p><p>it's better than hurting for real.</p><p>Names in order all the time.</p><p>Know your place in the line.</p><p>Take turns, be nice, and play fair.</p><p>"Mine," "yours," "you," and "me."</p><p>And the truth sets you free.</p><p>Still, it's "i before e, except after c."</p><p>And hear the piper, to lead you as one.</p><p><br /></p><p><span> </span><b>(Bridge)</b></p><p>Who would you be if you could only be someone?</p><p>What would you do if no one told you "No"?</p><p>How would you love if love truly were free?</p><p>All the rules you've learned fall away</p><p>(blown away, float away, fly away, faraway).</p><p>Let the wind in your flags guide you home....</p><p><br /></p><p><b><span> </span>(3)</b></p><p>She holds her father's hand,</p><p>walking slow down the street with a smile.</p><p>New faces, new friends, a new world.</p><p>Parade washed in a bright glow of colors.</p><p>Letting go of the wall,</p><p>she might climb, she might fall.</p><p>And a warm smile lets her in.</p><p>Music plays, and she dances, and sings.</p><p>Loneliness sheds from her skin.</p><p>Feeling love, and she's here, and she's home.</p><p><br /></p><p><b><span> </span>(Chorus)</b></p><p>It's always A leads to Z.</p><p>One plus two equals three.</p><p>Things are greater-than, less-than, or equal.</p><p>Recess games that you choose,</p><p>though it hurts when you lose,</p><p>it's better than hurting for real.</p><p>Names in order all the time.</p><p>Know your place in the line.</p><p>Take turns, be nice, and play fair.</p><p>"Mine," "yours," "you," and "me."</p><p>And the truth sets you free.</p><p>Still, it's "i before e, except after c."</p><p>And hear the piper, to lead you as one.</p>David Newsomhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02698845610286763351noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1218241678607183535.post-36603847224992916802022-01-29T19:13:00.030-08:002022-01-31T08:48:42.875-08:00The World Divided in Two: 2021 and Another Splintered Year Spent Reading<p> </p><p>"It felt like the world had divided into two different types of people, those who had felt pain and those who had yet to."</p><p><span> <span> <span> </span> </span></span>-- Michelle Zauner, <i>Crying in H Mart</i></p><p style="text-align: center;">______________________________</p><p style="text-align: center;"><br /></p><p>We are living in splintered times.</p><p><i>[Aside: Just saying such a sentiment makes the sentiment seem untrue, makes it seem too overtly obvious, too meaninglessly trite, too flat-out sentimental. But it's true: the times we are living in--the times that we have been living in for quite some time now--are beyond the pale in their ability to hurt us, and to lash out at us, and to cause us to feel isolated, and to cause us to feel anxiety, and sadness, and maybe even despair.]</i></p><p>We have all possibly felt it from time to time recently. I am not describing anything new for any of us. I know that.</p><p>In such times, though, we can seek out the company and the comfort of others. Friends. Family. Loved ones. The calm found in the presence of someone else. Succor. Solace. Call it whatever you want; it is "strength in numbers" sort of stuff. And it is real. But you could alternatively choose the opposite reaction and purposely seek, instead, to be alone.</p><p>The comfort of yourself--there is nothing quite like it; there is also nothing wrong with it. </p><p>There can be, and is, great medicinal benefit to securing for yourself a little quiet time every now and then, a little alone time, a little time in which you allow yourself to simply be yourself. Time in which you give yourself permission to enjoy the silence. Time in which you grant yourself the freedom to admit--if only to yourself--that it is okay to spend some time alone.</p><p>In such quiet times over this past year, I enjoyed the quiet company of books (words, authors, story-presence), and so I was never quite alone. It helped the time to pass, all the days and weeks and months of another year in pandemic-mode. We all have our own ways of dealing with it; we all do what we can. I like to read. And so I read a lot over the past year. I had some time to spare in 2021--alone and yet not alone--and I enjoyed my time spent with some great books.</p><p>Below is a selection, listed alphabetically, of some of the better books I read last year--a form of healing, of sorts, in these broken, wounded, divisive times.</p><p><br /></p><p style="text-align: center;"><b>FAVORITE READS OF THE PAST YEAR -- 2021:</b></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEh5IIFWNuw3fct77xpgPU_9e4pRs3K_0GXLA8gK6G92s8aZBwJ6YaEUpp5EpwCtonqFmpM8V8uVZftKsISigpszmXrzRLgqqCs4SqZQbp9H6MApoP1Cm_hLanP7T0bIF0bg8uDatM8rHA5IgVxEop-iQSlxMaWYsrO95enfL0uLAqy-V1s1Y4LWFaMA=s2550" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2550" data-original-width="1688" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEh5IIFWNuw3fct77xpgPU_9e4pRs3K_0GXLA8gK6G92s8aZBwJ6YaEUpp5EpwCtonqFmpM8V8uVZftKsISigpszmXrzRLgqqCs4SqZQbp9H6MApoP1Cm_hLanP7T0bIF0bg8uDatM8rHA5IgVxEop-iQSlxMaWYsrO95enfL0uLAqy-V1s1Y4LWFaMA=s320" width="212" /></a></div><b><i><div><b><i><br /></i></b></div>Crying in H Mart: A Memoir</i> (2021) -- Michelle Zauner</b><p></p><p> Zauner--a young musician hailing from the northwestern music scene of Oregon and Seattle--is best known today as the singer/songwriter/guitarist of the indie rock/pop band, Japanese Breakfast. Before that she served a brief stint in the band Little Big League. Now she can add bestselling, award-winning author to her CV with this, her first book, evolved from a 2018 essay she originally published in <i>The New Yorker. </i>Born half-Caucasian (her father) and half Korean (her mother), Zauner's book is part grief-memoir, part identity-discovery testimony, part love story, part lyrical ode to her growing up a part of two cultures, and part introduction to Asian/Korean cuisine. A graduate of Bryn Mawr College's school of creative writing, Zauner is the real deal as a writer. She knows what she's doing here. Poetic. Confessional. Hilarious. Moving. Insightful. Wise beyond her years. And unforgettable.</p><p><br /></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhwRaiGQKvNJiVOiLI1R-j2Z_kaCFGSMFxp6mzmEoUxDrxnoBjv1wOoeNp__B1VmcuG78BkJfQ6KERbc2LNT4s7I54fCdXWhzAsmF2bRvB1LZvk4lD-6SNXCL2cUYXLQ8exAA7Xu47BOuOm5xwHhOQ3WkYqrkAIZm8eEMvPw5rjK5D_VjuY3A9DHDXF=s500" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="500" data-original-width="324" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhwRaiGQKvNJiVOiLI1R-j2Z_kaCFGSMFxp6mzmEoUxDrxnoBjv1wOoeNp__B1VmcuG78BkJfQ6KERbc2LNT4s7I54fCdXWhzAsmF2bRvB1LZvk4lD-6SNXCL2cUYXLQ8exAA7Xu47BOuOm5xwHhOQ3WkYqrkAIZm8eEMvPw5rjK5D_VjuY3A9DHDXF=s320" width="207" /></a></div><br /><b><i>Fleishman Is in Trouble</i> (2019) -- Taffy Brodesser-Akner</b><p></p><p>New York City power-couple Toby Flieshman (a successful, young doctor) and his beautiful wife, Rachel (a successful, young talent agent) find themselves locked in a bitter divorce. Told in the 2nd-person, Toby is the novel's central character (at first), while the book's narrator is a woman who has been close friends with Toby since college, and who--we learn later in the novel--has a troubled marriage of her own. The novel is an interesting take on the relationship between men and women, gender roles, and domestic nightmares in various forms. (The Fleishman "in trouble," according to the book's title, might be Toby, as we are led to assume. Or it might be Rachel....) As soon as you think you have the characters and the story figured out, Brodesser-Akner--a staff writer at <i>The New York Times</i>, in this, her debut novel--pulls the rug out from under your expectations; you find yourself suddenly uncomfortable and unsure of all you thought you knew.</p><p><br /></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEh1c3heYppLjzTzl7DqKgFzUqE4rfAeQaCMtgaRe-fk6LWCKt349-3X3BauF6IosNDuepWKq4geVvj_IV3CBGxOJDXLSY-VrmKrezqU4X2dAhZkacIjVReGgI6H3-h3oZdlaIQpQ-PzXx-7_tK7K21YrWiVKgoSZ9r6gr17Zz5yicut3i6gux-KQ8YQ=s2560" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2560" data-original-width="1681" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEh1c3heYppLjzTzl7DqKgFzUqE4rfAeQaCMtgaRe-fk6LWCKt349-3X3BauF6IosNDuepWKq4geVvj_IV3CBGxOJDXLSY-VrmKrezqU4X2dAhZkacIjVReGgI6H3-h3oZdlaIQpQ-PzXx-7_tK7K21YrWiVKgoSZ9r6gr17Zz5yicut3i6gux-KQ8YQ=s320" width="210" /></a></div><br /><b><i>Horror Stories: A Memoir</i> (2019) -- Liz Phair</b><p></p><p>It should come as no surprise that Liz Phair can write her ass off. The indie-auteur phenom of the early1990s music scene (indelibly linked with a genre of "alternative rock" of the day, blending in-your-face confessional poetry with in-your-face guitar-hooked pop-rock, which she helped to usher in) is most well known for her flat-out masterpiece, the 1993 album <i>Exile in Guyville</i>. And now (like Michelle Zauner above) we have Phair's first book, proving something her fans have already always known: Phair is a wonderful storyteller. Her individual chapters are all standalone stories pulled from various incidents in her life. At times these stories read more like a collection of contemporary fiction, and you find yourself thinking, <i>This surely couldn't have happened like this....</i> But then of course she reminds you, through her art, that this is exactly how life is, and this is exactly how it all went down.</p><p><br /></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiNk_TmRn7cOwE41_sCaZ-YdMo3Gg_PpGkzGkE8_fdUcuBDe44eEy5986Y_96Uv0qcbuavbwvKugMikK6GNpFcNRwGiTGG3fAWM348tEvwZ2XLph664JtKP58oAV7MuDbdwG-xCc-8GKMdmp1GtvIsenBtezPRxEExd0FcJaUQbXe327rE068_pvL-0=s2550" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2550" data-original-width="1725" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiNk_TmRn7cOwE41_sCaZ-YdMo3Gg_PpGkzGkE8_fdUcuBDe44eEy5986Y_96Uv0qcbuavbwvKugMikK6GNpFcNRwGiTGG3fAWM348tEvwZ2XLph664JtKP58oAV7MuDbdwG-xCc-8GKMdmp1GtvIsenBtezPRxEExd0FcJaUQbXe327rE068_pvL-0=s320" width="216" /></a></div><br /><b><i>Interior Chinatown </i>(2020) -- Charles Yu</b><p></p><p>This 2020 National Book Award-winner is a gem. Only the second novel from Charles Yu, <i>Interior Chinatown</i> tells an (at times) epic story of the Chinese-American immigrant experience while all the while telling the intimately personal story of young Willis Wu, "Generic Asian Man" and occasional "Delivery Guy" in a fictional TV cop-show <i>Black and White</i>, where he dreams--always in the background, typecast as the "model minority"--to someday take the spotlight and play the coveted role of "Kung Fu Guy." Written in a deceptively playful postmodern manner--including being formatted as a motion picture screenplay--this is a funny, harrowing, and ultimately moving experiment in both fact and fiction. I love this book.</p><p><b><br /></b></p><p><br /></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiZ0m6Jy4vPW8a-TzeZyuNIQ1eUzu2QYo4tX--MTepgwKVOSW5IaReclP1orjbJUmgh71S2uRmvchqeM0M5VT1u1ZMgkO3zkcpvSVFfodF3AWYiM-Lc6djYNpRx49G5C9pbjY7kaIZwUALTeKJL67Q8sDsOIxzFEsdc7fs1EGyr5CfGoD1eAs0ihYkC=s2263" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2263" data-original-width="1400" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiZ0m6Jy4vPW8a-TzeZyuNIQ1eUzu2QYo4tX--MTepgwKVOSW5IaReclP1orjbJUmgh71S2uRmvchqeM0M5VT1u1ZMgkO3zkcpvSVFfodF3AWYiM-Lc6djYNpRx49G5C9pbjY7kaIZwUALTeKJL67Q8sDsOIxzFEsdc7fs1EGyr5CfGoD1eAs0ihYkC=s320" width="198" /></a></div><br /><b><i>Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell</i> (2004) -- Susanna Clarke</b><p></p><p>A brief story about this book:</p><p>In the long-ago days of my separation and eventual divorce (beginning way back in the dim year of 2004), I remember initially taking only a few things with me as I left the house. Essentials--the usual day-to-stuff one needs to get by, if only for a short while (or what would turn out to be another lifetime). Among the things I took with me at that time was a hardback copy of this book, just recently published. I tried to start reading it then, in the early days of my exiled solitude and loneliness. Susanna Clarke's dense, immense alternative-history fantasy (set in 19th-century, Napoleonic-war era England) was just a bit too much for my addled brain then. And I gave it up, only about 1/4 of the way through. Fast-forward (but not too fast) 17 years later, and I pulled the book from my shelves again, blew the dust from it, and cracked it open to the first page.... </p><p>Long story short: I could not turn the pages fast enough this time. And it occurred to me, as I read it in earnest at this point in my life {with all that has happened to me since I first took the book with me as solace, to help me get lost in another world so long ago) that the person I was way back when wasn't ready to tackle the novel. I wasn't in the right place in my life. But I was ready now for Clarke's amazingly clever and unique tale, so much its own creation. Books will wait for us, I realized. They will choose their readers carefully. (Even though we think we choose them.) And when the time is right, they will select us. And they will carefully read us--all the while teaching us how, and when, to finally fully read them.</p><p>This book is a contemporary literary masterpiece of speculative/fantasy fiction. It deserves to be remembered, and read, and revered for ages.</p><p><br /></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEi42d80F7ghFmhfxAotDxOMYk0X3VgKkyg9xWWtRR3p9Wz9hab5jVmK6Ln9A4Rqeub-aXbns3wVjGGp5yMlj5XHBnx6i2Y9_joAQtkFT2fBMhyqx2r0HNHHYPMjohNjIIf7bGq3zvZwm6wWHh2x3QATMORIyMvSasfeovsGLEv1DhRB5GiTis_sfZpK=s2560" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2560" data-original-width="1684" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEi42d80F7ghFmhfxAotDxOMYk0X3VgKkyg9xWWtRR3p9Wz9hab5jVmK6Ln9A4Rqeub-aXbns3wVjGGp5yMlj5XHBnx6i2Y9_joAQtkFT2fBMhyqx2r0HNHHYPMjohNjIIf7bGq3zvZwm6wWHh2x3QATMORIyMvSasfeovsGLEv1DhRB5GiTis_sfZpK=s320" width="211" /></a></div><br /><b><i>Klara and the Sun</i> (2021) -- Kazuo Ishiguro</b><p></p><p>No one--and I mean <i>no one</i>--writes a novel like Nobel Prize-winner, Kazuo Ishiguro. It is not easy to pinpoint exactly what it is he does that is so damned special. But it is there, in between the words almost, lodged in the characters and their plight--so fraught with longing, and desperation, and their dream of happiness, and the awareness of the almost impossible gulf between them and what it is they most desire. No one writing today comes close to Ishiguro for touching--every single time--upon just what it means to be human. Almost in parallel lines with his masterful 2005 dystopian science fiction novel, <i>Never Let Me Go</i>, Ishiguro's latest novel exists as a sort of "spiritual" sequel, in line with that earlier novel's themes. </p><p>One by one, Ishiguro's books can break your heart. And this one--in its shimmering, impassioned, sad longing--is no exception.</p><p><br /></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEig4GjnK_2Hf0RqoivWcQWaJQde3hYOues88QIpjIqea91EUtzFTXXOXiSEkn5eThh4tXnEV1AEx-66lXSsoJI5t8OwHF4A8o9V4wJGLbhMYdwvmW9vZOSpBzhN40ppbGjcF34I3c9DWHCP_V1xzzUnzv91GFTSFL0GUe_hOLAfmncOzWwRBbeamRqL=s1360" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1360" data-original-width="893" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEig4GjnK_2Hf0RqoivWcQWaJQde3hYOues88QIpjIqea91EUtzFTXXOXiSEkn5eThh4tXnEV1AEx-66lXSsoJI5t8OwHF4A8o9V4wJGLbhMYdwvmW9vZOSpBzhN40ppbGjcF34I3c9DWHCP_V1xzzUnzv91GFTSFL0GUe_hOLAfmncOzWwRBbeamRqL=s320" width="210" /></a></div><br /><b><i>Life Itself: A Memoir</i> (2011) -- Roger Ebert</b><p></p><p>I wish I could have met Roger Ebert. I wish I could have gotten his autograph. I wish I could have talked to him, asked him some questions--about his life, his art, about writing (of course), about movies (of course). I wish I could have listened to his answers, his anecdotes, his stories of life as an early reporter for the <i>Chicago Sun-Times</i>, and then assigned the job as the <i>Sun-Times</i>' film critic, and then the winner of the coveted Pulitzer Prize, and then the popular co-host of the television show(s) he shared (in all its iterations) with beloved rival <i>Chicago Tribune</i> film critic, Gene Siskel. Ebert obviously never knew what he meant to me; growing up as a young boy, a film buff in isolated western Kansas, I first learned about something called "cinema" from this film critic in Chicago. His gift to me was priceless; I feel I owe him a "thank you," at the very least.</p><p>This book was his closing gift to all of us. And it is enough.</p><p><br /></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEieo1_COrsLgb63hwjnrM2O39NwaKeVyRXqP3FYx1-cVyqGKaYHX81rKeCXcqEFj6Bt8HwuhJMUjY4357Sq02OCQLN37XokdnbYo-tJWQPBIf0sQEAcy0YQ8t--DtIdiQFgaPoXJfIzxdWUJGSPJriaOMAB87JGvx-5sZK4ePfCr41_PQUujhIAZ5nY=s1200" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="778" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEieo1_COrsLgb63hwjnrM2O39NwaKeVyRXqP3FYx1-cVyqGKaYHX81rKeCXcqEFj6Bt8HwuhJMUjY4357Sq02OCQLN37XokdnbYo-tJWQPBIf0sQEAcy0YQ8t--DtIdiQFgaPoXJfIzxdWUJGSPJriaOMAB87JGvx-5sZK4ePfCr41_PQUujhIAZ5nY=s320" width="207" /></a></div><br /><b><i>The Plot Against America</i> (2004) -- Philip Roth</b><p></p><p>Leave it to Philip Roth to tell us where we would be in 2021. Chilling. Breathtaking. Heartbreaking. Eerie in its prescient, metaphorical glimpse at an all-too-real alternative reality of a fascist America--where Franklin Delano Roosevelt loses the presidential election to famed celebrity aviator/anti-semitic/Nazi-sympathizer Charles Lindbergh. And the rest is...well...history. (Sort of.)</p><p>Roth is an American master, and here he was writing at the top of his late-career powers. <i>The Plot Against America</i> is pretty much an undisputed contemporary masterpiece.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgfLHZdF0N3M13kO_oKaVPlfvXzwixTOcjS25sstf4QB02igzbyJ2yqcq3KO6UZ69uNkseORy9siCxPV661jS0M20po3DhVkSBMKBXL1xiEmgHT8LEhRmdvkAXlN9kIL7nrWwBOvL8IfcpQ0jqySkAeGA-zumtOlUfd3V12wEEKRPjFeShwYNxsc_V3=s2560" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2560" data-original-width="1737" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgfLHZdF0N3M13kO_oKaVPlfvXzwixTOcjS25sstf4QB02igzbyJ2yqcq3KO6UZ69uNkseORy9siCxPV661jS0M20po3DhVkSBMKBXL1xiEmgHT8LEhRmdvkAXlN9kIL7nrWwBOvL8IfcpQ0jqySkAeGA-zumtOlUfd3V12wEEKRPjFeShwYNxsc_V3=s320" width="217" /></a></div><br /><b><i>Space Odyssey: Stanley Kubrick, Arthur C. Clarke, and the Making of a Masterpiece</i> (2018) -- Michael Benson</b><p></p><p>I am an admitted cinephile (in the correct parlance, I suppose). As such, I am also a confessed devotee of the master American filmmaker, Stanley Kubrick. I am a fan of his films; I enjoy them. I like to re-watch them, to think about them, to ponder them, to discuss them, to read about them. I have always liked his groundbreaking 1969 science fiction film <i>2001: A Space Odyssey</i>, made in mythic collaboration with legendary science fiction author Arthur C. Clarke. I have always liked the movie. I have always admired it and its place in film history. But it's never been a movie that I could honestly say I embraced warmly. That is, maybe...until I read this book. Benson's deep-dive into this strange, wonderful, masterful, one-of-a-kind work of groundbreaking cinematic art made me see Kubrick's classic film, at long last (as if for the first time), as the genuine masterpiece of "human cinema" that it is.</p><p><br /></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgWDZewx1hUBljKGhpxdtLv6EVPMADBwdG6yoT69pzfHw5l9Dxxx_icAYUQ4FQHak8_U3AqN83qjMrX1pE6FDvflnQON2XZWW26o_Wphmtzg61n1nihllojlHnkjU7TH1DqP4mO9pm4njQvuYkVfnWTBw9rWQGu8Odt5YQA2piDO4Y5oz7FFzZvBI4X=s2560" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2560" data-original-width="1687" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgWDZewx1hUBljKGhpxdtLv6EVPMADBwdG6yoT69pzfHw5l9Dxxx_icAYUQ4FQHak8_U3AqN83qjMrX1pE6FDvflnQON2XZWW26o_Wphmtzg61n1nihllojlHnkjU7TH1DqP4mO9pm4njQvuYkVfnWTBw9rWQGu8Odt5YQA2piDO4Y5oz7FFzZvBI4X=s320" width="211" /></a></div><br /><b><i>This Isn't Happening: Radiohead's "Kid A" and the Beginning of the 21st Century</i> (2020) -- Steven Hyden</b><p></p><p>In 1997, the British alternative rock band Radiohead released their third album to the world, <i>OK Computer</i>, and it would quickly become one of those rock albums--arty, thematically conceptual, moody, with guitar and "noise" hooks, and dark, brooding, mysterious lyrics--that is heralded into the rarefied air of the Great Rock Albums of All Time. Three years later appeared their fourth album, their follow-up to a masterpiece that by all rights could not be followed up. And yet...the band did it. Not with a repeat performance of all that worked before, but with the exact opposite, almost. The appearance of <i>Kid A</i> in 2000 (just one year before the paradigm-shifting events of 9-11-01) was perhaps even more thematically, socially, artistically "important" than its predecessor--in fact, maybe one of the most important rock albums ever.</p><p>I have always loved Radiohead. And I have always loved the album <i>Kid A</i>. I could not put Hyden's book down.</p><p style="text-align: center;"><b><br /></b></p><p style="text-align: center;"><b><br /></b></p><p style="text-align: center;"><b>HONORABLE MENTIONS:</b></p><p style="text-align: center;"><b><br /></b></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiqiQgrS-msYoGghrsj3rOkxEXojFvo8G3T_Q9vfzyYbhro-hrG-_QhetZqQY-VPpgukYlib4kzs9GL-WHl4gx7ACwVOk1G4JSfuuGzHtP3HFnO8xQbSWORFQzaNRMvaZnl2H0-9LIQT5ml4pAoYKhEJqczhML7P7tHG2eupbfeUi3TRpkb6H_VyMS-=s2113" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2113" data-original-width="1400" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiqiQgrS-msYoGghrsj3rOkxEXojFvo8G3T_Q9vfzyYbhro-hrG-_QhetZqQY-VPpgukYlib4kzs9GL-WHl4gx7ACwVOk1G4JSfuuGzHtP3HFnO8xQbSWORFQzaNRMvaZnl2H0-9LIQT5ml4pAoYKhEJqczhML7P7tHG2eupbfeUi3TRpkb6H_VyMS-=s320" width="212" /></a></div><b><i><div><b><i><br /></i></b></div>Best. Movie. Year. Ever: How 1999 Blew Up the Big Screen</i> (2019) -- Brian Raftery</b><div><br /></div><div>Raftery's book may seem like a required textbook for "film-nerds" and cinephiles everywhere to dig into, to hash out, to argue over, to pick apart, to agree with, to think about, to come to terms with. His argument's thesis could not be more simply stated than it is in his book's title, and while I'm not sure I (still) entirely agree with him, his argument is fun. I enjoyed revisiting some of the movies from 1999: It was a good year (not to sound too much like Sinatra, but...). It was a very good year.</div><div><br /></div><div>But the best ever? The GOAT of movie years? I don't know about that. Still, a good argument is a good argument, whether I completely agree with it or not. And this was a good argument and an entertaining read.</div><div><p><br /></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhPy6axDPC5D7Gb9P4dYaHq4F9h9KBHaI3vkjmGjJ9CvJ6gL6dZkloIJNahujf0gbc4tJaDXr0vwyN2Q-HCAvvVzbzBYArkPpv-tM3_Y8KX5oUHdZf-fGJ_6WNElvo8dVkQvScytINkjQioGkPsz_ktCpZr-vEPHIZnKIqsr_DkzE00rfgddwg8i3zW=s2139" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2139" data-original-width="1400" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhPy6axDPC5D7Gb9P4dYaHq4F9h9KBHaI3vkjmGjJ9CvJ6gL6dZkloIJNahujf0gbc4tJaDXr0vwyN2Q-HCAvvVzbzBYArkPpv-tM3_Y8KX5oUHdZf-fGJ_6WNElvo8dVkQvScytINkjQioGkPsz_ktCpZr-vEPHIZnKIqsr_DkzE00rfgddwg8i3zW=s320" width="209" /></a></div><br /><b><i>Billy Summers</i> (2021) -- Stephen King</b><p></p><p>Let me fill in some background a bit:</p><p>Ever since I was in high school and my Algebra teacher, the wonderful Ms. Kris Waldren (a veritable saint in disguise as a math teacher) loaned me her copy of the classic 1978 novel <i>The Stand</i>, I have been a devoted fan of Stephen King. And this was back in the early-to-mid-'80s, when King was in his cocaine-and-alcohol fueled heyday as a masterful storyteller and craftsman of popular (and in several instances very, very good) novels with a largely supernatural bent: <i>Carrie</i> (1974), <i>'Salem's Lot</i> (1975), <i>The Shining</i> (1977), <i>The Stand </i>(1978), <i>The Dead Zone</i> (1979), <i>Firestarter</i> (1980), <i>Cujo</i> (1981), <i>Different Seasons</i> (1982), <i>Pet Sematary</i> (1982), <i>Christine</i> (1983), <i>The Talisman</i> [with Peter Straub] (1984), <i>It</i> (1986), <i>Misery</i> (1987).... Do I seriously need to keep going? Classics, I would argue. Great American popular novels. All of them.</p><p>And then...as is wont to happen over time, something happened. Granted, the man has nothing left to prove anymore. But for at least the past 20 years (or more) he hasn't really proven anything so much, other than that he has kind of run out of ideas and has merely coasted on his reputation and on a working man's devotion to churning out novel after novel after novel, all sadly reading more like caricatured, well-crafted fan fiction. (Which is too bad, because--as the above roll call of titles indicates--when King was in his prime he was on fire and could not be touched. No one was even close. But those days are gone.) And then a funny thing happened last year: He published a good novel. (No, not a great one. I don't think so, anyway. But a strong one. A good one.) <i>Billy Summers</i> hearkens back to his best art of slow, methodical, carefully layered character-building and plot construction. One thing that holds this book back, however, is its tired, cliche' story-type of the good-hearted hired-killer making careful plans to get out of the business, just one last job, a big one, and then he's gone. We've seen it just one too many times before, maybe. (As we have, of course, the young girl who gets thrown into the killer's life, giving him something pure to believe in, something and someone to help redeem him before the inevitable, telegraphed end.) We've seen all of this before. And yet what makes this book good is that King calls back some of his old, latent talent, and he does some of his old tricks, and he shows that he still knows how to do it all and do it very well. Faults and all, the book still does what it is supposed to do. And it kept me turning pages. Which is one of the most basic things you can ask of a writer, I suppose.</p><p><br /></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgV3CwjXwRPiIIwnPvMlDJ_zAKpXZCgYWxBbdMYK8_l2fgy1wqBh21zNEY2JYuAYOa6oZ2vaaPI26S1POvtzvvtU9s7MVYznnf2Oi32mv76xCM69QbJxPugJ2ZrHS1tpUke7taUMaBNI0nxaer8AeuxzVlNMvp4W4AZQR4EGIdRHDc-g88yfJLQp3-W=s1600" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1063" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgV3CwjXwRPiIIwnPvMlDJ_zAKpXZCgYWxBbdMYK8_l2fgy1wqBh21zNEY2JYuAYOa6oZ2vaaPI26S1POvtzvvtU9s7MVYznnf2Oi32mv76xCM69QbJxPugJ2ZrHS1tpUke7taUMaBNI0nxaer8AeuxzVlNMvp4W4AZQR4EGIdRHDc-g88yfJLQp3-W=s320" width="213" /></a></div><br /><b><i>July, July</i> (2002) -- Tim O'Brien</b><p></p><p>Tim O'Brien is easily one of the greatest living contemporary American authors we have. He is a genuine treasure. His unproclaimed "trilogy" (of sorts) of Vietnam War novels--the National Book Award-winning <i>Going After Cacciato</i> (1978), his masterpiece <i>The Things They Carried</i> (1990), followed by the award-winning <i>In The Lake of the Woods</i> (1994)--are, each of them, unmatched, unparalleled, and untouched in the canon of American Literature. This 2002 effort by O'Brien reads just like that, unfortunately--an <i>effort</i> that for some reason or other just never comes together and never quite works in the manner of his greatest writing. I don't know if he wanted this to be some sort of "Part 4," the last "chapter" of a great tetralogy of his Vietnam War. (If he did, it doesn't read like it. Overall, it reads like what it is: A tired retread of material he has done before and done exceptionally better.) Still...all that being said, there are a few scenes--Vietnam War scenes, particularly--that read just as powerfully as anything he has written. The problem is, those scenes are too few and scattered between longer passages of "present-day" material at a college reunion (<i>The Big Chill</i> sort of vibe), peopled largely by characters who are not particularly interesting or likeable. And yet those great moments linger in your memory, like the sun somehow catching the glint of gold lying in the silt at the bottom of a river. Those moments are very fine.</p><p>As it turns out, though--at least to me, anyway--even "lesser" Tim O'Brien (and, let's face it, maybe even "not good" Tim O'Brien) is still worth reading, and maybe even better reading than 90% of what is often out there to read.</p><p><br /></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEi1T59J31QY2WPwawmaUQuj4JHx7ncN9LoxFLqoK9cWZapS8Lt7pndVUJTQyXWlLAM34zDeJk_oZLYtPmlVJd0eI46RYkBZasiOwKlMoNJiCPxVjSVm8mPnvmS5l50SupB41rbbw7Soo-40k5SVLxeTy7FG1k4fMWK2YMpTeI5xEjNXeKUcSkL-fX7n=s2560" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2560" data-original-width="1667" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEi1T59J31QY2WPwawmaUQuj4JHx7ncN9LoxFLqoK9cWZapS8Lt7pndVUJTQyXWlLAM34zDeJk_oZLYtPmlVJd0eI46RYkBZasiOwKlMoNJiCPxVjSVm8mPnvmS5l50SupB41rbbw7Soo-40k5SVLxeTy7FG1k4fMWK2YMpTeI5xEjNXeKUcSkL-fX7n=s320" width="208" /></a></div><b><i><div><b><i><br /></i></b></div>Moonglow: A Novel</i></b> <b>(2016) -- Michael Chabon</b><p></p><p>Michael Chabon exploded to fame with the 1988 publication of his first novel, <i>The Mysteries of Pittsburgh</i>--which, amazingly, he began writing as an undergrad in college and would eventually publish as his MFA graduate thesis. (Who does that?) He would follow this out-of-the-gate success with <i>Wonder Boys </i>(1995), and then the Pulitzer Prize-winning <i>The Adventures of Kavalier and Clay</i> (2000), as well as 2007's <i>The Yiddish Policeman's Union</i>.</p><p>Chabon is a chameleon with his talent. I honestly believe there is nothing he can't do as a writer. And while <i>Moonglow</i> may not be "top-shelf" Michael Chabon--maybe high "middle-shelf," after all--it is still very good. Some postmodern fireworks here in the form of a pseudo-memoir by a writer named Michael Chabon, whose grandfather--dying after a long, full life--begins recounting his charmed life to his grandson, the writer. This is a funny, moving, deeply rich reading experience--kind of like every Chabon novel, in other words.</p><p><br /></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEi9UV4-v8GRdsgWC1CTqXk0hDO6GBr9nDsrVcFcqh2Ax1fM5pp_75bIRkTOoWa9SKKgWiwIb3F3o1x9N8UYkl_f-QD7A5wHhNrvAIskz-s0pQWU8wm3k1UDJU2aQey35-iAdSC7m2QzyY1rEsuR8cvMMtMVGC1yUr16d2cQ1SJ6l1ng3Ts7_sWhs0Wn=s500" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="500" data-original-width="330" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEi9UV4-v8GRdsgWC1CTqXk0hDO6GBr9nDsrVcFcqh2Ax1fM5pp_75bIRkTOoWa9SKKgWiwIb3F3o1x9N8UYkl_f-QD7A5wHhNrvAIskz-s0pQWU8wm3k1UDJU2aQey35-iAdSC7m2QzyY1rEsuR8cvMMtMVGC1yUr16d2cQ1SJ6l1ng3Ts7_sWhs0Wn=s320" width="211" /></a></div><br /><b><i>The Splendid and the Vile: A Saga of Churchill, Family, and Defiance During the Blitz</i> (2020) -- Erik Larson</b><p></p><p>Like so many of the writers and their books on my list this year, I could say of Erik Larson what I have mentioned previously: He can seemingly do anything he wants. As a nonfiction historical writer, his subjects are wide and varied: <i>Isaac's Storm</i> (1999), <i>Devil and the White City</i> (2003), <i>Thunderstruck</i> (2006), <i>In the Garden of Beasts</i> (2011), <i>Dead Wake </i>(2015), and now this one, his latest, about England during W.W. II, about London, specifically, during the Blitz, and about the great British leader Winston Churchill, as he painstakingly struggles to hold the literal structures and the spirits of his country together while patiently trying to urge America (represented by his great friend and ally, President FDR) to come to England's aid. Winston Churchill is so great a character, I am convinced he exists in a world all his own: Had he been created by the greatest English novelist, no one would have ever believed it.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div></div>David Newsomhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02698845610286763351noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1218241678607183535.post-63468094421143888262022-01-22T10:09:00.007-08:002022-01-30T16:25:38.192-08:00"It's supposed to be charming...": Watching Movies in 2021<p> </p><p><b>Arthur Howitzer, Jr.:</b> [<i>reading aloud from a news story</i>] "Pick-pockets, dead bodies, prisons, urinals." You don't want to add a flower shop or an art museum?</p><p><b>Herbsaint Sazerac:</b> No, I don't.</p><p><b>Arthur Howitzer, Jr.:</b> A pretty place of some kind?</p><p><b>Herbsaint Sazerac:</b> I hate flowers.</p><p><b>Arthur Howitzer, Jr.:</b> [<i>reading aloud again from a news stor</i>y] "Rats, vermin, gigolos, streetwalkers." You don't think it's almost too seedy this time?</p><p><b>Herbsaint Sazerac:</b> No, I don't.</p><p><b>Arthur Howitzer, Jr.:</b> For decent people?</p><p><b>Herbsaint Sazerac:</b> It's supposed to be charming.</p><p style="text-align: center;">______________________________</p><p style="text-align: left;">We can say what we want about the year 2021. There would undoubtedly be a lot to say. If years had sequels, then--true to the notion that most sequels don't quite live up to the film that preceded them (rare and famous instances excluded, of course, like the often-mentioned exceptions, <i>The Godfather Part II</i> and <i>The Empire Strikes Back</i>)--2021 sucked as a sequel to the already historically dismal year 2020. I believe that's fair to say.</p><p style="text-align: left;">On most fronts--public, political, social, private--we couldn't seem to collectively or independently catch a break in 2021.</p><p style="text-align: left;">Just when things seemed to have gotten "better" as the year progressed, things soon took a nosedive again. We all know it. There isn't any sense in rehashing what we have all spent the past two years experiencing, again, collectively and independently, over and over.</p><p style="text-align: left;">In the world of film/movies/cinema, though, I have to say that I think this was an exceptionally good year. It was a challenging year for filmmakers and for their films, certainly--as artists making art, not to mention as workers in an industry. But we have discovered, through the fires of this ongoing pandemic, new ways of doing old things. In such a forge, the current struggles have seemed to strengthen some aspects of the film industry while simultaneously weakening others. We have accustomed ourselves, rather quickly--through necessity and because of a shared love of watching films--to a different, evolved way of "watching" movies. Cinemaplexes opened up again, with required social restrictions. Online streaming services flourished. Highly anticipated "big" movies--with big budgets, promising big-screen spectacle, or "smaller" new titles from big-name filmmakers--were given calendar-date releases, only to be stalled, or bumped back, or re-scheduled over, and over, and over, and over....</p><p style="text-align: left;">Again, I'm reporting on news that all of us already know.</p><p style="text-align: left;">And yet, all things considered--2021 being the terrible year that it was--we were treated to some really fine movies over the past year. One way or another, whether it was venturing out to the movie theaters again or staying home and catching up with films on streaming services like Netlix, Hulu, Prime, etc., I enjoyed a great year of movie-watching. </p><p style="text-align: left;">Below are two different lists comprising my choices for some of the best movies I saw over the past year. The first list of ten titles are all "new" films that were released, one way or another, in 2021. The second list of ten titles includes some more "new" 2021 films, as well as a few "older" films from recent years that, through streaming at home, I was only now seeing for the first time. Regardless, these are all great films in my opinion. There is no system of valuation here, no ranking order--descending or ascending--of "greatness" to my lists. I didn't do that. Such valuation seems pointless right now, in light of the year that was.</p><p style="text-align: left;">Both of the lists below, then, are ordered alphabetically.</p><p style="text-align: center;"><b><br /></b></p><p style="text-align: center;"><b>FAVORITE MOVIES -- 2021 FILMS:</b></p><p style="text-align: center;"><br /></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEj4yPmuYHqLEu0nTLQn_5kmK6UjMBtw59_SigDI0tyJhNTTfWIe2mntzTbjE-PyM-OPrLmVCnf2wQlHux-WCbb5m7k0hToYA_a7c8LSzbZJ8K4hZetVsojd11ndxACy93n2mUbGIS1x6yn7-Rj1Bkq5p9uoA26ftpe9ZKcQ5TDJepXMWJehE0e-n94x=s1778" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1778" data-original-width="1200" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEj4yPmuYHqLEu0nTLQn_5kmK6UjMBtw59_SigDI0tyJhNTTfWIe2mntzTbjE-PyM-OPrLmVCnf2wQlHux-WCbb5m7k0hToYA_a7c8LSzbZJ8K4hZetVsojd11ndxACy93n2mUbGIS1x6yn7-Rj1Bkq5p9uoA26ftpe9ZKcQ5TDJepXMWJehE0e-n94x=s320" width="216" /></a></div><br /><b><i>Annette</i> (2021) -- dir. Leos Carax</b><p></p><p>It isn't often that I find myself saying these days, as a film's end-credits begin to roll, "Well, I've never seen anything quite like <i>that</i> before." But such was my response to French filmmaker Leos Carax's latest project. With the exception of its dazzling self-aware opening musical number, "So May We Start," right at the film's outset, I found myself (in the movie's first 30 minutes or so) seriously questioning if I had the fortitude to make it through its looming 140-minute runtime. But by the end of it all, Carax's strange, haunting rock-opera/dark parable of the vampiric entertainment industry had completely won me over. I immediately started urging anyone who would listen to me to give this offbeat, dark, strange, moving, lovely little film the chance it deserves.</p><p><i>Annette</i> is in a category all its own this year.</p><p><br /></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjxA2QpPqgX-bLHSo_eGqVfL8FuvYEgaTJSqi6Krwx5cqzxoB7gZh0IBR7tY2pY9RuRc5oMBptTe6uBv-5FA6MWOWE7W56aCkuARtxMu9c3el0HNHrOOBr3POll_8ZzLdE7fHSkuFh0V8zwdWjC1X9Xi0DaWUUU_Rg1WC_NSVlPLHUBWbm0nsi8bbxr=s1483" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1483" data-original-width="1000" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjxA2QpPqgX-bLHSo_eGqVfL8FuvYEgaTJSqi6Krwx5cqzxoB7gZh0IBR7tY2pY9RuRc5oMBptTe6uBv-5FA6MWOWE7W56aCkuARtxMu9c3el0HNHrOOBr3POll_8ZzLdE7fHSkuFh0V8zwdWjC1X9Xi0DaWUUU_Rg1WC_NSVlPLHUBWbm0nsi8bbxr=s320" width="216" /></a></div><br /><b><i>Dune</i> (2021) -- dir. Denis Villenueve </b><p></p><p>A lot can be said about a movie that makes you forget just how awful David Lynch's 1984 big-screen <i>Dune</i> debacle was. Anyone who's read Frank Herbert's dauntingly dense 1965 epic sci-fi novel knows how notoriously unfilmmable the book supposedly is. (To which Lynch's contribution nearly proved correct, I might add.) Fortunately for us, though, time has passed. Visual and sound effects have leaped light-years ahead in regards to what can believably be accomplished on a grand scale. And we have a filmmaker in Canada's Denis Villenueve who understands the intricacies of Herbert's original world-building and has the patience and the vision to successfully bring it to the screen.</p><p>A new sci-fi epic-in-the-making; I look forward to its "Part II."</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgGbZEbFD7Y4t_NWZcgNuzLwrMYFlSV829-BkaqUOakStbSGJr5Spjkw4Btf2GdWlysWJY0pjdWfZFy6eVQ_yVqyRVUgZLbhVLKlb_3AJhf8hqyxfyvDkPBVPdkvD8e1qXS42_FFBG4U9rNb64Waft7nLgivEhWoqF4Dv8O6QvPD0Dqqek-iRzPb8Lc=s1398" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1398" data-original-width="900" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgGbZEbFD7Y4t_NWZcgNuzLwrMYFlSV829-BkaqUOakStbSGJr5Spjkw4Btf2GdWlysWJY0pjdWfZFy6eVQ_yVqyRVUgZLbhVLKlb_3AJhf8hqyxfyvDkPBVPdkvD8e1qXS42_FFBG4U9rNb64Waft7nLgivEhWoqF4Dv8O6QvPD0Dqqek-iRzPb8Lc=s320" width="206" /></a></div><div><br /></div><b><i>The French Dispatch</i> (2021) -- dir. Wes Anderson</b><p></p><p>You either love a Wes Anderson film, or you hate it. If you hate one of his movies--for whatever particular reason(s)--odds are high that you will more than likely hate all of them. Conversely, if you love one of his movies, the chances of you serving as an acolyte to the vaunted "Wes Anderson style" are exponentially (and probably annoyingly) increased.</p><p>I unreservedly and unabashedly fall in the acolyte camp. No apologies. No explanations. I just think his films are extraordinary explorations into the world of filmmaking (and art) itself, and into the nature of whimsy, and loneliness, and joy, and melancholy, and the people whom we love, and the people who don't love us back, and our need for acceptance, and our need for family--even if that family is made up, finally, of a "family" we make for ourselves. </p><p><br /></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjluwlzuOUDUq-QhcySYCRWldAEtHDIx0pJY6JZ94ljfblHOx2ChTxm3hz1NwhRS2IwUNDyz8dKR_GtRJQzaoT7k2WHKgwx9fHKD4hbbWSDWq_ofz-7zpLz67lCczVYbT8ifRF4-brQV5xcdRxaK51wCbZDXdPCJBYe4jpI6OjBjXtAqEMwpsK4R-qU=s1481" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1481" data-original-width="1000" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjluwlzuOUDUq-QhcySYCRWldAEtHDIx0pJY6JZ94ljfblHOx2ChTxm3hz1NwhRS2IwUNDyz8dKR_GtRJQzaoT7k2WHKgwx9fHKD4hbbWSDWq_ofz-7zpLz67lCczVYbT8ifRF4-brQV5xcdRxaK51wCbZDXdPCJBYe4jpI6OjBjXtAqEMwpsK4R-qU=s320" width="216" /></a></div><br /><b><i>The Green Knight</i> (2021) -- dir. David Lowery</b><p></p><p>For years my high school English classes--seniors who are bored, and tired of school, and simply wanting a passing grade so they can graduate--have read the 14th-century chivalric romance, <i>Sir Gawain and the Green Knight</i>. Originally written (anonymously) in Middle English dialect nearly 700 years ago, its 101 stanzas still manage to work their magic. Nine times out of ten my classes will begin the reading with the typical grumbling, moaning, griping, and complaining. And nine times out of ten my classes will come to the end of the poem surprised at how much they enjoyed it.</p><p>David Lowery is a daring artist, and his take on this old poem is everything you would hope a film adaptation would be in 2021. I couldn't take my eyes off the screen--right up until the movie's last line of dialogue (maybe one of the great film-closers of all time).</p><p><br /></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjDN_Majm1uxPaib5T9Y1pK6AQMv0x66qM6IV5okYHR-_m1uNaekaSG1KOL-NtsBOClH2EZfKMFeYaS-JfNkrmxkvUNTUA8BQVEGTQ4VK6KyXKzNO-zMva1FzBaII99wDqe9BIAdvQfbVfNh1Wh-UBSZ7xQUsGEa05AvdEw5L_ctElUROn1knN8GAGJ=s800" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="800" data-original-width="504" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjDN_Majm1uxPaib5T9Y1pK6AQMv0x66qM6IV5okYHR-_m1uNaekaSG1KOL-NtsBOClH2EZfKMFeYaS-JfNkrmxkvUNTUA8BQVEGTQ4VK6KyXKzNO-zMva1FzBaII99wDqe9BIAdvQfbVfNh1Wh-UBSZ7xQUsGEa05AvdEw5L_ctElUROn1knN8GAGJ=s320" width="202" /></a></div><div><br /></div><b><i>Licorice Pizza</i> (2021) -- dir. Paul Thomas Anderson</b><p></p><p>I honestly think I had a smile pasted on my dopey face during the entire running time of this film. I couldn't help it. It is just pure delight. Funny, nostalgic (in the best sense), heartwarming (without being needlessly saccharine), and genuinely good-hearted. It is almost hard to believe that those adjectives are describing a P.T. Anderson film. Although he is easily on the shortlist of great contemporary American filmmakers, his movies are not usually described as "funny, nostalgic, heartwarming, and genuinely good-hearted" smile-busters. But this one seems to be that rare outlier.</p><p>Headed by first-timers Cooper Hoffman (son of Philip Seymour Hoffman) and Alana Haim (one-third of the band, HAIM, with her sisters, who also make brief appearances in the film), this thing has charm, charisma, and chemistry to spare. I loved every minute of it.</p><p><br /></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEh34HjnzO5iqFyfns0kjyB79PHkrE8QzeXIjKWjx6cYS6qTCZiwLyWsLwANV5ZFeB9kWFf7ztW6H-5RRXmBwXCmaBVGdA349qg14zVUKeegZDgBQgOZizMw-hUDZOBMbVgyDlvmZVtnjlFYw0z1LuuFzDIwz-6iqNb-zcPWCRVU5HHyswchOO9C0euL=s1925" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1925" data-original-width="1300" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEh34HjnzO5iqFyfns0kjyB79PHkrE8QzeXIjKWjx6cYS6qTCZiwLyWsLwANV5ZFeB9kWFf7ztW6H-5RRXmBwXCmaBVGdA349qg14zVUKeegZDgBQgOZizMw-hUDZOBMbVgyDlvmZVtnjlFYw0z1LuuFzDIwz-6iqNb-zcPWCRVU5HHyswchOO9C0euL=s320" width="216" /></a></div><br /><b><i>Pig</i> (2021) -- dir. Michael Sarnoski</b><p></p><p>Imagine this elevator pitch for a new movie idea: A "retired" Portland chef, Rob Feld, now living off-the-grid in the outlying woods, wakes to find his truffle-hunting pig stolen from him. He goes on a journey to find his beloved pig and discovers, in the process, the dark underground of the urban restaurant scene--a world of drug addicts, and shady fight clubs, and desperate, lonely misfits who don't understand Rob's simple life-code: "We don't get a lot of things to really care about."</p><p>Imagine a first-time director at the helm. Now imagine Nicolas Cage being cast in the lead role as Rob....</p><p>No, by all calculus, this thing should not have worked. But against all odds it does. Beautifully. This is a stunningly good movie.</p><p><br /></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjrCca8mBqHN8UVxWJfY-JFDNEPyz7Va7REORY-brQ9EVnm3Dj4FA9RKiGoH-k1Wr3OPccHgTeCU4CUCrk-b2IdTS6ZLT-kD1oTkuUhPzXz0wT8RyqK5N5An6YZEWsLkdjf3zobiuNFJXfiH0GIw8No50RTXjPfrE9So7fCs6KKt4Y5OhJG2ETBRMSr=s1500" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1500" data-original-width="1013" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjrCca8mBqHN8UVxWJfY-JFDNEPyz7Va7REORY-brQ9EVnm3Dj4FA9RKiGoH-k1Wr3OPccHgTeCU4CUCrk-b2IdTS6ZLT-kD1oTkuUhPzXz0wT8RyqK5N5An6YZEWsLkdjf3zobiuNFJXfiH0GIw8No50RTXjPfrE9So7fCs6KKt4Y5OhJG2ETBRMSr=s320" width="216" /></a></div><br /><b><i>The Power of the Dog</i> (2021) -- dir. Jane Campion</b><p></p><p>Set in 1925 Montana, yet filmed in New Zealand by renowned New Zealand filmmaker Jane Campion (her first feature since 2009's <i>Bright Star</i>) with a script she adapted from the 1967 western novel of the same name by closeted-gay author Thomas Savage about Old Testament-style brotherly resentment, grief, love, jealousy, anger, memory, fear, and sexuality.</p><p>Real Jane Campion sort of stuff, in other words.</p><p>Not your father's western, maybe. But this thing is going to have some staying power. While maybe not up to the level of Campion's masterpiece, 1993's <i>The Piano</i>, this is still a film that will be remembered over time, not only as one of her best (which is saying a lot) but also as simply a great movie. I think it is masterful.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEirQ_LJxlscam2w9opAOAS4VkjchdorUiL-toQyP1oiLYpBN63dc71wySVeCqvwmovyDFqgFq_i6L3OclRr3u7VDSfPMB60qMXY2clXueCfIDwqlRSf3pKeyQ0Fcg9fY9qc-hMxLg_ntV-bwVUBPYP6WDxXz3VWEojwcjI18JvrecrhtaCgoqTEBTu7=s1024" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1024" data-original-width="728" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEirQ_LJxlscam2w9opAOAS4VkjchdorUiL-toQyP1oiLYpBN63dc71wySVeCqvwmovyDFqgFq_i6L3OclRr3u7VDSfPMB60qMXY2clXueCfIDwqlRSf3pKeyQ0Fcg9fY9qc-hMxLg_ntV-bwVUBPYP6WDxXz3VWEojwcjI18JvrecrhtaCgoqTEBTu7=s320" width="228" /></a></div><br /><b><i>Spencer</i> (2021) -- dir. Pablo Larrain</b><p></p><p>What is a human life worth--in monetary value, I suppose (if that can even be definitively determined) but also in more metaphorical, emotional values? What is the cost of a human life? I don't know. But Larrain's movie made me ask such questions. And, granted, it also made me think of such current terms as "white privilege" and "first-world problems," etc. (Is it possible, after all, to feel sorry for a white, wealthy, privileged British princess suffering from depression, and bulimia, and existential despair? Fair questions, I guess. But the answer is simple: Yes.)</p><p>Kristen Stewart has come into her own as a fine young actress. And this is a stirring, strong, unforgettable performance as the late Princess Diana. Along with her recent films with French filmmaker, Olivier Assayas, this is some of Stewart's best work.</p><p><br /></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEijenWTEeo19eWJcXC9ghGhH1WVzKKyWlQd5sGSbSdFA_GMruiQ569RRHqVzydYX2WdGGk8VuCGa1K_0bvLzZ3iVxBU9FTGaqEJLT9s_jridqQJYoUd_25ZccRkPx_HSI4t2BwsYP9VAH3tFHIMA02DrWmwrKVDWtbbuM_WkeJZ3jn_80KPP_CFvFNZ=s2000" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2000" data-original-width="1334" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEijenWTEeo19eWJcXC9ghGhH1WVzKKyWlQd5sGSbSdFA_GMruiQ569RRHqVzydYX2WdGGk8VuCGa1K_0bvLzZ3iVxBU9FTGaqEJLT9s_jridqQJYoUd_25ZccRkPx_HSI4t2BwsYP9VAH3tFHIMA02DrWmwrKVDWtbbuM_WkeJZ3jn_80KPP_CFvFNZ=s320" width="213" /></a></div><br /><b><i>Summer of Soul</i> (2021) -- dir. Ahmir "Questlove" Thompson</b><p></p><p>I had never heard of this six-week 1969 concert held in Harlem's Mount Morris Park, featuring some of the greatest black musical acts of the time. And chances are neither had you, I'm guessing.</p><p>And that, I suppose, is largely the point behind Questlove's absolutely mesmerizing work of archival documentary filmmaking. From original footage of the event, to interviews with older attendees looking back at the great concert and wondering why no one had ever documented it before, this movie soars.</p><p>"I thought I had dreamed it," one grown attendee says in the film.</p><p>This is a great musical documentary that deserves to be seen. And to be remembered.</p><p><br /></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEi9IFmyFRNhl4hhf5A2eZlcdl36VnTDZgMhVBQ7El-9pqEnysvQuF9TMIPK2zN8skqNC5zCFh6ilsHMVlMkEta5BR0GRhHte_g1bmP8yfJYpmmvTXkF_H4-4ato6MNqj4vpcg49r7rkvW8SOIf72ldY8bY-6XkqZ_BlGT6vI5LHlXk4xfeVJ-FKmV12=s3000" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3000" data-original-width="2000" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEi9IFmyFRNhl4hhf5A2eZlcdl36VnTDZgMhVBQ7El-9pqEnysvQuF9TMIPK2zN8skqNC5zCFh6ilsHMVlMkEta5BR0GRhHte_g1bmP8yfJYpmmvTXkF_H4-4ato6MNqj4vpcg49r7rkvW8SOIf72ldY8bY-6XkqZ_BlGT6vI5LHlXk4xfeVJ-FKmV12=s320" width="213" /></a></div><br /><b><i>West Side Story </i>(2021)<i> </i>-- dir. Steven Spielberg</b><p></p><p>Steven Spielberg has nothing left to prove, really. He's done it. But he decided to prove himself again this past year, anyway, with his film remake of the great (and by "the" I mean maybe <i>the</i>), classic American musical.</p><p>Does it get any better than <i>West Side Story</i> as far as stage musicals? I don't know. I'm not an expert on the art. I just know what I like. With a classic score by the great Leonard Bernstein, and lyrics by the equally great Stephen Sondheim, as well as original dance choreography by the great Jerome Robbins (updated in 2021 by Justin Peck), Spielberg's retelling of the classic stage-to-film musical not only updates Robert Wise's tired 1961 movie-version but also ups the ante. And it does so with great urgency and with great style. We needed a movie like this during a year like 2021.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p style="text-align: center;"><b>2021 MOVIE-WATCHING -- HONORABLE MENTIONS:</b></p><p><br /></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgtDvmyJgPVET8tQQyYnF20a21_k8Dia12lWwLmVoWWQb8ens5W7SAPSAV-k6Nu5TuQoJljH28JOTcluTok9q7uXJ6G269lNRvpLoo_9IZupjHjLz-W-1WlLc3TCAyfQRk9gq8C8KpiypoV8aIU2QKzrQtDg1CoEH7Y8d_0vT0XCSm_3ooj47dAAjjx=s2835" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2835" data-original-width="1984" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgtDvmyJgPVET8tQQyYnF20a21_k8Dia12lWwLmVoWWQb8ens5W7SAPSAV-k6Nu5TuQoJljH28JOTcluTok9q7uXJ6G269lNRvpLoo_9IZupjHjLz-W-1WlLc3TCAyfQRk9gq8C8KpiypoV8aIU2QKzrQtDg1CoEH7Y8d_0vT0XCSm_3ooj47dAAjjx=s320" width="224" /></a></div><br /><b><i>About Endlessness</i> (2019) -- dir. Roy Andersson</b><div><b><br /></b></div><div>This past year I quietly discovered Sweden's Roy Andersson. (Which is the best way, I suppose, to become familiar with an artist like Andersson and his work.) Though certainly not to everyone's taste, his minimalist, offbeat, often off-putting films--made up of short, individual scenes carefully pieced together in a thematic montage--inexorably begin to work their spell on you. I look forward to making up for lost time and working my way through his film-backlog.</div><div><br /></div><div>Upon finishing this movie, I immediately started it over again and watched it straight through, beginning to end. (I imagine someone else could watch this movie and wonder what's wrong with me; but, honestly, this is the thoughtful, explorative, philosophical sort of film that I want to savor and to spend time with.) Great stuff.</div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><p></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEg8pWjm7Ff_rY_Yim02pmyGx6cZtTEqRfkkzcPjqQR-ZJzWrXk2xIWyYeT3giZGW_OJEjOSuJQZoejnyUKmX4ukUsckINYCyaszpApNiplJANB_tgpfizASf7rCrilIICLumgUFCvF4rtz6uphJE1OBinCoDxWF9eM1o253hMKEeC-S4CGZruTjappT=s933" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="933" data-original-width="750" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEg8pWjm7Ff_rY_Yim02pmyGx6cZtTEqRfkkzcPjqQR-ZJzWrXk2xIWyYeT3giZGW_OJEjOSuJQZoejnyUKmX4ukUsckINYCyaszpApNiplJANB_tgpfizASf7rCrilIICLumgUFCvF4rtz6uphJE1OBinCoDxWF9eM1o253hMKEeC-S4CGZruTjappT=s320" width="257" /></a></div><div><br /></div><b><i>Get Back</i> (2021) -- dir. Peter Jackson</b><p></p><p>Never one to do anything in a small way, Middle-Earth visionary Peter Jackson is on a roll these days with back-to-back breathtaking documentaries, both pieced together with archival footage run through the best film technology of his New Zealand-based Weta Workshop. First there was Jackson's 2018 W.W. I documentary, <i>They Shall Not Grow Old</i>, blowing our minds with its stunning use of film-colorization done right. And now, this past year, we were treated to his nearly 8-hour behind-the-scenes glimpse at the inner-workings of the last days of The Beatles, holed up together (for the most part) in a London sound-studio, working feverishly for 21 days on the material that would make up the band's legendary final two albums, <i>Abbey Road</i> and <i>Let It Be</i>. The resulting film is unbelievably watchable.</p><p><br /></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjZLxvH5T3AB2b-evaxSGfIW6hIjo8XdeJnGHpFchxcVBASfNiEsktfad2BZuMfQi9VJirUYtlxKNw9tcdco5EHKamFu08XWtQxpRQf7aQ5OILEa22l3FK1PAwDSRbbXJVstp_YmH9Uc_xnwAOKk0xZCq0gvJ5f6WsIrvp1rqTkG9t4YGjB_OE7c2uW=s2500" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2500" data-original-width="1688" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjZLxvH5T3AB2b-evaxSGfIW6hIjo8XdeJnGHpFchxcVBASfNiEsktfad2BZuMfQi9VJirUYtlxKNw9tcdco5EHKamFu08XWtQxpRQf7aQ5OILEa22l3FK1PAwDSRbbXJVstp_YmH9Uc_xnwAOKk0xZCq0gvJ5f6WsIrvp1rqTkG9t4YGjB_OE7c2uW=s320" width="216" /></a></div><br /><b><i>Gunda</i> (2020) -- dir. Viktor Kossakovsky</b><p></p><p>Filmed in glorious black-and-white by auteur Russian documentarian Viktor Kossakovsky on various farms and animal shelters in Norway, England, and Spain, and "starring" a sow and her scene-stealing piglets, and some cows, and some sheep, and a one-legged chicken, this is a film that follows the daily life of a simple mother and her children. Pieced together in deliberately slow, long takes (oh, the patience of the film crew here), the movie beautifully weaves a picture of pastoral life slowed down to a four-legged pace, a life lived on a farm by a pig and her litter of little piglets snuffling for a place at the dinner line, snorting behind her on the daily walks around the yard, tracing an existence of no small consequence lived from birth in the barn to...the film's jaw-dropping denoument of a mother's agonizing incomprehension turned to slow, painful realization of a pig's sad fate on a farm. </p><p><br /></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjbSB38U4y5pxltHnzwHmwV1ROq6CpCeojzZ4T_prYVzMuiVsLVPrxDOOX_iy1kngX7eaZQByOue8pAU59-SFdig50x0Aa4Z1A8htmk2AoDShiZmt03GNBBeLi8dSYgQ9P13hxucNQnjRng6JRPA1v_Z3AKLUaZX7EDNVR0ZGrXHpanU0k5QpqG1g5s=s1500" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1500" data-original-width="1018" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjbSB38U4y5pxltHnzwHmwV1ROq6CpCeojzZ4T_prYVzMuiVsLVPrxDOOX_iy1kngX7eaZQByOue8pAU59-SFdig50x0Aa4Z1A8htmk2AoDShiZmt03GNBBeLi8dSYgQ9P13hxucNQnjRng6JRPA1v_Z3AKLUaZX7EDNVR0ZGrXHpanU0k5QpqG1g5s=s320" width="217" /></a></div><br /><b><i>I'm Thinking of Ending Things </i>(2020) -- dir. Charlie Kaufman</b></div><div><br /></div><div>I've noticed several online discussion threads dedicated to deciphering the supposed confusing and confounding nature of this film, with viewers seeking answers to what it's all about and what it's all supposed to mean. I streamed this movie on Netflix and so had the luxury of re-watching it quickly and yet at my leisure. It is a movie that certainly benefits from at least a repeated watch--if not more (taste willing). And although Kaufman is notorious for his elliptical, existential, postmodern touches as a writer/filmmaker, I actually found this movie to be fairly decipherable on the first (and second) viewing. You just have to pay attention, and be a cognizant watcher, and notice the subtle intricacies of what's going on--a dreamlike reverie (or nightmare) on loneliness, and love, and isolation, and dreams, and despair. Heavy stuff, maybe, but a work of art from a genuine artist.<p><br /></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgm3Pavcivv12g-F11kOeMhB72CptiOMblhuXxvNq-ZxR0Imnl4bSzZJyPp38Rb_NX4QukFzWLZW-xM_-EKmsaYCDYKf6-decIpuuEyUukKN6_uAaQfwZiyWxjlHzCc-QX7kU6B7qsnz_pdvrj038arAz7d6leIVgB7f--0M0K20VUaArADHO9-tLnq=s1500" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1500" data-original-width="1016" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgm3Pavcivv12g-F11kOeMhB72CptiOMblhuXxvNq-ZxR0Imnl4bSzZJyPp38Rb_NX4QukFzWLZW-xM_-EKmsaYCDYKf6-decIpuuEyUukKN6_uAaQfwZiyWxjlHzCc-QX7kU6B7qsnz_pdvrj038arAz7d6leIVgB7f--0M0K20VUaArADHO9-tLnq=s320" width="217" /></a></div><br /><b><i>The Killing of Two Lovers</i> (2020) -- dir. Robert Machoian</b><p></p><p>I caught up with this movie on Hulu this past year, and it blew me away. It shook me. The gut-wrenching honesty of its indie-style exploration into the pain, and the confusion, and the awkwardness, and the sadness, and the rage, and the heartbreak, and the helplessness of a young husband/father going through a separation/impending divorce from his wife/mother of his children is visceral. I felt it under my skin. And it made me shiver with memory. Writer/Producer/Director Robert Machoian is fantastic here, from the film's startling opening shot, to its use of non-diagetic sound--a thunderous, repetitive clicking (the cocking of a gun?)--that works to unnerve you, to unsettle you, and to keep you wondering, right up to the movie's last scene, just what is going to come of all this agony.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiQiCdLDQS6iLBSF_FNjfaJ7KLH_2n69GCyB5tnLAhp393jGa4SOdhetIevxfwFY1m9hmf9GZooqXcqY8ZjqLujMZKuChIYIrJAwdlJo4B7kOr2YTNABlq0NYJ-zjDpXOiiObsqnVFu86nxDT8jx55Otsz7bm0Q056EXg1s2uPZDb9cVISiJTX-va8c=s1500" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1500" data-original-width="1013" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiQiCdLDQS6iLBSF_FNjfaJ7KLH_2n69GCyB5tnLAhp393jGa4SOdhetIevxfwFY1m9hmf9GZooqXcqY8ZjqLujMZKuChIYIrJAwdlJo4B7kOr2YTNABlq0NYJ-zjDpXOiiObsqnVFu86nxDT8jx55Otsz7bm0Q056EXg1s2uPZDb9cVISiJTX-va8c=s320" width="216" /></a></div><br /><b><i>The Lost Daughter</i> (2021) -- dir. Maggie Gyllenhaal</b><p></p><p>Seasoned actress and first-time writer/director Maggie Gyllenhaal seems to have intuitively absorbed, over the course of her acting career, just what it takes to make a damn good movie. She has obviously watched, and listened, and paid attention. With her script adapted from the 2006 novel of the same name by Italian writer, Elena Ferrante, Gyllenhaal enlists the aid of some top-shelf acting talent here to tell this tightly-wound examination of a middle-aged woman on the verge of coming unraveled. Olivia Colman, Jessie Buckley, Ed Harris, Dakota Johnson... It's a heady brew. </p><p>(Not that movie-awards season technically means anything--I get that. But still...it is recognition. And I hope Colman and Buckley, at least, are remembered and recognized for the great work they do in this film.)</p><p><br /></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEijlIBm4RdqkwAMIVrIt3PVyyxWSj6kiotR4R67zF0es0_azGZfk3kktxpqGONynox68jpq7t924-8YksunQnItB8ZaLSlWeMidul23bALHJiCYFC9LDxK3Va2HlOnDUqFaFmOSrUSXnGk5BrhHV6H2oF7CzOQqfHLKj0nIh9LHccJsqUaHTFPg5s-e=s4096" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4096" data-original-width="2765" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEijlIBm4RdqkwAMIVrIt3PVyyxWSj6kiotR4R67zF0es0_azGZfk3kktxpqGONynox68jpq7t924-8YksunQnItB8ZaLSlWeMidul23bALHJiCYFC9LDxK3Va2HlOnDUqFaFmOSrUSXnGk5BrhHV6H2oF7CzOQqfHLKj0nIh9LHccJsqUaHTFPg5s-e=s320" width="216" /></a></div><br /><b><i>No Time to Die</i> (2021) -- dir. Cary Joji Fukunaga</b><p></p><p>All right.... Calm down. Calm down. I know. I know....</p><p>I feel fairly safe in assuming I am probably one of the few people anywhere mentioning this film on any sort of 2021-End-of-Year-Best-List. But....</p><p>I make no excuses: I enjoyed this movie. It made me smile. It was entertaining. While certainly not a "perfect" film, I liked the closure it brought to the arc of Daniel Craig's five-film run as 007.</p><p>(<b>Side note:</b> The film-stealing action sequence reuniting Craig with his 2019 <i>Knives Out</i> co-star, Ana de Armas, was worth the price of admission itself. It made me hungry for the rumored <i>Knives Out</i> sequel... We'll see.)</p><p><br /></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjAPCqZUqk6mPHGM4rqzl74hBZ6LkqiHubd87SoqIJcZR0f9NnPztGEYbjGxaqUciEsuk_ZMO4kfQTvaPR4bu1Nrrdl-O6dX-1Zdu68B2NJDnie3PMdb7c8ilcRU8xP9whhSyszEFiCitd6npJVDm5gdN1kUom8dEu3DUMDxAo2Bp2-aiw8xV92J-yv=s2963" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2963" data-original-width="2000" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjAPCqZUqk6mPHGM4rqzl74hBZ6LkqiHubd87SoqIJcZR0f9NnPztGEYbjGxaqUciEsuk_ZMO4kfQTvaPR4bu1Nrrdl-O6dX-1Zdu68B2NJDnie3PMdb7c8ilcRU8xP9whhSyszEFiCitd6npJVDm5gdN1kUom8dEu3DUMDxAo2Bp2-aiw8xV92J-yv=s320" width="216" /></a></div><br /><b><i>Raya and the Last Dragon</i> (2021) -- dir. Carlos Lopez Estrada and Don Hall</b><p></p><p>Another "guilty pleasure" from the past year, I suppose. (Although I have never been entirely clear why we are supposedly hardwired to intuitively feel guilt over something that brings us pleasure. Oh well...I'm not going to tackle that conundrum here.)</p><p>I saw this movie in the theater with my daughter. It was one of the first movies we saw together, venturing back with one another into the sparsely populated movie theaters--like dipping a toe into the uncertain COVID waters--and we enjoyed it thoroughly. So much so, we returned together to the theaters to enjoy it a second time....</p><p>I think it is a good "guilty pleasure." I remember the movie, largely, for those shared experiences, the two of us. It is a great memory.</p><p><br /></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhzDMsLgVPtIaGhsEaIIMCAgZQmmoStr-ebjIiSx5pBSF3kz3QKrLEUjUw_Rnc4VYiSLYZ7CGhUiTEYC2-3I8Nynqypidaa1SLVlgdX56qyDOjPd1HJGuId9v5SE79J5pSy-jvyUM2VtnQkR6DxV-uXIkX80E9fIfUCIz4kke_nZ3TzcSs7wJM-VvdA=s1200" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="800" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhzDMsLgVPtIaGhsEaIIMCAgZQmmoStr-ebjIiSx5pBSF3kz3QKrLEUjUw_Rnc4VYiSLYZ7CGhUiTEYC2-3I8Nynqypidaa1SLVlgdX56qyDOjPd1HJGuId9v5SE79J5pSy-jvyUM2VtnQkR6DxV-uXIkX80E9fIfUCIz4kke_nZ3TzcSs7wJM-VvdA=s320" width="213" /></a></div><br /><b><i>The Sparks Brothers</i> (2021) -- dir. Edgar Wright</b><p></p><p>It is entirely possible that I enjoyed this movie more than any other single film on my lists. Edgar Wright's documentary about the 50-year career from the pop-music act of brothers Ron and Russell Mael (the creative duo behind the band they call Sparks). Like most viewers--I'm assuming--I had never heard of the band Sparks. (I find that fact almost impossible to believe, considering I am a music buff, and the brothers' career has spanned a large part of what could only be called my "growing up" years. But I'd never heard of them until this film. Not even once.)</p><p>Which, much like Questlove's documentary, <i>Summer of Soul</i> (see above), Wright attempts to correct. And he does so. Wonderfully.</p><p>(<b>Side note:</b> Sparks wrote the music/story for the film, <i>Annette</i>.)</p><p><br /></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEj3MkmUVEwdMUD_FDO_LJeAldWnOkvSq4B5cL_38aaK7S2AWterPAYBFZFiBP8HNg_Y0-HeoKFUM_Jb3fQviugyunVrsSTjg5DSrJzuEJmzb9kvNcu2MnFvfJe4eoc22nolDX4TcJ3yqXlJwpKeeZvwAyuAUXWKl6Ftbw-_iWQTh7CdETD64KqFPoYC=s2048" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2048" data-original-width="1382" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEj3MkmUVEwdMUD_FDO_LJeAldWnOkvSq4B5cL_38aaK7S2AWterPAYBFZFiBP8HNg_Y0-HeoKFUM_Jb3fQviugyunVrsSTjg5DSrJzuEJmzb9kvNcu2MnFvfJe4eoc22nolDX4TcJ3yqXlJwpKeeZvwAyuAUXWKl6Ftbw-_iWQTh7CdETD64KqFPoYC=s320" width="216" /></a></div><br /><b><i>Thelma</i> (2017) -- dir. Joachim Trier</b><p></p><p>Like Sweden's Roy Andersson, I stumbled upon the Danish-Norwegian filmmaker, Joachim Trier, during the past year. And I'm glad I did. His 2021 film, <i>The Worst Person in the World</i>, has earned a lot of high praise and acclaim, to date; and, to date, I have yet to see it.</p><p>In the meantime, though, I came across this earlier film from Trier on Hulu, and I felt--while watching it--as if the wind had been knocked out of me. What a great movie-watching experience. From its shattering opening scene (some of the most impressive first 5 minutes of any film I've ever seen, perhaps) to its provocative closing scene, I never quite knew where this film was leading me.</p><p>Thought-provoking, disturbing, visually exciting: I love this movie.</p></div>David Newsomhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02698845610286763351noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1218241678607183535.post-2052544725224309612021-09-24T15:06:00.014-07:002022-04-06T11:48:43.882-07:00Apocryphal (The One-Armed Man): a song<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><b><br /></b><p></p><p><b><span> </span> (1)</b></p><p>The news came down today.</p><p>A ragamuffin's heart and a charlatan's way</p><p>of saying "<i>Goodbye</i>." </p><p>Of course it doesn't matter in the end.</p><p>It seems that what you spend is all you've got.</p><p><br /></p><p><b><span> </span>(Chorus 1)</b></p><p>And what a shame, at the close of the day,</p><p>to be nothing more than the one-armed man.</p><p>Living your life, passing through time,</p><p>only to find when everything's done</p><p>and the curtain comes falling down</p><p>that for good or bad</p><p>you'll only be remembered</p><p>for the one thing you don't have.</p><p>It's so apocryphal.</p><p><br /></p><p><b><span> </span>(2)</b></p><p>"<i>The best is yet to come</i>." Or so they say.</p><p>But one way or another there's never </p><p>an end to what resolved itself through fire--</p><p>just burnt ashes and the smell of endings</p><p>hanging on a wire, left undone.</p><p><br /></p><p><b><span> </span>(Chorus 2)</b></p><p>And what a laugh, at the close of the day,</p><p>to be nothing more than the one-armed man.</p><p>Passing your time, living your life,</p><p>always to find when everything's done</p><p>and the curtain comes tumbling down</p><p>that for better or worse</p><p>you'll only be remembered</p><p>for all you no longer have.</p><p>It's so apocryphal.</p><p><br /></p><p><b><span> </span>(Bridge)</b></p><p>When everything's for nothing</p><p>and nothing's for the good of it all,</p><p>burning bridges on the river</p><p>that runs through the tide of time.</p><p>Clouds of smoke,</p><p>blood on water,</p><p>twisted memories of those days</p><p>and all the ways I could have</p><p>bent like a tree in the wind,</p><p>holding ground, and rustling leaves,</p><p>losing limbs like bridges slowly falling down.</p><p>All falling down.</p><p>Just falling down....</p><p><br /></p><p><b><span> </span>(3)</b></p><p>There's a phantom feeling that comes in time,</p><p>when what's no longer yours still hangs on.</p><p>It's in the hours when the night falls darkly down,</p><p>before you're ready for the lowlight scenes.</p><p>Another drink thrown back and gone. It's all gone.</p><p><br /></p><p><b><span> </span>(Chorus 3)</b></p><p>And it's okay, at the close of the day,</p><p>to be nothing more than the one-armed man.</p><p>Pissing away time, playing at your life,</p><p>hoping to find when everything's done</p><p>and the curtain comes crashing down</p><p>that there was no other way</p><p>but to only be remembered</p><p>for what you never really had.</p><p>And it's oh-so-apocryphal.</p><p>Yeah, it's always apocryphal.</p><p>In the end, it's so goddamned apocryphal.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p>David Newsomhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02698845610286763351noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1218241678607183535.post-32994941435412230982021-01-12T18:18:00.027-08:002022-01-24T08:08:12.522-08:00Henry Bemis and Me: A Year of Reading in Solitude Amidst the Rubble<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgAgmgOvg6dcxGvTaDxyEP9bHM_cSJHoFCNn8nin4gMP4ggIdMd1_XRtRzaAOiL-d2YMY4NnUiSh2eBhtOo7hLPFIqmWCPJqKauKsPi7Pbd9LBmMXF66491hdETQZZwcfbJQDR9gi5sBR0/s997/Burgess_Meredith_Twilight_Zone_1960.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="997" data-original-width="800" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgAgmgOvg6dcxGvTaDxyEP9bHM_cSJHoFCNn8nin4gMP4ggIdMd1_XRtRzaAOiL-d2YMY4NnUiSh2eBhtOo7hLPFIqmWCPJqKauKsPi7Pbd9LBmMXF66491hdETQZZwcfbJQDR9gi5sBR0/w257-h320/Burgess_Meredith_Twilight_Zone_1960.jpg" width="257" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><p style="text-align: center;">____________________</p><p style="text-align: center;"><b><i>INTRO</i></b></p><p><i>"'The best-laid plans of mice and men...' and Henry Bemis, the small man in the glasses who wanted nothing but time. Henry Bemis, now just a part of a smashed landscape, just a piece of the rubble, just a fragment of what man has deeded to himself. Mr. Henry Bemis... in the Twilight Zone."</i></p><p>-- Rod Serling (closing narration), "Time Enough at Last," <i>The Twilight Zone</i>: Season 1, Episode 8 (starring Burgess Meredith), originally aired November 20, 1959 on CBS</p><p><br /></p><p>For readers the world over, it would seem--at first glance--that the year 2020 might have been from the perfect cloth. After all, when everything <i>[Aside: And by "everything," I do kind of mean "everything"]</i> came to a crashing halt, leaving all of us quarantined at home, alone with our loved ones and with ourselves, we all of us suddenly found ourselves with time on our hands to more or less do whatever we wanted. For movie buffs, this meant time to catch up on some quality movie-watching. For television addicts, this meant ample time to stream and binge on everything offered up by the algorithm. For car enthusiasts, this presented itself as time spent alone in the garage, the hood to your old classic propped open, droplights illuminating the old engine where you lose yourself. For music-aficionados, this meant flipping through old record albums, dusting them off, and spinning them again. For sports nuts, this meant more time than you knew what to do with to follow all your favorite games, and your favorite teams, and your favorite athletes. For online gamers, this meant unlimited time lost in the chosen game-world. And, again, for readers it meant time at last to settle back in your favorite chair--a stack of books piled on the floor beside you--and the opportunity to literally make time disappear within the pages of a book</p><p>Suddenly, in 2020, readers found themselves with something they had perhaps always quietly wished for: a chance to read, to dive into a book (or books) without having to worry about scorn or judgment from others, and without having to hear the age-old question: "<i>Don't you have anything better to do?</i>"</p><p>Because, quite frankly--for maybe the first and only time in our lives--readers could answer a question like that with: "<i>No. I have nothing else to do. Now, leave me alone</i>."</p><p>The quandary arises, of course, when you have more time than ever to do something that you love to do, how do you discriminate? How do you choose wisely? When a reader suddenly has on their hands more time than ever before to catch up on their reading, what do you choose to read?</p><p><i>[Aside: I know... First-world problems.]</i></p><p>Below is just a sampling of some of the books and writers I chose to spend time with over the past 12 months. There were other great books and writers that I had read before and that I chose to revisit and to reread in 2020 (titles like <i>The Old Man and the Sea, The Hobbit</i>, <i>Catch-22</i>, <i>The Country of the Pointed Firs</i>, <i>The Plague Dogs</i>, <i>The Hotel New Hampshire</i>--all of them wonderful books that definitely would have made my year-end list of Best Reads), but I decided to leave them off this list. Below are only <i>new</i> books (or "new" to me, anyway) that I cracked open and read during this past year. Ten books that challenged me, entertained me, made me happy, made me angry, made me laugh, made me scared, and made me glad to be alive, even in difficult times such as these--books that made me glad to have time enough at last to spend some of my time (and some of my pandemic-induced solitude) in their company.</p><p><br /></p><p style="text-align: center;">_______________________</p><p style="text-align: left;"><br /></p><p style="text-align: left;"><b>10.) <i>I Am C-3PO: The Inside Story</i> -- by Anthony Daniels (2019)</b></p><p style="text-align: left;"><br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiO-MSBqCdzaV91JZSW92Ap9NodlpRFX6yO2fLmppwqZ0gBKWnW10wnCHop45xo_hUKDLVzp_OgYlJ4-GOOXuNCYJ8FPoHBkYp6J3yy3yxV81d9LeNPz0UyaYelNTCWV1l7D5m9vA22RWs/s2048/C-3PO.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2048" data-original-width="1355" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiO-MSBqCdzaV91JZSW92Ap9NodlpRFX6yO2fLmppwqZ0gBKWnW10wnCHop45xo_hUKDLVzp_OgYlJ4-GOOXuNCYJ8FPoHBkYp6J3yy3yxV81d9LeNPz0UyaYelNTCWV1l7D5m9vA22RWs/w212-h320/C-3PO.jpg" width="212" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><p>What a notably strange career Anthony Daniels has had over the past 40 (+) years as an actor and an entertainer. A returning cast member in what is undoubtedly one of film history's most lucrative and popular movie-series of all time, Daniels has been able to maintain an almost unheard-of level of anonymity. Outside of legions of diehard/convention-level <i>Star Wars</i> fans, an actor of Anthony Daniels' CV can walk down the street basically unknown and unmolested by hordes of autograph-seekers and selfie-hounds. To most of us, he is a veritable mystery man--which is also, unsurprisingly, his personal axe to grind in this brief memoir/autobiography. As the physical- and voice-actor of the character C-3PO in all nine of the "canon" Star Wars films (not to mention various stints voicing the character in numerous offshoots and animated <i>Star Wars</i> series), Daniels loves this robot that he has brought to life over his lifetime as an actor. But he also undeniably feels cheated, somewhat, out of the "normal" career that seems to have eluded him. He has spent his life as an actor behind the golden body-suit armor of one of the most well-known and beloved characters in all of filmdom. And yet...therein lies the story of his life, I suppose.</p><p>Daniels is not a writer, nor does he pretend to be. If there is a weakness in his book it is in his somewhat amateurish writing style. (At times it reads, honestly, like an over-zealous older teenager expounding on his thoughts and feelings. But...then again he's not a professional writer. And that's okay.) Would the book have been better if he had been aided by a co-writer, to help "dress up the style" a bit? Perhaps. But then part of the clunkiness of Daniels' writing is in perfect keeping with the <i>Star Wars</i> films themselves (clunky dialogue and all). And it accentuates the fact that it is <i>his</i> story--literally the inside story--of what it's been like for him, sacrificing his ego and his career for the love of a character he has spent his life creating. As a life-long <i>Star Wars</i> fan reading Daniel's memoir, I discovered a thing or two about the <i>Star Wars</i> films that I did not know. His book is entertaining. It's fun. And it put me inside that suit, if only for a while, to look through the eyes of someone else--an actor, a robot, an icon.</p><p><br /></p><p><b> 9.) <i>A Journal of the Plague Year</i> -- by Daniel Defoe (1722)</b></p><p><b><br /></b></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh7EgumwTYuoT_Hy4mU2jmn81Uk8XbNFcgMbxCkVZvA66d_jgFxyWPUWi1JRTvd79S7KU-Sto01cPzfVPJ_eaQDMVwkdOj7cuNCKSIV0LVbMXBdZWJMlg7tI6ny-5NAYC8nXxcfOsc4Xk4/s450/Journal.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="450" data-original-width="291" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh7EgumwTYuoT_Hy4mU2jmn81Uk8XbNFcgMbxCkVZvA66d_jgFxyWPUWi1JRTvd79S7KU-Sto01cPzfVPJ_eaQDMVwkdOj7cuNCKSIV0LVbMXBdZWJMlg7tI6ny-5NAYC8nXxcfOsc4Xk4/w207-h320/Journal.jpg" width="207" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><p>I don't think it's a mistake that my "Best Of" reading list for 2020 consists of several titles having something to do with disaster--either natural or man-made.</p><p><i>[Aside: It was, obviously, that kind of year.]</i></p><p>Would I have picked up Defoe's book under more "normal" circumstances? I don't know. I almost doubt it. But our contemporary life being what it <i>was</i> in the year past (and <i>still</i> <i>is</i> in 2021--let's just accept it right now), I thought this book--written nearly 300 years ago and set, fictionally, in the bubonic plague-ravaged streets of London--would be an interesting comment on our modern COVID-19 life that we all seem to be living. And I was right. Defoe's 18th century fictional-nonfiction is amazing.</p><p>From the parallels--gleaned from history--to our own times in the haggard 21st century, Defoe charts a remarkably prescient glimpse of our world in 2020, staring down a microbial enemy. The echoes are startling, and when reading it I had to keep reminding myself that this is a work of fiction. Defoe, one of our first "novelists" in the English language, was (who knew it at the time?) one of our first genre-bending post-modernists, with this historic account told in a creative-nonfiction stylistic approach. As it is, it's an amazing "novel"/historical document that sings to the tune of our times.</p><p><b><br /></b></p><p><b> 8.) <i>Dune</i> -- by Frank Herbert (1965)</b></p><p><b><br /></b></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjhCe9nkIdM_oyOkwesniPuu_FpyFaO69jhns8x0TsricCJ52-IA_jtRT7y8SMZbVHh67Ggr2TCHYe8MK9itjZ_TFuH4IyRySQDFXc1DnRHAAfBwL9habCrKTbkVNm91MWxOG2aZdzAHTw/s475/Dune.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="475" data-original-width="316" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjhCe9nkIdM_oyOkwesniPuu_FpyFaO69jhns8x0TsricCJ52-IA_jtRT7y8SMZbVHh67Ggr2TCHYe8MK9itjZ_TFuH4IyRySQDFXc1DnRHAAfBwL9habCrKTbkVNm91MWxOG2aZdzAHTw/w213-h320/Dune.jpg" width="213" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><p>Okay. Full disclosure: It seems I have always been aware of Frank Herbert's <i>Dune</i> and yet (for some reason) have always resisted it.</p><p>When I was younger, I was a sci-fi fan, snatching up whatever titles I could, devouring every piece of science-fiction (modern and classic) that I could get my hands on. This inevitably extended into the sub-genre of fantasy fiction, as well, and so early reading of novels like Arthur C. Clarke's <i>2001: A Space Odyssey</i> and <i>Childhood's End</i>, as well as Ray Bradbury's <i>Martian Chronicles</i> and <i>Fahrenheit 451, </i>eventually melded with the likes of J.R.R. Tolkien's Middle Earth sagas of <i>The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings</i>, and <i>The Silmarillion</i>, as well as Richard Adams' anthropomorphic allegorical masterpieces, <i>Watership Down</i> and <i>The Plague Dogs</i>.</p><p>Along with all of this, then--always orbiting somewhere out on the periphery--was Frank Herbert's daunting <i>Dune</i>. I remember the stiff Permabound copy of the book on the shelves in my high school library, and I remember riffling through it occasionally, probably even checking it out from the librarian from time to time, and opening the cover, and turning to the first page, and taking a glance at the book's several Appendices toward the back of the book, as well as its Maps and its Glossary. And I am more than certain that Arthur C. Clarke's famously cryptic critical blurb on the cover (or in the inside cover)--"...I know nothing comparable to it other than <i>The Lord of the Rings</i>"--teased my curiosity all the more.</p><p>I have always enjoyed certain speculative fiction--I can be a sucker for fantastic fiction that deals with all the minutiae of carefully drawn-out world-building. Richard Adams had that skill. Tolkien more than had that skill. And I always knew (albeit indirectly and only through osmosis, in a way) that Frank Herbert's massive, mythological sci-fi masterpiece, <i>Dune</i>, doubled-down on the whole world-building thing and existed almost as a thing unto itself.</p><p>And yet strangely (for me at least) it remained unread. I just could not get into it, for some reason.</p><p>Fast-forward to 1984, my freshman year of college, and coincidentally the year of the release of David Lynch's legendary failed attempt at filming Herbert's almost unfilmable novel. </p><p><i>[Aside: Let's face it, that movie is a disastrous mess, from start to finish. (Could there really be a serious dissenting discussion on that point?) Lynch is an artist of unparalleled talent and vision, in my opinion. But the book (not to mention the studio) got the best of him in this case, I believe.]</i></p><p>Anyway.... I do remember buying the pocket paperback movie tie-in version of the novel when I was in college--complete with the movie-poster artwork on the book's cover--orange colored sand dunes, and Kyle Mclaughlin striding heroically across the foreground, some sort of weapon-device draped over his arm and across his shoulders, looking every bit the messianic protagonist. <i>[Aside: Cue the movie's theme music from Toto.]</i> And I remember (because I was still intrigued and I was, already at that time, a fan of David Lynch) that I cracked open the book and tried to break into it. And I made it through the first chapter or so before quickly giving up.</p><p>I found the novel's mysteries impossible to crack, I guess. I didn't get it. It was beyond me, I suppose. And what's more, I didn't care.</p><p>But now fast-forward several decades. I'm older now (obviously). I've read considerably more (obviously). And yet another attempt to film this seemingly unfilmable book is "in the can," as they say (this time from visionary Canadian filmmaker, Denis Villeneuve--so we'll see), and merely awaiting a post-COVID green light, allowing it to open at theaters on the big screen...finally. So this year I thought would be an interesting time to once again try to tackle this cumbersome novel--hopefully making it past Chapter One this time--and finally check this book off my list of Heretofore Unread Big Books.</p><p>It's dense. It's complex. But the novel was not as daunting or impenetrable as I remember from my previous attempt 40 years ago. The book is definitely dated, I think--most definitely a product of 1965, when it was published. The drug-induced reveries of "the Spice," the ridiculously stilted dialogue, the clumsily awkward patriarchal sexism, the (supposedly) anti-Semitic take on Cold War-era views of the Middle East and U.S. relations.</p><p>It's all a mess of a mix, really. (And I'm not convinced that if the novel were to be published today it would find even half of its cult-like reverential audience--even underground. Who knows?) Herbert's classic novel is a product of its time, to be sure, but it is also undeniably the product of a massive imagination constructing and controlling a unique and singular vision.</p><p>Don't ask me what it's all about. I'm not entirely sure what all this vision finally amounts to or what it all means. But I'm glad I finally read it.</p><p><br /></p><p><b> 7.) <i>The Thing With Feathers: The Surprising Lives of Birds and What They Reveal About Being Human</i> -- by Noah Stryker (2014)</b></p><p><b><br /></b></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiaZlnuYjja1aIRtOgm_QYVBHKWrPuJoZ0YYMbQ6emIHycHLDgapMLDwbBkvf1XBlGUDDg-z8m0s5ydGKsqmjT5GhOOVT4wmejq3SEp5kpssoKoKJJf4I_vU0cgp7Y7DRINP7j0Cxd92CI/s450/Feathers.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="450" data-original-width="300" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiaZlnuYjja1aIRtOgm_QYVBHKWrPuJoZ0YYMbQ6emIHycHLDgapMLDwbBkvf1XBlGUDDg-z8m0s5ydGKsqmjT5GhOOVT4wmejq3SEp5kpssoKoKJJf4I_vU0cgp7Y7DRINP7j0Cxd92CI/w213-h320/Feathers.jpg" width="213" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><p>One upside to the whole "quarantine thing" over this past year, I suppose, is that (like many people, I'm assuming) it has caused me (or "allowed me," if you'd rather) to slow down and to take a closer look at the immediate world around me. This year's pandemic and quarantine has allowed me to take inventory, to take stock of all the things I have and of all the things I'm missing.</p><p>My back yard--as it reveals itself to me now--is a remarkably interesting place. My back yard is its own little ecosystem--its own little world--of rabbits, and squirrels, and raccoons, and snakes, and possums, and chipmunks, and deer, and coyote, and birds.</p><p>I have lived around birds all my life, obviously. For 50+ years now I have listened in the back of my mind to their voices singing to one another, calling, laughing, searching, ringing through the air, and I have watched our little winged neighbors flit so casually and effortlessly in and out of the corners of my eyes, up and down, floating from tree to tree, from limb to limb, from branch to branch, from tree to ground, and back again. And I have barely noticed them.</p><p>The more I began to watch them over this past summer, the more I wanted to make time to watch them. To observe them. To note and to infer what in the world could possibly be going on with them in their airy, leafy world above my back yard.</p><p>So I got my hands on Stryker's book, wanting to maybe gain a little more educated insight into what I was watching and listening to, and I couldn't put the book down. It has changed the way I watch and listen to the ecosystem, the little world above me and all around me, the daily avian drama in my trees in the back yard.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><b> 6.) <i>Whale Day: And Other Poems</i> -- by Billy Collins (2020)</b><p></p><p><br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgscsOqFRX9KRNpMlnXdSERAhg0HTmR5j3Lsh8SShIiOoF4NuifwNTaa7oA5Yh1rLAXouwGGbkbCctRKVOWreVQgMj_h58MLsxvf6DNDztNy6DVjp6F-x7spfnD-x3yzFEojV_5UgAS_MA/s2048/Whale+Day.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2048" data-original-width="1356" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgscsOqFRX9KRNpMlnXdSERAhg0HTmR5j3Lsh8SShIiOoF4NuifwNTaa7oA5Yh1rLAXouwGGbkbCctRKVOWreVQgMj_h58MLsxvf6DNDztNy6DVjp6F-x7spfnD-x3yzFEojV_5UgAS_MA/w212-h320/Whale+Day.jpg" width="212" /></a></div><p><br /></p><p>From the beginning of the quarantine, the former U.S. poet laureate, Billy Collins, took to taping and recording short little daily poetry readings and discussions from the comfortable book-strewn confines of his home and study in Florida. These continuing "sessions," then, are posted to his social media sites--a daily visit and conversation that Collins has taken to calling "The Poetry Broadcast."</p><p>Subsequently, he also published his 13th collection of new poetry this past year. Like all of Collins' work, his persona's voice in this book sidles up next to you like an old friend, and you simply find yourself once again picking up the relationship since the last time you'd met. </p><p>He's just so good at what he does best. I don't mean this simile to sound like a detriment or a criticism, because it isn't meant that way at all: Collins' poetry reads like a comfortably worn-out pair of shoes, or jeans, or sweatshirt--the kind that you're so used to you have forgotten just how good they feel, just how much you like them, until you slip them on again, and settle in to them, and find yourself saying, "<i>Oh yeah.... This is it. This is what I like....</i>"</p><p>It's inevitable, I think. His poetry is often--and rightfully so--described as playful, and humorous, and grounded in the everydayness of everyday life. And while those descriptions are apt, it can be too easy to simply leave his poetry there and to dismiss it and to miss what else is also there: How, for example, he so effortlessly (it seems) picks at the threads of subtle and seismic nuances in the everydayness of our everyday lives, uncovering places that we thought we had either hidden or hidden from, and all the time echoing the depths of some great and profound silence and sadness.</p><p>Collins is a contemporary master. He is a national treasure. I will read anything he writes.</p><p><br /></p><p><b> 5.) <i>Hiking With Nietzsche: On Becoming Who You Are</i> -- by John Kaag (2018)</b></p><p><br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiYCIAbNTJKhcJWS8UGQbcVgFSwkzYlEBEtwlX4kHY1HIGLgVbIJxcCZAoTZPlL9DJCE93EQ5gy19Fmw2FwV-_upAgThEq-BUMRTcgEo3JU9xF5YoC1iHI5RaXGAZEm94_4AGFvJg48NSE/s2048/Hiking.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2048" data-original-width="1335" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiYCIAbNTJKhcJWS8UGQbcVgFSwkzYlEBEtwlX4kHY1HIGLgVbIJxcCZAoTZPlL9DJCE93EQ5gy19Fmw2FwV-_upAgThEq-BUMRTcgEo3JU9xF5YoC1iHI5RaXGAZEm94_4AGFvJg48NSE/w209-h320/Hiking.jpg" width="209" /></a></div><p><br /></p><p>With such book titles on his Amazon page as <i>Idealism, Pragmatism, and Feminism: The Philosophy of Ella Lyman Cabot</i> (2011), <i>Drone Warfare (War and Conflict in the Modern World)</i> (co-authored with Sarah Kreps, 2014), <i>Thinking Through the Imagination: Aesthetics in Human Cognition</i> (2014), <i>American Philosophy: A Love Story</i> (2014), <i>Hiking With Nietzsche: On Becoming Who You Are</i> (2018), and <i>Sick Souls, Healthy Minds: How William James Can Save Your Life </i>(2020), you could be fairly quick, I'm sure, in assuming that John Kaag would be the life of any party. </p><p>This book was fascinating, frustrating (at times), captivating, maddening, and finally fully illuminating.</p><p>Yes, as the title suggests, it is a book about walking. It is a book about walking through mountains, to be more specific. It is a book about hiking through the Swiss Alps, to be most specific, and about the pursuit of the19th-century German philosopher, Friedrich Nietzsche, to follow--quite literally--in his footsteps, and to better understand what it means to be a human being.</p><p>Kaag, a respected professor of philosophy at the University of Massachusetts, Lowell, is haunted by Nietzsche's writings and teachings, and returns to the master's beloved area in the Swiss Alps, Sils Maria, with his wife and young daughter, to pursue his own demons, to chase them down, to hopefully finally understand Nietzsche, himself, and the meaning of his own life.</p><p>This is the kind of book that you read a little bit, put down, think about, process, read some more, put down, think about, process...and repeat. It's thoughtful, engaging, and undeniably challenging in the gauntlet that it throws down before you. Nietzsche, after all, was not an easy philosopher to either fully understand or to fully accept. The story of his life (which Kaag pursues on his own parallel track) is a story of genius, and madness, manic highs and lows, joy, sadness, and ultimately despair. Kaag--on the journey with his wife and daughter--discovers something that always eluded Nietzsche, perhaps.</p><p>And the result--at least in part--is this book. I found it moving, maddening, and beautiful.</p><p><br /></p><p><b> 4.) <i>Nemesis</i> -- by Philip Roth (2010)</b></p><p><br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjJNPOsVYwt86KeArDJhk7MZPTMpTxgWd9JwC4rqFW1XJWHZXI-b3tidNfFsrSRXOBTJyxyTEODf5avMC2yYjxJy3yeUeuGCxN6bL-BcBNznDqTC6-rI2DXxbPnNciY5aFOhvgrqP3472U/s2048/Nemesis.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2048" data-original-width="1334" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjJNPOsVYwt86KeArDJhk7MZPTMpTxgWd9JwC4rqFW1XJWHZXI-b3tidNfFsrSRXOBTJyxyTEODf5avMC2yYjxJy3yeUeuGCxN6bL-BcBNznDqTC6-rI2DXxbPnNciY5aFOhvgrqP3472U/w208-h320/Nemesis.jpg" width="208" /></a></div><p><br /></p><p>If there is another late-20th century American author of Philip Roth's stature who turned out such a surprisingly strong run of books in what came to be the "late period," I would like to know who the author is. By 1997, Roth's output (already prodigious and worthy of cementing him in place as one of America's great contemporary writers) was further solidified with the publication of <i>American Pastoral</i>, which would go on to win him the Pulitzer Prize the following year in '98. That book would be followed by 2000's much applauded, <i>The Human Stain</i>, and later, in 2004, by his alternative-history masterpiece, <i>The Plot Against America</i>.</p><p>All told, that is an incredible run of fine novels for any "older" writer to achieve. At a time when a writer (of such a lauded reputation) could normally relax and set the pen aside and step away from an honorable career of great books, Roth seemed intent on doing the opposite. He found a second wind at the tail end of his career and produced what many critics consider not only some of his own personal greatest work yet but also, perhaps, some of the greatest work by any contemporary American writer at the time.</p><p>In the years immediately following <i>The Plot Against America</i>, Roth then released a trio of short, gasping little novellas, as if finally, at long last, maybe the air was gone. But then in 2010--as if in one last, closing burst--came this novel, <i>Nemesis</i>, which though while just falling short of being a "great" Roth novel, perhaps, at least finds the strength to be filled with its author's typically formidable writing and some of the usual Rothian narrative trademarks.</p><p>Set in a sweltering summer of 1944 in Roth's own hometown of Newark, NJ, the novel (one of his last), signs off on his career with a story that looks back to an imagined outbreak of polio that sweeps through the city's Jewish Weequahic section, devastating countless lives--the victims, their families and loved ones, as well as the novel's doomed protagonist, Bucky Cantor, fated through the course of his life to suffer ignominy, loss, and loneliness.</p><p>While maybe the book won't be mentioned in the same breath as many of the other novels that make up Roth's pantheon, I still found <i>Nemesis</i><i> </i>to be powerful, relevant, and moving. (I would imagine practically every writer alive would be honored to write such a "lesser" novel.)</p><p><br /></p><p><b> 3.) <i>The Topeka School: A Novel</i> -- by Ben Lerner (2019)</b></p><p><b><br /></b></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEglPClFG5Uu1cfMVQzECh_Ov4qFQRGAO2TBAmgIj6mUgYZeJPmiKQtBXIO_ywfT2lgSwpZR2IyxD47SroKaE-T_TVQj-8T81MJWgE3QJ9qEkvq5kJhLmvZ8yaBThMXD_GPVzFVEuAr6LHA/s2048/Topeka+School.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2048" data-original-width="1366" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEglPClFG5Uu1cfMVQzECh_Ov4qFQRGAO2TBAmgIj6mUgYZeJPmiKQtBXIO_ywfT2lgSwpZR2IyxD47SroKaE-T_TVQj-8T81MJWgE3QJ9qEkvq5kJhLmvZ8yaBThMXD_GPVzFVEuAr6LHA/w213-h320/Topeka+School.jpg" width="213" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><p>I must admit, I was surprisingly unfamiliar with Ben Lerner's name before coming to this novel. As a young poet and novelist, Lerner does not have a long catalogue behind him. <i>The Topeka School</i> is only his third novel--his first, the acclaimed <i>Leaving the Atocha Station</i> (2011) was closely followed by <i>10:04</i> (2014). All of his novels (to date) are experiments of postmodern self-referential reflectivism, resulting in a clever play of fictional autobiography (or autobiographical fiction--take your pick).</p><p>This story's protagonist--Adam Gordon--is coincidentally the narrator in <i>Leaving the Atocha Station</i>, while <i>10:04</i>'s narrator is interestingly named Ben. </p><p><i>[Aside: That's the limit of my knowledge of his first two novels, at this point, having only read this book, so far. But knowing even that small degree of Lerner and of the arc of his novels paints an exciting portrait of a young writer--hailing from my home state of Kansas--who is not afraid to push some boundaries and some buttons with his literary experimentalism and his deft poet's eye and ear for language.]</i></p><p>So, what's going on here? What are we to believe is real and what made up? Lerner is hardly the first writer to trip down this experimental metafictional Proustian lane, but this is a pretty fascinating contemporary addition to the genre. With scenes of mesmerizing wordplay and character-building, the book moves along quickly. It is compact, with passages of aching beauty and awkward humor and mounting dread and implosive sadness and explosive violence.</p><p>A depiction of late-20th century/early-21st century America--with its boiling angers, and hatreds, and manipulated rhetoric, and blunt-force trauma divisiveness--it feels as if Lerner somehow has his finger on the pulse of a nation, not to mention a voyeuristic telescope trained on all of us.</p><p>I plan on getting caught up on Ben Lerner, the writer.</p><p><b><br /></b></p><p><b> 2.) <i>Midnight in Chernobyl: The Untold Story of the World's Greatest Nuclear Disaster</i> -- by Adam Higginbotham (2019)</b></p><p><b><br /></b></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhaaTK6pokmMVAqHMdiwLJrMS6BopAMyL9M0nnAazTr-Krk5mFgwOicWsfP5Kg3IXQAFXk3V7sBNR_wfhd6MmA861P1knep7pdDuboimqRTFCzU-8c6cjPY69XCrAKii47DP1iWomnEhUk/s2048/Chernobyl.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2048" data-original-width="1355" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhaaTK6pokmMVAqHMdiwLJrMS6BopAMyL9M0nnAazTr-Krk5mFgwOicWsfP5Kg3IXQAFXk3V7sBNR_wfhd6MmA861P1knep7pdDuboimqRTFCzU-8c6cjPY69XCrAKii47DP1iWomnEhUk/w212-h320/Chernobyl.jpg" width="212" /></a></div><p><br /></p><p>I remember the days when I could say something as casual as, "<i>I don't know that I've ever actually been legitimately frightened by a book before</i>."</p><p>I can't say that anymore.</p><p><br /></p><b> 1.) <i>Gravity's Rainbow</i> -- by Thomas Pynchon (1973)</b><p></p><p><br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiBZ_ueFJffGcsVcfu3Fksx9TsbAzKl4cITZyhl_DLbjpF4YEwELYqbdDEkM7E5lxhsehjUYjyzYC8zilvNETfyiu94oG-PJXMpTSEDFDbn_k62T3Q1-HjcaEpyluUudt2l13w2P5imZbo/s2048/Rainbow.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2048" data-original-width="1364" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiBZ_ueFJffGcsVcfu3Fksx9TsbAzKl4cITZyhl_DLbjpF4YEwELYqbdDEkM7E5lxhsehjUYjyzYC8zilvNETfyiu94oG-PJXMpTSEDFDbn_k62T3Q1-HjcaEpyluUudt2l13w2P5imZbo/w213-h320/Rainbow.jpg" width="213" /></a></div><p><br /></p><p>I've written about this reading experience elsewhere [<a href="http://emptyshipoutward-bound.blogspot.com/2020/07/">emptyshipoutward-bound.blogspot.com/2020/07/</a>] and so won't belabor the point revisiting things I've already said and resaid <i>ad nauseum</i> about this one-of-a-kind novel.</p><p>Except by saying this: Pynchon's novel is an exhaustive and exhausting work--maybe <i>the work</i>--of 20th century American post-Cold War encyclopedic Menippean satire. It is funny. It is tragic. It is exciting (in places). It is boring as hell (in places). It is singular, and massive, and it is a crazy fucking masterpiece, in a world that unrelentingly needs exactly that.</p><p><br /></p><p style="text-align: center;">____________________</p><p style="text-align: center;"><b><i>OUTRO</i></b></p><p style="text-align: left;"><i>"Witness Mr. Bemis, a charter member in the fraternity of dreamers. A bookish little man whose passion is the printed page but who is conspired against by a bank president and a wife and a world full of tongue-cluckers and the unrelenting hands of a clock. But in just a moment, Mr. Bemis will enter a world without bank presidents or wives or clocks or anything else. He'll have a world all to himself--without anyone."</i></p><p style="text-align: left;">-- Rod Serling (opening narration), "Time Enough at Last," <i>The Twilight Zone</i>: Season 1, Episode 8 (starring Burgess Meredith), originally aired November 20, 1959 on CBS</p><p style="text-align: left;"><br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3Tn9coh-uMVKGcZ7v2W0fZxx50m8goaJSdFQVGtO5t1cybu5HlkUjauph5cax0DD1OLACenecjBRDxTHgyB88qh-kc75C1QdeTz3Q4KpdKeYnsncro35yIbBv2gt75Fpfgfhsvja8ULU/s1259/timeenough15.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="917" data-original-width="1259" height="291" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3Tn9coh-uMVKGcZ7v2W0fZxx50m8goaJSdFQVGtO5t1cybu5HlkUjauph5cax0DD1OLACenecjBRDxTHgyB88qh-kc75C1QdeTz3Q4KpdKeYnsncro35yIbBv2gt75Fpfgfhsvja8ULU/w400-h291/timeenough15.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><p style="text-align: left;"><br /></p><p style="text-align: left;"><br /></p><p style="text-align: left;"><br /></p>David Newsomhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02698845610286763351noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1218241678607183535.post-33508676616187304132020-10-22T11:10:00.058-07:002023-06-23T19:21:41.924-07:00The Train Station at LaSalle and Van Buren<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg-TgRxZRl83b921cNRaDhQsAZ4Ljgmle7vOTtnHh6rHtQiUoYNGonBAaFMcZe-KyOpRC0LDvBsbhxDmkb665AYrKX9BEAhc-6e5WsuXAxOkF7QOtRehVrxnegKgj6WLlKD4gmQdRkBdEM/s1024/LaSalle+Street+Station+6.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="681" data-original-width="1024" height="265" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg-TgRxZRl83b921cNRaDhQsAZ4Ljgmle7vOTtnHh6rHtQiUoYNGonBAaFMcZe-KyOpRC0LDvBsbhxDmkb665AYrKX9BEAhc-6e5WsuXAxOkF7QOtRehVrxnegKgj6WLlKD4gmQdRkBdEM/w400-h265/LaSalle+Street+Station+6.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">__________</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><i>"You realize the sun doesn't go down. </i></div></blockquote></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><i>It's just an illusion caused </i></div></blockquote></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><i>by the world spinning 'round." </i></div></blockquote></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><p> -- The Flaming Lips, "Do You Realize?" </p></blockquote></blockquote></blockquote><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">________</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span>She didn't dream much anymore. Or if she did dream, she certainly didn't remember her dreams these days. Often she would wake in the middle of the night or early in the morning--jump awake, usually, from a sound that had startled her or from the familiar feeling of falling--and she would take a moment to remember where she was. Take a moment to familiarize herself. To let it all come back to her. The fear. The anxiety. The dread. The hiding.</span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span> </span>She could remember that upon waking, b</span>ut nothing in the way of her dreams. Those seemed lost to her. Lost as the thought that woke her this afternoon from her sudden, much-needed nap--a memory from long ago. A song that her dad had liked and that he used to play for her and her sister when they were both younger, riding together in his car--the three of them--coming back perhaps from a trip to the Area Club, or from a shopping excursion, or from fishing, or from a movie. Or from just wherever.</div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span> She thought of the song this afternoon upon waking, and she thought of her memories about the song. But she could not recall the song's name, or the band's name, or the song's chorus, or its lyrics.</span><br /></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span> She just remembered that the song existed. Which was enough, it seemed. That was all it took this afternoon to rouse her, to give her a reason to open her eyes, and a reason to wake up and to face the day. </span><br /></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span> There was the sound of gunshots off in the distance somewhere, echoing down the empty thoroughfare of Halsted Street. The sound of the repeated fire from an automatic rifle bounced and ricocheted off the sides of buildings and abandoned cars parked alongside the street. A siren blared somewhere not far away, its bleated warble rising and falling in the crisp air of late November. It was coming from up north, it sounded like. Somewhere in the direction of Greektown. But she couldn't be sure. </span><br /></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span> Directions were meaningless to her at this point, it seemed. Nothing was where it used to be--where it was supposed to be. And nothing made any sense. </span><br /></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span> "Are you really going today?"</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> She heard the voice before she noticed she wasn't alone in the room. It was Dara, her roommate. Of course it was. She wasn't alone.</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> More gunshots in the distance woke her up even more. The sound trailed along some distant valley of concrete, stone, steel, and glass in the world outside. The shattering of windows followed. Raised voices, yelling. The sound of vehicles roaring by (<i>was that Taylor Street? Halsted?....</i>) Pickup trucks most likely, with diesel engines rattling and with flags flapping behind in their beds. And riders huddled in the cold, bundled in the back of the trucks by the flags, all of them wearing warm hunting gear and all of them shouldering rifles, guns of all makes, RPGs, military-grade hardware.<br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> <i>This is what a coup looks like and sounds like</i>, she thought to herself--her first real, coherent thought since her dreamless sleep. If it weren't so real she might have laughed.<br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "Yes," she answered Dara. "I'm going. Tonight. Once it's dark."</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "Surely you're not thinking of going by yourself? You can't do that. I won't let you do that."</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "You won't let me?"</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> Dara laughed quietly and moved to sit down on the bed beside her. She reached out softly. "You know what I mean."</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> Silence.</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "Do you think it's even real?" Dara asked her. "The text from your dad, I mean. Do you think it's true?"</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> She got up from her bed. Dara's hand fell from her shoulder as she stepped in her fuzzy, pink socks to the window in their confined little dorm room. The University of Illinois at Chicago. A nexus of neighborhoods all around them--Maxwell Street to the south, Pilsen and Little Italy to the west, Greektown to the north, a thin wisp of new smoke withering overhead like a thread into the late November sky. Off to the south and east, Chinatown--it had been the first to fall in the days immediately after the election. </span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span>The Chinese. The "Chinese Virus," as it had been labeled by some.</div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span> </span>After the delicate days of waiting and wondering following the election, and after the new president had been officially declared the winner, that was when the problems started. And it had happened so fast. Militias. Violence. Chaos. The new president-elect and vice president-elect had been kidnapped, both of them, and murdered, piecemeal, all of it recorded on video and uploaded online. Gangland-style. Execution-style. Terrorist-style. Immediately the sanctioned murders had gone viral, as expected. <i>"The better angels of our nature have fallen,"</i> the pundits moaned. And it seems, for once, they weren't wrong. Anger, hatred, viciousness was the rule of the day. The current, sitting president had been restored, all as if the election process had never happened. Because the election hadn't happened. None of it. Orwell had been right, as it turns out. And the death of a democracy was never pretty, history could tell you. The death of a republic. The death of a dream, a bold experiment that had lasted...for a while.</div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> That was about the time the neighborhoods had begun to fall, one by one. And it had started with Chinatown--just blocks away, minutes away from them here on campus. An all-out war one night, it had sounded like, the dark city skyline lit up as if it were, ironically, the Chinese New Year. Explosions. Gun fire. Screaming. More explosions. And shooting. The CPD and the National Guard all caught off guard to the level of destruction, to the animosity of the violence and the genocide, to the frightening thoroughness of the planned revolution and takeover. Chinatown now lay under a thick, oily cloud of smoke--it was still burning, and this had been a week ago. Stories were filtering to them, hidden as they were in the dormitory on the UIC Courtyard. Stories of dead bodies piled up on Cermak, right at the Gateway of Chinatown. Corpses of Chinese-Americans piled up, rotting, reeking, burning.</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> She was Chinese. Adopted, both her and her sister, when they were only 11 months old. Adopted by white parents and brought to live in the United States, in Illinois, in the suburbs just outside of Chicago. America was her home, the only home she could remember. She was an American citizen. But she was also Chinese. And for the first time ever, in the recent unfolding of days and weeks, she found herself genuinely scared for her life. Her father had sent her a text late last night--it was his number at least on the other end of the message.</span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><i><span> </span>But was it really from him? </i>she wondered.<i> </i>Who knows anymore? It was so short and so abrupt, she couldn't read into the mysterious words any of his usual flippant, sarcastic personality. <i>Was it really him who had sent it? </i>She didn't know. <i>And why was it so abbreviated and so rushed? Why so many typos? He would never write and send a text like that. Would he?</i></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> S</span>he didn't know the answers. And she didn't want to think about it.</span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"> </div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><b>The trains are running again but only tomorrow night.<br /></b><b>Last train out of teh city at midnight, take it all the way<br /></b><b>to the end. I wll meet you @ Joliet. Any way you can<br /></b><b>get to the train station at LaSalle and Van Buren.</b><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><b>Tomorrow! Be carefull. I love you....</b></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div></blockquote><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> </span>And that was that. She did not know any more than that. She did not know if that text had in fact come from her father. She did not know if the trains were running again. She did not know if there was a train leaving tonight from LaSalle Street Station. She didn't know if it was real, any of it. She didn't know whether or not to trust it. She didn't know who or what to trust. She didn't know how she would get to the train station. And if she did, would the train be there? Would it be full? Would there be room for her? Was it all a trap, perhaps? Would the black, and silver, and white pickups--the flags hanging from the backs of their beds, coiled soundlessly like snakes at rest--be waiting for her once she showed up at the Metra station, diesel engines purring, sending out clouds of sweet-scented exhaust behind them? <i>Is this how the world ends, not with a bang but a whimper?</i> Is this how her world ends? <i>Is this real, any of it? Is it true? What is truth anymore anyway?</i></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "Yes," she answered Dara. "I think it's real. My dad sent me that text. There is a train going out tonight, and I'm going to be on it. Somehow."</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span>When darkness came it came fast. Streetlights had been shot out all along Halsted days ago. They had been huddling with some friends in the dorm at the time in a makeshift "panic room," of sorts, down in the basement by the washing machines when the gunfire had started on the streetlights. The requisite roar of the pickup trucks. Potshots at first. Howling. Shouting. Cursing. Laughter. The shooters must have been drinking before this, obviously. The dinging on metal of missed shots. The explosion of glass from direct hits. All around the campus now there was an inky, thick blanket of blackness that descended on them once the sun slid past the bare limbs of the trees and below the rooftops. This was a new kind of darkness.</span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> They stayed in whenever they could, she and Dara, and their friends in the dorm. Of course there were emergency runs to the commissary on campus, to pick up some essentials--snack food, toiletries, other stuff, whatever they needed. More than anything trips like that were just an excuse to get away from the dorm room and the familiar hallway upstairs. But when they made their heroic mad dashes to the student union or to the commissary, they did it sparingly, and quickly, and always in pairs, at least. They never went alone, anywhere, the two of them, she and Dara. They had made it their practice anyway--before all of this--to never go anywhere without the other. This was common knowledge and accepted fact between the two of them. But now they really didn't go anywhere without the other. Now it was life or death. And so they stayed together.</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> Of course what no one talked about, ever--not her, not Dara, not any of their friends holed up with them for the time being on campus--was how long any of this was going to last. How much longer could they hide, like mice, in their dorm rooms in the middle of an obvious college campus in the middle of the city? How much longer before someone on campus forgot to turn off a light bulb at night and left a window burning to the city streets beyond--a flare marking their presence. A neon arrow pointing to their existence. The college would be the next target, then, left in a burning pile of rubble, like Chinatown, and Little Italy, and Greektown.</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> It was like checking off boxes, she knew, and they would be next. It was just a matter of time. They all knew it, even though no one would ever mention it in conversation. Maybe the revolutionist militias--these self-styled "New Patriots," as they had taken to calling themselves--hadn't forgotten about the college after all; maybe they knew about them hiding here, scuttling around, trying to be safe. Maybe it was the case that the gun-toting mobile armies simply hadn't worked their way to the campus yet. <i>It's just a bunch of stupid fucking spoiled privileged college kids anyway. What the fuck are they going to do? We'll get to them in time. No worries.</i><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><i> </i>How long could this last? How long could the food hold out? How long could their nerves hold out? Winter would be here soon. What if the heat got turned off? What if the water pipes froze? And what if the food ran out? How long could she do this? She didn't know, and she didn't want to know.<br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;">"So, you're really doing this?" This was from Diego, their friend from down the hall. He was in their room now, as he often was. "You're really going to try for the train station? Why?"</div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span> "Yes, I'm really doing this."</span><br /></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span> "Show him the text from your dad," Dara said.</span><br /></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span> She showed Diego the text from her dad.</span><br /></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span> "That is some crazy shit," he said, shaking his head. "I have a bad feeling about this. Seriously, girl. Come on. Do you hear and see how fucking crazy those maniacs are out there? Are you kidding me right now?"</span><br /></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span> "Well, I didn't say you had to go with me, did I?" she said.</span><br /></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span> "No. You didn't say that. But you need someone to go with you."</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "No, I don't."</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "Yes, you do. I'm not letting you go out there alone. Not in this shit."</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "I've been hearing that a lot lately."</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "What?"</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "Never mind."</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "Let me see what Will's doing tonight," Diego said. Will was Diego's roommate.</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> She laughed at that.</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "What? You have a problem with Will?" Diego asked her.</span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "No, it's just I don't see him as the '<i>My hero</i>' type. He may have to tear himself away from <i>Call of Duty</i>."<br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "Well, you're not going on this little jaunt of yours alone," Dara said, as if she were putting her foot down and speaking the law. "Do you have a better idea?"</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> She had to think for a moment. Her silence told the others that, no, in fact she didn't have a better idea.</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "Besides," Diego said, "I know for a fact that Will can get his hands on a gun. Tonight. No questions asked. And you're going to need a gun."</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "I have some questions about that," she said.</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "Smartass," Diego said. "I said 'No questions asked.'"</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "Oh, that was literal?" she said. "I thought that was, like...you know...just a cliche' phrase. Something you heard once in a movie."</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "I'm trying to save this foolish little girl's life," Diego said to the room, "and listen to the way she talks to me."</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "Whose gun is it?" she asked.</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "Like I know? I think he said it was, like, his cousin's friend's gun, or his friend's cousin's gun... One of the two. Either way, it's a gun. Let me text him now. He can probably have it here, in your hands, within the hour. When are you leaving?"</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "In a couple of hours."</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "Do you really want a gun?" Dara asked her. "Have you ever shot one before?"</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "No."</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "Do you know how?"</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> She looked at Dara. "Take a look outside. How hard can it be?"</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> Dara laughed. Or tried to. "Girl.... Are you sure about this?"</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> She suddenly found that she couldn't answer that question.</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;">"What kind of gun is that?" she asked Will. He had shown up at their room 30 minutes after Diego had texted him the request. That was fast. And now he unwrapped the gleaming silver pistol from a cloth that he carried it in. He unwrapped it lovingly almost. She watched Will's face as he did so. He was interesting.</div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span> "It's a Walther .22," he said, as if he knew what he was talking about. From the front pocket of his jeans he pulled out two clips for the gun. "These go with it. They slide in here, at the base of the handle."</span><br /></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span> "Where did you get this?" She looked at him, as if she had never seen him before. "And how did you come by this so quickly?"</span><br /></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span> He looked at her and smirked. "That's really your main question right now? Are you shitting me?" He was cute, when he wanted to be.</span><br /></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span> She continued looking at him, watching his mouth as it moved, watching the fluttering movements of his hands--like a nervous bird in flight, almost--as he explained to her the workings of the Walther .22. She paid attention to what he was saying and the way he was saying it, or tried to at least. </span><br /></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span> "It's going to have a bit of a kick for a little girl like you," he said. "That is if you fire it." He paused and watched her. "And hopefully you won't have to. I mean, of course you won't have to. I'll be with you."</span><br /></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span> "What?" she asked him.</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "I'm going with you."</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "No, don't. Please stay here. Please be safe. You don't have to go. No one has to go with me."</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "No, there's no way I'm staying here, knowing you're out there, wandering the city."</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "Well, I wouldn't exactly put it that way, 'wandering the city.' I know where I'm going."</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "I don't care. I'm going with you."</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> She looked at him, and after a moment of thinking about it she smiled at him. A little. "Okay," she said.</span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span>It was later that evening. The hours were drawing on. Temperatures were dropping. Shadows were deepening outside. Sounds of explosions from homemade propane-bombs, and the rumble of gunfire, and sirens, and the return of gunfire. Shouting somewhere in the distance. Followed by more explosions--one of the tank-bombs exploded just blocks away from the college, from the dormitory, close enough to rattle the window in her dorm room. She was packing a small nylon shoulder bag with some of her belongings, some of her things, essentials, stuff that might tide her over for the days ahead. Something light that she could carry easily and run with, if necessary. Anything. She didn't even know what to bring with her.</span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> There was so little she knew. So many uncertainties. So much in the shadows, so much that couldn't be seen. So much that asked her to rely merely on faith, or on blind luck, or on chance. She was uncomfortable with everything she didn't know, but she knew she didn't have a choice.</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "I feel like there's something I should say." Again the voice behind her. As always, Dara. She loved Dara. They had quickly formed a bond, like sisters almost. And this hurt.</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> She turned to her roommate. <i>Poor Dara....</i> She knew what this was doing. To both of them. But there was nothing she could say or do to help make things easier or better. This was one of those wounds that ended up cutting both ways.<br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "Come here," she said to Dara. She momentarily dropped the bag she had been packing, and she opened up her arms. Dara came to her, then, and let herself be wrapped in an embrace. It felt good. They both needed this moment. They were inseparable, that was true enough. And yet she was going, she was leaving, and there was no changing her mind on that. She had to go. And Dara was staying.</span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "You don't have to say anything."</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> She could feel Dara starting to cry.</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "Don't...." she said quietly. "You're going to make me cry, too."</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> They both laughed, sort of, a nervous, anxious, upset sort of laugh, the kind of laugh that sounds forced and fake, the kind of laugh that only barely masks the fact that just underneath its surface is a cry.</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "I want to go with you," Dara said. "But I can't. But you know I want to go with you...."</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "You can't go with me."</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "I would...."<br /></span><span> "No, you can't. You need to stay here. Wait for your family to get ahold of you. Because they will."</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "I don't know."</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "They will. Just give them time."</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "That's not even it," Dara said to her. "The biggest part, the main part, is that I'm scared. I'm scared at the thought of leaving. Hell, I'm scared of the thought of staying. But I'm even more scared at the thought of leaving." She wiped at her eyes. "I think I'm losing my mind. There, I said it. I didn't think I would say it to you, and I said it: I'm scared of leaving here. Of going out there. And yet I'm watching you leave...."</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "Don't...."</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "What kind of friend does that make me?"</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "Shut up," she said to Dara. "Stop it. Don't talk like that. I love you. Your family will reach you. I know they will. You have to be here for them, when they get ahold of you. Maybe they'll come get you."<br /></span><span> "Why haven't you heard from your sister?" Dara asked. "Or your mom? How come they haven't called you or texted you? How come they haven't made an effort to come get you? When was the last time you talked to either one of them? I don't understand where everybody is...." She tried to laugh again but once more found that she couldn't. "Did everybody just forget about us here?"<span> </span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "No. They haven't forgotten," she said, more to convince herself than anything. "They're trying. It's just difficult for them out there right now." She glanced briefly out the window. "God only knows what it's like out there for them.... But I know they're all right. I know we'll hear from them. Like I heard from my dad."</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "Yeah...." Dara whispered.</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "You have to believe that."<br /></span><span> "I know. I do."</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "I love you, girl. You know that."</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "I know...." Dara smiled at her. "And you and Will are really going?"</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> She looked at Dara. The two held their gaze for a moment. This was real. "Yes," she said. "We're going soon. We'll be all right. I promise you."</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> They hugged each other. Tightly. Neither one of them wanted to let go.</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "Tell your dad I say, 'Hey.'" Dara whispered to her.</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "I will."</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;">They left by the side door of the Courtyard dormitory, she and Will, the two of them bundled up warm as they stepped out into the cold late-November night air. If they weren't wearing face masks you could have seen their breath. It was good to hide such a thing, now. The steam of their breathing could have possibly given them away if they weren't careful.</div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "These masks are finally good for something," Will said quietly as they stepped outside into the turnaround cul-de-sac by the side exits. "Who knew?"</span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> T</span>hey moved to the corner of the building, Will in the lead with his pistol drawn. He halted and slowly peeked around the edge of the building out onto Halsted Street. He looked to his right and to his left--down south Halsted and up north Halsted--and then held his finger up to his lips, hidden behind his mask. She had to imagine him making a "<i>ssssshhhh</i>" sound to her, and then he waggled two of his fingers at her, motioning her forward.<br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> It was all she could do to not say something about <i>Call of Duty</i>. She shook her head and rolled her eyes. <i>He's helping you,</i> she had to remind herself.<br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "It's just a couple of blocks north," he said to her, whispering. "We'll come to Van Buren, then, and cut to the right. Head to the east."</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "I know that Will," she said. <i>He's trying to help you.</i><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "I know you know. Just stay close to me."</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> They headed out, slowly. Cautiously. Always watching, always listening. The sound of pickup trucks, their flags flapping in the cold air, their diesel engines always roaring. The sudden glare of headlights coming from behind them or turning in front of them. They were watchful for everything, jumping at shadows. Careful to move slowly and quietly through the darkened streets. It was slow going. She didn't realize how slow their progress was going to be. She thought of her dad's text to her. The train left at midnight, he had told her. Did they finally get around to leaving the dorm at the right time? Should they have left sooner? She hadn't accounted for how slow their going might be in the dark and the cold of night, mindful of everything they thought they saw and heard. Were they going to make the train station? Would they be late, she and Will? Would she miss the train?</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "Did we leave on time?" she whispered to him. "Should we have left sooner?"</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "What do you mean?"</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "I mean are we going to miss the train? This is slow going," she said. "And it's so cold."</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "We'll get there," he said to her. "We'll make it."</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "And then what?" she asked him. "What are you going to do once we get there?"</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "Well," he said, "something tells me that whatever's going to happen it isn't going to be the way they called it back in Nha Trang...."</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> She looked at him. "What?"</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "Nothing...." he said. "It's just a line from a movie. A good movie, though."</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "Are you fucking kidding me with this right now? What is wrong with you?"</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> He laughed, quietly. "I'm joking," he said. "Take it easy. Jesus."</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "Will you stop? I can't even...."</span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "And here we are," Will said. They stopped. "Van Buren." He motioned with the drawn pistol to the green street sign above them. "That was easy. Piece of cake."</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "Are we ready?" she asked.</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "So far so good. I'm ready when you are," he said. "Wait, though..." He took off one of his gloves and reached into his jeans pocket. He pulled out one of the clips for the Walther .22. He slipped the clip neatly into the handle of the pistol, as if he had done it all his life. It clicked into place. The sound seemed loud, magnified in the stillness of the frozen air. He tried not to look at her. "Don't say anything."</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "What did you just do?" she said to him. "What just happened?"</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "I said not to say anything."</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "Are you joking me?" she said. "Do you think this is one of your games, Will?"</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "I forgot."</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "Oh my God...." </span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> He sighed, loudly. "Maybe you'd like it back in your cell, your highness?"</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "Please stop," she said.</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "I'm sorry."</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> Silence.</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "No, I'm sorry," she said. "I mean... Thank you...."</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "Don't mention it," he said. "You're welcome. No way I'm letting you do this alone tonight."</span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "You didn't answer my question, though."</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "What question was that?"<br /></span><span> "Once we get to LaSalle Street Station, what then? What about you? What are you going to do?"</span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> He paused for a moment. He looked around the two of them in the darkened city street, standing alone at the corner of Halsted and Van Buren. "And then I give you the pistol," he said to her. "And I say 'Goodbye' to you. And I kiss you, if you'll let me. And then I make my way back. Or try to...." He rethought that. "I will make it back."</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "No," she said. "No, you're not doing that. Come with me."</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "No," he said. "I can't do that."</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> It was her turn to pause. She looked up at him in the dark. She could make out his eyes. They were kind eyes. She liked them. "Then you'll keep your pistol. It's yours, anyway...."</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "It's actually not mine..."</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "Shut up. It's yours. You keep it. You'll need it."</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "No. You're taking it with you." He paused and looked at her. "Not that you'll need it, you know. You'll be fine. But.... You're taking the gun with you. I'll be okay."</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "<i>My hero</i>..." she said, and tried to laugh but was surprised to suddenly find tears, cold, in her eyes.<br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> They hugged each other then, standing there in the dark at the crossroads of the two streets. They held each other for as long as they felt they could. They knew, both of them, there would not be a time when they could do it again.</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "It's okay...." he whispered. "Are you ready?"</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "Yes," she said. "Are you?"</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "Yes. I think so."</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> "All right then," she said. "Let's go."</span><br /></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span> The two of them took off running east from Halsted Street, staying close together, their breath coming in short little gasps, their face masks pulling restrictively at their mouths, their legs like frozen fence posts with the cold November wind cutting around them. They ran, not gracefully but steadily, into the dark, the two of them, alone, in the direction of the train station at LaSalle and Van Buren.</span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><span><span> </span><br /></span></span></span></span></div><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span><span><span><br /></span></span></span></div><p><br /></p>David Newsomhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02698845610286763351noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1218241678607183535.post-60349602316386461952020-10-18T07:24:00.025-07:002021-01-15T07:00:49.934-08:00The Spider That I Killed This Morning in the Shower<div><br /></div><div>It was there waiting for me<br />when I pulled back the curtain.</div><div><br />Hiding, silent, unexpected, scuttling into motion,<br />with the spray of the water</div><div><br />suddenly altering its world of quiet<br />patience and sleep (if spiders sleep).</div><div><br />Science will say it was more<br />afraid of me than I was</div><div><br />of it. But I don't know</div><div>about that. And philosophy will say </div><div><br /></div><div>suffering can produce strength. But after</div><div>weighing if I really needed a</div><div><br /></div><div>shower today, I then remembered psychology</div><div>talking about something called a collective </div><div><br /></div><div>memory, and so I summoned long-<br />mouldering cave-ancestors to help muscle</div><div><br />the spider toward its drain. Then,</div><div>victorious, I resumed my expected routines.</div><p style="text-align: left;"><br /></p>David Newsomhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02698845610286763351noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1218241678607183535.post-35576645373442151492020-10-15T11:15:00.010-07:002020-11-05T12:56:14.668-08:00Quietly Reading Nietzsche While I Sit at My Desk in the Back of the Room and Watch Students Take a Standardized Test<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEibFaf24IEX8tOj5gI346n6K54VsdYXGy8z7jh9vRn2Uyk9WAeX9zZmAshc1U7uPix-6EQjNBC-pvtC68cq79CaOemQol6E_PdMYMjFsyud23R4O-VH2gcw4QvB44F-mviCqkMuhrMW_UU/s583/alps.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="583" data-original-width="500" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEibFaf24IEX8tOj5gI346n6K54VsdYXGy8z7jh9vRn2Uyk9WAeX9zZmAshc1U7uPix-6EQjNBC-pvtC68cq79CaOemQol6E_PdMYMjFsyud23R4O-VH2gcw4QvB44F-mviCqkMuhrMW_UU/s320/alps.jpg" /></a></div><br /><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">There is always, of course,</div><div style="text-align: left;">the admonition to be</div><div style="text-align: left;">one's self. And then there is</div><div style="text-align: left;">the addressing of such insights<br />as the will to power, and <i>amor fati</i>,</div><div style="text-align: left;">and of course eternal recurrence,</div><div style="text-align: left;">and the<i> Ubermensch</i>, and destruction-and-rebirth.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br />Mountaintop views interspersed</div><div style="text-align: left;">with descents into hell,<br />and back, and forth, and back,</div><div style="text-align: left;">and back, and forth. (And I haven't</div><div style="text-align: left;">even mentioned yet the unfortunate infamy</div><div style="text-align: left;">of our inevitable role played</div><div style="text-align: left;">in the untimely death of God.)</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br />Because it's a lot to think about--</div><div style="text-align: left;">a lot to take in, after all. Too much</div><div style="text-align: left;">for the likes of their young egos,</div><div style="text-align: left;">concerned as they are today with</div><div style="text-align: left;">completely filling in the ovals of their choice, </div><div style="text-align: left;">careful to erase any human error,</div><div style="text-align: left;">careful not to leave any stray marks.</div><p style="text-align: left;"><br /></p><p style="text-align: left;"><br /></p><p><br /></p>David Newsomhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02698845610286763351noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1218241678607183535.post-27590408735797288012020-10-12T08:51:00.011-07:002020-12-05T10:31:56.625-08:00Moriah<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjNe_O7OYEmAc9qjTqaaUC1zPxz9yIFagtw9q4JNBz63FygQ3XtbApxezE91PgKNr9VMs-JcYatAuKohGREL_5fIk-JESmH7wP2jWN5gzkBQtGxlAMgTxasrHimFBwerv75Or7PMgni2qM/s512/unnamed.gif" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="410" data-original-width="512" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjNe_O7OYEmAc9qjTqaaUC1zPxz9yIFagtw9q4JNBz63FygQ3XtbApxezE91PgKNr9VMs-JcYatAuKohGREL_5fIk-JESmH7wP2jWN5gzkBQtGxlAMgTxasrHimFBwerv75Or7PMgni2qM/s320/unnamed.gif" width="320" /></a></div><span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: Georgia; text-align: justify;"><div style="font-size: 13px;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: Georgia; text-align: justify;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: Georgia; text-align: justify;">"[If] God should really speak to man, man could still never <i>know</i> that it was God speaking. It is quite impossible for man to apprehend the infinite by his senses, distinguish it from sensible being, and <i>recognize</i> it as such. But in some cases man can be sure that the voice he hears is <i>not</i> God's; for if the voice commands him to do something contrary to the moral law, then no matter how majestic the apparition may be, and no matter how it may seem to surpass the whole of nature, he must consider it an illusion."</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: Georgia; text-align: justify;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: Georgia; text-align: justify;">-- Immanuel Kant, <i>The Conflict of the Faculties </i>(1798)</span></div></span><div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia;"><span style="font-size: 13px;"><br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia;"><span style="font-size: 13px;">_____________________</span></span></div><p></p><div><br /></div><div>I've sometimes wondered about that walk<br />down from Mount Moriah,<br />father and son, together.<br />What could have possibly passed for <br />conversation between the two that day?<br />Idle banter?<br />Angry reproach?<br />Commonplace chitchat about the<br />clouds overhead looking something<br />like the family's beloved old camel,<br />or about the welcome scent of approaching rain,<br />or about the evening's chores awaiting them back home,<br />or about what it is that mother Sarah has fixed<br />for dinner that night?<br />Or did they say nothing, the two of them?<br />Did they just walk steadily downhill, returning home,<br />the fall of Abraham's scuffed sandals caressing lonely rocks<br />underfoot, and a gentle gust of wind<br />every now and then carrying birdsong<br />and the faraway plaintive cry of sheep?</div><div><br />What happened, I wonder?<br /><br /></div><div>And how did Isaac sleep that night, by the way?<br />Did he sleep that night?<br />And did that afternoon's events ever come up again<br />in conversation between the two of them?<br />"<i>So...you know, Dad...about that one day....</i>"<br />Or was it never breathed again, ever?<br />Did it die in Isaac's place<br />on the top of that dry, forlorn mountain?<br />Was it left there,<br />carried to faraway lands and times<br />by the breeze of angel's wings?</div><div><br />Of course, many scholars<br />(ever the cup of cold water)<br />apologize for destroying the myth<br />of Isaac being such a young child,<br />overturning the temples of legend<br />and colorful Sunday School felt-board figures<br />with the studied reality that he was probably,<br />in all likelihood<br />(given the parameters of the story, anyway),<br />a young man in his 20s.<br />A difficult day's worth of stubble<br />shadowing his gaunt cheeks, perhaps,<br />the muscles in his sculpted calves burning<br />from the morning's wild climb,<br />his man-voice gravelly with youthful self-confidence<br />and quiet wonderment of his ailing father's<br />obvious sad decline into<br />inevitable old age.</div><div><br />Maybe.<br />I suppose anything is possible.</div><div><br />But just for the sake of airy irrational stubbornness<br />against the hard ground of academia,<br />the occasional romantic in me<br />still wants to imagine the scene that day<br />somehow unfolding this way:</div><div><br />Let's imagine Isaac as that young boy.<br />Let's say 5 years old.<br />Imagine the little boy is tired, confused, scared--<br />not so much at the day's strangeness<br />but more at the simple fact that now,<br />on the silent walk down<br />the mountain toward home,<br />his father--stranger still--is trying to hide<br />the tears tunneling down his dirty cheeks<br />and into his stiff beard.<br />Isaac reaches his tiny 5-year old arms<br />up to his father, so tall--<br />too tired to walk another step, perhaps,<br />as little boys often are,<br />but more than that it is just a case this time<br />of a little boy wanting to be held by his father.<br />Wanting to feel his father's strong arms around him.<br />Wanting to bury his face<br />into his father's warm shoulder.<br />The smell of the man's sweat from the day,<br />sour, comforting, alive.<br />The taste of his father's salty tears<br />as the boy kisses the rough, bristled cheek.<br />Wanting to whisper to his father,<br />"<i>It's okay. I forgive you....</i>"</div><div><br />The little boy's legs dangling in the air<br />to the cadence of his father's assured steps below,<br />counting out time down the steps<br />of the mountainside,<br />the boy feeling, at last,<br />sleep falling over him,<br />creeping up on him,<br />comfortable and safe<br />hiding against his father's chest,<br />little boy's feet swaying, small and tender,<br />as he gives in to sleep, so trusting,<br />a hot, blistered sole resting<br />atop the sweat-stained haft<br />of a knife now holstered at his father's waist.</div><p style="text-align: left;"><br /></p></div>David Newsomhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02698845610286763351noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1218241678607183535.post-23248347674318266022020-08-16T14:07:00.015-07:002022-01-22T13:14:34.580-08:00Crossing the Rubicon: a primary source (8/16/20)<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgjrnqRpJRwcM50yYL3BXVrxBVptRX-oQbtmKreKH16VpYqpIS82LV7Nmd9p0_v7H6gY8_E_R10sC2me3Xg_X_tLZ1B0zmAt-E_5Ox7PfUmj7ewt1etCCE_d5LVJ49R61yUkDTG6uogCN4/s640/i-am-not-a-robot-091619.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="340" data-original-width="640" height="272" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgjrnqRpJRwcM50yYL3BXVrxBVptRX-oQbtmKreKH16VpYqpIS82LV7Nmd9p0_v7H6gY8_E_R10sC2me3Xg_X_tLZ1B0zmAt-E_5Ox7PfUmj7ewt1etCCE_d5LVJ49R61yUkDTG6uogCN4/w512-h272/i-am-not-a-robot-091619.jpg" width="512" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">"...<i>Alea iacta est</i> (The die is cast)."</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">-- Quote attributed to Julius Caesar, January 49 BCE, while leading his armies across the Rubicon River (at that time a northern boundary of Italy), an act considered by the Roman government to be treasonous, eventually leading to the Roman Civil War</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><b>__________________________</b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><b><br /></b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><b><br /></b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">When I was younger, my teachers knew everything, or so I always thought when I was their student. It's not that I don't think that way now about them--there is a part of me (a nostalgic part) that would still like to hold on to their inhuman infallibility. There's a part of me that still stubbornly clings to this idea. But I'm older now, and a teacher myself, and as such I know these days how much my teachers were more than likely winging it day by day, faking it, making it up as they went along, and just trying to make it through to the dismissal bell at 3:00 p.m.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">And I certainly don't mean this as a negative critique. I mean this as an observation of reality.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">I'm not going to get treacly with this piece. I'm not going to waste your time or mine, beleaguering you with the old tropes about teachers being noble and teaching being a noble profession. Nor am I going to give much validity to the tired critical misconceptions about teachers and the teaching profession.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Teaching is just like anything else, finally: It's a job. And teachers are just like everyone else. There is a misguided picture, in some circles, that we're stuffy and snobbish, standing around puffing on a pipe and always discussing weighty matters of the world. There is an equally misguided picture of us that teachers are dumb, lazy, under-performing, unambitious, and spoiled. The truth of who teachers are and of what teaching is, though, has always fallen somewhere in Aristotle's beloved middle ground.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Some teachers are good, while others are not. Some teachers are hard-working and dedicated professionals, and others are simply putting in their time until they can retire with a somewhat decent pension.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><i>[Aside: And in so saying, I have just described practically everyone in the world who works, and who holds a job, and who is a member of a particular profession.]</i></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">I'm not going to preach or pretend or patronize with this writing. Teaching is a hard job. Of course there are some days when we all feel like coasting a bit, and if you've been doing the job long enough you learn the "tricks of the trade" on how to do that while still doing something productive in the classroom. (You learn how to "teach the kids to teach themselves," at times. That's not a joke. That is a real thing.) But always, in the background--particularly in our modern times--teaching is a job that requires you to be alert and to be responsive and to be "on your game" as much as possible. So it's not easy, but it gets easier as you go along over the years, in some ways--as most jobs do. But teaching is constantly also in a state of flux, continually changing and evolving, becoming more and more bureaucratized and business-model oriented. It's no longer just about "teaching." In fact, ironically, most of the job of being a teacher these days really isn't about "teaching" at all, which is an interesting and disturbing paradox. Most of today's "teaching" involves things like standardized-testing, and reams of data, and evaluations, and one-to-one technology, and remote-learning, and cold, clinical imagery derived from the industrial world of assembly-line mentality:</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><b>RAW MATERIAL IN =====> REFINED PRODUCT OUT</b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">And while the emotional, romanticized, Mr. Keating-notion of "teaching" in an inspirational, interpersonal way (the kind that makes students want to stand on their desks in loving salute) was maybe never real--now, then, or ever--such an image of a teacher teaching today is as far from the day-to-day real picture as can be imagined.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">And all of that, as just described, is in the best, most sane, most "normal" of conditions. But let's scrub-swipe to the current day and to the approaching 2020-21 school year.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">I have been teaching off-and-on <i>[Aside: mostly on, except for a time when I stepped away from the career for a while to try my hand in the "real" world--which I didn't like so much and therefore came back to working with students]</i> for the better part of 25 years. And it is safe for me to say--with unequivocal certainty in my voice--that I've never stared down a "beginning-of-the-year" start to a new school year like the 2020-21 school year lying just ahead.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">I'm nervous. It has me rattled. It has me unsure of myself, and of my profession, and of the state of our country and our world in ways that I haven't felt in a while. If ever. And I don't know what to do about it or how to feel about it. It is the stereotypical fear of the unknown that I'm experiencing, I suppose, and I don't like it.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">But it's my career. It's my profession. It's my job. It's what I do. It's how I earn a living and pay bills and manage to get by--however meagerly. But it's also how I earn a sense of self-satisfaction and self-respect, because my students generally like me as their teacher (I think), and I (most of the time) like being around them and working with them and trying to make a difference for them.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">The thing about teaching, interestingly, is the same thing our President says about the current death-rate from COVID-19: "It is what it is...."</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">And now a new school year blinkers on the horizon. </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">The high school where I teach English is a relatively small-to-medium sized district in the southwest exo-suburbs of Chicago. We--like the rest of the country--went into full-lockdown mode in the middle of March, finishing the remainder of the 2019-20 school year at home, with remote-learning, and Google Classroom, and Zoom, and whatnot. The district's plan at the time, such as it was <i>[Aside: which wasn't much of a plan at all, if I'm being brutally frank]</i> was pretty ineffective, unimpressive, and pointless, but it got us through the remaining two months of the school year--a Band-Aid on a gaping wound, to momentarily stanch the loss of blood.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Like it or not (which none of my colleagues or students really did), it worked well enough to see us through. It did the job we needed at the time. Like it or not.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">And now here we are, five months later, with COVID-19 still in our midst <i>[Aside: despite the adamant and angry Libertarian-types across the country who insist on the absolute primacy of the nation's economy above all else, and who choose not to believe what science tells them, and who refuse to wear face-coverings of any kind, and who argue for a dystopic "herd immunity" solution...but that's another level of crazy and another topic of discussion for another time]</i>. Believe it or not a new school year is preparing to start, in one form or another. And suddenly parents, and children, and whole communities, and school districts, and education staff--teachers included--are being faced with choices and being asked to make decisions that no one in any of the groups ever felt they would be required to make:</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><b>Parents:</b> Do I send my child to school or keep her/him at home, where I can trust it is relatively safe?</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><b>Children:</b> Do I want to go back to school, or do I want to stay home and try to learn in this relatively "safe" setting?</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><b>Communities:</b> What is best and safest for the health and well-being of all community members?</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><b>School Districts:</b> For the approaching fall semester, do we delay the start-date of the school year, or do we go full-on in-person instruction, full-on remote-learning instruction, or an invented hybrid of the two?</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><b>Education Staff/Teachers:</b> Do I go into work? Can I take a sabbatical year off? Do I look for another job? Do I meet with my lawyer and write my will before the start of the new school year?</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Unprecedented times. Unanswerable questions. Unbelievably difficult decisions.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">At my school district--at the high school where I work--the decision was made to return with full-on, in-person instruction for those parents who choose to send their student. For those who opt to keep their children home and to have them learn remotely, an online digital-curriculum education platform, Apex Learning, is being offered.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">At the high school, we currently have around 85% of our student-population reportedly returning for in-person, on-campus learning. Particular guidelines--as mandated by the state--are required to be in place and enforced "whenever possible," <i>[Aside: nice governmental CYA-wording there, by the way]</i>, but no one is really too clear on how, for example, proper 6 ft. social distancing is to be enforced in a small classroom with 25 young people scheduled to be in it. Or how, for a further example, students and teachers are to wear a face-mask for a full 7 hr. day. Or what happens, for yet another example, when students do not wear a mask, or if they take it off, or if they refuse to follow the carefully outlined arrows on the floor directing one-way traffic in hallways around the building. Or how lunch periods will be organized. Or school buses. Or bathroom/hall passes. Or drinking fountains. Or sneezing. Or coughing. Or sharing pencils, turning in papers, or touching, laughing, talking. The kind of stuff that is rudimentary and fundamental and basic to the daily operations of a school and to students and to teachers.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">How is this all going to work? Nobody really knows. We have ideas, or so it seems. We have tentative plans. We have carefully shadowed outlines and forms of ideas, but nothing really to take any shape or substance for the time being. We think we know how this little part might work and how it might play itself out, but then we're not sure. We'll have to wait and see. Take it as it comes. A case-by-case basis. Learn as we go.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><i><br /></i></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><i>[Aside: I've heard and memorized all the stock phrases by now already. This is how the bureaucratic game is played. The problem is, though, we're possibly dealing with some lives here this time.]</i></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><i><br /></i></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">But how could something like this happen? How could we get to such a point in our society where education (in general) and schools (in particular) are forced to make such difficult decisions that affect countless numbers? How could we get to this point?</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Let's play a hypothetical thought-experiment for a moment and imagine the following scenario of a made-up school district, which could be many school districts anywhere in the country:</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Imagine, if you will, over this past summer the staff of this hypothetical district conducting their own survey which asked fellow employees a variety of questions regarding their comfort-level regarding the idea of returning to campus and to in-person learning in the midst of the continuing COVID-19 pandemic. Imagine the majority of staff members at this district indicating concern and being "somewhat uncomfortable" with the idea of returning to campus in the fall. Imagine that the majority of this staff also voted to start the new school year with a hybrid of in-person learning and remote-learning, to ease into the school year with a soft step, to first assess the situation, to gauge it carefully, to respond with a plan, and then to modify the plan as needed.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Now imagine none of this survey mattering in the end. If this imaginary district's administration and school board--who were presumably privy to the survey along with its findings--looked at the survey's results at all, imagine if both entities collectively ignored it and opted instead to go with their own survey--a survey of the community, with a simple online questionnaire to local parents, basically consisting of a single choice:<br /><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><b>In the fall, would you:</b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><b>1.) prefer to send your student to school for in-person instruction, or</b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><b>2.) keep him/her at home and rely again on remote-learning?</b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><i><br /></i></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Needless to say--in a community largely made up, let's say, of middle-class, conservative, blue-collar Americans concerned (understandably) about their jobs, and the nation's economy, and what to do with their children during the workday--the results of that survey would be obvious before anyone would even need to be asked to count the numbers.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Regardless of the feelings of the experienced professional staff and despite the inherent risks that the medical community could echo, such a district would be going back to full-on, in-person instruction in the fall, based (on the surface anyway) on a decision made largely by the community's parents. And what's even worse, imagine the state's largest education union being little or no help in supporting its members. At this point--as with everything--the larger union would be taking the bureaucratic, political approach with its "wait-and-see" response, and it would offer minimal guidance or support to its smaller local associations across the state when they needed it most over the summer and in the approaching fall.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Imagine such a scenario. Just think of the veritable house of cards waiting for a gust of breeze. That's how it could happen, perhaps.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><i>[Aside: </i>Alea iacta est<i>....]</i></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">I've never faced a school year like this one before. None of my colleagues have either. I hope to never be asked to deal with something like this again. But realistically this novel coronavirus disease is here to stay (despite what the mountaintop-stronghold Libertarian-types among us have to say about it), at least until a safe vaccine can be developed, and tested, and approved, and marketed. Until then this is our new way of living for now, and it's still going to be our way of life for the unforeseeable future. Will schools that are opening in the fall--like my district--be open for long? Will schools make it for a week? Two weeks? To Labor Day? For a whole semester? The whole year? Will we make it through, "learning as we go," until crossing the finish line next May? Or could it be, in fact, that nothing will go wrong? Nothing bad will happen? This is all just an elaborate hoax? Or will someone get sick sometime during the school year? What if it's a student? A staff member? Will it be more than one?</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Will it be me?</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">And the fact that I have to ask a question like that--or that any educator does this year--is staggering in its implications. I don't know what's going to happen. I don't know what this school year will bring. Of course I never do; no teacher ever really does. And yet we do. If we've been doing it for a while, teaching is teaching, and school years--though each unique--are also uniquely alike in particular ways. Except for this year. This year is different. This year is dark. It's shadowy. Indistinct. Hard to see. Hard to read. And to know.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">It's in the not knowing--the world of the unknown--that most of our fears reside and have always resided. In such a world it requires that decisions be made (maybe sometimes against our better judgment), and actions be taken, and boundaries be breached, and points-of-no-return be crossed, or re-crossed, with only the most casual of worried glances behind us over our heavily burdened shoulder, and remembering, at such a time, some of the few lines from Eliot that we learned in senior English class in high school from Mrs. Bell--lines that manage to come to mind today:<br /><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><i>"....This is the way the world ends</i></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><i>This is the way the world ends</i></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><i>This is the way the world ends</i></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><i>Not with a bang but a whimper."</i></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div>David Newsomhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02698845610286763351noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1218241678607183535.post-5268657044850644512020-07-13T20:58:00.090-07:002022-01-22T13:15:03.351-08:00Apparent Weight: or, Learning to Read (Finally) Gravity's Rainbow [in Which the Author Seeks to Express the Sense of Frustration and Exhilaration Accompanying His Latest Attempt to Read Thomas Pynchon's 1973 760-Page Postmodern "Encyclopedic Narrative" Magnum Opus While at Home During the Recent Pandemic and During Which, in the Unspecified Stretch of Time Ahead of Him, the Author Assumed He Would Have Not Only the Requisite Time but Also the Requisite Attention Span and the Requisite Stamina Normally Associated with "Cracking the Code" of One of the Most Notoriously Difficult Contemporary American Novels Written Over the Past 50 Years or So and About Which the Author is Pained to Admit that Said Time, Attention Span, and Stamina All Faltered a Time or Two While Trying Again (a Second Time) to Make His Way Through Pynchon's Maze of a Book and Stopping During These Times of Stasis to Reflect on the General Nature of Basic Physical Laws, Like the Laws of Relativity, Gravity, and Entropy, All "Basic" Laws of Physics Which Coincidentally Reflect Relationship--Sequential and Spatial--of One Thing to Another and So Which Inevitably Turns the Author Toward Seemingly Random Philosophical Contemplations of Why Books Like This Would be Written in the First Place, and Why They Would Ever be Read, and What is Meant by the Metaphorical Similarity Between the Complicated, Challenging Books That We Choose to (Try to) Read and the Complicated, Challenging People That We Choose to (Try to) Love]<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhAGNwSIA1dQNKbw2x5sr9TgvscGTY-J8rLR5-u2vGKeP7GhUNgak7YO326kFcsfM4QqXEOp_1b6aKuRHqNPk6ICSzTI62di1bKlWxqBLieNOvhp9AIEUJLlJ_vD4nJBvi4lEW0qlQ60Ho/s1600/GR1.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhAGNwSIA1dQNKbw2x5sr9TgvscGTY-J8rLR5-u2vGKeP7GhUNgak7YO326kFcsfM4QqXEOp_1b6aKuRHqNPk6ICSzTI62di1bKlWxqBLieNOvhp9AIEUJLlJ_vD4nJBvi4lEW0qlQ60Ho/s400/GR1.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
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<b>* 1 *</b></div>
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The lunatic is on the grass.</div>
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Remembering games, and daisy chains, and laughs,<br />
[we've] got to keep the loonies on the path....<br />
<br />
And if the dam breaks open many years too soon,<br />
and if there is no room upon the hill,<br />
and if your head explodes with dark forebodings, too,<br />
I'll meet you on the dark side of the moon.<br />
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-- Pink Floyd, <i>The Dark Side of the Moon</i>, "Brain Damage" (1)<br />
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<b>*</b></div>
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Here are some things that happened in (and with) the United States of America in 1973:</div>
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<li style="text-align: left;">President Richard M. Nixon was sworn in for his second term.</li>
<li style="text-align: left;">Ohio became the first state to post signs with distances written in metrics.</li>
<li style="text-align: left;">The Supreme Court overruled the states' right to ban abortion with the new ruling, Roe v Wade.</li>
<li style="text-align: left;">UCLA won its 7th consecutive men's college basketball National Championship title under head coach John Wooden.</li>
<li style="text-align: left;">The World Trade Center opened in New York City.</li>
<li style="text-align: left;">The last U.S. soldier was withdrawn (officially) from Vietnam.</li>
<li style="text-align: left;">The Watergate scandal/investigation intensified.</li>
<li style="text-align: left;">The first hand-held cellular phone call was made by Martin Cooper in New York City.</li>
<li style="text-align: left;">In Super Bowl VII the Miami Dolphins, under head coach Don Shula, beat the Washington Redskins 14-7. The Dolphins' victory capped a perfect, unbeaten 17-0 season--still an NFL record today.</li>
<li style="text-align: left;">Pioneer 11 was launched, with its mission to study the solar system.</li>
<li style="text-align: left;">A 71-day standoff between federal authorities and American Indian Movement activists--occupying the Pine Ridge Reservation at Wounded Knee in South Dakota--ended with the militants' surrender.</li>
<li style="text-align: left;">Thoroughbred racehorse, Secretariat, became the first Triple Crown winner in 25 years with his victory at the Belmont Stakes. Secretariat's win by 31 lengths is still considered by many to be one of the greatest achievements in race history.</li>
<li style="text-align: left;">Congress passed the Education of the Handicapped Act (EHA), federally mandating Special Education.</li>
<li style="text-align: left;">DJ Kool Herc originated the (then "new") genre of hip-hop music in New York City.</li>
<li style="text-align: left;">The Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) was founded.</li>
<li style="text-align: left;">The American Psychiatric Association removed homosexuality from its DSM-II.</li>
<li style="text-align: left;">Egypt and Israel signed a U.S.-sponsored peace-treaty accord.</li>
<li style="text-align: left;">Skylab, the first U.S. space station, was launched.</li>
<li style="text-align: left;">Skylab 2 was launched, with a mission to repair damages to the recently launched Skylab.</li>
<li style="text-align: left;">Skylab 3 was launched, with a mission to conduct medical and scientific experiments aboard Skylab, which had been previously launched, and then damaged, and then repaired by the also-previously launched Skylab 2.</li>
<li style="text-align: left;">The U.S. bombing of Cambodia ended (officially).</li>
<li style="text-align: left;">The Oakland A's repeated their MLB championship title following their victory over the New York Mets, 5-2, in Game 7 of the World Series.</li>
<li style="text-align: left;">The Buffalo Bills' O.J. Simpson became the first NFL running back to rush for 2,000 yards in a single season.</li>
<li style="text-align: left;">The Endangered Species Act was passed. (2)</li>
<li style="text-align: left;">The movie, <i>The Exorcist</i>--with a screenplay by William Peter Blatty (based on his bestselling novel from two years earlier) and directed by young wunderkind filmmaker, William Friedkin--was released to wide outcry and acclaim. Long lines of eager, trepidatious filmgoers wrapped around city blocks, awaiting their chance to see the film, despite (and even largely because of) reported stories of audience members passing out and/or vomiting during the movie. (Due to the hysteria and the resulting crowds around it, <i>The Exorcist</i> would become an early--if not the first--American film to herald in a new age of "blockbuster films" in cinema. A welcome blessing to some aficionados. A death-knell of the art form to other cinephiles.)</li>
<li style="text-align: left;">The British psychedelic/progressive rock band, Pink Floyd, released their 8th studio album, <i>The Dark Side of the Moon</i>, which would go on to sell over 45 million copies, would become entrenched on U.S. music charts for over 950 weeks, would be a mainstay on record players and stereos the world over, and would serve as fodder--inside a perpetual cloud of skunky smoke--for marijuana-inspired dissection, discussion, and debate in dorm rooms for decades.</li>
<li style="text-align: left;">Young American author Thomas Pynchon had published two previous novels to somewhat unanimous (if not generously confused) acclaim--<i>V.</i> (1963) and <i>The Crying of Lot 49</i> (1965). After setting a high bar for himself, there would follow a silent hiatus from Pynchon and his typewriter--a period which drove speculation and anticipation through the roof: <i>What would this great young writer surprise us with next</i>? It was in this atmosphere, then, that Pynchon would finally reveal his third novel to the reading world: <i>Gravity's Rainbow</i>. </li>
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<b>* 2 *</b></div>
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"We have to talk in some kind of code, naturally," continues the Manager. "We always have. But none of the codes is that hard to break. Opponents have accused us, for just that reason, of contempt for the people. But really we do it all in the spirit of fair play. We're not monsters. We know we have to give them <i>some</i> chance. We can't take hope away from them, can we?"<br />
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-- Thomas Pynchon, <i>Gravity's Rainbow</i>, Part 4: "The Counterforce" (3)<br />
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<b>*</b></div>
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Off the Japanese mainland--940 km. (580 mi.) south-southeast of Tokyo--the small, nondescript isle of Nishinoshima had existed silently for thousands of years as a barely noticeable splotch of terra firma in the Pacific Ocean's Volcanic Island Arc. (4) At Nishinoshima's center slept a dormant volcanic vent, until around 1973, anyway, when the isle--for whatever reason--decided to wake up, stretch its atrophied limbs, yawn, and get out of bed. Inexplicably, Nishinoshima--after lying small and dormant since forever--began to grow. A series of volcanic eruptions sent a flow of ash and lava cascading downward (as volcanoes are wont to do), pooling and collecting in cooled, blackened piles around the island's impressively alert blow-hole.</div>
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Steam. Rumblings. Sulphur. Fire. Lava. The whole miasmatic stuff of Genesis.</div>
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<i>[Aside: ...or Hell...take your pick on which end of the Bible you want to start from, I guess. Of course, the Japanese tradition of reading sees a book beginning from right to left, though, so...there's that.]</i></div>
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Varieties of plants and animal species have, over time, begun to call the island home. To this day, Nishinoshima has defied odds and continues to grow every year. As of 2019, the island was measured at 2.89 sq km (1.12 sq mi). (5) Scientists are stymied and even somewhat amused, viewing it as a cute sort of anomaly, almost. Even some of the world's top scientists cannot predict how long little Nishinoshima's growth spurt will last or how big it will eventually become when the island's beating heart and breathing lungs inevitably fall silent again.</div>
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But as all the poets of the world and all the shaman of varied cultures over time have reminded us <i>[Aside: and that would include George Harrison, of course]</i> all things must pass.</div>
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<b>* 3 *</b></div>
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BENOIT BLANC: .... I anticipate the terminus of Gravity's Rainbow.<br />
MARTA CABRERA: <i>Gravity's Rainbow</i>...<br />
BENOIT BLANC: It's a novel.<br />
MARTA CABRERA: Yeah, I know. I haven't read it, though.<br />
BENOIT BLANC: Neither have I. Nobody has. But I like the title. It describes the path of a projectile determined by natural law.<br />
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-- <i>Knives Out</i>, Screenplay: Rian Johnson, Director: Rian Johnson (6)<br />
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<b>*</b></div>
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I was 30 years old when I first decided to read a Pynchon novel. At the time, in 1997, his fifth novel, the pistache-intermingled pseudo-historical yarn, <i>Mason & Dixon</i>, had just been published to some considerable fanfare; after all, with a writer of Pynchon's notoriously hermetic privacy and (at that time) sparse output, the arrival of a new book from the celebrated author of <i>Gravity's Rainbow</i> was a relatively big deal--at least to those who pay attention to such arcana. At that time in my life, I was already familiar with postmodernism and with the name of Thomas Pynchon. I even owned two of his previous books: 1965's <i>The Crying of Lot 49</i>, and his most recent book (at that time), 1990's <i>Vineland</i>, although I had not yet read either of them. Up to that point in my reading life, "Thomas Pynchon" existed as a name on the spine of books sitting on my shelf, proudly on display, undisturbed and unread, gathering the dust of good intentions. </div>
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The thought was always there in the back of my mind, though: <i>I'll get to him sometime</i>.</div>
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And then in 1997 when <i>Mason & Dixon</i> came along, I decided it was time to get serious (so to speak) and get to him. So I did.</div>
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I remember liking <i>Mason & Dixon</i>. Though it was distorted and a little confusing and "different," I wasn't surprised or put off by it. I expected a fair degree of experimentalism and surrealism, knowing enough about Thomas Pynchon (even though, as I say, up to that point I had never read a word from him). But I liked the novel. Getting through his thick maze of such devices as vocabulary and characters and "plot" (such as it is) took some time and effort. But it was worth it in the end. It paid off. I liked it.</div>
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I remember that year, 1997, as being a year of at least a couple of "big" books by "big" postmodern American authors who had made a name for themselves and had since fallen rather silent. Not only did Pynchon make an impressive return with his new novel in 1997, but he was joined by fellow American author Don DeLillo and his latest novel, <i>Underworld</i>. Over the years, DeLillo had quietly crept up on readers--he had managed to establish a kind of underground cult-following of fans. But it wasn't until 1985's <i>White Noise</i> that he gained major attention from the critics and the public alike. Winning the National Book Award that year, DeLillo followed in 1988 with the publication of <i>Libra</i>, his controversial yet critically lauded fictional retelling of the life of Lee Harvey Oswald and his covert participation in a CIA plot to assassinate the American president. <i>Libra</i> was nominated for the National Book Award, but it lost out (possibly due to the criticisms it gained from its divisive characterizations and plot). Three years later, in 1991, DeLillo published the novel <i>Mao II</i>, which would see him win, this time, the PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction.</div>
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DeLillo was a writer who had slowly earned his place, and 1997 seemed to cement his legacy as a "great" and "important" writer of late-20th century American literature with the publication of his masterwork, <i>Underworld</i>. The book is massive, written by a massive talent, and it couldn't help but draw attention to itself. Once again DeLillo was nominated for the National Book Award, as well as shortlisted for the Pulitzer Prize. The book wouldn't win either of those awards, but it would go on to be named by the <i>New York Times </i>as a runner-up for the best work of American fiction over the (then) past 25 years, falling second only to Toni Morrison's <i>Beloved</i>, which had appeared 10 years earlier.</div>
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<i>[Aside: Just in case you're curious, here is a list of some other books--both fiction and nonfiction--that were published in 1997 alongside </i>Mason & Dixon<i> and </i>Underworld-<i>-all which help to point to 1997, I would say, as an exceptional year in the publishing world:</i></div>
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<ul>
<li style="text-align: left;">Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone<i>, J.K. Rowling</i></li>
<li style="text-align: left;">The God of Small Things<i>, Arundhati Roy</i></li>
<li style="text-align: left;">Memoirs of a Geisha<i>, Arthur Golden</i></li>
<li style="text-align: left;">The Perfect Storm<i>, Sebastian Junger</i></li>
<li style="text-align: left;">Into Thin Air<i>, Jon Krakauer</i></li>
<li style="text-align: left;">Personal History<i>, Katherine Graham</i></li>
<li style="text-align: left;">Tuesdays with Morrie<i>, Mitch Albom</i></li>
<li style="text-align: left;">The Red Tent<i>, Anita Diamant</i></li>
<li style="text-align: left;">Timequake<i>, Kurt Vonnegut</i></li>
<li style="text-align: left;">A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again<i>, David Foster Wallace]</i></li>
</ul>
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Anyway, what was I talking about?... Oh yeah: the appearance of <i>Mason & Dixon</i> during a year of big reads.</div>
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So, anyway, my point is it was a busy year--1997--if you're someone who enjoys reading and who enjoys the enjoyment of reading something challenging and worthwhile.</div>
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I had, as it turns out, more than I bargained for that year, tackling (among some of the other titles mentioned on the list above) both <i>Mason & Dixon</i> and <i>Underworld</i>. Both of them are big books (in every imaginable meaning of the word "big.") They both have many pages to them. They are dense. They have mass and weight. They take up space. You know you have a book in your backpack or in your hands when you hold either of those two books. You know you're really reading something. They're not "light" reading. They're not passive reading. It's not a joke, holding a book like <i>Underworld </i>or <i>Mason & Dixon--</i>laid open on your lap, or propped up, or grasped with both hands before you, reading the words on the page, making sense of them, making connections with the words to other words and to other images and to other ideas. </div>
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This is what reading is about, after all. It was a hell of a year. And when I was through with those two books, I knew I was impressed with them. I knew I wasn't done yet with those two authors. I knew I wanted more from them.</div>
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And first up (if for no other reason than I already had two of his books waiting for me on my shelf) was Pynchon.</div>
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<b>____________________</b></div>
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<b>* 4 *</b></div>
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Meantime, Jessica has gone into her Fay Wray number. This is a kind of protective paralysis, akin to your own response when the moray eel jumps you from the ceiling. But this is for the Fist of the Ape, for the lights of electric New York white-waying into the room you thought was safe, could never be penetrated . . . for the coarse black hair, the tendons of need, of tragic love. . . .<br />
<br />
"Yeah, well," as film critic Mitchell Prettyplace puts it in his definitive 18-volume study of <i>King Kong</i>, "you know, he <i>did</i> love her, folks." Proceeding from this thesis, it appears that Prettyplace has left nothing out, every shot including out-takes raked through for every last bit of symbolism, exhaustive biographies of everyone connected with the film, extras, grips, lab people . . . even interviews with King Kong Kultists, who to be eligible for membership must have seen the movie at least 100 times and be prepared to pass an 8-hour entrance exam. . . . And yet, and yet: there is Murphy's Law to consider, that brash Irish proletarian restatement of Godel's Theorem--<i>when everything has been taken care of, when nothing can go wrong, or even surprise us . . . something will</i>.<br />
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-- Thomas Pynchon, <i>Gravity's Rainbow</i>, Part 2: "Un Perm' au Casino Hermann Goering" (7)<br />
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<b>*</b></div>
<i><br /></i>
<br />
<div style="text-align: left;">
Immediately after <i>Mason & Dixon</i>, I turned toward my bookshelf and read the two books that had been sitting there waiting for me--Pynchon's legendary second novel, <i>The Crying of Lot 49</i>, and his much-anticipated and generally well-received fourth novel, <i>Vineland </i>(although at the time, among some circles, it was also considered "disappointing" in some ways, probably because of its having to follow <i>Gravity's Rainbow</i>...and having taken 17 years to do it).</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
I liked those novels, as well. Entertaining. A bit challenging, but in a good way. A productive way, I suppose. A bit confusing. A bit high-strung, with more questions than answers--but again in a good way. I like that sort of thing. I like to be pushed by a good writer who is intelligent and daring enough to trust himself and his readers with something different and something challenging.</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
What was it with all this talk about Pynchon's supposed abstract inscrutability and his notorious impenetrability? This wasn't so bad. In fact, I rather liked it.</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
And with that, I went to my nearest bookstore and plunked down the necessary change for the book that I'd heard so much about, the book that (along with his 1963 debut novel, <i>V.</i>) earned Pynchon such labels as "unreadable," "unendurable," "a mad genius," and "the king's jester and prankster, with actually nothing to say and taking 800 pages to reveal his point": I bought <i>Gravity's Rainbow </i>that day, along with a handy little readers' guide to the novel, providing chapter-by-chapter, page-by-page, line-by-line contextual resources and notes. (I had learned to use a similar tool a few years back, making my way, in graduate school, through James Joyce's <i>Ulysses </i>at the time. It helped.)</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
I was ready. There was nothing to stop me. It was time. I opened the novel (while open beside me, as well, next to a fresh cup of coffee, was the reader's guide.) New beginnings. New mountains to climb. Possibilities awaiting me. The thrill of discovery. The joy of reading. The opening lines of <i>Gravity's Rainbow</i>:</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
"A screaming comes across the sky. It has happened before, but there is nothing to compare it to now...." (8)</div>
<i><br /></i>
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>____________________</b></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b><br /></b></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>* 5 *</b></div>
<br />
This book is total crapola. Pretentious, meandering, empty. Save your time and money and stare at a wall for a couple of weeks. You will look back at the time as having been more productive than reading this screwed up exercise in bad typing.<br />
<br />
-- Alan, "Crapola," 2013, 1-star review on Amazon.com for Thomas Pynchon's, <i>Gravity's Rainbow</i> (9)<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>*</b></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
I think, as memory serves me, I made it to about...maybe...roughly page 50 or so (<i>-ish</i>) before closing the front cover of the novel with a long, intentional sigh, and putting it on the shelf next to <i>The Crying of Lot 49</i> and <i>Vineland</i>. Now in my personal Pynchon collection I could also proudly display the postmodern "classic," <i>Gravity's Rainbow</i>, along with, of course, its handy reader's guide, which helped to provide chapter-by-chapter, page-by-page, line-by-line contextual resources and notes...at least to about page 50 or so (<i>-ish</i>).</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
And that was that.</div>
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>____________________</b></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b><br /></b></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>* 6 *</b></div>
<br />
A gerund comes across the sky....<br />
<br />
-- Leatherbags Reynolds, 2015, Comments section on Amazon.com regarding Thomas Pynchon's, <i>Gravity's Rainbow</i> (10)<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>*</b></div>
<br />
Except that wasn't that. Not exactly.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>____________________</b></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b><br /></b></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>* 7 *</b></div>
<br />
FATHER KARRAS: Why her, though? Why this girl?<br />
FATHER MERRIN: I think the point is to make us despair. To see ourselves as animal and ugly. To make us reject the possibility that God could love us.<br />
<br />
-- <i>The Exorcist</i>, Screenplay: William Peter Blatty, Director: William Friedkin, (11)<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>*</b></div>
<br />
There was a game I used to like to play when I was a little boy. I don't know if "game" is the right word, since it was a rather solitary act, and no one knew I was doing it except for me, which I guess may have been the point. At least partly.<br />
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<i>[Aside: I guess.]</i></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
Either way, the "game" was simple, and it could exist in at least a couple of different forms:</div>
<ol>
<li style="text-align: left;">I would excuse myself from the rest of the family (although they were never aware of this) and find the thin grill of an AC/heating vent to lay down next to, my ear close to the metal, holding my breath, and listening to the hushed, muted sound--filtered through the old house's snaking ductwork--of my brothers' voices as they played in the basement without me; <b>or</b>,</li>
<li style="text-align: left;">I would bury myself in a closet, or under a bed, or in a bathroom, or behind the sofa--anywhere that I felt was sufficient cover--and I would wait quietly and patiently in my hiding place, playing at "being gone"--nonexistent, absent, never there, nevermore, alone....</li>
</ol>
<div style="text-align: left;">
Strange, I know. Maybe. But invariably here's how that little "game" of mine always managed to play itself out:</div>
<ol>
<li style="text-align: left;">I remember it as if it always took place in the summertime, as if it were perpetual summer during my childhood, or perhaps as if the notion of playing the game only occurred to me during the summer months; but whatever the case it is always summer--the cauldron-like crucible of Kansas summers that always in memory, now, seem to be composed of the unlikely combination of both an unmercifully dry heat and a rain-forest like humidity, carried along on a steady 35-mph wind, with no hills or trees to break its flow, scorching everything in its path like the breath of a dragon. And here I am inside the house, comfortable and cool, seeking out the metal grate on the floor that would give me access to the game. I lay there, my face in the carpet--still showing streaks from the brushes of the recent vacuum-sweeper--my ear pressed against the metal floor-vent, listening to the muffled voices of my brothers below. I can barely make out words. I wonder what they're saying, what they're doing. Only occasionally does a specific word float (echoic) through the air ducts to my ear. Only on those occasions can I make out what is being said from the basement. My stomach tickles with my secret knowledge: I'm listening, and they don't know I'm listening; they don't know where I am. I hold my breath to hear better and to also not give myself away. "<i>Did you hear that? I thought I heard something--it sounded like someone breathing. You didn't hear that?</i>" I don't want to speak. I don't want to utter a sound, to send words down past the vent, echoing down into the duct, revealing the truth of my game to my brothers. The game would be pointless, then, and it would be over. It would all come to an end. So I simply want to listen to them. I simply want to be quiet and to be unobserved, unheard, unbothered, undiscovered. And then, to keep up with the Kansas summer outside, the house's central air-conditioning unit kicks on, and a sudden breath of cool air licks my cheek, and I smell a faint odor of dust blowing up from the ductwork, and I can hear no more from the basement below. But the tickling feeling in my stomach remains; <b>or</b>,</li>
<li style="text-align: left;">Once I choose my hiding place in the house, I hide. And I remain as quiet as possible, listening to life go on around me, without me. And I hold my breath, or try to, while also trying to hold back a laugh, which would give my game away. So I listen. And I wait. I wait for someone to say, "<i>Hey, has anyone seen Dave, lately? Have you seen him around? I've gotta ask him something important. No one's seem him? That's weird. Where could he be? I hope he's all right</i>." But every single time, nothing like this ever happens. No one ever says anything like this. No one even notices I am missing. No one detects my absence from the scene. "<i>Hey, I'm back,</i>" I think I might say, popping out suddenly from being hidden, taking them all by surprise and really showing them what they were missing. "<i>Did you even stop to think that I was gone? Did anyone even care that I wasn't here? Hello?</i>" But as always, after about ten minutes of it, I get bored with this version of the game, and I come out of hiding to resume my life, as if nothing ever happened. Because nothing ever did.</li>
</ol>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>____________________</b></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b><br /></b></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>* 8 *</b></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<br />
[The novel] is the form that allows a writer the greatest opportunity to explore human experience.... For that reason, reading a novel is potentially a significant act. Because there are so many varieties of human experience, so many kinds of interaction between humans and so many ways of creating patterns in the novel that can't be created in a short story, a play, a poem or a movie. The novel, simply, offers more opportunities for a reader to understand the world better, including the world of artistic creation. That sounds pretty grand, but I think it's true.<br />
<div>
<br />
-- Don DeLillo (interviewed) (12)<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>*</b></div>
</div>
<br />
<div>
I'm not sure how accurate it is to use a word like "fault" when it comes to reading, and particularly when it comes to starting a book that--for whatever reason(s)--you find yourself unable to finish, or maybe it's just not working for you, or engaging you, or speaking to you, or maybe you simply can't keep your mind from drifting and wandering and wondering about all the other books you could be reading at this time instead.</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
It's not an uncommon thing. Is it?</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
Who is "at fault" if, as a reader, you start a book you can't finish or don't want to finish? Is anyone or anything finally to blame for something like that? Is something missing in you as a reader? Or is something missing in the book itself? Or is something missing from the writer--mistakes that he or she made in the writing of the book?</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
Where does the fault lie if you begin a book and you don't want to finish it? What does this say about you? What does this say about the book? What does this say about the writer? Anything at all? Where is there a weakness? Anywhere?</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
Or could it just be that maybe it's the wrong time for the reader and the book to "hook up"? (Maybe later in life? Maybe never?) Or could it be something as simple as personal taste and choice in reading material? Maybe it's just not your "thing," after all? Or could it be that the writer is just not that good--despite all the hype, perhaps? Is it all of the above, at least in parts? Or could it be none of the above? Maybe, in the end, it's "just one of those things that happens." No biggie.</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
A no-fault divorce; no one to blame here, simply set the book aside or return it to the shelf where you got it. You gave it a shot, after all; you at least did that much. "<i>It's only a book, for Christ's sake,</i>" you hear the voices saying.<i> </i>"<i>There are others. It's not the end of the world if you don't finish a book. What difference does it make? Just choose another book to read, if you have to. One that's more to your liking. Good Lord, worry about something important. It's not fucking rocket science, you know....</i>"</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
Except....</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
Call me crazy, but I'm proud of the fact that I like to read and that when I choose to pick up a book it's usually done with some deliberation and with some careful forethought, coming to the conclusion that, before picking it up and opening to the first page, I have--for whatever reasons--determined that this book will interest me, entertain me, challenge me, push me, test me, teach me...something. Otherwise, I don't want to waste my time.</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
So, in a way it is rocket science.</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
I'm a book snob. I know that. I get it. I'm fine with that label. Call me what you will, but I don't like to skim-read. I don't like to skip pages. I don't like to turn to Sparknotes or to LitCharts or to the last page to get the ending. I don't like to cheat on a book or on myself. And I don't like to quit a book before getting to the end. I'm a completionist, I guess you could say; I want to see things through to the end--even if it's the bitter end. I don't like giving up before it's over. I have to see if the writer had a plan and if that plan somehow works itself out in some sort of artistic and satisfying way. I have to see if I have what it takes to stick it out, for better or worse, through the good and the bad, and make it to the other side of the book, if for no other reason than to just prove to myself that I can do it. And that the writer knew what he or she was doing. And that I knew what I was doing all along, too.</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<i>[Aside: As the years have gone on, I've kind of come to the conclusion that I am that way with people, as well. I've been in relationships before that, by all rights, probably should have killed me with the stress of hanging on too long, the stress of not wanting to let go, the stress of not wanting to give up, to call it quits, to admit defeat, and to be alone. I am stubborn, if nothing else, and like a cat I've lived longer than I should have, time and time again, trying to prove this stubbornness to myself, if to no one else. A book is like a person. Or else a person is like a book. I don't know which. I just know that I approach them both in much the same way these days. You choose a book as you choose a person. You do this carefully, or at least you should. You do it willfully. Thoughtfully. You open them with anticipation and care, going slowly at first, savoring the words, the imagery, the careful introduction, the developing plot and characterization, the gentle give-and-take of them. And you make your way through, and you learn how to read a particular book the same way you learn to know a person. People want to be loved, after all, and a book wants to be read. With patience, with paying attention to the details, and with knowledge of yourself and of who you are, over time a person will show you how to love. Similarly, by a book's end--before you turn its last page and read its last sentence and close its cover--the book will teach you how to read it. And that's important.]</i></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<i><br /></i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>____________________</b></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<i><br /></i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i><b>* 9 *</b></i></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<span style="background-color: w;">If you don't go on thinking rationally, you will think irrationally. If you reject aesthetic satisfactions you will fall into sensual satisfactions.... If you don't read good books you will read bad ones.</span><br />
<div>
<br />
-- C.S. Lewis (13)<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>*</b></div>
<br />
I could say several things, maybe, about my first attempt at reading <i>Gravity's Rainbow </i>in the late 1990s, and why I didn't make it very far in the book, and why I quickly grew frustrated with it, and why I was able to set it aside so easily.<br />
<br />
Actually, for anyone who has either read the novel (or tried to read the novel) you will know that I probably don't need to explain much. The reasons are all pretty much right there in the early part of Pynchon's long, circuitous, maddening novel.<br />
<br />
And it isn't as if I had never taken on challenging reads before. I've proudly taken to task some rather "big," "demanding," "difficult" books and come out the other side--always better for it. <i>[Aside: See Appendix A.]</i> Of course, there are also a fair number of books that I've consciously (or unconsciously) either chosen to stay away from or simply never taken the time to crack open. <i>[Aside: See Appendix B.]</i> Still, there are those books (important, great books, I know, I know...) that, like <i>Gravity's Rainbow</i> when I was a "young" man in my early 30s, I dived into, headfirst, with the best of intentions, only to flounder, slapping away at the water momentarily, until finally dragging myself ashamedly to the shore, watching the book purposelessly float away from me. <i>[Aside: See Appendix C.]</i><br />
<br />
I think my problem (at that time, trying to read Pynchon's infamous novel) was the reader's guide I kept open next to me as I read. I would find myself reading each note as it came up in its context within the story. That method of dancing my eyes back and forth--between the novel and its explanatory notes--helped get me through Joyce's novel of Leopold Bloom years before. In the case of <i>Gravity's Rainbow</i>, though, it didn't work. Such a method this time had the opposite effect of what was intended: 1.) It was slowing my reading down interminably; 2.) It was confusing me even more with what was going on in the book's plot; and 3.) It was causing me to quickly lose interest and to wonder why I was going to so much trouble.<br />
<br />
And so I stopped. <i>Christ, there are easier and more enjoyable ways to spend your time, after all</i>.<br />
<br />
But it bothered me. I don't like quitting, and it lodged in the back of my brain (this idea that I perhaps had not given the book a fair attempt) and it stayed there. The memory of <i>Gravity's Rainbow</i>, sitting on my shelf unfinished--hell, basically unstarted--lingered. Time moved on, though, and I read other books, and I discovered other writers, and I became familiar with established, great writers, like Cormac McCarthy, as well as new, young novelists like David Foster Wallace, and Jonathan Franzen (both of whom were deeply indebted, in their own ways, to postmodernism and to metafiction and to writers like Pynchon, et al.)<br />
<br />
<i>[Aside: In fact, young,"up-and-coming" writers like Franzen and Wallace have been, on more than one occasion in their varied careers, labeled "Pynchonesque" by more than one reviewer. I'm not sure how a writer like Thomas Pynchon feels about having his last name morphed into an adjective, and then having that adjective used to describe a new generation of writers following in his footsteps (sort of), or if a writer like Pynchon is even aware of such goings on these days, or if he even cares.]</i><br />
<br />
Somewhere in his hermetically-sealed little world, though, of perfectly controlled privacy and quietness and aloneness, from which he would send out an out-of-the-blue missive every now and then (the occasional book review, comment, "blurb") or the latest tome of a novel, meant to encapsulate an entire decade, Pynchon seemed to get the message that he was, for better or worse, considered an important contemporary literary/cultural figure, and it seems as if he began to wake up to that fact and respond in kind. Suddenly Pynchon was everywhere (at least for him and his notorious lack of "presence"). In the Introduction to his 1984 collection of early short stories, <i>Slow Learner</i>, he would offer just the barest glimpse of autobiographical hints--it's not much, granted, but it's still all there is for those who are looking for such a thing. Also, his "character"--masked by a brown paper bag--made an appearance on <i>The Simpsons</i> (a sign of cultural coolness and "arrivedness," if there ever was one). And more importantly was the arrival of new novels--<i>[Aside: "</i>novels<i>," as in plural.]</i> In 1990, as mentioned, <i>Vineland</i> was published, after a 17-year silent retreat from the man; in 1997 <i>Mason & Dixon</i> was published; and then, in 2006, his long-rumored, much-mystiqued, massive 1,085-page monster of a novel <i>Against the Day</i> finally saw the light of day.<br />
<i><br /></i>
<i>[Aside: I own the hardback copy of </i>Against the Day.<i> I bought it, 1st edition, immediately after its surprise-publication. It sits (heavily) on my shelf, unread. I have not tried to read it, nor do I plan to (I think). Perhaps it is a case, this time, of admitting defeat before even pretending a halfhearted attempt. I don't know. I guess it's always good to know one's limits.]</i><br />
<br />
Three years later--like an unlikely breath of fresh air--came 2009's <i>Inherent Vice. </i>At a mere 369 pages, this was Pynchon's shortest novel since 1965's <i>The Crying of Lot 49</i>. Just looking at the physicalness of the book, <i>Inherent Vice</i> is one of the more "approachable" novels in his oeuvre, maybe. It doesn't immediately scare you off by its sheer heft. This time around, Pynchon chose to take on the Raymond Chandler/Philip Marlowe thing, drowned in a druggy atmosphere of comic-noirish late-'60s/early-'70s California confusion, sprinkled with a creeping sense of post-pot paranoia (of course), as well as a nagging case of the munchies.<br />
<br />
<i>[Aside: I bought this book, too. I read it. I found it to be "Pynchon-lite" in many ways, but pleasantly so. Here, as always, there are the typical Pynchon ingredients of plot-convolution and puzzles-within-puzzles and red-herrings of subplots-within-subplots-within-subplots, all leading to frayed ends and seeming to going nowhere. But I liked it...even though I can't fairly summarize the novel's storyline (if it even matters) and even though I can't say I understood it all (or if you're even supposed to), I still liked the book. And come to think of it, that is perhaps the best Sparknoted statement of Pynchon's literary legacy that could ever be written: "Even though I'm not sure I totally understand it, I like it."]</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
Finally, rounding out this trio of books in a seeming late-period burst of creative output, Pynchon published his eighth novel, <i>Bleeding Edge</i>, in 2013. Set in a fictional New York City shortly before the terrible events of September 11, 2001, and focusing on the (then) growing (and secretive) world of "dark web"-style dot.com industries, <i>Bleeding Edge</i> sits mysteriously on my bookshelf, its title on the spine looming at me, reminding me it is there, waiting for me, and waiting for the next title from its aging, prolific author <i>[Aside: what will it be? when will it be?]</i> to join it on the shelf.<br />
<br />
<i>[Aside: Like </i>Against the Day<i>, I have not yet read </i>Bleeding Edge<i>. But unlike </i>Against the Day<i>, I do plan on reading it. One of these days. Sometime. As soon as I get around to it. It's waiting for me, like so many other titles on my "to-read" list, it seems. So we'll see.]</i><br />
<br />
But first (as always) there was this little matter of <i>Gravity's Rainbow</i> to take care of....<br />
<i><br /></i>
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>____________________</b></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b><br /></b></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>* 10 *</b></div>
<i><br /></i>
Skippy, you little fool, you are off on another of your senseless and retrograde journeys. Come back, here, to the points. Here is where the paths divided. See the man back there. He is wearing a white hood. His shoes are brown. He has a nice smile, but nobody sees it. Nobody sees it because his face is always in the dark. But he is a nice man. He is the pointsman. He is called that because he throws the lever that changes the points. And we go to Happyville, instead of to Pain City. Or "Der Leid-Stadt," that's what the Germans call it. There is a mean poem about the Leid-Stadt, by a German man called Mr. Rilke. But we will not read it, because <i>we</i> are going to Happyville. The pointsman has made sure we'll go there. He hardly has to work at all. The lever is very smooth and easy to push. Even you could push it, Skippy. If you knew where it was. But look what a lot of work he has done, with just one little push. He has sent us all the way to Happyville, instead of to Pain City. That is because he knows just where the points and the lever are. He is the only kind of man who puts in very little work and makes big things happen, all over the world. He could have sent you on the right trip back there, Skippy. You can have your fantasy if you want, you probably don't deserve anything better, but Mister Information tonight is in a kind mood. He will show you Happyville.<br />
<br />
-- Thomas Pynchon, <i>Gravity's Rainbow</i>, Part 4: "The Counterforce" (14)<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>*</b></div>
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b><i><span style="font-size: large;">The Island of Yesterday's Tomorrow</span></i></b></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b><i><span style="font-size: large;">or, "Time Lost and Found"</span></i></b><br />
<b><i><span style="font-size: large;">or, "Feeling the Weight of Gravity's Pull"</span></i></b><br />
<b><i>(with all due respect to R.E.M.)</i></b></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b><br /></b></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>[an Original Screenplay]</b></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b><br /></b>
<b>*******</b></div>
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>[Cinematography in B/W: </b><b>Described in the Pre-Production Pitch as, </b><b>"Real Gregg Toland/<i>Citizen Kane</i> by-way-of Ortello Martelli/<i>La Dolce Vita</i> by-way-of Sven Nykvist/<i>Persona</i> by-way-of Laszlo Kovacs/<i>Paper Moon</i> by-way-of Gordon Willis/<i>Manhattan </i></b><b>Kind of Stuff"]</b></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b><br /></b></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>*******</b></div>
<b><br /></b>
<b>FADE IN--BEGIN TITLE SEQUENCE</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>EXT. AERIAL SHOT--DAY- SKY--CLOUDS</b><br />
<br />
<i>A bird's-eye POV as the camera calmly, soundlessly (save for the faint noise of wind) floats through a bank of clouds. Finally, the camera breaks under the clouds. Below is seen the surface of water, the ocean stretching on and on endlessly. Wave patterns and faint shadows of clouds can be seen upon the water's surface as the camera's POV continues its descent, floating freely.</i><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>(INSERT)</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<i>A human eye is shown in close-up, closed, asleep. Faint twitching behind the eyelid can minutely be detected, as if the eye is experiencing rapid eye movement while dreaming. Hold momentarily. The sound of wind can still be faintly heard.</i><br />
<br />
<b>EXT. AERIAL SHOT--DAY--SKY--OCEAN</b><br />
<br />
<i>Returning to the bird's-eye POV as the camera has continued its slow descent, closer toward the water. Still drifting, the speed of floating has increased. As we draw closer to the water, more definite aspects and details of the ocean's surface come into view. Slowly the camera tilts up and we see, off in the far distance, what looks to be an island, a volcano in its center, a thin wisp of cloud willowing from its cratered peak, trailing up into the sky. The sound of rushing wind grows steadily louder.</i><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>(INSERT)</b><br />
<br />
<i>Return to the closed human eye, twitching from dream. The sound of rushing wind continues to be heard.</i><br />
<br />
<b>EXT. AERIAL SHOT--DAY--SKY--ISLAND</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<i>The bird's-eye POV continues as the camera's descent from above approaches the island, ever nearer. Trees, rock formations, beaches, inlets, waves surrounding the land all begin to take shape and to grow in focus as the camera floats steadily downward. We approach the volcano's peak, fly above it, through its thin smoke plume, and are able to gain a glimpse down into its crater. We circle the peak, gaining a good view of the volcano. The island is small, but beautiful, lush, alive. The sound of wind is much louder.</i><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>(INSERT)</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<i>Again a shot of the human eye, closed, asleep, but starting to stir, starting to show signs of fluttering. The sleeper is possibly beginning to awaken. We hear the familiar sound of wind rushing by, but suddenly this is replaced by a harsh sound of thumping and banging and crashing.</i><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>EXT. AERIAL SHOT--DAY--SKY--ISLAND--TREES</b><br />
<b><br /></b><i>
Bird's-eye POV, and we are flying through trees now. They go whizzing by us rapidly. Limbs, branches, leaves of the island's tropical trees clatter and snap all around us as our descent to the island nears its end with a crash landing. The sound of the cacophony is deafening.</i><br />
<br />
<b>(INSERT)</b><br />
<br />
<i>Our familiar shot of the human eye--asleep, closed, dreaming--suddenly jars awake. The eyelid flutters open. We hear a surprised gasp for breath.</i><br />
<br />
<b>EXT. ISLAND--DAY</b><br />
<br />
<i>The camera's bird's-eye POV comes to an end, with the crashing and clattering and splintering and breaking of tree limbs and the sound of earth giving way.</i><br />
<br />
<b>INT. BEDROOM--DAY</b><br />
<br />
<i>David jumps awake in bed, pulling himself quickly upright and letting out a little yell of surprise. The room is bare and sterile looking--white walls, with no windows or door. In the room there is only a bed and a single chair at the foot of the bed. Jack sits in the chair, and he smiles, noticing David is now awake.</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
<i>Jack is an older gentleman, dressed comfortably but with care and attention to detail. He wears a tweed jacket, a tie, and wool pants. In his mouth is clenched a pipe, which he will remove, and hold, and replace in his mouth, and light, and relight, and puff on occasionally throughout. He holds a cane/walking stick. He speaks with a crisp yet tender voice of a learned British gentleman. He is hushed, calm, ever refined. </i><br />
<i><br /></i>
<i>David is middle-aged, going gray at his temples, and is dressed in hospital whites (at the outset). His accent (and attitude) when he speaks shows him to be an American. He is flustered, confused, with a slight tinge of irritation, irritability, and impatience simmering just below his surface, barely kept in check.</i><br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
JACK</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
(<i>smiling</i>)</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
Well...there you are. The sleeper awakes.</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
DAVID</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
(<i>short of breath</i>)</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
What?.... Where am I?....</div>
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
JACK</div>
I could explain that to you, or I could show you. Personally, I think the latter would be more effective. And certainly much more beautiful. You really should see it. This place is wonderful.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
DAVID</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
(<i>looking around him at the bare, minimal surroundings</i>)</div>
This place? What is this place? Where am I? What's going on? Who are you?<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
JACK</div>
Well, no, not this place, particularly. It's a bit spartan, even for my tastes, I suppose. And one thing at a time, please. (<i>He chuckles pleasurably</i>.) I mean out there. Outside. The island. It really is lovely. But... I should show you. I tell you what, you gather yourself together, take some time, feel refreshed, and I'll meet you just outside. How does that sound?<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
DAVID</div>
Huh?<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
JACK</div>
Very good then. Yes, just outside. It's all set, then. Only a moment, sir, and it will all be explained. You really must see the island. Stunningly beautiful.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
DAVID</div>
Island?....<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
JACK</div>
Yes. Really quite lovely. I'll be just outside, then.<br />
<i><br /></i>
<i>David looks around him and notices there is no door or windows in the room. He appears confused.</i><br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
DAVID</div>
Outside?.... What?....<br />
<br />
<i>Suddenly Jack is gone, leaving David alone in the room. </i><br />
<i><br /></i>
<b>EXT. ISLAND--DAY--CLEARING</b><br />
<i><br /></i>
<i>The camera's view takes in a slow, measured, deliberate pan of the tropical island view. The beach. The waves crashing in on the rocks and the sand in the distance. The trees swaying. The sound of an island breeze. The calls of various local birds, monkeys, insects, and other island wildlife. The natural decoration of island flora and fauna. The place is a paradise. The scene is naturally beautiful, gentle, and relaxing.</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
<i>As the camera continues its sweep, taking in the lush scenery, we see Jack sitting peacefully in a clearing, in the same chair he had been sitting in previously inside the room. He puffs on his pipe, contentedly. His face suddenly lights up, and he stands with the aid of his walking stick.</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
JACK</div>
Ahhh...there you are. Feeling much better now, yes? (<i>He chuckles gently</i>.)<br />
<br />
<i>David enter the scene, walking toward Jack. David is dressed now--comfortably, casually--and still appears to be confused and disoriented. But he seems calmer now, his anger and frustration have dissipated for the moment.</i><br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
DAVID</div>
Yes, thank you. I think.... (<i>He reaches forward to shake Jack's hand</i>.) Thank you. But.... I'm David, by the way.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
JACK</div>
Oh, of course, David. A pleasure to meet you. (<i>He takes David's hand in the handshake, smiling, always congenial</i>.) And so many questions, I'm sure.<br />
<br />
<i>David looks at Jack quizzically. The handshake is still held as David sizes up the old gentleman, studying him. A look of familiarity crosses David's face. A faint smile forms on his lips.</i><br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
DAVID</div>
Have we met? I'm sorry, but...I feel as if I know you. From somewhere. I've seen you, at least.... But for the life of me....<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
JACK</div>
Oh, well, now that I wouldn't know. I suppose it's possible. Yes, quite. I'm Jack, by the way.<br />
<br />
<i>David still holds the handshake with Jack. The two men look at one another warmly, but David's smile is sly, as if an awareness is slowly dawning on him.</i><br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
DAVID</div>
Jack?....<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
JACK</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
(<i>smiling</i>)</div>
Yes. Well...as my close friends call me.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
DAVID</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
(<i>returning the smile</i>)</div>
Wait a minute. I know who you are! I recognize you. "Jack." That's your nickname. You're C.S. Lewis!<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
JACK</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
(<i>laughing gently</i>)</div>
Yes. Oh my dear, man, yes. I'm afraid I'm been "found out," as they say. Quite right. Clive Staples Lewis, sir. My good friend, David. But, please, do call my Jack. I insist my friends call me Jack.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
DAVID</div>
Oh my God! C.S. Lewis. <i>The Chronicles of Narnia</i>. Oxford professor. One of the original Inklings. Friend of Professor Tolkien. Oh my God! I recognize you from your picture on the book jackets. And from Wikipedia. Are you kidding me? (<i>He laughs, now looking at Jack warmly</i>.) What in the world are you doing here? How are you here? How am I here? (<i>He pauses, looking around him, incredulous</i>.) Where is "here," anyway? What is this place?<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
JACK</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
(<i>gently chuckling</i>)</div>
Oh my, well....<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
DAVID</div>
And, professor Lewis..."Jack"...with all due respect, please don't say again something like, "All in good time, old boy." This is a good time to explain things. This is the time to start answering some questions. No time like the present.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
JACK</div>
Well, yes, I suppose you're right, David. There is no time like the present. And it seems you've hit on the very theme of this place. Right from the start, too. Very commendable. Very good. Yes...some answers. You deserve some answers to your questions. You've been more than patient. This is a lot to take in, I'm sure. (<i>Jack pauses and looks around, puffing leisurely on his pipe. He looks at David</i>.) Shall we walk, then? A bit of fresh tropical air should do our lungs some good, I would think. Fortifying, and all that. Yes, let's.... Come along, then.<br />
<br />
<b>EXT. ISLAND--DAY--JUNGLE</b><br />
<br />
<i>As the two begin to walk and talk, the camera follows along with a smooth Steadicam Tracking Shot, through the lush, tangled overgrowth (at times), moving along with the pair amidst the beautiful island scenery. There is a brief, awkward moment of quiet as Jack and David begin their walk. Jack--ever the well-mannered host, it would seem--allows for the natural silence at first, seeing if David would begin with more questions. But when it is apparent that his guest is going to be silent, Jack breaks the quiet between them and begins to speak.</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
JACK</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
Yes, well.... Very good, then. The island you are on now goes by the name "Nishinoshima." It's Japanese. Tokyo is... (<i>he points, generally, to the north of them</i>) ...that way, about some 500 miles, or so, I should say.</div>
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
DAVID</div>
Nishinoshima?....<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
JACK</div>
Yes. That's it. (<i>He smiles</i>.) It's quite a mouthful, at first. But you've already got it. I do love the Japanese language. Just the very look of its words on the page. The sound of them filling your mouth. Much like musical notes, in a way. But you've got it. Nishinoshima. To the Japanese, it means, "western island." Isn't that nice? <i>Western Island</i>...<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
DAVID</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
(<i>as if lost in thought</i>)</div>
Nishinoshima.... That sounds familiar.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
JACK</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
(<i>chuckling gently</i>)</div>
Well, yes, I should say so. You wrote about it just a mere several pages back. "Chapter 2" of all of this. That is if you are, indeed, going by the term, "chapter." Perhaps "Section 2," if you prefer? The second movement of this...testimonial, is it? This critique? This reader's confession? Whatever you'd like to call this bit of writing, I suppose....<br />
<br />
<i>David looks at him, dumbfounded. Jack laughs good-naturedly.</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
JACK</div>
Well, I dare say, David, if you're going to insist on standing there with your mouth open, you had better not be a bit surprised when you catch some flies, as my grandmother used to say.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
DAVID</div>
What is this? What's going on here? What is this place, really? Who are you?<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
JACK</div>
I thought we had established all of that already. Really, David, we can't keep going in circles with our conversation. You're inventing all of this, after all. You're the architect of this piece, the writer, the controlling consciousness. I am merely your humble Virgil, after all, here to escort you:<br />
<br />
"Midway in our life's journey, I found myself<br />
In dark woods, the right road lost...." (15)<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
DAVID</div>
Dante's <i>Inferno</i>. The famous opening lines of Dante's <i>Inferno</i>. My God!... (<i>he laughs</i>) ... Professor Lewis is quoting the opening lines of Dante's <i>Inferno</i> to me. I wish I could record this. No one's going to believe it! Where's my phone?...<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
JACK</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
(<i>smiling gently at David as they continue their walk</i>)</div>
Yes, well.... We don't have those here. Not allowed. You'll find you can get by rather easily without.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
DAVID</div>
Nishinoshima.... The little island that could. (<i>He laughs. And then stops abruptly</i>.) Wait a minute. Are you implying that this is Hell? Am I in Hell, now, you being my Virgil here to guide me? Is that what you're saying. Oh my God... Am I dead? Did I die?<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
JACK</div>
David.... David, calm down. No, it's not like that. It's not what you're thinking. You haven't died, for goodness sake. You're not dead. You're merely writing. It happens. You should know this. You're fine.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
DAVID</div>
Is this Hell, though? Is Nishinoshima Hell?<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
JACK</div>
Well, I didn't say that, did I? I suppose it all depends on your perspective.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
DAVID</div>
My perspective?<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
JACK</div>
<br />
Yes. On the way you choose to approach it. The way you decide to look at it.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
DAVID</div>
What do you mean? Is this Heaven, then? Am in Heaven? Is that what Nishinoshima is--Heaven?<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
JACK</div>
Come, now. I didn't say that, either, did I?<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
DAVID</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
(<i>looking around him as they continue to walk</i>)</div>
Well, I could imagine this looking like Heaven, I suppose. I don't know. It's all rather paradisiacal.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
JACK</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
(<i>looking around also, and smiling</i>)</div>
Yes, it is beautiful, isn't it? But that's not why you're here. You see, around here, on these shores, we like to refer to Nishinoshima as "The Island of Yesterday's Tomorrow."<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
DAVID</div>
The Island of Yesterday's Tomorrow?....<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
JACK</div>
Yes, that's it.<br />
<br />
<i>There is a brief pause as you can see on David's face that he's working through the mental wordplay.</i><br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
DAVID</div>
Well...that would mean..."The Island of Today," then, wouldn't it?<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
JACK</div>
Why, yes it does. Very good, David. The Island of Today, if you prefer. That is much easier to say. Has more of a ring to it, I suppose.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
DAVID</div>
Okay. Nishinoshima. "The Island of Today." But.... I'm still not sure why I'm here.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
JACK</div>
You're here, after all, because of what you're writing about. You're here because you are a reader--and a serious, conscientious one, at that. You're here because of... (<i>he chuckles wryly</i>) ... well, I suppose, for want of a more precise term, because of your teeming existential crisis over the reading of Mr. Pynchon's little book that you've wrestled with for decades now.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
DAVID</div>
Oh, that.... (<i>sarcastically</i>) I thought you said I wasn't in Hell....<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
JACK</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
(<i>smiling</i>)</div>
Oh, now, my dear, David, you must get over this. You must stop thinking this way about a book. After all, it's only a piece of writing. And that's why you're here. To try to help you see that. To get... (<i>he pauses</i>) ...perspective, if you will. To gain some new insight. To learn something about yourself, perhaps. That is, after all, why you're writing all of this, isn't it? Nishinoshima, as it turns out, is an island for unread books. Its shores and jungles and rocky precipices and alcoves serve as a natural storehouse--a home--for all the hundreds, thousands, probably millions of books, at this point, that go unread every year. All bought or borrowed with nothing but the best of intentions, of course. But...unread, anyway. Begun and--for whatever reasons--abandoned. Or never opened. Never looked at. Untouched. Unread. Forever. This is where they come now. This is their home. And it's growing, perceptibly, every day, all the time. More and more unread books. And that is why you're here. To confront <i>Gravity's Rainbow</i> once and for all. (<i>He chuckles</i>.) And to just read the damned thing, for God's sake.<br />
<br />
<b>EXT. ISLAND--BEACH--ROCKY BREAKWATER</b><br />
<br />
<i>Suddenly, the sound of the island's surrounding jungle wildlife (birds, monkeys, insects) is overtaken by the sound of the ocean and of waves washing in upon the beach and upon a rocky outcropping. The two have continued walking the whole time during their conversation and now step out into the clear, leaving the trees of the jungle-canopy behind and strolling out onto the open beach and onto a natural breakwater of rocks jutting out into the water and the waves. The ocean is vast and magnificent around them. Behind them, at various times as the camera continues to follow their conversation--not moving now, as they take a moment to rest upon the beach and upon the rocks--the island's central volcano can be glimpsed behind them, always looming, its peak towering above them, sending up a steady trail of smoke.</i><br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
JACK</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
(<i>sighing and laughing jovially</i>)</div>
Ahhh...yes, here we are. How lovely. Now, this is not something you see every day.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
DAVID</div>
No, to be sure. Not where I come from, anyway.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
JACK</div>
Yes. Nor I.<br />
<br />
<i>David grabs a handful of sand and stares at it, opens his palm, and watches it sift slowly through his fingers. He stares out at the ocean. Meanwhile, Jack has carefully made his way to a nearby outcropping of rock which forms the base of a narrow natural breakwater jutting out from the island's southern shore. Carefully, Jack sits down. He rummages in his jacket pockets for his pipe, his pouch of tobacco, and matches. He goes about the practiced ritual of preparing and smoking his pipe as they continue talking. During the conversation David will eventually find a spot of sand on the beach and sit down, close to the rock where Jack is sitting.</i><br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
DAVID</div>
So, an island of unread books?.... That's interesting. Who else knows about this?<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
JACK</div>
Oh, many. Many like yourself, I should say. Those who are troubled by not finishing a good book, or a challenging book, anyway. A book that they hold, perhaps, a perverse love/hate relationship with. Is this striking any bells for you?...<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
DAVID</div>
So, this is some sort of penance, after all, then? Some sort of punishment--or withheld reward, anyway--for being a "bad reader"? <i>Go sit in the corner, David, and think about what you've done</i>.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
JACK</div>
No. No, David. Not at all. You really must get past this notion of blame and fault in regards to reading and/or not reading a book. My Lord, one would think you were Catholic. This game of assigning guilt--such a thing doesn't apply here. There's no one to blame. You're not a "bad reader," David. As a point of fact, my dear boy, you're quite a very good reader. You know that, yes? You're quite astute when it comes to art, and to books and writers, in this case. You pay attention to not only what is being written but how it's being written. Those are good traits. Interesting traits. Good writing matters to you. You understand the importance of good writing. And so it quite naturally bothers you when you struggle with a piece of writing that is--well, reportedly anyway--considered important, considered a classic, and considered to be worth reading.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
DAVID</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
(<i>after a brief pause</i>)</div>
What are you doing here, then, Professor Lewis?<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
JACK</div>
"Jack," please....<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
DAVID</div>
Jack. Yes. What are you doing here, then, Jack? On an island like this? What brings a writer and reader--a veritable scholar--like you to a place like this?<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
JACK</div>
As I said, think of me as your guide, your Virgil....<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
DAVID</div>
Great. I mean, no offense, Professor Lewis--Jack--but I get as my Virgil on Nishinoshima, this Island of Yesterday's Tomorrow, this land of unread books, the writer who is perhaps the late-20th century's greatest Christian apologist? What did I do to deserve that honor? (<i>He laughs and rolls his eyes. And then, sarcastically.</i>) How come I couldn't get a writer like Henry Miller appointed as my guide?<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
JACK</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
(<i>smiling slyly</i>)</div>
Oh, dear Lord. Well... I've taken a peek at your Appendices, here, and you haven't tried to read Miller, have you? Rather surprised you've managed to leave him off your list, I must say.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
DAVID</div>
What?... (<i>and then as if it suddenly dawns on him, sheepishly</i>) .... Oh, wait a minute. Wait....<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
JACK</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
(<i>a smile twinkling from the corner of his eyes as he draws on his pipe</i>)</div>
Yes. Am I to be offended that you didn't see fit to make your way through all of my dear old Narnia books?<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
DAVID</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
(<i>embarrassed</i>)</div>
Oh...Mr. Lewis. It's not that. It's just....<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
JACK</div>
No need to apologize, son. Good Lord, my skin is thicker than that. And I entirely understand. The whole affair does--I suppose for some--get a little long in the tooth, the further along it goes. Believe me, if one writes long enough you hear much worse criticism than that. It's quite all right. But... in answer to your question, one of those "Unfinished Authors" of yours was summarily appointed to you. (<i>Laughing heartily</i>.) I seem to have drawn the short straw, as you might say.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
DAVID</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
(<i>sarcastically</i>)</div>
I'm surprised I didn't get Pynchon, himself.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
JACK</div>
Ha! Take my word for it, you wouldn't have wanted him.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
DAVID</div>
Well, I would have had a few questions for him, that's for sure.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
JACK</div>
I'd say you've had a few questions for me. Besides, I don't think anyone properly knows where he is, of course. Rather famously reclusive. Preferring, instead, to stay "out of the limelight," I believe the saying goes...<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
DAVID</div>
Yes, to put it mildly.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
JACK</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
(<i>begins feeling about his jacket, patting the pockets, as if in search of something</i>)</div>
Oh, now, let's see.... Where is it? Where have I put it? A small clipping I was going to share with you. (<i>He reaches inside the liner pocket of the breast of his jacket and then smiles</i>.) Ahh, yes. Here it is. Just a moment....<br />
<br />
<i>Jack unfolds a small piece of paper, clipped from a journal, and holds it in his hands to read aloud.</i><br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
JACK</div>
I came across this the other day in the <i>San Diego Union-Tribune</i>. Quite good. Made me think of sharing it with you, anyway. Rather apropos, at the moment, I should say. Let's see, once I get my eyeglasses on, that is.... (<i>He adjusts his glasses on his nose and begins to read</i>.) This is dated 2004, 8th of February, from a Mr. Arthur Salm, about our dear friend, Mr. Pynchon: "The man simply chooses not to be a public figure," Mr. Salm writes, "an attitude that resonates on a frequency so out of phase with the prevailing culture that if Pynchon and Paris Hilton were ever to meet--the circumstances, I admit, are beyond imagining--the resulting matter/antimatter explosion would vaporize everything from here to Tau Ceti IV." (16)<br />
<br />
<i>Jack laughs loud and long at what he has read from the news clipping. David only stares silently, again open-mouthed.</i><br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
JACK</div>
Oh my, that is wonderful. I must say, that's rather delightful. Can you imagine?....<br />
<br />
<i>He laughs some more. David is still unresponsive, at first. Eventually he breaks his silence.</i><br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
DAVID</div>
Are you trying to tell me you know who Paris Hilton is? The late-20th century's greatest Christian apologist has a working knowledge of Paris Hilton? What the hell is going on here?<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
JACK<br />
(<i>still laughing and smiling</i>)</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
I beg your pardon?</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
DAVID</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
Nothing. Never mind.... Look, can I ask you a question, Jack?</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
JACK</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
Of course you can, David. I'm here to help you.</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
DAVID</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
I have to ask you--since I seem to now have the opportunity--about that famous quote attributed to you. You know the one....</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
JACK</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
I'm afraid I know of several.</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
DAVID</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
(<i>reciting from memory</i>)</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
The one that goes: "We read to know we're not alone."</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
JACK</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
(<i>smiling knowingly)</i></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
Ahh, yes. That old chestnut....</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
DAVID</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
Can I be blunt, Professor Lewis?</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
JACK</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
Oh, I would appreciate that.</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
DAVID</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
Well... I mean, it's not that I find anything particularly disagreeable with the saying, I suppose. I mean...it's a nice thought. It's a warm sentiment. And it's partly true, I guess, from a certain way of looking at it. From a certain perspective, as you say. (<i>He smiles nervously</i>.) It's just.... Professor Lewis, I just don't know that I agree with it wholeheartedly.</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
JACK</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
Well, that's good.</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<i>David continues quickly, as if he didn't even hear Jack's reply.</i></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
DAVID</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
I mean, yes, reading is--or can be, certainly--a communal act. Certainly there are Reading Groups and classes that meet and discuss books. And there is a universality to the act itself, where two people on opposite ends of the earth can both be reading the same thing and experiencing the same responses from the reading. But... I don't know.... Reading is also, primarily, such a solitary act. Don't you think? It's such an act done in silence, when one is alone with a book and an author, talking with the author, conversing one-on-one, the two of them. In private. Alone. I think reading can be--maybe even should be--a lonely act. It might be one of the most lonesome acts we have, aside from writing, interestingly.... (<i>It finally registers with David what Jack has said earlier</i>.) .... Wait. What? Did you say, "Good"?</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
JACK<br />
(<i>chuckling</i>)</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
Yes. "Good." That's good that you don't agree with that saying wholeheartedly.</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
DAVID</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
Wait. What do you mean? You're glad I disagree with you?</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
JACK</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
But you're not disagreeing with me, David. Because I never said that.</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
DAVID</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
What? But you....</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
JACK</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
(<i>interrupting</i>)</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
No. I never actually said "We read to know we're not alone." Those words don't belong to me. Oh, certainly, I know they sound good. Such a saying is all very lovely, I suppose, on the countless memes floating around these days. A part of me even half wishes I had said it. Think of the royalties, my boy. (<i>He chuckles emptily</i>.) No, I didn't say it, though. My fictional self said it, however. Credit the playwright, William Nicholson, who had me mouth those words in his stage play and then in his eventual film, <i>Shadowlands</i>. About me and Joy... Yes....</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<i>Jack stares off in the distance, his eyes grow far away, misty. Finally he smiles again.</i></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
JACK</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
Lovely bit, that, I must say, seeing Joy brought to life by the lovely Debra Winger. And then there's myself, being played by Sir Anthony Hopkins. Well, it's not every day, you know, one is portrayed by Hannibal Lecter.</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<i>Once again, David is silent for a moment, open-mouthed, staring dumbly at Jack.</i></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
DAVID</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
Paris Hilton. Memes. Debra Winger. Anthony Hopkins. And Hannibal Lecter.... Oh my God, there is so much to unpack here. (<i>He shakes his head</i>.) If I wasn't standing here right now, hearing it for myself, I wouldn't believe it. No one is going to believe this.</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
JACK</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
(<i>as if he didn't hear what David has just said</i>)</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
But for what it's worth, David, I agree with your previous assessment about reading being a lonely act. I believe you're on to something. I mean, it's strangely almost an outgrowth of your earlier notion of anthropomorphizing a book--giving it the attributes of a woman, for instance, as you started to do earlier and as you'll explore even further along in this piece here. You seem to find the act of reading a book much the same as you see the act of forming a relationship with another human being--even though the two acts are so different and so totally at odds with one another. On the one hand, you must be willing to open yourself up and share yourself intimately with another person. To be at one with another. On the other hand, you must be willing to close yourself off and to shut out the world, to experience the world offered to only you by the author. To be at one with yourself, in other words. Union and disunion. Order and chaos. In your earlier discussion in this...essay, book, whatever this piece of writing of yours is becoming now...you almost began to draw parallels between the two acts, to metaphorically show that they are the same, though different. Quite interesting, indeed. Yes... (<i>Jack pauses, drawing again on his pipe, sizing David up</i>.) How remarkable, this notion of togetherness and separateness. Two sides of the same coin, as it were. A perfect dialectic. Together and alone. And both fueled by the same desire--to feel love. There is loneliness, for you--the same loneliness in the act of reading a book--in the very act of falling in love. The two are one and the same. (<i>He pauses again</i>.) To read is to be alone. And to fall in love, you are saying, is also to feel this same sense of loneliness. Or maybe not even the same "sense" of it. Maybe it is, quite simply, one and the same loneliness. Extraordinary, David. Absolutely extraordinary.... Perhaps your new meme should read: "We read to know we are alone." Yes, perhaps. Quite right.... Do you mind if I make a note of this?</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<i>At this moment, as Jack finishes this last thought--and quite unexpectedly--a large, over-sized octopus, named Grigori, lurches up from the waves that are washing against the rocky outcropping where Jack sits. Lunging awkwardly, swinging its slimy, ropelike tentacles about, the crustacean manages to grab hold of the rockface on the breakwater and pull itself toward the unsuspecting Oxford professor, who is too busy pontificating on the dialectical nature of love and aloneness to notice that he is no longer alone on the rocks. With one sucker-covered tentacle, Grigori reaches toward Jack, wraps one of his eight arms around the waist of the old writer/Virgil, and pulls Jack off from the rock cliff into the foam and the spray of the crashing waves.</i></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
JACK</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
(<i>through teeth clenched determinedly on the stem of his pipe</i>)</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
Oh, bloody hell....</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<i>Watching the scene unfold, it takes only a matter of seconds. David witnesses it, stunned and unable to react or to respond in time to save Jack's life. Immediately, David jumps to his feet, standing alone in the sand, watching as Jack disappears with Grigori below the surface of the ocean.</i></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<i><br /></i></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<b>(INSERT)</b></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<i><br /></i></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<i>The camera's view quickly moves directly in front of David. He is centered directly in the frame, standing alone on the beach, watching helplessly. As described in the pre-production pitch as, "Real Hitchock/</i>Vertigo<i> by-way-of Spielberg/</i>Jaws<i> kind of stuff," the camera dolly-zooms in on David's amazed and horrified expression.</i></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
DAVID</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
WHAT THE FUCK?!</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;"><b>(INSERT)</b><br /><b><br /></b><i>Suddenly, we see again--as before--a human eye shown in close-up, closed, asleep. Faint twitching behind the eyelid can minutely be detected, as if the eye is experiencing rapid eye movement while dreaming. Hold momentarily. The sound of the ocean's crashing waves on the rocks can still be heard. The eye continues to move and to flutter. Slowly, the sleeper is beginning to waken, and the eye flutters open.</i></div><div style="text-align: left;"><i><br /></i></div><div style="text-align: left;"><b>INT. BEDROOM--DAY</b></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /><i>A young man jumps awake in bed, pulling himself quickly upright and letting out a little yell of surprise. The sound of the waves and the ocean is gone now. It is silent. The room is bare and sterile looking--white walls, beige carpet, a window with lace curtains along the far wall, rays of sunlight spilling in through the window and through the thin, gossamer curtains. In the room there is only a bed and a single wooden chair sitting in the spill of sunlight close to the window--a book lays spread open, face down, on the chair, bathed in the light. The young man breathes deeply, shaking himself awake, looking around slowly, gaining a bearing on his surroundings and on himself. He buries his face in his hands.</i></div><div style="text-align: left;"><b><br /></b></div><div style="text-align: left;">
<b>FADE OUT--"FIN"</b></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<b>FADE TO BLACK</b></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<b><br /></b></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>*******</b></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<b><br /></b></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>____________________</b></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b><br /></b></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>* 11 *</b></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<b><br /></b></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
Pynchon doesn't create characters so much as mechanical men to whom a manic comic impulse or a vague free-floating anguish can attach itself, often in brilliant streams of consciousness.... The risk that Pynchon's fiction runs is boredom, repetition without significant development, elaboration that is no more than compulsiveness. For all its richness and exuberance, <i>V.</i> is more a wonderful, concatenated jigsaw puzzle than an esthetically coherent literary structure. <i>The Crying of Lot 49</i> is smaller but better built. In <i>Gravity's Rainbow</i> the structure is strained beyond the breaking point. Reading it is often profoundly exasperating; the book is too long and dense; despite the cornucopia of brilliant details and grand themes one's dominant feelings in the last one to two hundred pages are a mounting restlessness, fatigue and frustration. The book doesn't feel "together."</div>
<br />
This is a judgment about its form, but let me go a step further. One feels in the end that Pynchon's imagination is so taken with the imagery of Nazi death...that he is driven to make the plot larger and larger, to add more and more characters, to invent increasingly zany comic routines and digressions as a frantic defense against the fear and love of death--the odor of the crematorium, burnt cordite, bombed out minds and bodies, ruins. This all gets out of his control. Pynchon's sensibility and achievement here are limited by the very paranoid traits that he is ostensibly criticizing. The sentimental and comic characters and their mindless pleasures do not have the intended force to counterpoint the theme of death; the druggy, spaced-out comedy becomes too juvenile and self-indulgent to function as a real alternative.<br />
<br />
-- Richard Locke (17)<br />
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>*</b></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
At the outset of the 2020 COVID-19 Pandemic, I couldn't help but find my mind wandering to the line from Mel Brooks' classic 1974 film, <i>Young Frankenstein</i>, when the frightened village father, anxiously hammering into place residual lumber to cover the windows of his modest little home, finds the time to offer throwaway advice to his wife--all doing so, of course, in the standard movie-language of stereotypical Eastern-European-Yiddish-English: "When monsters are loose, boards must be tight!" (18)</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
So, what do you do during a virus pandemic? Do you frantically get busy looking for layabout 2x4s, some nails, and a hammer? There is no rule-book for this sort of thing. Quarantined at home--"stuck" at home either with loved ones or by yourself--you have been encouraged [<i>Aside: no...more than "encouraged," you've been "ordered"]</i> to be anti-social, to be private, to stay at home, to limit your time with others, to keep your distance safely, and--basically--to just...kind of...do nothing.</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<i>[Aside: It could be worse.]</i></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
It was about now that I looked at the bookspines aligned and stacked on my shelves here at home--staring at me accusingly--and I decided one of the things I was going to "get busy" doing was finally dusting off some of them and catching up on some reading. <i>No time like the present</i>, after all:</div>
<ul>
<li>Franz Kafka's, <i>The Metamorphosis</i></li>
<li>Sarah Orne Jewett's, <i>The Country of the Pointed Firs</i></li>
<li>Daniel Defoe's, <i>A Journal of the Plague Year</i></li>
<li>Michael Ondaatje's, <i>Warlight</i></li>
<li>Edith Hall's, <i>Aristotle's Way: How Ancient Wisdom Can Change Your Life</i></li>
<li>Anthony Daniels', <i>I am C-3PO: The Inside Story</i></li>
<li>Adam Higginbotham's, <i>Midnight at Chernobyl: The Untold Story of the World's Greatest Nuclear Disaster</i></li>
<li>William Lee Miller's, <i>Lincoln's Virtues: An Ethical Biography</i></li>
<li>Mark Cousins',<i> The Story of Film</i></li>
<li>Noah Stryker's, <i>The Thing With Feathers: The Surprising Lives of Birds and What They Reveal About Being Human</i></li>
<li>Don DeLillo's, <i>Point Omega</i></li>
<li>Sarah M. Broom's, <i>The Yellow House</i></li>
<li>Philip Roth's, <i>Nemesis</i></li>
</ul>
<div>
I made it through a handful of the books that I initially pulled down from my bookshelf, most disappearing quickly, some requiring a little more time. But still, not a bad reading list, all told. Not a bad way to spend the time, if one has the time to spend.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
And then it hit me. I saw the book, its familiar light-blue spine glaring at me (as it has for years--decades). And once I saw it, I couldn't unsee it:</div>
<ul>
<li>Thomas Pynchon's, <i>Gravity's Rainbow</i></li>
</ul>
<div>
<br /></div>
I had met my Waterloo years before. I had been bested, and I had admitted defeat. I had (or so I told myself over all these long years) confronted my strengths and weaknesses; I had made peace with my limitations; and I had moved on to other authors and to other books. But here I was at home, <i>stuck</i> at home--"ordered" to be at home--with nowhere else (literally) to go and not much of anything else (literally) to do.<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
So, what was I waiting for? An invitation? I threw down the gauntlet, then and there, and declared a rematch. I picked up the book that had beaten me 20 years before, and I turned, once more, to its first page and to its familiar first sentence: "A screaming comes across the sky." And I dived in headfirst and started swimming.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
And here's the first thing I found this time around: I didn't drown. I surprisingly held my own right from the start, amidst Pynchon's sea of words and ideas, and his cast of hundreds (literally, at last count that I saw online, roughly 400 characters--give or take--throughout), and his confusing passages of mathspeak/sciencespeak (written in passages that--honestly--only physicists and engineers could reasonably grasp), and his (satirical, I know, but still somewhat glaring in 2020 America) instances of misogyny/racism/soft-core pornography/child abuse (physical, emotional, sexual, etc.), and his meandering plots, and his ventures into subplots with no destinations, and his scenes of late-60's/early-70's "free-to-be" hippiesh holdovers--complete with drugs, free love, counter-cultural references--and his playful free-association with Cold War politics and paranoia, and his (everywhere) freefloatingwaterfall of pages and pages and pages of stream-of-consciousness musing. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
I was staying afloat for quite a while during the early parts of the book. I was keeping up with it, and I was not giving in. I was impressed with myself--and with the book, to be honest. But eventually (and, really, when considering the novel's length, not all that far in, I guess--maybe around page 200-250, or so) all of my strength and my fresh outlook and my attempts to stay positive and to stay focused and motivated began to weaken and to show signs of breaking and maybe even collapsing. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
I began to hit a wall. And I wasn't very far into the book. Granted, I made it much further than my first attempt some 20 years prior. But already I was showing signs of lagging--once again--and of questioning just what the hell I was doing all of this for. <i>What is the point of it, anyway? I mean really?</i></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
This wasn't good. All signs pointed to failure again. I wasn't up for it. While I had come a long way over the past 20 years--a lot of seismic/Pangeaic-like changes in my life, a lot of growing up and growing into the person I had finally, fully become as an adult, a lot of paradigm-shifting, and a lot of questioning, a lot of evolving--I still, perhaps, wasn't quite there. Although I had read a lot over the past 20 years and had challenged myself with some damned good books--some of the best and most thought-provoking writing I had encountered so far in my life--and although I had emerged (I think, anyway) as a confident, clearheaded, careful thinker/reader, I was still...still...finding this book of Pynchon's to be my "bridge too far," my Hastings Cutoff/Donner Pass, my Pickett's Charge, my Vietnam. It had the stink of defeat all over it again. And I was disgusted with myself, with the novel, with my decision that I had made to waste my time--this time of all times--when I could possibly be spending my quarantine-time on something more productive and (almost certainly) more fun.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
It was Waterloo all over again.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
So I set <i>Gravity's Rainbow</i> down. One more time. For a while, anyway. I would just give it a rest, I told myself. Give myself a rest. Redirect my energies and read something else. Recharge. And then try again, perhaps. And just to be sure of this, I kept my bookmark in its place (around page 250, or so) knowing full well that I didn't want to do something as foolish as remove it and lose my place altogether.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
If I had done that, I knew, all my efforts up to that point would have been for nothing, and that would have been the end of it. And I would never try again.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
But I simply had to take a breather, I said to myself, if for no other reason than just to read something that was a little more pleasing, maybe, and a little easier to digest, and a little less headache-inducing, and a little more rewarding at the end of the day. I set <i>Gravity's Rainbow</i> aside, and turned to other things. (At least for a while, anyway.)</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>____________________</b></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b><br /></b></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>* 12 *</b></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
The novels of Thomas Pynchon seem to take place in a vast, unfathomable cyclotron. Characters, ideas, metaphors, styles, pains, ecstasies, assorted objects from the Pyramids to paper clips all whirl about at enormous velocity. They collide, split into new forms, or suddenly decay, leaving behind only enigmatic smiles.... And now <i>Gravity's Rainbow</i>.... It is a funny, disturbing, exhausting and massive novel, mind-fogging in its range and permutations, its display of knowledge and virtuosity--a metaphysical, phenomenological, technological Mad Comic. The author seems to have read and understood everything from quantum mechanics, probability theory and engineering manuals to the labels on bottles of 1920s Schloss Vollrads, Tarot cards and rock lyrics. This, and much more, Pynchon catalogues and tickles into fantasies so elaborately detailed that most of his readers will come away feeling illiterate in the terms of the 20th century.... Even more than Pynchon's previous novels, <i>Gravity's Rainbow</i> is about man the symbol-making animal desperately trying to build a protective system of meaning over his head while at the same time blind technology increases the odds that something will bash his head in.<br />
<br />
-- R.Z. Sheppard (19)<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>*</b></div>
<br />
But that "breather" of mine didn't last very long. I had to keep going. I had to keep fighting the good fight. I had to keep trying and to keep pushing ahead--a page, two pages, ten, thirty, fifty, a scene, a section, a chapter, the first half of the book, the second half of the book, moving forward, forcing myself (at times). Finishing it.<br />
<br />
I had to keep going, because the thing with Pynchon's books is--or, I should say <i>one</i> of the things with his books is--if you stop too long you will forget too much, because there is simply way too much to remember. If you put the book down for any extended interval you have automatically increased the chances of forgetting specific events and information, misrembering details and characters and plot strands, and growing confused and frustrated, and eventually quitting. It is best to just keep going. I knew this both from online discussion sites that I'd consulted and from my own past experience.<br />
<br />
There is something undeniable about <i>Gravity's Rainbow. </i>More than any book I have ever read or have ever tried to read it brings me back and keeps me trying. And I can't explain what this "something" is. Not to anyone else, and maybe not even to myself. Not fully. Maybe not ever.<br />
<br />
I don't know what it is. But there it is.<br />
<br />
For some reason I have to stay with this impossibly frustrating, magnificent, maddening, funny, moving, boring, thrilling, laughably stupid, mind-alteringly intelligent, lowbrow, highbrow, philosophically complex, full-of-shit/work-of-genius, (Edward Mendelson's) "encyclopedic narrative" masterpiece--all the way to the end. Even if it means the end of me.<br />
<br />
<i>[Aside: "It eluded us then, but that's no matter--tomorrow we will run faster, stretch out our arms farther.... And one fine morning----- And so we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past." (20)]</i><br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>____________________</b></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b><br /></b></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>* 13 *</b></div>
<br />
"The point is," cutting off Gustav's usually indignant scream, " a person feels <i>good</i> listening to Rossini. All you feel like listening to Beethoven is going out and invading Poland. Ode to Joy indeed. The man didn't even have a sense of humor. I tell you," shaking his skinny old fist, "there is more of the Sublime in the snare-drum part to <i>La Gazza Ladra</i> than in the whole Ninth Symphony. With Rossini, the whole point is that lovers always get together, isolation is overcome, and like it or not that is the one great centripetal movement of the World. Through the machineries of greed, pettiness, and the abuse of power, <i>love occurs</i>. All the shit is transmuted to gold. The walls are breached, the balconies are scaled--listen!"<br />
<br />
-- Thomas Pynchon, <i>Gravity's Rainbow</i>, Part 3: "In the Zone" (21)</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>*</b></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
What is wrong with the notion of spending your time with a book that you, perhaps, don't always like? Oh sure...you see the good in it, you admit to moments of its beauty, pages that promise great things, unforgettable scenes and passages of dialogue that stay lodged in your memory, the breathtaking overarching artistry of all that's accomplished in it. But still there are those times that (although you love a book for all its lovable reasons) you perhaps don't like it very much. In fact you might even hate it. What is wrong with this?</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
What is wrong with maybe not being entertained by a book? What if at times (much of the time, maybe) it isn't fun to read it? What if you find yourself not really connecting with the characters all the time, maybe even confused about who all the characters are and what they're supposedly up to and why? What if you get bored with a book? What do you do then? How are you supposed to feel about that? And particularly if these moments of boredom and frustration and confusion and hopeless rejection are counterbalanced with a sense of awe and fascination at all the promise that the book holds, all the moments of humor and beauty in its pages, all the sheer wonder of the fact--held in your hands and held within its crude/exalted poetry--that the book exists in the first place?</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
How do you answer that? How do you deal with a love-hate relationship with a book--a book that is, by all rights, considered "classic"...albeit with some admitted complications? A book that is considered timeless and worth spending time with...but is admittedly difficult? A book that you perhaps love to hate. (But you don't hate it--not really). A book that you maybe hate to love, at times. And yet you do love it. You can't deny it, nor should you.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
What do you do with a book like that?</div>
<div>
<i><br /></i></div>
<div>
<i>Why would anyone write a book like that</i>? I believe this is a fair question to ask. As is its accompanying question: <i>Why would anyone read a book like that</i>?</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
The only answer to these questions I can fairly give is that a writer might feel compelled to write a book like this, and a reader might be inevitably drawn to read a book like this, because--what with all of its world-building and world-demolishing, fraught with inherent anxieties and awfulnesses and adorations--a book is nothing more than a person disguised in pages. I believe we do this with a book because a book is like a person, and we do this (or should do this) with the people in our lives all the time--the people we love and try to love, and the people who we wish (sometimes so desperately) would do something as crazy as love us back.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Books aren't perfect. People aren't perfect. Love isn't perfect. It's a wrestling match, much of the time. And it's okay to wrestle with a book. It's okay to be confused by it. It's okay to struggle with it. That's how you figure it out. That's how you get down to the book's bedrock, down to its base materials. Only in such a place can you begin to try to understand what the author <i>really</i> wants you to understand. Only in such a place can you begin to try to comprehend just what is <i>really</i> meant with the meaning between the words.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
We live in an age of relative comfort, for most of us, anyway. We live at a time in history when the world is literally at our fingertips and can be accessed with lightning-speed. We have computers in our pockets and in our hands almost 24/7. We don't know what to do with ourselves. We're frustrated easily. We're angered easily. We find fault easily. We grow complacent easily. We grow listless easily. We give up easily and move on to other things easily. We don't seem to really know what it is we want and who we are. And yet we also don't really seem to know what it is we don't want and what we want to be.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
We just know we would like things to be easier, and we would like things to make sense.<br />
<br />
We are frustrated with ourselves, with our lives, with the constant barrage of contentment vs. discontentment that bombards us daily, constantly, without stop. We are bored easily--too easily--with everything and everyone (or so we say). And we don't know how to handle our dissatisfaction with life and with people. We don't know what to do with disappointment or how to handle it. And so we get bored...and then we don't know what to do with our boredom or how to handle our boredom.</div>
<div>
<i><br /></i></div>
<div>
<i>[Aside: And this, by the way, is a recurring theme of postmodern/contemporary literature, this notion of boredom in our everyday contemporary lives and what to do with it. For a primer on this theme, check out some of these postmodernist writers and their novels: David Foster Wallace/</i>The Pale King<i>; Joseph Heller/</i>Something Happened<i>; Lucy Ellmann/</i>Ducks, Newburyport<i>; and Charlie Kaufman/</i>Antkind<i>.]</i></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
We don't have to think too much, if we don't really want to. We don't have to form our own opinions too much, if we don't really want to. If we don't like something or someone--for whatever reason (and what's more, we don't even have to really have a reason)--we can hit "dislike," blue thumb down, swipe left, block, delete. And then it's on to something or someone else.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>It's easy to do. Way too easy.</div><div><br /></div><div>I've done this, with persons that I've struggled to like or to love or to forgive; with friends who have made me angry; with total strangers who I find myself in opposition; with groups of people that leave me feeling divided; with political, religious, and social organizations that stir up hatred and ire, on a whim; with social media; with the media, in general; with headlines, and sound bites, and real news, and supposed "fake news," and all the news in-between somewhere, and a world leader who can't tell the difference (and, what's more, doesn't seem to care about the difference) between real and make-believe; and with a country that appears--way too often--to be coming apart, piece by piece, at the seams.</div><div><br /></div><div>I've taken part in it myself. I know. I've joined in, to an extent. I'm guilty of doing it. I've discarded people, turned my back on them and on institutions that disagree with me or that make me disagreeable. I have quit on people. I have stopped reading books once I've started. I've given in, and I've "given it all I can give," I say, and I've given up. (It's so easy.)</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
But I've also done the opposite. I've struggled with people. I've fought with people. I've refused to give up on people. In certain situations, I've held on, and on, and on, and on...(much longer than any reasonable person would have or should have). In some relationships that I've found myself in over the years (and in some cases you may have to stretch the meaning of the word "relationship" like Play-Doh to its breaking point) it's been a struggle. A constant pushing and pulling. ("Come here.... No, go away.") For years, decades, at times. (It feels like a lifetime.) The pushing apart, only to pull one another back in silent, subtle ways. The flying apart. The drifting together. Disunion and union. Entropy (the natural order of things which leads to chaos and the breaking apart of order) followed by negentropy (the natural coming back together of things and the reestablishment of order). Elemental forces causing things to fly apart, while other elemental forces at work to reunite these same things. Pushing, pulling, straining, struggling.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>Why would anyone do that? W hy would any two people put themselves through all of that?</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
I think, in those instances, it was quite simply because we thought we couldn't let it all entirely go to nothingness. <i>What was all of that for, then</i>? we can't help but ask. It's difficult. It's complicated. It's confusing. It's maddening. That person you see such beauty in, at other times you are consumed only with seeing her ugliness. It's all around you and all you can see. That person who you hate (or convince yourself that you hate), at other times all you can think about is how much you love her. Or did.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
"<i>But look at what she's done,</i>" the voices insist. "<i>All that's been said and done</i>.<i> All this time.</i>"</div>
<div>
"<i>Yes</i>," you answer, "<i>I know, but</i>...."</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
And therein lies the tale. "<i>Yes, I know, but</i>...." Difficult relationships with difficult people can teach you more than you ever knew about who you are, and the person you want to be, and all that it is possible for you, maybe--somehow--to forgive. Difficult people also show you how to move on. They show you exactly when and how to stop and to walk away, if it's apparent there is no other reasonable choice. But difficult people show you how to love them, too--faults and all--if you're willing and patient and open enough to let them. But you have to be willing and patient and open enough to let them. (Which is not always easy or fun.) Similarly, difficult books teach you how to read them. You just have to be willing to learn--if you are comfortable enough to sit back, and to reserve judgment, and to let the book slowly reveal itself to you. (Which is not always easy or fun, either.)</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
This notion of reading only for entertainment's sake is a stubborn holdover from our childhood. From our earliest ages we learn the idea that art--books, stories, poems, movies, songs, etc.--exists solely to make us smile and to feel good. To make us laugh. To make us satisfied with the antique pablum, "<i>And they all lived happily ever after....</i>" Art is there to prop up our escapist worldview: <i>All is in its place and as it should be</i>. We need that confirmation when we're young. We don't need it in quite the same way when we're 50 years old. When we are children learning to read, books exist for our sake. When we have grown older and have learned to deepen our reading and our understanding of the world, we learn (sometimes in a bitter contest of will and ego) that we exist for art's sake. It's a switch, a reversal. And if you don't or can't make that reversal, then you, as a reader, will spend the rest of your adult life still under the mistaken notion that art (a book, for example) is solely there to serve you. To make you happy. To make you feel better about yourself, perhaps. To keep you entertained. To pass your time. To fill your bored and dissatisfied existence with the notion that you are fine and that everything is fine and that nothing could be better.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>When, often, in fact, nothing could be further from the truth.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Sometimes art is ugly. Sometimes art is brutal, and painful, and shockingly disturbing, and upsetting. Sometimes you hate it. Sometimes you want to turn away from it. And sometimes you do turn away from it (and are meant to). And sometimes you turn back toward the art (and are meant to). As a way of example: For my entire life, I've been under the impression that I had a fairly complete understanding of the terms "anti-war film." A lot of cinema, over the years, has been dedicated to that genre, after all. But it wasn't until recently, watching two films (both of them for the first time), that everything I thought I knew and understood about the "anti-war" film was upended. I had heard of both films--interestingly, they had both been released in 1985--but I'd simply never taken the time (or simply never had the opportunity, perhaps) to watch them. Until now.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
French documentarian Claude Lanzmann and his monumental documentary opus, <i>Shoah, </i>is<i> </i>a nearly 10-hour slow-slide into the grueling oblivion of the Nazi's "final solution" of its infamous death camps. Similarly, Soviet filmmaker Elem Klimov offered his harrowing glimpse, <i>Come and See</i>, through the gaze of his teenage male protagonist at the brutal annihilation of the rural Belarusian countryside from the incendiary hands of Nazi forces during W.W. II.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Two films, two works of art, dealing with difficult, challenging subject matter. Each film told in its own ways, in brutal imagery and construction of scene upon scene upon scene of unrelenting, horrifying ugliness--the worst in humanity. It's admittedly difficult to watch these movies. It is painful to watch them. Both films--<i>Shoah</i> and <i>Come and See</i>--will teach you, over the course of their viewing-times, how to watch them. How to understand them. How to make sense of the senselessness in them. How to absorb them. And once you allow the movies to work on this level, once you settle in to them and allow them to work in this way, you will never forget them. And you will understand their purpose. And you will understand why they were made. And why someone might want to watch them.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
We need cinema like this--we need art like this--just as much as we need the cinema of <i>Jurassic Park</i> or <i>Toy Story</i>. There is room for it all. And we need music, painting, and writing that makes us feel good and happy and content; there's nothing wrong with that. That's important. But we also need songs, paintings, films, and books that will push us, and push us, and push us, waiting--wanting--for us to push back. To show that we are paying attention. We are invested in the outcome, after all. And to show that we care, or that we want to care, or that we can't care, or that we hate this but that we need this. All at the same time. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
We need difficult, challenging, complicated art to show us that we are alive and that we are here to feel love and hate; and that we are willing to experience beauty and ugliness; and that we want to feel comfort and struggle; and that we want to endure and learn and move on and grow. We want to experience the coming together and the falling apart of existence--the natural dissolution of chaos, the pulling at everything from opposite strings into eventual and inevitable disarray; only to be found again and to be brought back together, perhaps, under the weighted hand and the formative force of gravity.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>____________________</b></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b><br /></b></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>* 14 *</b></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Much Madness is divinest Sense -<br />
To a discerning Eye -<br />
Much Sense - the starkest Madness -<br />
'Tis the Majority<br />
In this, as all, prevail -<br />
Assent - and you are sane -<br />
Demur - you're straightway dangerous-<br />
And handled with a Chain -<br />
<br />
-- Emily Dickinson, "Much Madness is divinest Sense - " #435 (22)<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>*</b></div>
<br />
"<i>This ascent will be betrayed to Gravity. But the Rocket engine, the deep cry of combustion that jars the soul, promises escape. The victim, in bondage to falling, rises on a promise, a prophecy, of Escape. . . .</i>" (23)<br />
<br />
The time is short now. He is almost at its end, finally, after all this time. His voice, the only voice he's ever known, has grown thin with his reading every chapter, every page, and sentence, and word. It has taken a long time, and he is tired. But it is almost over now. He pauses to look around him, to memorize once more the room he has memorized so well over the past days, weeks, and months. <i>Has it been years</i>? Just him alone now. Alone with the book, his only companion. The only voice, the chorus of voices ringing from its pages.<br />
But they're not real. Not really. Not anymore. Maybe not ever. Right now it's just him, as it's always been.<br />
But he knows that's not true, either. Wasn't there a time, a day long ago? Was it always like this? Just him, and the book, sitting on a chair by the window, or sitting cross-legged on the floor by the window, or lying on the floor by the window--the sunlight pouring through the shade, the thin gossamer of the lace curtain brushing against his cheek sometimes if he gets too close to it or when the air comes on and blows through the vent, drowning his voice, choking back the words.<br />
It has taken the life of him reading this book aloud, speaking down into the metal floor-grate of the air vent, down into the metal ductwork snaking below the floor and along the walls and above in the ceiling, in the rafters, all around him. His voice traveling through the world around him, sometimes thin and tired--as it is now--sometimes bold and strong, like it was when he was younger. Sitting on a chair by the window, face aimed downward at the carpeted floor, the vent at his feet. Speaking aloud to the room, to himself, and to the ductwork, and to whoever there was to listen.<br />
<i>We read to know we are alone</i>.<br />
But he is aware of something now. Something that maybe he's always known but was only afraid to say to himself. He doesn't want to say it now. He only wants to read, to speak the words, to finish the story (he is so close to the end he can feel it in the fingers of his hands and in his heart). The catch in his voice. It is so close. And the time is short now.<br />
<br />
"<i>'The edge of evening . . . the long curve of people all wishing on the first star. . . . Always remember those men and women along the thousands of miles of land and sea. The true moment of shadow is the moment in which you see the point of light in the sky. The single point, and the Shadow that has just gathered you in its sweep . . .'</i>" (24)<br />
<br />
The days are bright outside the window, and the sun stays long, as it always does in the summer. The season is late now, or so it seems to him, and the skies haven't brought rain for weeks or for months. He tries not to look outside the window because there usually isn't all that much to see. Mainly, though, he just knows he shouldn't. And so he doesn't. He just sits most of the time, either on his chair or on the floor, and sometimes he'll lay down on the floor, too, without a pillow under his arm or his head, and he'll read aloud the story from the book. He speaks into the vent, though he doesn't think anyone is there to hear him anymore these days. Not the way there used to be, anyway. This is not the house where he used to live, after all. Or if it is, things have moved on; things have changed. There's no one now to hear him. No one on the other end. No audience to hear the story that he has read for so long, one word at a time, one sentence at a time, down into the vent, down into the ringing metal of the tunnel that wraps around him and rings his voice back to him, at times. Alone.<br />
<br />
"<i>And it is just here, just at this dark and silent frame, that the pointed tip of the Rocket, falling nearly a mile per second, absolutely and forever without sound, reaches its last unmeasurable gap above the roof of the old theatre, the last delta-t.</i>" (25)<br />
<br />
<i>It's like saying Goodbye to an old friend,</i> he thinks to himself. <i>Almost it is</i>. The words coming fast now, the pages thin and gone beneath his fingers. There is nothing to hold on to now. There is nowhere to go, his eyes drawing ever downward on the page, toward the end, the beginning of the white space closing in on the last of the printed type. He savors the moment, draws it out, tasting it like a candy he remembers from when he was a boy, holding on to that flavor for as long as he can.<br />
But it's over now. At long last he can see the end. He can see the way it's over. And it's really not as bad as he once thought it would be. It's really not as sad as he once feared, either. The book is over. He has read it all, aloud, to no one but himself. His final recitation of only two words--the book's closing thought. <i>How it begins with a missile's scream</i>, he laughs, <i>and ends with a song</i>. A dance--a bit of old vaudeville. A chorus of disparate voices (ranging 400 or more). And a quiet, whispered invitation, a beckoning toward erasure. And then it's over.<br />
<i>And the rest</i>, when it comes, he knows, <i>is silence</i>.<br />
<br />
"<i>Now everybody----</i>" (26)<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>____________________</b></div>
</div>
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>*</b></div>
<br /></div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>NOTES</b></div>
<br />
(1): Waters, Roger. "Brain Damage." <i>The Dark Side of the Moon</i>. Harvest/EMI. Prod. Alan Parsons. 1973. Music.<br />
<br />
(2): <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1973_in_the_United_States#:~:text=Wade%3A%20The%20U.S.%20Supreme%20Court,of%20Richard%20Nixon%20in%201974.">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1973_in_the_United_States#:</a>. Web.</div>
<br />
(3): Pynchon, Thomas. <i>Gravity's Rainbow</i> (1973). Penguin Twentieth-Century Classics Edition. Penguin Books: New York City. 1995. (pg. 756). Print.<br />
<br />
(4): <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nishinoshima_(Ogasawara)">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nishinoshima_(Ogasawara)</a>. Web.<br />
<br />
(5): ibid<br />
<br />
(6): <i>Knives Out</i>. Dir. Rian Johnson. Lionsgate, 2019. Film.<br />
<br />
(7): Pynchon, Thomas. <i>Gravity's Rainbow</i> (1973). Penguin Twentieth-Century Classics Edition. Penguin Books: New York City. 1995. (pg. 275). Print.<br />
<br />
(8): Pynchon, Thomas. <i>Gravity's Rainbow</i> (1973). Penguin Twentieth-Century Classics Edition. Penguin Books: New York City. 1995. (pg. 3). Print.<br />
<br />
(9): <a href="https://lithub.com/the-50-best-one-star-amazon-reviews-of-thomas-pynchons-gravitys-rainbow/">https://lithub.com/the-50-best-one-star-amazon-reviews-of-thomas-pynchons-gravitys-rainbow/</a>. Web.<br />
<br />
(10.): ibid<br />
<br />
(11): <i>The Exorcist</i>. Dir. William Friedkin. Warner Brothers. 1973. Film.<br />
<br />
(12): Caesar, Ed. "Don DeLillo: A Writer Like No Other," <i>The Sunday Times (London)</i>, Feb. 21, 2010. Print.<br />
<br />
(13): Lewis, C.S. "Learning in War-Time." <i>The Weight of Glory and Other Addresses</i>. The MacMillan Company. 1949. Print.<br />
<br />
(14): Pynchon, Thomas. <i>Gravity's Rainbow</i> (1973). Penguin Twentieth-Century Classics Edition. Penguin Books: New York City. 1995. (pg. 644-5). Print.<br />
<br />
(15): Alighieri, Dante. <i>Divine Comedy: The Inferno</i>. Trans. Robert Pinskey. The Noonday Press: New York City. 1994. Canto I, lines 1-2 (pg. 3). Print.<br />
<br />
(16): Salm, Arthur. "A Screaming Comes Across the Sky (but Not a Photo)," <i>San Diego Union-Tribune</i>, Feb. 8 2004. Print.<br />
<br />
(17): Locke, Richard. "One of the Longest, Most Difficult, Most Ambitious Novels in Years," <i>The New York Times Book Review</i>, March 11, 1973. Print.<br />
<br />
(18): <i>Young Frankenstein</i>. Dir. Mel Brooks. 20th Century Fox. 1974. Film.<br />
<br />
(19): Sheppard, R.Z. "<i>V.</i> Squared," <i>Time Magazine</i>, March 15, 1973. Print.<br />
<br />
(20): Fitzgerald, F. Scott. <i>The Great Gatsby</i> (1925). Scribner Paperback Edition. Scribner: New York City. 2003. (pg. 189). Print.<br />
<br />
(21): Pynchon, Thomas. <i>Gravity's Rainbow</i> (1973). Penguin Twentieth-Century Classics Edition. Penguin Books: New York City. 1995. (pg. 440). Print.<br />
<br />
(22): Dickinson, Emily. "Much Madness is divinest Sense - " (#435). <i>The Complete Poems of Emily Dickinson</i>. Ed. Thomas H. Johnson. Little, Brown and Company: Boston. 1960. (pg. 209). Print.<br />
<br />
(23): Pynchon, Thomas. <i>Gravity's Rainbow</i> (1973). Penguin Twentieth-Century Classics Edition. Penguin Books: New York City. 1995. (pg. 758). Print.<br />
<br />
(24): ------ . (pg. 759-60).<br />
<br />
(25): ------ . (pg. 760).<br />
<br />
(26): ibid<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>*</b></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>APPENDIX A</b></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b><br /></b></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>(A Short Cross-Section, in No Certain Order,</b></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>of Some of the </b><b>"Big," "Important," and/or </b><b>"Difficult" </b><b>Books</b></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>the Author Has Read...So Far)</b><br />
<b><br /></b></div>
<ul>
<li><i>Moby-Dick, </i>Herman Melville</li>
<li><i>All the Pretty Horses (The Border Trilogy: Volume One)</i>, Cormac McCarthy</li>
<li><i>The Road, </i>Cormac McCarthy</li><li><i>No Country for Old Men</i>, Cormac McCarthy</li>
<li><i>The Odyssey</i>, Homer</li>
<li><i>The Iliad</i>, Homer</li>
<li><i>In Cold Blood</i>, Truman Capote</li><li><i>American Pastoral, </i>Philip Roth</li>
<li><i>Nemesis, </i>Philip Roth</li>
<li><i>Beowulf</i>, (Anonymous)</li>
<li><i>Anna Karenina</i>, Leo Tolstoy</li><li><i>The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn</i>, Mark Twain</li>
<li><i>All the President's Men</i>, Carl Bernstein and Bob Woodward</li><li><i>Tess of the d'Urbervilles</i>, Thomas Hardy</li>
<li><i>Going After Cacciato</i>, Tim O'Brien</li><li><i>The Things They Carried</i>, Tim O'Brien</li><li><i>In the Lake of the Woods</i>, Tim O'Brien</li><li><i>The Handmaid's Tale</i>, Margaret Atwood</li><li><i>The Hobbit, </i>J.R.R. Tolkien</li>
<li><i>The Lord of the Rings</i>, J.R.R. Tolkien</li>
<li><i>The Silmarillion, </i>J.R.R. Tolkien</li>
<li><i>The Poisonwood Bible</i>, Barbara Kingsolver</li>
<li><i>American Psycho</i>, Bret Easton Ellis</li>
<li><i>Catch-22</i>, Joseph Heller</li><li><i>Something Happened</i>, Joseph Heller</li><li><i>Angela's Ashes</i>, Frank McCourt</li>
<li><i>The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay</i>, Michael Chabon</li>
<li><i>The Complete Poems of Emily Dickinson</i>, Emily Dickinson</li>
<li><i>Winter's Tale</i>, Mark Helprin</li><li><i>Leaves of Grass</i>, Walt Whitman</li>
<li><i>The Poems of Robert Frost</i>, Robert Frost</li>
<li><i>My Antonia</i>, Willa Cather</li><li><i>Soul Mountain</i>, Gao Xingjian</li><li><i>Women in Love, </i>D.H. Lawrence</li>
<li><i>Dubliners, </i>James Joyce</li>
<li><i>Ulysses, </i>James Joyce</li>
<li><i>The Jungle, </i>Upton Sinclair</li><li><i>The Right Stuff</i>, Tom Wolfe</li>
<li><i>The Bonfire of the Vanities,</i> Tom Wolfe</li>
<li><i>One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, </i>Ken Kesey</li>
<li><i>Native Son, </i>Richard Wright</li>
<li><i>Don Quixote</i>, Miguel de Cervantes</li>
<li><i>Where I'm Calling From: Selected Stories</i>, Raymond Carver</li><li><i>All of Us: The Collected Poems</i>, Raymond Carver</li><li><i>The Overstory, </i>Richard Powers</li>
<li><i>Beloved</i>, Toni Morrison</li>
<li><i>Mrs. Dalloway, </i>Virginia Woolf</li><li><i>On the Road</i>, Jack Kerouac</li>
<li><i>Into the Wild</i>, Jon Krakauer</li><li><i>Watership Down</i>, Richard Adams</li>
<li><i>The Plague Dogs</i>, Richard Adams</li>
<li><i>White Noise</i>, Don DeLillo</li>
<li><i>Underworld</i>, Don DeLillo</li>
<li><i>Frankenstein</i>, Mary Shelley</li>
<li><i>The Sun Also Rises</i>, Ernest Hemingway</li><li><i>A Farewell to Arms</i>, Ernest Hemingway</li><li><i>For Whom the Bell Tolls</i>, Ernest Hemingway</li><li><i>The Complete Short Stories of Ernest Hemingway</i>, Ernest Hemingway</li><li><i>The Great Gatsby</i>, F. Scott Fitzgerald</li><li><i>The Grapes of Wrath, </i>John Steinbeck</li>
<li><i>East of Eden, </i>John Steinbeck</li>
<li><i>Walden, </i>Henry David Thoreau</li>
<li><i>The Broom of the System</i>, David Foster Wallace</li>
<li><i>Infiinite Jest</i>, David Foster Wallace</li><li><i>A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again</i>, David Foster Wallace</li>
<li><i>The Bell Jar</i>, Sylvia Plath</li><li><i>Ariel</i>, Sylvia Plath</li><li><i>The Corrections</i>, Jonathan Franzen</li>
<li><i>Freedom</i>, Jonathan Franzen</li>
<li><i>Purity</i>, Jonathan Franzen</li>
<li><i>The Canterbury Tales, </i>Geoffrey Chaucer</li>
<li><i>Pride and Prejudice</i>, Jane Austen</li><li><i>Sense and Sensibility</i>, Jane Austen</li><li><i>1984, </i>George Orwell</li>
<li><i>The Haunting of Hill House</i>, Shirley Jackson</li><li><i>The Sound and the Fury</i>, William Faulkner</li>
<li><i>Absalom, Absalom!</i>, William Faulkner</li>
<li><i>Lonesome Dove</i>, Larry McMurtry</li><li><i>The Shining</i>, Stephen King</li>
<li><i>The Stand</i>, Stephen King</li><li><i>It</i>, Stephen King</li>
<li><i>The Brothers Karamazov</i>, Fydor Dostoevsky</li>
<li><i>The Color Purple, </i>Alice Walker</li><li><i>Dune</i>, Frank Herbert</li>
<li><i>Oliver Twist</i>, Charles Dickens</li>
<li><i>David Copperfield</i>, Charles Dickens</li><li><i>Great Expectations</i>, Charles Dickens</li>
<li><i>Slaughterhouse-Five, </i>Kurt Vonnegut</li>
<li><i>Cat's Cradle,</i> Kurt Vonnegut</li>
<li><i>Breakfast of Champions,</i> Kurt Vonnegut</li>
<li><i>The House of the Spirits</i>, Isabel Allende</li><li><i>The World According to Garp</i>, John Irving</li>
<li><i>The Cider House Rules</i>, John Irving</li>
<li><i>A Prayer for Owen Meany</i>, John Irving</li><li><i>The Nix</i>, Nathan Hill</li>
<li><i>One Hundred Years of Solitude</i>, Gabriel Garcia Marquez</li>
<li><i>Love in the Time of Cholera</i>, Gabriel Garcia Marquez</li>
<li><i>The Mosquito Coast</i>, Paul Theroux</li><li><i>Madame Bovary, </i>Gustave Flaubert</li>
<li><i>Uncle Tom's Cabin, </i>Harriet Beecher Stowe</li>
<li><i>A Staggering Work of Heartbreaking Genius</i>, Dave Eggers</li><li><i>Zeitoun</i>, Dave Eggers</li><li><i>Giles Goat-Boy</i>, John Barth</li>
<li><i>The Unbearable Lightness of Being</i>, Milan Kundera</li>
<li><i>The Portrait of a Lady</i>, Henry James</li>
<li><i>To Kill a Mockingbird</i>, Harper Lee</li><li><i>1Q84</i>, Haruki Murakami</li><li><i>The Crying of Lot 49, </i>Thomas Pynchon</li><li><i>Vineland, </i>Thomas Pynchon</li><li><i>Mason & Dixon</i>, Thomas Pynchon</li><li><i>Inherent Vice,</i> Thomas Pynchon</li><li><i>Gravity's Rainbow</i>, Thomas Pynchon *</li>
<li>etc.</li>
</ul><div><br /></div><div> * (Finished: 7/21/20)</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br />
<b>*</b><br />
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>APPENDIX B</b></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b><br /></b></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>(A Short Cross-Section, in No Certain Order,</b></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>of Some of the </b><b>"Big," "Important," and/or </b><b>"Difficult" </b><b>Books</b></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>the Author Has <i>Not</i> Read...So Far)</b></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b style="background-color: red;"><br /></b></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
</div>
<ul>
<li><i>Finnegan's Wake</i>, James Joyce *</li>
<li><i>Roots</i>, Alex Haley</li>
<li><i>Shogun</i>, James Clavell</li>
<li><i>The Tale of Genji</i>, Murasaki Shikibu</li>
<li><i>Faust,</i> Johann Wolfgang von Goethe</li>
<li><i>Sabbath's Theater</i>, Philip Roth</li>
<li><i>The Plot Against America</i>, Philip Roth</li>
<li><i>Blood Meridian, </i>Cormac McCarthy</li>
<li><i>Cities of the Plain (The Border Trilogy: Volume Three), </i>Cormac McCarthy</li>
<li><i>The Magic Mountain</i>, Thomas Mann</li>
<li><i>Death in Venice</i>, Thomas Mann</li>
<li><i>Crime and Punishment</i>, Fydor Dostoevsky</li>
<li><i>A Room of One's Own</i>, Virginia Woolf</li><li><i>Tropic of Cancer</i>, Henry Miller</li><li><i>Bleak House</i>, Charles Dickens</li>
<li><i>The Recognitions</i>, William Gaddis</li><li><i>J R</i>, William Gaddis</li><li><i>Invisible Man</i>, Ralph Ellison</li>
<li><i>Their Eyes Were Watching God</i>, Zora Neale Hurston</li><li><i>Kafka on the Shore</i>, Huruki Murakami</li><li><i>The Epic of Gilgamesh</i>, (Anonymous)</li><li><i>The Naked and the Dead</i>, Norman Mailer</li><li><i>The Executioner's Song</i>, Norman Mailer</li>
<li><i>Ada, or Ardor: A Family Chronicle, </i>Vladimir Nabakov</li>
<li><i>Hangsaman</i>, Shirley Jackson</li><li><i>Cloud Atlas, </i>David Mitchell</li>
<li><span style="background-color: w;"><i>A Visit from the Goon Squad</i>, Jennifer Egan</span></li><li><span style="background-color: w;"><i>2666, </i>Roberto Bolano</span></li>
<li><i>The Sagas of Icelanders</i>, (Anonymous)</li>
<li><i>The Tin Drum</i>, Gunter Grass</li><li><i>House of Leaves</i>, Mark Z. Danielewski **</li>
<li><i>Gilead</i>, Marilynne Robinson</li><li><i>Labyrinths</i>, Jorge Luis Borges</li><li><i>The Exegesis of Philip K. Dick</i>, Philip K. Dick</li>
<li><i>The Magus</i>, John Fowles</li>
<li><i>The Collector</i>, John Fowles</li>
<li><i>The French Lieutenant's Woman</i>, John Fowles</li><li><i>The Golden Notebook</i>, Doris Lessing</li><li><i>Sometimes a Great Notion</i>, Ken Kesey</li>
<li><i>4 3 2 1</i>, Paul Auster</li><li><i>V.</i>, Thomas Pynchon</li>
<li><i>Slow Learner: Early Stories, </i>Thomas Pynchon</li>
<li><i>Against the Day</i>, Thomas Pynchon</li>
<li><i>Bleeding Edge</i>, Thomas Pynchon</li>
<li><i>Libra</i>, Don DeLillo</li>
<li><span style="background-color: w;"><i>Mao II, </i>Don DeLillo</span></li>
<li><span style="background-color: w;"><i>The Aeneid</i>, Virgil</span></li>
<li><i>The Joy Luck Club</i>, Amy Tan</li><li><i>The Once and Future King</i>, T.H. White</li>
<li><i>The Pale King</i>, David Foster Wallace</li><li><i>The Twenty-Seventh City</i>, Jonathan Franzen</li>
<li><i>Ducks, Newburyport</i>, Lucy Ellmann ***</li>
<li><i>Antkind</i>, Charlie Kaufman ****</li>
<li>etc.</li>
</ul><div><br /></div><div> * (I just don't know about this one. I'm bold and daring, but... Again, I know my limitations.)</div><div><br /></div><div> ** (I don't know about this one, either...)</div><div><br /></div><div> *** (1,000 + pages, told in a--basically--single sentence stream-of-consciousness burst, from the central consciousness of an Ohio woman/mother/housewife. The sound of it almost reminds me, somewhat, of Chantal Akerman's 1975 film masterpiece, <i>Jeanne Dielman, 23 quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles</i>. I honestly can't wait to tackle this book. What the fuck is wrong with me? Have I learned nothing?) <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/can-one-sentence-capture-all-of-life">https://www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/can-one-sentence-capture-all-of-life</a></div><div><br /></div><div>**** (A nearly 800-page postmodern experiment--another one--in which the protagonist, a film critic in existential crisis mode, has viewed a stop-motion film that takes 3 months to watch, and then the film is destroyed, and then he must recreate it from memory, frame-by-frame. No, I'm serious.... Call me crazy, but--like above--I can't wait to read this. Again, what the fuck is wrong with me? Have I learned nothing?) <a href="https://slate.com/culture/2020/07/charlie-kaufman-novel-antkind-book-review.html">https://slate.com/culture/2020/07/charlie-kaufman-novel-antkind-book-review.html</a></div>
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>*</b></div>
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>APPENDIX C</b></div>
<div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b><br /></b></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>(A Short Cross-Section, in No Certain Order,</b></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>of Some of the </b><b>"Big," "Important," and/or </b><b>"Difficult" </b><b>Books</b></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>the Author Has Started--With the Best of Intentions--</b><b>but Left Unfinished...So Far)</b></div>
</div>
<br />
<br />
<ul>
<li><i>Swann's Way (In Search of Lost Time: Volume One)</i>, Marcel Proust</li>
<li><i>War and Peace</i>, Leo Tolstoy</li>
<li><i>The Goldfinch</i>, Donna Tartt *</li><li><i>Lolita</i>, Vladimir Nabakov</li>
<li><i>The Complete Works of William Shakespeare</i>, William Shakespeare</li>
<li><i>L'Morte d'Arthur</i>, Sir Thomas Malory</li>
<li><i>The Collected Stories of Amy Hempel</i>, Amy Hempel</li>
<li><i>Paradise Lost</i>, John Milton</li>
<li><i>The Left Hand of Darkness</i>, Ursula K. Le Guin</li><li><i>The Dark Tower (Series)</i>, Stephen King</li><li><i>The Lottery and Other Stories</i>, Shirley Jackson</li><li><i>The Crossing (The Border Trilogy: Volume Two),</i> Cormac McCarthy</li>
<li><i>Divine Comedy</i>, Dante Alighieri</li>
<li><i>Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell: A Novel</i>, Susanna Clarke</li><li><i>A Soldier of the Great War</i>, Mark Helprin</li><li><i>Jude the Obscure</i>, Thomas Hardy</li><li><i>The Chronicles of Narnia, </i>C.S. Lewis</li>
<li><i>The Golden Bowl</i>, Henry James</li><li><i>Consider the Lobster</i>, David Foster Wallace</li><li><i>Sister Carrie</i>, Theodore Dreiser</li>
<li><i>Forty Stories, </i>Donald Barthelme</li><li><i>The Collected Stories of Flannery O'Connor</i>, Flannery O'Connor</li>
<li>etc.</li>
</ul><div><br /></div><div> * (I've tried twice. I honestly can't do it--and what's more important, maybe, I don't seem to want to do it. I think I'm alone on this one, though, so someone please tell me what I'm missing here with Tartt's Pulitzer Prize-winning novel.)</div><div> </div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>____________________</b></div>
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />David Newsomhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02698845610286763351noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1218241678607183535.post-18646056787020175232020-06-01T13:53:00.000-07:002020-06-14T21:13:08.485-07:00Nine Minutes, Nine Different Ways: a primary source (6/1/20)<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>Monday, March 25, 2020</i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>Minneapolis, MN</i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>____________</b></div>
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b><u>1</u></b></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
"I can't<br />
breathe<br />
please the<br />
knee<br />
in my<br />
neck<br />
my stomach<br />
hurts<br />
everything hurts<br />
please<br />
don't kill<br />
me<br />
Mama I'm<br />
through"<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b><u>2</u></b></div>
<br />
"I<br />
can't breathe<br />
please<br />
the knee<br />
in<br />
my neck<br />
my<br />
stomach hurts<br />
everything<br />
hurts please<br />
don't<br />
kill me<br />
Mama<br />
I'm through"<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b><u>3</u></b></div>
<br />
"I can't breathe<br />
please<br />
<br />
the knee in<br />
my<br />
<br />
neck my stomach<br />
hurts<br />
<br />
everything hurts please<br />
don't<br />
<br />
kill me Mama<br />
<br />
I'm<br />
through"<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<u><b>4</b></u></div>
<br />
"Ican'tbreathepleasethekneeinmyneckmystomachhurtseverythinghurtspleasedon'tkillme<b>MAMA</b>I'mthrough"<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b><u>5</u></b></div>
<br />
"I can't breathe please the<br />
knee in my neck my stomach<br />
hurts everything hurts<br />
<br />
please<br />
don't<br />
kill<br />
<br />
me <i>Mama I'm through</i>"<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b><u>6</u></b></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
"I can't breathe please<br />
the knee in my<br />
neck my stomach hurts<br />
everything hurts please don't<br />
<br />
kill me Mama I'm<br />
through"<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b><u>7</u></b></div>
<br />
"<b>I CAN'T</b><br />
(breathe)<br />
<br />
please<br />
theknee<br />
in my<br />
<b>NECK</b><br />
my stomach<br />
<b>HURTS</b><br />
<br />
(everythinghurts) please<br />
<br />
<b>DON'T KILL ME</b><br />
<br />
Mama<br />
<br />
I'mthrough"<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b><u>8</u></b></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
"I</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
can't</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
breathe</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
please</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
the</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
knee</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
in</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
my</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
neck</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
my</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
stomach</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
hurts</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
everything</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
hurts</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
please</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
don't</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
kill</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
me</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
Mama</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
I'm</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
through"</div>
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b><u>9</u></b></div>
<br />
"I can't<br />
<br />
breathe<br />
<br />
<i>please</i><br />
<br />
the knee in<br />
<br />
my neck<br />
<br />
my stomach<br />
hurts everything<br />
hurts<br />
<br />
<i>please</i><br />
<i> don't</i><br />
<i> kill </i><br />
<i>me</i><br />
<br />
Ma<br />
ma<br />
<br />
I'm<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
through"<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />David Newsomhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02698845610286763351noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1218241678607183535.post-3029565204019680152020-05-28T14:05:00.000-07:002020-05-29T11:30:57.045-07:00Spring Day: a primary source (5/28/20)<br />
A spotted fox snake<br />
slips smooth from damp cool into<br />
morning warmth. I watch.<br />
<br />
Gentle rain, mid-day,<br />
birdsong loud in clear, washed air.<br />
(What is it they sing?)<br />
<br />
Rabbits taste their fill,<br />
licking drops from blades of grass,<br />
ears tall, turned to me.<br />
<br />
Sunset fire, old oak,<br />
runnelled bark glowing orange-red<br />
--a fine ambered scotch.<br />
<br />
Nightfall, moon is low,<br />
softened wind in trees beyond<br />
whispers, all alone.<br />
<br />David Newsomhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02698845610286763351noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1218241678607183535.post-56269833420478872432020-05-21T06:25:00.001-07:002020-05-23T08:08:46.529-07:00Trash-Talking: a primary source (5/21/20)<br />
<img alt="Should You Tamp Your Coffee? - Mr. Coffee" height="233" src="https://pictures.brafton.com/x_0_0_0_14120734_800.jpg" width="320" /><br />
<br />
This morning was like all the ones before,<br />
except, of course, how I forgot the all-<br />
important step of pouring coffee grinds<br />
into this old coffeemaker of mine.<br />
Missing was the familiar deep-rich waft<br />
of the dark-roasted Colombian bean.<br />
Waiting for me, instead, when the machine<br />
finished--something warmed and murky, but not<br />
coffee, not anything remotely close.<br />
I felt a moment's pity for myself<br />
and for the ruined, empty, wasted filter,<br />
its recycled life, raison d'etre,<br />
now in the trash atop yesterday's used<br />
filter--smug, proud, smirking, clutching its dregs.<br />
<br />David Newsomhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02698845610286763351noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1218241678607183535.post-68863300543645950082020-05-06T12:05:00.001-07:002020-06-14T21:14:11.573-07:00Intimacies: a primary source (5/6/20)<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<div style="text-align: left;">
"Grief makes everything intimate."</div>
</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<div style="text-align: left;">
-- John Irving, <i>The Hotel New Hampshire</i></div>
</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
__________</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<br />
These days we say "Hello" to strangers on our walks.<br />
I mean, not just the noncommittal nod and raised wave,<br />
but we actually say, "Hello,"<br />
along with, "How are you?"<br />
to people we don't even know but feel we do.<br />
"How are you?" we ask,<br />
and we mean it.<br />
<br />
These days we meet alone together<br />
for micro-concerts from musicians<br />
in their living-rooms not all that different<br />
from our own, we notice, feeling a new connection to them.<br />
<i>Oh, I have that pillow--or used to, at least.</i><br />
<i>And that sconce, that picture: She likes horses.</i><br />
<br />
And these days we gather separately as one<br />
in the cluttered study of a former poet laureate,<br />
who sits at a book-strewn desk--volumes of his published verse<br />
sticky-noted with fluorescent flags to mark his pages,<br />
semaphore motioning us forward,<br />
speaking to us,<br />
calling us in.<br />
<br />
A silver shovel leans alone<br />
against the back wall behind him<br />
below a painted airplane<br />
in clouds.<br />
<br />
These days are the days of silent applause, assent, acclamation.<br />
A choir of colorful voices singing in<br />
yellow smiles, red hearts, blue thumbs.<br />
Some to say, "I love you."<br />
Some to say, "Thank you."<br />
Some to say, "How are you?"<br />
Some to say, "I hope all is well."<br />
Some to say, "I miss you."<br />
Some to say, "I will miss this."<br />
Some to say, "This is good."<br />
Some to say, "This means something."<br />
Some to say, "Stay."<br />
Some to say, "Don't go away."<br />
Some to say, "I love you."<br />
<br />
But these days I wonder if<br />
(when all of this is over)<br />
we really will remember.<br />
Will we recall these days of forced separateness,<br />
quarantined togetherness,<br />
lonely intimacies forged of necessity,<br />
longing, longed for, long-distance?<br />
<br />
Cautious eyes catching glances<br />
over our masks we wear to meet the masks we meet,<br />
we carry along with us the ache of episodic memory,<br />
though we don't go anywhere with it, these days,<br />
aside from deeper into memory, deeper into ache,<br />
like a stubbed toe in the dark, perhaps,<br />
reminding us that this is what the world feels like,<br />
this is what the living feel,<br />
and consoling us with<br />
some remembered future scene--<br />
<br />
a crowded restaurant,<br />
a single table,<br />
the din of noise, and conversation, and kitchen<br />
silverware and dishes and cups,<br />
and laughter, and music.<br />
A young waitress not old enough yet to call me "Hon"<br />
will balance coffee in hand, my bill in the other,<br />
and set it in a syrup spill beside my plate.<br />
She will smile at me, then, and ask the inevitable about a refill,<br />
adding, in a cigarette-voice beyond her years,<br />
"Was everything good here, hon?"<br />
And I will smile back to her, my mask at home, and answer,<br />
"Yes. It was. Thank you. Everything was good...."<br />
And I will mean it.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />David Newsomhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02698845610286763351noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1218241678607183535.post-62449788177828824762020-03-22T10:05:00.001-07:002022-01-22T13:15:45.434-08:00"Act of God Days": a primary source (3/21/20)<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<b>* * *</b></div>
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This is new. And yet, at the same time, not new. It's all rather inescapably old, actually.<br />
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<b>* * *</b></div>
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An <i>unintentional</i> history buff, of sorts, I've always read up on the accounts of pestilence, and plague, and privation that have accosted mankind--all acting very much...well...like a pest--throughout history. The influenza epidemic of 1918. The ceaseless waves of the Black Plague that ebbed and flowed centuries ago, pitilessly drowning out uncountable portions of Europe in its recurring flood.</div>
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An <i>intentional</i> English/Language Arts teacher, by trade, I've taught--uncountable times--the history of Elizabethan England, and the Bard, and the role of the theater in Shakespeare's day, and the cycles of invasion from the unseen enemy, carried by fleas, that caused panic, and disruption, and death. Time and time again, the plague would rear its head, and time and time again an aristocratic decree would go forth, closing public meeting places: pubs, churches, theaters--anywhere where people could gather in large groups; anywhere where people could be found congregating, talking, laughing, sharing their lives, living.</div>
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It foolishly never occurred to me that it would happen here (to me, to us, to mankind) in my lifetime. Not seriously, anyway. Oh sure, of course I was blindly aware of the chances. I was aware of the increasing likelihood, given the explosion of the world's population, the shrinking of the world through the ease of travel, and the fluctuating health codes around the world, and environmental changes during modern history. It was always all there, swirling like some dark witch's brew, waiting, hinting of itself, teasing us with the occasional SARS outbreak, or Ebola scare, or bioterrorism threat, and the like.</div>
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It all sounded like the latest apocalyptic end-of-the-world movie plot. It all read like a great, dark, dystopian metaphor of the future or alternate universe, from the minds of writers like George Orwell, or Margaret Atwood, or Albert Camus, or Stephen King. But it wasn't real. It couldn't really be real. It was just entertainment. It was art. It was something to be mindful of. Something to heed. Something to admire. Something to study. But not something real. It was just there...</div>
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And now it's here. And it's real.</div>
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<b>* * *</b></div>
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I teach high school English. (Old-fashioned reading and writing--the basics--the required core subject, the one that never quite seems to go away.) I've been an English teacher now for over 20 years. I began teaching 7th-8th grade Language Arts, and then returned to school, myself, to get a master's degree in Literature/Writing, with the idea of someday pursuing a doctoral program. I wanted to be a college professor somewhere, <i>Dr. Newsom, PhD,</i> walking the quad in my tweed jacket, a couple of books stashed under my arm for safekeeping, a leather satchel swinging by my side. The whole look. The whole thing.</div>
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<i>[Aside: "O Captain! My Captain!..."]</i></div>
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While that didn't quite take shape the way I imagined, perhaps, I did at least complete my master's degree, allowing me to teach adjunct classes at nearby smaller colleges, as well as giving me the opportunity to teach online college courses and dual-credit classes offered to students in various ways today.</div>
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Over the past 15 years, I have steadily taught English at a local high school in my little sub-suburban area southwest of Chicago. These days, I primarily teach seniors and juniors in high school. And it's been a good gig. Of course I could complain. (Teachers are good at that, take my word for it.) But, all in all, I can't really complain too much. My job is a good job. And I think I'm pretty good at it. And I like it.</div>
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With the emergence of COVID-19 (a.ka. the "Novel Coronavirus") in the United States, schools, last week, began to close. At first--in apparent confusion at what was actually happening and how quickly it was all happening--state governors, and state education boards, and local school districts scrambled to come up with an immediate joint-plan. Schools would be closed temporarily, they decided, at least through the end of March. Schools would use their normal "Emergency Days"--held in reserve (again, in normal situations) for normal occurrences, like snow days. State governors and state education boards then moved to grant "Act of God Days" to local districts (days beyond the normal, contractual Emergency Days) that would extend indefinitely, and that would not be held against students (who would be--through no fault of their own--obviously falling short of the normally required 180 days of school attendance), and that would not have to be accounted for nor made up.</div>
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It wasn't long, though, before some states (including my home state of Kansas) declared the 2019-20 school year officially over. It was a wash, Gov. Laura Kelly declared; there would be no resuming of classes. Soon, a few other states fell in line.</div>
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<i>[Aside: There will be more.]</i></div>
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Yesterday, Friday, March 20, Illinois Governor, JB Pritzker, declared that his state (along, so far, with two other states, New York and California) would be issued a "shelter-in-place" order (or a "stay-at-home" order), beginning at 5 p.m. the following day, Saturday (today), March 21, and running (at least for right now, anyway) through Tuesday, April 7.</div>
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And so it begins.</div>
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My cupboards are fairly stocked with food. I did some quick grocery shopping before all of this, but I admittedly wasn't very careful (or not as careful as I could have been) when grabbing things from the shelves to have at home. I have enough to get by for now. But eventually I'm going to have to venture out and restock on the necessities--food, toiletries, drink, and the like.</div>
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The thought of venturing out is a little unnerving. I won't lie. While we are allowed to resume our "normal lives" within reason--such as venturing out for "essentials" only--we are required to remain at home as much as possible. We are required to limit our going out to things like groceries, gas, visits to the doctor, to the pharmacy, going for walks, running, being outside, breathing the fresh air, all within safe "social distancing" of 6 ft. or so.</div>
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It all seems so surreal, but this is our "new normal." (I already hate that tired phrase.)</div>
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Right now, restaurants are closed, except for "curb service" and delivery. I already miss going out to eat. Something as simple and as privileged as that.</div>
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* * *</div>
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Will liquor stores be allowed to stay open? Is alcohol considered an "essential," during these "Act of God" days?</div>
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I'm divorced. I have been for 16 years, now.</div>
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<i>[Aside: Jesus Christ, how is that possible?]</i></div>
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My daughters are now 20 and 17 years old, respectively. My older daughter is in college--currently attending a local community college, with plans to transfer, next year, to Illinois University-Purdue University Indianapolis, studying Forensic Biology. My younger daughter is a senior in high school this year. <i>[Aside: My heart breaks for her...] </i>Her plans, upon graduation, are to attend the University of Illinois at Chicago, studying Pre-Dentistry.</div>
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Right now, at this very moment as I write, they are with their mother. They live not even 5 minutes from my door. She and I agreed--unspokenly, even--on an amicable divorce, particularly with the girls. And I've always been proud of that. When they were younger, my daughters split their time between their mother and me, basically half-and-half, at times. Now that they're older, I don't see them as often--what with their friends, and with school, and with being girls of that age.</div>
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I get it. But I'm used to being alone, I guess I'm trying to say.</div>
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Still, I miss them. And I think of them all the time. Literally. And I wish, right now, that they were here with me, I won't lie. But I check in with them daily, several times throughout the day (as I have always done), and it comforts me to know that they are safe.</div>
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But still...</div>
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<i>* * *</i></div>
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I read. I go for walks. I currently take my temperature three times a day--just to check. I listen to music. I'm having a pretty good time, actually, digging through my old album collection, rediscovering stuff I haven't listened to for years. I watch movies--I love the art of cinema. </div>
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<i>[Aside: This is not necessarily a time of cruel-and-unusual punishment for me, in other words.]</i></div>
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Of course, I spend an inordinate amount of time on streaming services like Netflix, Hulu, YouTube, et al. Of course, there are our phones, our social media, our connections with others and with the outside world. Our families. Our friends.</div>
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All of this was/is so easy to take for granted. Maybe something like this virus will reprogram our brains a little bit. Give our souls a little reshuffle. A reset.</div>
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I think we all could use that.</div>
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My immediate family--my mother and my three brothers--all live states away. I moved the furthest away from home, drifting toward the Chicago area in 1995. My mother still lives, alone (after my father's death in 2008), in the old farmhouse where I grew up in the middle of Kansas. My oldest brother stayed home with his family and works the farm. My second brother lives with his family in Omaha, Nebraska. My younger brother lives with his family in Kansas City, Kansas.</div>
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We've always been close, and we've always kept in touch with one another, albeit sporadically at times. I have them, and I check in with them more regularly these days, and they with me. And that's a good thing. I miss them.</div>
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Being a teacher, I'm trying to work from home, as we've been directed to do. In the mornings, I'm trying to maintain some sort of scheduled normalcy when it comes to my job. "Remote Learning" is the sudden term these days, and so I have all my junior and senior English classes set up on Google Classroom, and Zoom, and I check in with them (I "Zoom" with them--this is the world we live in now), and I assign them chapters to read from their novels (which I can only hope they have with them at home during this time), and I sometimes provide links to articles and to essays online, urging them to comment and to respond. Urging them to stay awake to the world around them. Urging them to pay attention. To observe. To record. To learn. </div>
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My students (as well as myself, my family, my daughters, my friends, everyone I know and don't know) are all living through history right now. We are, most definitely, living "in the moment."</div>
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Are we awake? Are we adequately paying attention? Are we observing what's happening to the world--to the larger world, certainly, but also to our immediate, personal worlds? Are we recording our thoughts, our feelings, our anxieties, our desires, our fears, our loves? Are we aware of any of that, even?</div>
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Are we learning?</div>
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In the realm of research writing, I teach my students that there are two basic types of sources that they will always come across, no matter the topic.</div>
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1.) Primary Source</div>
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2.) Secondary Source</div>
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A "primary source" is exactly that: It is a primary piece of writing (or video, or music, or whatever) that someone took the time to record during a moment in history. A primary source comes directly in and from the moment it is produced. It is an historical time capsule, an actual expression of thoughts, and feelings, and anxieties, and desires, and fears, and loves, perfectly (or imperfectly) set down and preserved for posterity.</div>
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A "secondary source," then, is also exactly what it says it is: It is a source removed from the primary source (once, or twice, or 200 times removed), written and/or recorded by someone commenting, from a distance, on the primary source, itself.</div>
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We are in "Act of God Days," to be sure. We are also living in "primary source" days.</div>
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Tonight, I re-watched (yes, on Netflix) the 1993 Bill Murray film, <i>Groundhog Day</i>. I love that movie. It's funny. It's well written. It's insightful and incisive. It lasts. It deserves to be called a classic. </div>
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<i>[Aside: I also might mention that the nature of that film's story never seemed quite so unnervingly relevant as it does now. But I digress....]</i></div>
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I watched the movie, this time, long-distance with a friend of mine. She lives about 30 minutes from me and is currently at home. All is good. But we decided, tonight, to call one another, and to scan the list of movies on our menus (a comedy, for God's sake!), and we struck an easy deal with <i>Groundhog Day</i>. We then, each of us, fixed ourselves a drink, settled into our favorite chair and/or couch (30 miles from one another), synchronized our starts via our remote controls, and stayed on the phone as we talked, and laughed, and watched the movie "together."</div>
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<b>* * *</b></div>
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Where I live, I have a nice view onto my backyard, butted up against a wooded area, as it is. There are animals--the occasional possum, or raccoon, or deer, or coyote. Beyond the woods and the narrow creek (Nettle Creek, it's called) that flows behind me, I can hear (always, incessantly) the hum of traffic along Interstate-80, flowing, at all times, to and from Chicago, and to points east and west beyond.</div>
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The semi-trucks continue to roll along the highway, I notice. I can hear them and even see them, with the trees being bare of leaves at this time of year. And my heart actually swells at the sound and the sight of them. Who knew that it would be truckdrivers, of all professions, who would be counted among our heroes during these days? And the nurses, and the doctors, and the law-enforcement, and the first-responders. They are working to keep life going. They are working to keep some sense of status quo in the midst of our disruption. They are working to keep some sense of humanity and normalcy alive.</div>
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It's happening. There is life outside my windows.</div>
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<b>* * *</b></div>
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I watch the birds in my backyard. The robins are out--it's spring, after all. That's what robins do. They're still hopping through the grass, heads cocked to the ground, listening for their worms. The occasional cardinal makes an appearance still--I have a couple of flashes of red and red-grey that live in the trees behind me. And the occasional streak of blue-and-white from the bluejays living not far above me. I used to have an owl that took up residence in an old, dead oak, but I haven't seen or heard from the wise old bird in a long time--ever since the oak tree fell in a storm. The owl must have flown on, carrying with it its lonely, haunting call. Later in the spring and in the summer, I will again put out my hummingbird feeder and see if I can draw their petite attention.</div>
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Grey squirrels are at play (or are they fighting? it's so hard to tell with squirrels), chasing each other candy-cane striped fashion up the trunks of the trees in the woods behind me. In time, the large family of rabbits that populate the gently sloped hill in my backyard will come out from their winter sleep, and I will sit on my deck again and watch them contentedly chewing their blades of grass in the quiet of early evenings before dusk. Before sunset. Before nightfall.</div>
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I will watch for them.</div>
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Life goes on.<br />
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David Newsomhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02698845610286763351noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1218241678607183535.post-84438459857550046572020-01-04T09:52:00.002-08:002022-01-22T13:16:09.949-08:00The Revolution is Definitely Going to Be Televised: Netflix, the Local Cineplex, and the Movie Year that WasThese are interesting days to be a film buff.<br />
<br />We're fortunate, I think, to be in the middle of a revolution these days of film and film production. There's a fight going on (whether you care or are aware of it or not) for not only the kind of movies that are being made today but also the manner in which films are being made, marketed, and released today.<br />
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Modern streaming services like Netflix, Hulu, Amazon Prime, <i>et al</i>. have changed the game in determining what movies we want presented to us, how we want to select our movies, and how we want to watch our movies. It is to stay at home these days--in the comfort and ease of our overstuffed chairs and couches, and our overstuffed surroundings, and our overstuffed sweatpants and pajamas, and our overstuffed flat-screen TVs in the corner of the room.<br />
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It is comfortable and easy these days to stay home and download a movie, or stream it, or simply "pirate it" (let's be honest). Going to the old-school trouble of actually getting dressed to step outside, and face the elements, and confront the crowds, and do the unthinkable of entering the age-old traditional movie-theater cineplex for something as old-fashioned crazy as "going to the movies" takes some revolutionary courage, itself, today. The playing field has evolved, and it is perhaps not what we knew when we were growing up.<br />
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All in an attempt to rebuff this growing competition, a pleasant outgrowth of this battle is the fact that it's never been more comfortable to go to the movie-theaters and to watch a movie. In many places, ticket prices have lowered to somewhat reasonable levels.<br />
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<i>[Aside: It would be nice, now, if the movie-theaters' concessions stands would follow suit. I'm sort of tired of being gobsmacked by laying down a crisp $20 bill on the counter for a small Coke and a small popcorn and not receiving any change back. But I digress....]</i><br />
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Nowadays, a moviegoer is expected (and almost required) to visit the theater's online site first, buy tickets there, and reserve seats. Which means, of course, no more unnecessary standing in unnecessary lines. No more worrying about getting a good seat. No more worrying period, for that matter. It's easy. It's simple. It's guaranteed, every time.<br />
<br />
And speaking of seats: Movie-theaters have gone the extra mile in completely restructuring and redesigning the whole idea of movie-theater seating. Nowadays, most up-to-date cineplexes come complete with oversized, soft-leather reclining seats, warming coils, blankets, and swivel trays for food and drink. And young theater-staff serve as waiters and waitresses now, bringing your concessions orders directly from the lobby to you, as you sit comfortably in the dark in your seat.<br />
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<i>[Aside: But unfortunately you're still not getting back any change for your snacks.]</i><br />
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It is, admittedly, an elegant improvement. And if it's keeping movie-theaters alive in 2019--getting people to leave the comfort of home and the convenience of their Netflix subscription to face the weather, and the traffic, and the crowds, and the reality of traditional movie-viewing at these new, modernized movie-houses--then so be it. There is still (even in this jaded, uber-downloadable age of the late 2010s) something to be said, after all, for going to the movie-theater to see a movie. The smell of the popcorn that hits you at the front door, making your mouth water. The richness and the fullness of the sound system. The clarity and the crispness of the digital projection. The vastness of the big screen.<br />
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Going to the movies is still an event, just as it's always been. But now--with so many other streaming challengers vying for our time and attention (and, let's face it, the simplicity of just staying at home in our sweatpants and our pajamas and "ordering up" a movie online is hard to compete against; there's no getting around it)--movie theaters have a monumental task ahead of them if they're going to stay relevant and alive. Movie theaters have a mountain to climb, now, if they're going to hold on to their place as a cathedral, of sorts--a holy place, the grail castle, holding in our hearts the nostalgic, traditional memory of the place where we go, with strangers in a darkened room, to experience the experience of the movies.<br />
<br />
But along with all of this, then, is another interesting wrinkle to the story. Streaming services (like, particularly, Netflix, again) have proven--at a remarkably fast pace--to be a formidable competitor. Not only did Netflix learn to play the game early on with movie theaters, but in recent years the company has grown into a powerful movie studio system in its own right. As a result, Netflix has changed not only the rules of the game but also the very layout of the playing field.<br />
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Netflix is not a joke, in other words. It really is here to stay, it would seem. And while it's here, it is determined to earn its share (and more) of movie audiences. And it's doing this by quickly expanding into the movie-production business. Of course, for many years now it has created its own original series, and specials, and shows, available only by subscription. But in no time at all (and I mean in what seems like a mere blink of an eye), Netflix Studios has moved into the world of financing, producing, and marketing a growing roll call of impressive, award-worthy motion pictures. Netflix has entered the ring with the big boys--United Artists, Paramount, Universal,<i> et al.</i>--and has established itself, quickly, as a powerhouse to be reckoned with.<br />
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Just for example, let's take a look back at 2018, when suddenly little Netflix was appearing on the radar with a list of serious films by serious filmmakers--films that were being endorsed by critics, embraced by audiences, and encouraged by Academy votes as awards season drew near. Top-shelf filmmakers--like brothers, Joel and Ethan Coen--released their 2018 Netflix film, <i>The Ballad of Buster Scruggs</i>, both on the streaming service and (concurrently) in a limited number of theaters for a limited theatrical run. Alfonso Cuaron repeated this double-release formula with his heralded 2018 film, <i>Roma</i>, which aired on Netflix while also playing a limited release in theaters throughout the country. <i>Roma</i> was not only my pick for the best film of 2018, but it topped "Best Of" lists of many critics and filmgoers of last year.<br />
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<i>[Aside: Of course, it was not meant to be. The Hollywood powers that be--older, established, and unwilling to see this new kid on the block, Netflix, as anything but an interloper in the world of the old Hollywood ways of doing business--decried the nominations of Cuaron's film (though it deserved all the praise it received, in my opinion) and, as we may all remember, bestowed its highest award of Best Picture of the Year to the safe, comfortable, PC film, </i>Green Book<i>, released by (...wait for it...) Universal Pictures. The fallout of it all, however is: </i>Roma<i> is a film that is a genuine work of art and will last (although snubbed by the establishment because of the name Netflix in its credits); </i>Green Book<i>, on the other hand is...well...does anyone even remember it, one year later? Hello? Is this thing on?...]</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
And by way of a third example of Netflix's presence in the film industry in 2018, one need look no further than Tamara Jenkins' beautiful, sad, funny, and achingly honest feature, <i>Private Life</i>. It was one of the best films of 2018, but as it turns out--for some inexplicable reason--it just sort of lingered in the shadows and stayed there. Though it would eventually receive the same double-release treatment as <i>Roma</i> and <i>The Ballad of Buster Scruggs</i>--its brother and sister on Netflix--the cineplex release didn't happen immediately. And so, unfortunately and unfairly, <i>Private Life</i> failed to gain much notice when it came time, later in the year, for the major awards season. For whatever reason, <i>Private Life</i> did not get the attention it should have gotten--from the critics, from filmgoers, and even from yours truly.<br />
<br />
<i>[Aside: More on this topic below, in my lists, actually.]</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
Which brings us (finally) to this year's "Best Of" list of films, 2019. And a cursory glance at the studios that I've included for my picks will tell you immediately the lay of the land for the playing field these days. For example, the little studio, A24 (which has, over the past several years, been home to a number of high-quality, smaller, independent-style films) claims four films to its credit on my various lists below. The streaming service, Hulu, claims one. And the giant, Netflix, has emerged from the footlights this year to stand fully in the spotlight, center stage, with five of my favorite films of this year to its credit.<br />
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And it's not just me. One or two of these Netflix films are being embraced and lauded--nearly universally--as one or two of the finest films of the year. And with another awards season quickly approaching, the interloping new kid on the block may finally elbow its way this year all the way to the big stage, to claim what it deserves.<br />
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The old ways of Hollywood may be teetering on its pedestals. "The center cannot hold," T.S. Eliot warned. Statues may fall this year. (Or in the year to follow. Or the next year....) Or be pulled down.<br />
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The revolution is at hand. And these are interesting times to love the movies.<br />
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<b><br /></b></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>LIST #3</b><br />
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<b>Movies From 2019 I Still Haven't Seen Yet (To Date) </b><b>That I'm Guessing Probably Would Have Made It </b><b>Somewhere On My "End-of-Year Best-Of" List</b></div>
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<b>(Had I Seen Them In Time)</b></div>
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<b><br /></b></div>
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<b>1.)<i> The Farewell </i>-- (Director: Lulu Wang, Studio: A24)</b><br />
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Obviously--as the title of this list more than clearly spells out--I have not seen this film yet, although I want to. But from everything I've read about it, and from just the trailer alone, I can tell this is a fantastic film. And the emerging star of Awkwafina may be deservedly on the rise. Nominations are in order for her, from what I understand. And I hope that happens.<br />
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<b>2.)<i> A Hidden Life </i>-- (Director: Terrence Malick, Studio: Fox Searchlight Pictures)</b><br />
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Love him as a philosophical film-poet, or dismiss him as a pretentious, bloated hack (and I am decidedly in the former camp), director Terrence Malick has made a handful of some of the finest modern American films that we have in the canon: <i>Badlands</i> (1973); <i>Days of Heaven</i> (1978); <i>The Thin Red Line</i> (1998); <i>Tree of Life</i> (2011). To put it simply, I would go see any film made by Malick. He is a treasure.<br />
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<b>3.)<i> The Lighthouse </i>-- (Director:<i> </i>Robert Eggers, Studio: A24)</b><br />
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I admittedly don't know much about this film, other than that it stars Willem Dafoe, Robert Pattinson, and a seagull. I also know that the black-and-white cinematography by Jarin Blaschke is being praised. Oh...and the name Robert Eggers gets my attention, as well, as he helmed 2015's unsettlingly pleasant surprise, <i>The Witch</i>. Weirdness reigns amid the rocks and the waves, by all accounts. I can't wait.<br />
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<b>4.)<i> Little Women </i>-- (Director: Greta Gerwig, Studio: Sony Pictures)</b><br />
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Former "mumblecore" leading lady and newly emerging director-par-excellence (her debut, 2017's <i>Lady Bird</i>, was the best movie of that year, in my opinion), Greta Gerwig is rising on the scene as a huge talent. Reuniting with her <i>Lady Bird</i> star, Saoirse Ronan, this new updating of Alcott's famous, beloved novel--in the hands of Gerwig--is getting some new life breathed into (c.a. the age of women's empowerment). It may be upsetting some devoted fans of the book, who view the written text as Gospel, clearly; but it seems the majority of audience members are pleased with this retelling. Two things are certain, regardless: Both Gerwig and Ronan have proven themselves great at their respective art. They work well together, too.<br />
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<b>5.)<i> 1917 -- (Director: Sam Mendes, Studio: Universal Pictures)</i></b><br />
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To date, this film hasn't even been released yet, but good Lord...the trailers. This thing looks good. This thing looks really good. And, supposedly, it has been filmed and cut to appear as if the entire film is all shot in one long take. Cinematic experimentalism on early-20th century battlefields, all in the capable hands of Sam Mendes. I look forward to seeing it.<br />
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<b>6.)<i> Uncut Gems </i>-- (Directors:<i> </i>Josh Safdie and Bennie Safdie, Studio: A24)</b><br />
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I think I know even less about this film, really, than any of the others, except for the fact that it's getting some explosively good initial reviews--particularly Sandler's dramatic performance as a jeweler/gambler gone bad. Sandler has been on the skids, career-wise, for a while now. But I've always found him particularly interesting when he ventures into dramatic territory. His nervous, angsty, angry shtick works really well in the handful of dramas that he's been in. He's got the goods. I'd like to see this, if for no other reason than to watch Sandler's performance.<br />
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<b style="font-size: medium;">LIST #2</b></div>
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<b>2019 Honorable Mentions *</b></div>
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<b>1.)</b><b><i> Catch-22 -- (Directors: George Clooney, Grant Heslov, and Ellen Kuras, Studio: Hulu)</i></b><br />
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So, my various lists here are going to start getting a little more interesting, with more of the entries reflecting some of the "revolutionary" aspects I alluded to above. And here is a perfect example to begin with: This year, the streaming service, Hulu, released a new 6-part adaptation of Joseph Heller's classic 1961 anti-war satire. Previously, the book had been interpreted for the big screen in 1970 by the young Broadway/Hollywood phenom-director, Mike Nichols, whose incredible one-two punch of 1966's classic film version of Edward Albee's, <i>Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?</i>, was followed one year later by the classic anthem of disaffected youth, <i>The Graduate</i>. Nichols' <i>Catch-22</i> is a fine film...but it's not great. It's certainly not without its problems. And the largest problem with it is that the bulk of Heller's book is either rewritten, reshaped, truncated, or trimmed away entirely to fit Paramount's carefully budgeted 2-hour time frame. And the problem with that is you can't honestly (not to mention accurately) tell Heller's story in a 2-hour movie. So this is where the magic of streaming services like Hulu can pick up the slack and present a long-form serialized motion picture--like this one. Does this movie work? Yes...for the most part. It is not perfect. It has some problems still. But it is at least the closest thing to Heller's original, intended tone and vision that we've been allowed to see so far on the screen--large or small. Does a film like this (serialized, not released in the cineplexes but instead only streamed on a subscription service at home) belong in any discussion of "End-of-Year-Best-Of" lists. To quote Dylan, here: "The times, they are a'changin'." And I think in 2019 the answer to that question has to be, unequivocally, "Yes."<br />
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<b>2.) <i>Private Life </i>-- (Director:<i> </i>Tamara Jenkins, Studio: Netflix, 2018) *</b><br />
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Okay... I know. I know. I realize I'm not far into all this official listing business, and I've already cheated. I've already had to insert an asterisk. (I've already fucked things up; let's say it like it is.) But still... I feel compelled to include this film on my list of favorite movies that I watched this year--or at least an Honorable Mention, for God's sake--because even though it was released last year (literally, January, 2018), I did not get around to discovering this gem until this year, basically a year after its release. Let me be very honest: This is a wonderful movie; and had I been aware of it last year (I take total blame for this, for whatever reason), I would have included it on my list of favorite movies of 2018--alongside Netflix's <i>Roma</i> and <i>The Ballad of Buster Scruggs (</i>interestingly enough). But I didn't see it last year; I only saw it later--this year. And so, technically, it's one of the best movies I saw this year, 2019, even though it was released last year, and this little movie deserves an Honorable Mention mention, if nothing else. (And if that rationale sounds irrational and like I'm trying too hard to include a movie on a list simply because I want to include it, even though it doesn't belong and invalidates the whole notion of list-making...well...then, touche', I guess. I don't care: It's my list; I can do whatever the hell I want.)<br />
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<b>3.)<i> Rocketman </i>-- (Director:<i> </i>Dexter Fletcher, Studio: Paramount Pictures)</b><br />
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I heard the question asked: "Did we really need another biopic about a gay British rockstar, following last year's hugely popular biopic on Freddie Mercury, <i>Bohemian Rhapsody</i>?" Well, the answer this year was, "Sure. Why not?" Fletcher's take on the material, here, was interesting and came at me a little unexpected: I wasn't sure, at first, what everyone was doing during the opening musical numbers--singing and dancing, as if it were an old-fashioned movie musical. (Until the obvious occurred to me: That's exactly what was going on.) How clever to bring that approach to the life of Elton John and to the material of his songs. The movie worked.<br />
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<b>4.)<i> Tell Me Who I Am </i>-- (Director:<i> </i>Ed Perkins, Studio: Netflix)</b><br />
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This movie took my breath away. I was not expecting this when I started it. I didn't cheat and go online beforehand to look up spoilers. I simply watched the trailer for this documentary film on Netflix, and I saw the critical praise the film had garnered, and I decided to hit PLAY. And I couldn't take my eyes off it. And afterwards, I had to watch it again. And then I couldn't stop thinking about it--the ethical dilemma and argument that resides at the core of this story. The real-life drama that unfolds as two twin brothers confront each other, across a table, after years of silence and separation, and get down to truths and revelations about their family... The greatest playwrights living would not be able to script a better work of fiction than this true story, told minimally and effectively. A very powerful nonfiction film from Netflix.<br />
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<b>5.) <i>Us</i> -- (Director: Jordan Peele, Studio: Universal Pictures)</b><br />
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While I thought that Jordan Peele's 2017 directorial debut, <i>Get Out</i>, was a good film--well made and entertaining--I honestly felt it was overrated, too. I didn't think it was a bad movie, but I didn't think it was as great as everyone else seemed to think it was. And so this year, when Peele's follow-up came out, <i>Us</i>, I figured it might be the same kind of thing: An entertaining and well-made film, but nothing great. But I was wrong. <i>Us</i> is a much better film than its predecessor, I feel. There is a lot going on here. And after seeing it at a local cineplex with my two older-teen daughters, the drive home that night after the show was given over to discussing, and dissecting, and debating what we had just seen. (Not a bad way to spend an evening with my daughters....)<br />
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<b>6.) <i>When They See Us</i> -- (Director: Ava DuVernay, Studio: Netflix)</b><br />
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Another instance of a streaming service getting it right. When it comes to trying to tell an intricate story in a thorough, artistic, and emotionally satisfying way, this is how it's done. Like Hulu demonstrated earlier in the year with its long-form treatment of <i>Catch-22</i>, Netflix responded in kind with an amazingly powerful long-form telling of the infamous Central Park Five case of 1989. This movie hit audiences right in the gut, and it did not stop throughout the length of its four serialized chapters. It was a weakening experience watching this film. It hurt, emotionally. It gripped you, and it didn't let go. <i>When They See Us</i> is a perfect argument, in fact, for why the revolution in the film industry is happening and should be happening. This is what streaming services can do better than the old-fashioned Hollywood/feature-film system. This is a beautiful movie that could not have been told any better any other way.<br />
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<b style="font-size: medium;">LIST #1</b></div>
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<b>My Top 10 Films of 2019 </b><br />
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<b>10.) <i>B</i></b><b><i>ooksmart</i> -- (Director: Olivia Wilde, Studio: United Artists)</b><br />
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Like the second half of its title implies, the emphasis here is on "smart." The script of <i>Booksmart</i> is alive with intelligence and a caustic, raunchy, bold sense of humor. This is the kind of young-teen post-adolescence-on-the-cusp-of-adulthood sort of film that generally features young men in the leads. (<i>American Graffiti</i>. <i>Diner</i>. <i>Superbad</i>. I could go on...) In fact, it isn't too difficult to imagine a stereotypical film-pitch in some Hollywood producer's office, beginning, "Imagine <i>Superbad</i>. But with girls." And while that comparison is apt, and not really an insult, <i>Booksmart</i> is so much more than just "<i>Superbad</i> with girls." It is so much better than just that three-word encapsulation implies. At its heart, Beanie Feldstein and Kaitlyn Dever form an inseparable pair of irrepressibly lovable loners--two misfit young women, best friends since the playground, celebrating their last night together, and their first night ever of planned debauchery, before graduating from high school and going their separate ways. No, it's not a particularly original conceit, and it's not meant to be. That's part of the joy of it, actually. The familiar journey that the two girls go on over the course of one long night is a classic set-up that we've seen played out before...yes... But never quite like this. And it's a delightful breath of fresh air. It's a little bit trashy. It's a little bit raunchy. It's funny. It's silly. It's honest. It's moving. I really enjoyed it.<br />
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<b> 9.) </b><b><i>Joker </i>-- (Director:<i> </i>Todd Phillips, Studio: Warner Bros. Pictures)</b><br />
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This movie impressed me. Despite the fallout from negative criticism and controversies surrounding the movie's release (its purported careless disregard for on-screen violence; its supposed misrepresentation of mental illness; its accused pandering to cliches' and tropes from a handful of Martin Scorcese's early existential masterpieces), Phillips' film knocked my legs out from under me. It's a serious film that takes its subject matter, its genre, and its iconic anti-hero protagonist seriously. And Joaquin Phoenix's performance?... Well, this will be considered sacrilege by many avid contemporary filmgoers and film buffs, but for years now--since Christopher Nolan's 2008, <i>The Dark Knight</i>--Heath Ledger's mesmerizing performance of The Joker (his last role, as it turned out) has been considered the career-defining performance, the golden ring, the standard-bearer. In my opinion, though, Phoenix overshadows Ledger's performance. He outdoes him. This is jawdropping method-acting going on in this movie. Joaquin Phoenix deserves recognition for what he's done here.</div>
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<b>8.) </b><b><i>A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood</i> -- (Director: Marielle Heller, Studio: Sony Pictures)</b><br />
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In the spirit of full disclosure: I was actually a little reluctant to go see this movie, at first. I was a big fan of Morgan Neville's 2018 documentary film, <i>Won't You Be My Neighbor?</i> In fact, that film appeared on my "Best Of" list last year. Similarly, Gavin Edwards' 2019 book, <i>Kindness and Wonder: Why Mr. Rogers Matters Now More Than Ever,</i> appeared on a recent list of mine, as I tallied some of my favorite reads of the past year. Let's face it: In an irony that even he could not have foreseen, it is "hip" these days to jump on the Mr. Rogers fan-bus. And I'm actually all-in on that. I get it. When I was sitting in the theater last year, watching Neville's documentary, I am not too proud to admit that, sitting there in the dark with a room full of strangers (as is the custom when venturing forth to watch a movie the old-fashioned way), I found myself crying more than once. A knot in the back of the throat. A tightening of air passages. Eyes filling with tears. And crying. More than once. And I wondered about that: Why? What about this man, Fred Rogers, has the power today to elicit--from a grown man, like myself--such emotions coming out of nowhere? Am I depressed? Am I sad? Is it the times that we live in--so disruptive, so divided, so acidic, so knee-jerk volatile, and so angry? Everything about this gentle, kind man represents the exact opposite of all of that, and I think Neville's 2018 documentary film--as does Heller's 2019 feature film, here-- captures the spirit and the soul of Fred Rogers so perfectly. He is an antidote for our times. He, and everything that he was and that he still represents, is what we are missing today, and maybe what we need. And, so, yes, I did go see Heller's movie (as I knew I would all along). And, yes, Tom Hanks is his usual brilliant self. But so much more than that, even, it's the film's script, and the rest of the cast, and the direction, and the art design, and the spirit of Fred Rogers running through every frame of the movie. It's all rather lovely and...well...beautiful.<br />
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<b><i> 7.) Jojo Rabbit</i> -- (Director: Taika Waititi, Studio: Fox Searchlight Pictures)</b></div>
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I guess in a roundabout way you could say this movie is the best thing to come out of Disney's subsidiary, Marvel Studios, in all of 2019. <i>[Aside: I'm not kidding.]</i> For what do you do after making a truckload of money, directing 2017's <i>Thor: Ragnarok</i>? Well, for starters--if you're Taika Waititi--you take the helm of a little dream-project inspired by Christine Leunen's international bestselling novel, <i>Caging Skies</i>, which tells the story of a young boy, Johannes Betzler, a member of the Hitler Youth, growing up in Nazi-controlled Vienna during W.W.II as a lonely, sensitive, imaginative, and compassionate little boy who has, as his imaginary friend, none other than Adolf Hitler.<i> [Aside: And it's right about here where I usually lose people when trying to explain the premise of this film.]</i> How, you might ask, does Waititi take this outrageous (and possibly even offensive) concept and turn it into one of the brightest, funniest, deepest, saddest, liveliest, most run-out-of-the-theater-afterwards-and-tell-all-your-friends-to-go-see-it movies of the year? Well...he does it. Channeling the likes of auteur filmmaker, Wes Anderson, Waititi brings just the right touch to his material, letting this gentle little fable unfold to share its message of love and understanding and acceptance. And by the time we, along with little Jojo, discover the tough and tender Jewish girl that his mother is hiding in their house, there is no turning away from this film. It's extraordinary. <i>Jojo Rabbit</i> is one of the great surprises for me this year. A great little film.</div>
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<b> 6.) <i>Midsommar</i> -- (Director: Ari Aster, Studio: A24)</b></div>
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More than any movie on my list (for whatever this may or may not say about me), Aster's movie lingered in the back of my mind long after I finished watching it--replaying scenes, images, and ideas over, and over, and over. This movie haunted me, disturbed me, intrigued me, fascinated me, and finally convinced me that it is, in fact, a great movie. Of course, as soon as a filmmaker/artist comes along and tries to do something startling and fresh, the negative appraisals and accusations are quick to surface, claiming that actually <i>Midsommar</i> was just a crude and easily apparent "lifting" of Robin Hardy's creepy 1973 cult-classic, <i>Wicker Man</i>. But that's not true. And it's selling both movies too short, I think. Yes, are there some motifs and tones and themes from Hardy's film that reappear in Aster's story? Of course. Such criticisms mean nothing to me, though, since they seem to act as if art (any art) exists in a vacuum somehow, oblivious to the inspirations and the influences of all the art that has come before. That's the way it has always worked--whether you want to call it inspiration or homage or "lifting. <i>[Aside: Go back and read Professor Harold Bloom's seminal 1973 critical work, </i>The Anxiety of Influence<i>, if you want to understand how this works in literature, storytelling, etc. It's hardly anything new. In the meantime, give Aster his due: He is the real deal. He knows what he's doing, and what he's doing is something very interesting and exciting.]</i> While 2018's <i>Hereditary</i> got attention and praise, my initial viewing told me that it was somehow overrated. After watching this year's <i>Midsommar</i>, however, I see that he's building on something. There are echoes within his work. He's really trying to do something as an artist; I look forward to seeing where he goes next. (I may have to turn my head on occasion, not wanting to see what he's showing me. But that's okay. I'll go along with him where he leads. I trust him.... I think.)</div>
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<b>5.) <i>Knives Out</i> -- (Director: Rian Johnson, Studio: Lionsgate)</b></div>
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Wunderkind writer/director, Rian Johnson, had a rough 2017. After weathering the storm of online critical backlash from some overly zealous and unimaginative cult-like <i>Star Wars</i> "fans," Johnson--whose eighth chapter in that saga, the much unfairly maligned, <i>The Last Jedi</i>--decided to quickly regroup, circle the wagons, and raise a filmic middle-finger to all of his unappreciative naysayers. <i>[Aside: For the record--and this is coming from an admitted lifelong </i>Star Wars<i> fan--I loved his contribution to the </i>Star Wars<i> canon. Johnson's 2017, </i>The Last Jedi,<i> is fresh, and daring, and fun. I think it's a very good movie, and I actually feel kind of bad for him, having to put up with so much whining and crying from supposed "fans" who supposedly didn't get what they supposedly wanted. But I digress....]</i> His latest film, <i>Knives Out</i>--fresh on the heels of all the heaped abuse--is about as much fun as anything you were likely to see at the movies this past year. As he is seemingly wont to do, Johnson turns his attention to yet another genre and does his usual tinkering and deconstructing-reconstructing. And what you have, then, is a modernized Agatha Christie-style murder-mystery, the likes of which you've never quite seen. There is just enough post-modern edginess to keep the whole thing kind of hipsterish and cool, but it's mainly a blast from the past (not to mention a blast at his childish critics who don't seem to "get" him). Johnson is the real deal, though. This movie put a smile on my face for its whole running time. </div>
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<b> 4.) <i>Once Upon a Time in ... Hollywood</i> -- (Director: Quentin Tarantino, Studio: Sony Pictures)</b></div>
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Like an old, champion prizefighter, Quentin Tarantino (with his ninth feature film credited to his resume',) still has the moves. And when he wants to, he can still come into the ring (and his "ring," here, is not so much a genre as it is a film-storytelling style that he very nearly created single-handedly back in the early-1990s), maybe a little older, maybe not quite as in-shape as he used to be, maybe a little slower, maybe a little more methodical in his game-plan. But when he decides to put it all together and to get into his new-found rhythm, like that metaphorical old boxer, Tarantino can still swing with the best of them and can still prove that he's the undisputed champ. Simply put: Nobody does what Quentin Tarantino does better than Quentin Tarantino. And he does it all again flawlessly, here. He has maybe faltered a time or two in his career. (His previous directorial outing, for example, 2015's <i>The Hateful Eight</i>, had all the usual pieces in place--it looked and sounded and felt like a Tarantino film--but, God help me, the movie felt like a mess and a bit of a slog to sit through.) With this outing, though, Tarantino again finds his stride. And as he does so often and so well, he is begging, borrowing, and stealing from every one of his cherished memories as a lifelong lover of the movies. His title, here--borrowed from Italian director, Sergio Leone, who enjoyed reusing the phrase for his own movies (<i>Once Upon a Time in the West</i>, and <i>Once Upon a Time in America</i>, <i>et al.</i>)--is a definitive nod to film geeks everywhere. But Tarantino's title serves another purpose, too. He's reminding us that he, just as he's always been, is in the business and the art of telling stories. And his story this time is about those who are also, like him, in the business and the art of telling stories. And like all the old, traditional stories that begin with the phrase, "Once upon a time..." and end with the closing coda, "...and they all lived happily ever after," Tarantino is going to deconstruct this narrative pattern in his usual premeditated, post-modern way. For in this film, as the title tells us, Tarantino sets the scene in Hollywood, a veritable land of make-believe, where anything can happen, and usually does. And in this particular story--as in all the great stories of old--truth is malleable. It can be reshaped and reformed to fit whatever fictional reality the storyteller wants. And we've seen him do this before, as a filmmaker. (I'm thinking particularly of 2009's great, <i>Inglorious Basterds</i>, where Tarantino had Adolf Hitler and the Nazis get their fitting comeuppance in a fiery blaze of ingloriousness.) Because in this world of make-believe, after all, anything can happen. Facts can be altered. History can be rewritten. Good people don't have to die senselessly and brutally at the hands of crazed, drugged-out followers of Charles Manson. The good guys can win, after all. And the dead don't have to die. They can be brought back to life. And they can, as the saying goes, all live happily ever after....</div>
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<b>3.) <i>Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker</i> -- (Director: J.J. Abrams, Studio: Disney)</b></div>
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What is there left to say about <i>Star Wars</i>? For the past 42 years, I have followed along with these characters and this storyline (as admittedly clunky and convoluted as it has gotten at times) with the same devotion of that wide-eyed 10 year-old boy who first sat in his seat in a darkened movie-theater way back in May of 1977 and fell in love with George Lucas' imagined universe. Whether they are good movies or bad movies, whether they make sense or they don't make sense, whether they are deemed to be too slavishly devoted to the tried-and-true formula that has worked before or are deemed to be too daring, and different, and disrespectful of the audience's wants and needs, none of that talk matters to me. My rational mind as one who obviously likes to study film, analyze film, and "talk film" admittedly gets put on the shelf when it comes to something like <i>Star Wars</i>. I love it. And I always have. I don't care about all the incessant online chatter and banter. There's no end to it. There's no outcome that could make everyone happy. There is no way that Abrams' film could possibly be all things to all people. The film-saga's worldwide legion of fans is made up of many particular mindsets, and there is no way that this, the supposed final chapter in the Skywalker saga, was going to wrap everything up nice and neat for everyone, answering all questions, and resolving everything in a way that would satisfy all fans everywhere. That was an impossibility. But, all that being said, I think Abrams has done a rather remarkable and admirable job. I don't care about all the naysayers. I don't care about all the negative hype, all the cool, uber-ironic, hipsterish hate being dished out on something as "old" and "outdated" and "so totes '70s" as <i>Star Wars</i>. <i>[Aside: "Okay boomer." Really? Give me a fucking break. And while you're at it, learn how to actually have a logical discussion and discourse. And take your airpods out of your ears, and get your phone out of your hands, and look me in the eyes, and speak intelligibly, and pull up your goddamned pants. THEN we can talk about your thoughts and opinions</i><i>. Maybe.] </i>Is this a perfect film? No. Does it have its share of flaws? Yes. Is it silly, and goofy, and irrational? Yes. (And in so saying, I have just neatly summarized every <i>Star Wars</i> film ever made.) But did I have a good time watching it? Yes. Did it thrill me, make me laugh, move me, and recapture for me that elusive sense of childlike wonder and fun that I first felt when I was that 10 year-old boy? Absolutely yes...to all of it. I got the lumps in the back of the throat. The tears stinging the eyes, on several occasions throughout. I had "all the feels" while watching <i>The Rise of Skywalker</i>, to be sure. Totes. The movie played me, just as surely as John Williams' familiar opening crash of chords played, once again, over the loud Surround Sound speakers in the cineplex. And I loved it. Abrams' film is a great ending to it all, I think. So there.</div>
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<b>2.) <i>The Irishman</i> -- (Director: Martin Scorcese, Studio: Netflix)</b></div>
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Recently, I revisited the Art Institute of Chicago, strolling through its familiar marbled halls. My favorite area of the museum would have to be its Impressionism wing. And some of the artists I am always most drawn to are deservedly famous names of 19th century (usually French or Dutch) Impressionism--artists such as Gustave Caillebotte, Edgar Degas, Vincent Van Gogh, and Claude Monet. Particularly with the museum's rather comprehensive collection of Monet's paintings--his various series of the Houses of Parliament, shimmering in a gauzy haze across the Thames; his ponds; his lily-pads; his gardens; his haystacks--it is surprisingly thrilling to slowly walk along, looking at each of his canvases, so many times the same subject, the same view, a similar composition, a similar take on what (at just a casual, passing glance) appears to be the same painting painted over and over and over. But of course to a careful eye you see what Monet was really trying to do with his repetition, with his repainted scenes of haystacks--some of them in the bright sunlight and blue sky, some of them at dusk with a pink and violet tinge, some of them capped with snow, some of them bare in the broiling summer sun. Monet was not out of ideas; he was simply exploring the theme of the passage of time on his chosen set of beloved subjects. He observed the changing seasons. He observed how the seconds, minutes, and hours moved. The way the light changes. The way shadows appear and stretch themselves across the ground. The same subject--looked at from different angles, at different times, and in different ways--could appear as a different subject every time.This is what the great artists do. And this is what Martin Scorcese has done--one more time--with his latest film, <i>The Irishman</i>, the "inspired-by-true-events" life story of a life in the mob; told as only he can tell it; told as he has told it many times before...but different. Studying the light. Studying the change of seasons. Studying the passage of time. It almost seems beside the point to say that the cast for this thing is impeccable. Once again, he is joined by his two favorite muses, the actors Robert De Niro and Joe Pesci. Between just Scorcese and De Niro, alone, the two of them have created some of the greatest film-art of our time: <i>Mean Streets;</i> <i>Taxi Driver;</i> <i>Raging Bull;</i> <i>Goodfellas</i>.... Do I need to go on? When Pesci joined them in 1980 for <i>Raging Bull</i>, what Scorcese managed to tap into--an improvisational feel of the on-screen relationship between his two actors--is the kind of gold that you can really only be lucky at striking once. But then the three of them struck it again together in 1990's <i>Goodfellas</i>. And then again, five years later, in <i>Casino</i>. And now, fast-forward 24 years, to 2019's <i>The Irishman</i>. <i>[Aside: And to think that I haven't even mentioned Al Pacino's name yet, playing (to the hilt) Teamsters leader, Jimmy Hoffa. This should tell you what kind of movie this is when I "bury the lead" like that, finally getting around to mentioning an actor of Pacino's caliber with just a few sentences left of my review. This thing is a work of art, after all.]</i> The feeling I had while watching this late-career masterpiece from Scorcese (another Netflix production, by the way), was that I was watching a genuine artist at work--a group of them, actually, comfortable with one another, familiar with one another, familiar with this story, and these characters, and this subject. But it's not, finally, about the repetition of the subject. It's about the changing of the seasons. And the passage of time. And the way the light moves.</div>
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<b>1.) <i>Marriage Story</i> -- (Director: Noah Baumbach, Studio: Netflix)</b></div>
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Which brings me, at long last, to my pick for what I think, finally, is the best movie of 2019. Yet another Netflix production from this past year, this movie is undeniably incredible. It left me speechless when I watched it. And I don't even really want to talk about it here, strangely enough (particularly after I have devoted so much time and space to doing nothing but talking about film, <i>ad nauseum</i>, perhaps). I simply want people to watch this movie. Whatever way you can--whether that is through streaming, on Netflix, in the comfort of your home, or in the movie-theater, at your local cineplex, Whatever. Just find it, and watch it. And maybe you're single. And maybe you're dating or in a relationship with a significant other. And maybe you're married--maybe only just recently married or maybe getting ready to celebrate 30+ years together. And maybe you're divorced. I don't know. I don't want to say that someone who isn't married couldn't understand, or appreciate, or like this film; just as I don't want to say that someone who has never gone through the agonies of divorce couldn't understand, or appreciate, or like this film. But...if you are married, you will certainly "get" this movie in particular ways, as opposed to someone watching it who has never been married. Similarly, if you are divorced, you will most definitely experience the depths of this film in a way that a viewer who is not divorced will not be able to fully understand. That's just the way it is. As someone who has experienced both marriage and divorce, I can say only this: In all my years of watching film and of loving movies, I cannot recall a more devastatingly honest depiction of it all. What Baumbach has accomplished here, with the acting chops of his two leads, Scarlett Johansson and Adam Driver (both of whom have never been better on film and who both, deservedly, are being talked about for awards this year), is nothing short of amazing. It's so good, and so powerful, and so affecting, and funny, and sad, and moving, and ultimately hopeful (I think), that all I want to do is encourage you to watch it. During these revolutionary times of ours, do it now. On Netflix. Or in the cineplex. Take your pick.</div>
David Newsomhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02698845610286763351noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1218241678607183535.post-44433382397554722472019-12-29T19:31:00.003-08:002022-01-22T13:16:22.996-08:00Mirrors and Windows: Notes from a Reader at the Close of a Decade<div style="text-align: center;">
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"HAMLET: Suit the action to the word, the word to the action, with this special observance, that you o'erstep not the modesty of nature: for any thing so o'erdone is from the purpose of playing, whose end, both at the first and now, was and is, to hold as 'twere the mirror up to nature: to show virtue her feature, scorn her own image, and the very age and body of the time his form and pressure."</div>
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-- William Shakespeare, <i>Hamlet</i>: Act III, scene 2, 17-24</div>
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"Shakespeare said that art is a mirror held up to nature. And that's what it is. The nature is your nature, and all of these wonderful poetic images [of literature] are referring to something in you. When your mind is trapped by the image out there so that you never make the reference to yourself, you have misread the image."</div>
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-- Joseph Campbell, <i>The Power of Myth</i></div>
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"Books exist for their readers as mirrors and windows.... [Readers] need to see themselves reflected [in the books they read]. But books can also be windows. And so you can look through and see other worlds and see how they match up or don't match up to your own."</div>
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--Rudine Sims Bishop</div>
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There is admittedly a lot of weight and ceremony in the sentiments expressed above regarding something as seemingly simple as the act of reading. And yet, as anyone who loves books and who loves to read could tell you, there is nothing "simple" about reading at all.<br />
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Below, then, is a list of some of what I spent my time reading this past calendar year. Some of these are old (one in particular is very old--so old, scholars aren't even particularly sure when it was "published"), while some are very new. Some are works of fiction, and some are works of nonfiction. And there is even some poetry thrown in for good measure. Regardless, in my opinion, these are the best pages I turned in 2019.<br />
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<i>[Aside: And just to be clear, when I say "pages," I still mean that term in a literal sense. "Pages" in the physical, tangible meaning of the word--hands around binding, fingers touching paper. That sort of thing. God help me, I still can't fully get with the times, it seems, and relearn to "read" in the technologically new way. And I'm okay with that.]</i><br />
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I have obviously adopted the time-worn structure of a "year-end list" sort of thing, but it will also quickly be obvious that I couldn't and didn't want to limit my list to an equally time-worn and totally arbitrary structure of 10 items. Consider the following a bakers-dozen sort of approach, I guess (or something like that). Also, it should be mentioned, that in some instances the books may appear in a preferential order, and in some instances they may not. I find that kind of thing completely arbitrary, as well (maybe even more so than the insistent pressure to limit my choices to the blessed number of 10, again). At times, such a best-of list can be limiting and just more than a little "apples-and-orangey."<br />
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<i>[Aside: I mean, after all, how am I supposed to say which I enjoyed more between Marcus Aurelius' ancient template of the philosophical/self-help genre, </i>Meditations<i>, and Chuck Wendig's uber-21st century take on the work of early-Stephen King/</i>The Walking Dead<i>/end-of-the-world sort of stuff, with his novel, </i>Wanderers<i>? Seriously? Is one "better" than the other? Is one "more important" than the other? Was my time more worthily spent turning the pages of one, as opposed to the other? I don't know. Nor do I really care. All I really know is that--as an example, anyway--these two completely disparate books kept my attention this past year...even long after I turned their last pages. I thought about the books. I deliberated over them. I wrestled with them. I remembered them. I saw them as both the proverbial mirrors and windows that all great writing is and has always been, ever since the art of writing was first created. And the same can be said (each with their own rationale and reasons) for all of the books below.]</i><br />
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If they are, indeed, windows, then what do the following books (new and old) look out upon, with this world of ours existing beyond their pages? What kind of world have we created for ourselves at the close of this second millennial decade? And what can we see of that world when we turn these pages?<br />
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And if, in fact, books are also mirrors, then what do my favored choices of reading material this past year say about me? When I hold these books up, I look at them, to be sure. And into them. But all the while I allow them to also look back at me and into me. What is it these books see? If they could talk to me (and make no mistake: books can talk, as anyone who's conversed with one can tell you...don't kid yourself), what is it that these books would say about me?<br />
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<b>14.) <i>Paul Simon: The Life</i> -- by Robert Hilburn (2018)</b><br />
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Paul Simon is (inarguably, in my opinion) one of the handful of great American songwriters/singers/poets of the 20th century. And the fact that he allowed Robert Hilburn supposed unprecedented access to his notoriously secretive and carefully formulated life could be a sign that Simon is in that late phase of his life, as a creative genius, when he is willing to take a "big-picture" sort of look back at his life--warts and all. A couple of takeaways from this book, though: 1.) Though I admire both Paul Simon and Bob Dylan (two artists whose careers seem, for very good reasons, to be intertwined, in some ways), Simon has always been relegated to exist in Dylan's shadow, as it were, viewed as the lesser, more pop-oriented, artist of the two. Maybe that label is warranted, and maybe it's not. But one thing that comes through very clearly to me in Hilburn's book is that while both artists (Simon and Dylan, respectively) both enjoyed extraordinary early years--producing one classic song/poem after the next--followed by similarly uneven and somewhat unbalanced middle years, at times, and then late-career stages involving "classic" albums from both of them in their own right (Dylan with his 1997 release, <i>Time Out of Mind</i>, and Simon with his undisputed masterpiece, <i>Graceland</i>, in 1986), in my opinion--and in the picture that Hilburn paints of his subject's creative output from <i>Graceland</i> on--it is Simon who has produced seminal works of continued and progressive creativity and originality in the late-stage of his career, while Dylan (again, solely my opinion) has not produced anything since his late masterpiece in 1997 that could be seen to hold a candle to Simon's late output. And 2.) While, yes, this is Simon's take on his life, as filtered through Hilburn--and while, as always, this means that said things must be taken with the proverbial grain of salt--the picture one gets of Art Garfunkel (from Simon's admittedly biased viewpoint over the years) is one of bemused tolerance--the same way one might feel toward a beloved brother that simply grows weirder, and more distant, and more intolerable as the years go on. Garfunkel, though undeniably blessed with one of the greatest male voices in pop music history, comes across in this biography (fairly or unfairly) as a small-minded, childish, petty asshole. All told, the truth of the two's fractious relationship is probably somewhere in between.<br />
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<b>13.) <i>Becoming Dr. Seuss: Theodor Geisel and the Making of an American Imagination</i> -- by Brian Jay Jones (2019)</b><br />
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Over the past decade, or thereabouts, biographer, Brian Jay Jones, has quietly fashioned for himself a little niche in which he has chosen to explore the lives of American artists who exist in the public's collective consciousness as iconic outliers, almost--revolutionary geniuses in their own right who (each for their own reasons and creative impulses) found themselves on the fringes of American creative society, while all the while rewriting, remaking, reordering, and restructuring the prescribed model and mold of what could, possibly, be considered "great" popular art. His list of previous biographies include such titles as: <i>Washington Irving: An American Original </i>(2008); <i>Jim Henson: The Biography</i> (2013); and <i>George Lucas: A Life </i>(2016). Do you see a pattern here, or is it just me? And now, with this year's release of his biography on the inimitable Theodor Geisel (a.k.a. "Dr. Seuss"), Jones continues in the specific genre that he currently excels at. This is an interesting look at a writer we think we all know, simply because we grew up with him (and his characters, and his verses). But, as it turns out (of course), there is much more to the story than what we think we know...as is almost always the case. It's a fascinating book. (And, as someone who likes to write, himself, I am continually amazed at how Jones makes all of this biographical work appear so easy--the research, the interviews, the digging through old photos, and letters, and manuscripts, and memories, all to be followed, finally, with the outlining of the material, and the act of--at long last--writing it all down in some sensible form. It's not easy. And he's a modern master at it.)<br />
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<b>12.) <i>White</i> -- by Bret Easton Ellis (2019)</b><br />
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Anyone who came of age in the 1980s (as I did) and who was an early bibliophile--bothering to pay attention to such things as books and writers and such (as I did)--certainly knew of Bret Easton Ellis, whether or not you had actually read any of his work. Ellis, the young American writer-phenom, exploded on the literary scene in 1985--at only 21 years old--with his legendary debut novel, <i>Less Than Zero</i>. He followed this with his sophomore effort two years later, <i>The Rules of Attraction,</i> and then followed that, in turn, with his third and most infamous novel--1991's grossly misread and misunderstood, <i>American Psycho</i>. (And about that third novel, let me briefly say only this: If it is possible to forget the movie adaptation and--yes, I'm not kidding--the stage-musical adaptation of Ellis' darkly hilarious and densely disturbing satire of New York City, and Wall Street, and Reagan-era America, and the empty, soulless, narcissistic, sociopathic state of the then-fashionable yuppie movement among the stereotypical "young American" scene, then what you have in this third novel from an undeniably huge talent is, in my opinion, one of the greatest sustained social satires--with its voice, its tone, its subject matter, its style--of late-20th century American literature. I'm serious; I think it's a brilliant novel. But anyway...) Be that as it may, though--in a water-under-the-bridge sort of way--that is all in the somewhat foggy past now, as if Ellis' meteoric appearance in the literary sky maybe never happened. Rather unsurprisingly, I guess, it would be his third novel which would unceremoniously bury him as a young writer-on-the-rise. And though Ellis has continued to write and to publish--fiction, nonfiction--while also these days hosting his own podcast, he has settled for a long time into his middle-age writerdom as a writer without a bestselling novel to his name. With this, then, his latest book--a collection of nonfiction pieces (part autobiography, part social-political commentary)--Ellis resurfaces as a writer and thinker who has lost none of his original fire and urge to--quite blatantly--piss people off. Though he is polarizing (and almost blissfully so) in his opinions and thoughts here, he is also--dare I say it--often right on the mark (maybe even more than my liberal-minded leanings would care to admit). This book will make you laugh. It will make you angry. It will make you roll your eyes, and sigh, and want to hurl the book across the room at times. It will make you nod your head, "yes," and/or shake your head, "no." And it will make you want to call up a friend or family member--regardless of political leanings--and read whole passages/pages aloud. It is a book that will make you think, in other words. And there's never been anything wrong with that. (And maybe today, particularly, more than ever.)<br />
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<b>11.) <i>The Closing of the American Mind</i> -- by Allan Bloom (1987)</b><br />
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Almost a perfect companion-piece in many ways to Bret Easton Ellis' 2019 book, <i>White</i> (see above), Professor Allan Bloom's 1987 social-political treatise burst on the book world as a publishing anomaly. Here, after all, was an academic book, written by an aging academic (then a highly respected political-science professor at University of Chicago), about an academic topic--what was, at that time, seen as an encroaching "danger" of America's losing its footing in the world. The crisis at hand, according to Bloom in 1987, was not only an encroaching crisis of America's losing its place as a world leader in the realms of economics, and military might, and moral and ethical certitude (gravitational centers that have always held the United States together and kept it...well...united). What Bloom more importantly saw on the horizon back in '87 was a danger even more concerning: an intellectual crisis, the likes of which our society had never seen. The old ways were being called into question, with the advent of a social climate of a (then) new "political correctness"--all in thought, word, and deed. And while many of the changing social norms were timely and welcome, many of the old American standards--including standards of academic excellence--were already beginning to show signs of slipping and eroding. Bloom saw it then, and he called out the questions: What happens, after all, to a culture that loses its core values in the areas of intellectual curiosity, its desire for excellence, and its standards of achievement? What happens to a culture that becomes acclimated and comfortable with mediocrity? And the answers to his questions are...well, like it or not, they are commonplace these days. We're seeing his theories manifested today. To his credit, he recognized the signs back in 1987, and we're realizing the results played out in American society, 2019.<br />
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<i>[Aside: A bit of transparency regarding this book: I was in college when it was first published. I was doing my undergraduate work at the time, studying English Education at my alma mater, Fort Hays State University, in Hays, Kansas. I fashioned myself a young academic, to be sure; I considered myself fairly well-read, fairly insightful, and fairly intelligent. I remember reading about Bloom's book and hearing about its (then) controversial ideas. And I bought the book, way back when, putting it on my undergraduate-student bookshelf, and telling myself I would get around to reading it soon. I did try picking the book up, as I recall, and thumbing through it, diving into it headfirst...only to make it through its first 40 pages, or so (what amounted to the book's Introduction, in other words), before admitting dumbfounded defeat and setting the book aside. And there it sat for 32 years, until this past summer, 2019. I'm 52 years old now; I was a young man, then, when the book first came out and when I first tried to scale its heights. I was ripe with dreams of being an English teacher someday, the likes of Mr. Keating at Helton Academy, setting the world (or my future classroom, at least) on fire with the passion of great literature and great writing and great learning. I was an illusioned, inexperienced young kid when I first picked up Professor Bloom's book. There was no way I could fully grasp the depth of his references and insights. I wasn't that well read, after all. And more importantly, I hadn't lived an adult life yet. I hadn't lived a life as an educator--more to the point--toiling in the world of education. And I hadn't yet experienced all the latent joys and frustrations that such a life entails. There was no way I could completely comprehend and connect with the book as a young man. But fast-forward 32 years into the present moment, when I've lived an adult life--as a divorced husband, and as a father, and as a teacher--and I've seen firsthand what Bloom was talking about, way back then. I see, now, what he was getting at. And I see that in many alarming and prophetic ways he was right. But because he wrote his book when American society--world society--was just on the cusp of a transcendent technological explosion (it's almost hard today to remember such a time before personal computers and before smartphones, but that world did, in fact, exist), Bloom's book can admittedly come across as somewhat quaintly dated, in a way. For example, while he personally saw distraction in the current popular media of the day--the ever-present television, movies, popular music, etc.--it's interesting to wonder what he would make of today's computerized world, and of the level of addictive distraction that comes from everyone carrying with them, 24/7, a pocket-sized computer. Though he doesn't address these sort of specifics (since they didn't exist yet, even then, in 1987), it isn't hard to tell what Professor Bloom would have said about it all, not to mention its deleterious effects on such things as education, personal drive and ambition, intellectualism, and the like. Even though he didn't have all the terminology at his disposal and he didn't know all the words for today's distracted computerized culture, Bloom saw its shadow looming, and he warned us of the storm-front fast approaching. All told, this is still a seminal and important book. And I'm glad I finally got around to reading it...32 years later.]</i><br />
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<b>10.) <i>Anything You Can Imagine: Peter Jackson and the Making of Middle Earth</i> -- by Ian Nathan (2018)</b><br />
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This is just a very entertaining and enlightening look at not only Professor J.R.R. Tolkien's timelessly inventive and dense world of Middle-Earth (as he originally created it on the page in the early 20th century) but also at the breathlessly thrilling and "envelope-pushing" cinematic world of Middle-Earth (as recreated in the early part of our 21st century) by New Zealand filmmaker, Peter Jackson, and his re-telling of Tolkien's classic myths, <i>The Lord of the Rings</i> and <i>The Hobbit</i>. I am an unapologetic fan of Tolkien's original books; I have been a fan ever since I first ventured into their pages way back in the day, as a young teenager. I am also an unapologetic fan of Jackson's film adaptations--because of and despite their (at times) slavish devotion to the Professor's original text and also, ironically, because of and despite their (at times) hit-and-miss efforts at rewriting, restructuring, and retelling the Professor's original text. Nathan's book entertainingly explores all of this. Its pages flew by.<br />
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<b>9.) <i>Talking to Strangers: What We Should Know About the People We Don't Know</i> -- by Malcolm Gladwell (2019)</b><br />
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What to say about writer/thinker/cultural observer/sociologist/master connector-of-dots, Malcolm Gladwell? This is his sixth book, following on the heels of the bestselling predecessors, <i>The Tipping Point</i>, <i>Blink</i>, <i>Outliers</i>, <i>What the Dog Saw</i>, and <i>David and Goliath</i>. Along with those accomplishments, Gladwell is also the creator and host of the podcast, <i>Revisionist History</i>. To try to pinpoint exactly what it is that Gladwell does that makes him unique as a writer is hard to say, in a way. He is part psychologist, part historian, part detective, part code-breaker, part puzzle-maker, part noticer of cultural patterns. He structures his books in the same way, pretty much every time, beginning with a specific anecdote, or story, or illustration, and then moving outward (and inward) from that opening to look at other anecdotes, stories, and illustrations, all the while picking apart at threads that lead from one revealed point to the next, connecting dots, forming an outline of a picture in the reader's mind, a noticeable pattern, an idea, an hypothesis, a theory, a thesis... In this way, Gladwell makes use of one of the oldest structures of classical argument: inductive reasoning. And he generally does it very well. Above all, he has the skills of a natural, masterful storyteller. He knows where he wants you to go, and if you are willing (as a reader) to sit back and trust him as your guide, the journey is always worth the time.<br />
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<b>8.) <i>Wanderers: A Novel</i> -- by Chuck Wendig</b><br />
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How does a young writer go about respectfully paying homage to an older, established, famous author that he grew up with, and read voraciously all throughout youth and early-adulthood, and cherished, and admired, and loved? In the case of Chuck Wendig, he grows up to become an established, well-respected author himself, and he sets about the business of creating a long door-stop of a novel (800 pgs.), styled after Stephen King's early-career post-apocalyptic masterpiece, <i>The Stand</i>.<br />
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<i>[Aside: The original 1978 version of </i>The Stand <i>is what I'm referring to in this review, not the unedited, uncontrolled, unfettered mess of King's 1990 "director's-cut" version of his classic novel. I don't have time or space here to go into all that I think is wrong with King's bloated revisioning of his famous early novel (it was only his fourth book, back in 1978, following an amazing run that any popular 20th century author would be proud of: </i>Carrie<i>, </i>Salem's Lot<i>, and </i>The Shining<i>), but let me just say that in the case of his 1,000+ pg. exercise in ego-vomit, this is an excellent example of the old "less-is-more" adage (if, in fact, an original version of the novel, weighing in at 850 pgs., itself, can be said to be "less"). In this case, however, it can.]</i><br />
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<i>Wanderers</i> is just an awful lot of fun. While it is consciously a send-up to the kind of story that King used to do so well as a young writer--a burgeoning artist on fire with creativity, and imagination, and professional drive--Wendig is respectful enough to tip his hat in the direction of the famed author who inspired his story. But make no mistake: This book is entirely its own thing, with a big cast of characters, a sprawling story set across a ruined American landscape, a handful of plucky survivors, heroes that you love, villains that you hate, and a churning energy constantly pushing and pulling you through its 800 pages of narrative drive. Simply put: <i>Wanderers</i> is a novel that finds a way to "out-Stephen King" even Stephen King, today.<br />
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<b> 7.) <i>Kindness and Wonder: Why Mr. Rogers Matters Now More Than Ever</i> -- by Gavin Edwards (2019)</b><br />
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To anyone who pays attention to the current situation(s) in our country--not to mention our world--it would seem easy, certainly, to slip into a paralysis of sadness, hopelessness, and despair. But to do that would then miss the point--the larger point of our life on this earth, perhaps--that while there will always be moments and people that push us to the edge of our deepest fear and anxiety, there are also particular moments and people that come along exactly at the right time and place for our lives. And they are a light in the darkness. They make us feel good. They remind us that there is, in fact, such a thing as goodness in the world. They give us encouragement to be brave, to be true to ourselves, to like ourselves, and to keep going. It seems like a banal, cliche' platitude, maybe, to say something so oft-repeated and so obvious, but Fred Rogers was a miracle of a human being. What you saw was exactly what you got. There was no act, no air of falseness, no pretending about him--other than his beloved "Land of Make-Believe" that he popularized on his long-running children's show on PBS, <i>Mister Rogers' Neighborhood</i>. Currently, there seems to be a renewed interest in the man, who left us in 2004 after a bout with cancer. It is not too hard to understand why we're experiencing this reawakening and reappraisal of this gentle, kind man in the colorful zip-up cardigans and the sneakers that he slipped into so casually at the beginning of every single show. If we took his goodness for granted while he was alive (in fact, using him as the butt of so many unnecessary jokes), then we certainly miss him now, it would seem. I think we realize we could all use a bit of Fred Rogers these days, and Gavin Edwards' book plays upon that realization. It is a short, quick read (at just a mere 250 pgs.), but that seems in keeping with Rogers' style, itself. Within its short structure, the book is divided into two fairly equal parts: the first half of the book is a quick biography of Fred Rogers--the man, the husband, the father, the friend, the TV personality; the second half of the book is given over to Edwards' summation of Rogers' teachings--a 10-point takeaway, if you will, divided by chapters with headings such as:<br />
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1.) Be Deep and Simple<br />
2.) Be Kind to Strangers<br />
3.) Make a Joyful Noise<br />
4.) Tell the Truth<br />
5.) Connect With Other People Every Way You Can<br />
6.) Love Your Neighbors<br />
7.) Find the Light in the Darkness<br />
8.) Always See the Very Best in Other People<br />
9.) Accept the Changing Seasons<br />
10.) Share What You've Learned (All Your Life)<br />
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If you're the kind of person who can read this book and not feel a lump forming in the back of your throat from time to time, then obviously this book isn't for you. But for me--and for the rest of us, maybe--that lump in the back of the throat, the tears that collect in the corners of the eyes while reading the book, speak to a feeling of regret and sadness, certainly, that Fred Rogers is no longer with us. But more than that, I think, the emotion that we feel speaks to the miracle that there ever was such a person as Fred Rogers in our midst. And the wonder at what it is we ever did to deserve him.<br />
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<b> 6.) <i>American Pastoral</i> -- by Philip Roth (1997)</b><br />
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Philip Roth was a master of late-20th century/early-21st century American literature. I had never read this book before, until going through my personal collection and picking it up this past year. There are a handful of American writers who could be said to reside at the proverbial "top of the mountain" of contemporary American fiction. Of course everyone's list would be different, but among the names in that rarefied air would have to be included (in my opinion) the writer, Philip Roth. What he accomplished during his career--including, of course, his early explosive talent but also, almost more impressively, his late-career run of unprecedented masterpieces (within which <i>American Pastoral</i> would neatly fit)--was almost indisputably masterful, as he set about chronicling the 20th century Jewish-American experience, novel after novel after novel... In this, his 1997 Pulitzer Prize-winning book, Roth depicts a disrupted American family, and a disjointed sense of the American Dream, and a disturbing view of cultural-political terrorism (four years before the tragic events of 9/11 would lay low any sense of American propriety, and American security, and...well, American "pastoral"...) This is a remarkable novel.<br />
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<b>5.) <i>Barefoot in Babylon: The Creation of the Woodstock Music Festival, 1969</i> -- by Bob Spitz (1979)</b><br />
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Simply put, this was the most fun and most "un-put-downable" book I read this year. It was in keeping with an interesting cultural (or counter-cultural?) trend of 2019, which recognized the 50th-anniversary celebration of events that happened during the "flower power" Summer of Love, c.a. 1969. (For it seems the Boomer generation--growing up and coming of age in the late-1960s--had more than its share of legitimately momentous occasions upon which to draw memories...or at least the occasional acid-flashback--the nightmares of Vietnam and the anti-war movement, notwithstanding). Whatever the case, Spitz--who also authored the wonderful 2005, <i>The Beatles: The Biography </i>(still, probably, the best book I've read on the band, to date)--is a nonfiction writer who understands how to slowly, carefully assemble all the puzzle pieces of his subject spread out on the table before him. He methodically lays out all the details of the story he's trying to tell--no matter how small or mundane the puzzle piece--until each element of the story locks into place, one by one, and you begin to see the finished whole. Basically...let's be honest...the 1969 Woodstock Music Festival was a disastrous mess, from start to finish. But it was also an amazing cultural triumph--against all practical and logical odds. And if that statement doesn't make sense--and it admittedly does not--then Bob Spitz's history of this important musical and sociological event is for you, because he explains it, in the smallest of details, and he makes you care, and he makes you cringe, and he makes you cry at a lost idealism that we'll never see again in our jaded, uber-materialistic, uber-ironic, uber-cool capitalistic world (all of which, ironically, such an event as the original Woodstock helped to unintentionally usher in. "And so it goes," to quote the late, great Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.)</div>
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<b> 4.) <i>Dad's Maybe Book</i> -- by Tim O'Brien (2019)</b><br />
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There's no point in me talking around the issue, here: Tim O'Brien is one of my favorite writers. Hands down. He will be remembered forever for some of the greatest novels written by an American author at the close of the 20th century. Going through the list of some of his titles is like a roll call of great contemporary American literature. From his auspicious early days, winning the National Book Award for his novel, <i>Going After Cacciato</i> (1978) to his universally praised masterpiece, <i>The Things They Carried</i> (1990), to later novels, such as, <i>In the Lake of the Woods </i>(1994), and <i>July, July</i> (2002), no American fiction writer has done more to so honestly and beautifully chronicle the angst, the pain, the fear, and the weight carried by soldiers both in wartime and in times of peace, back at home (in his case, the American war in Vietnam). He is, in my opinion, the best at covering this subject. He's done it, and he's done it masterfully. There will be (and already are) young writers coming along the literary scene, writing about contemporary soldiers at war who fittingly fall into a comparison with O'Brien, and who critics are quick to say write "like Tim O'Brien." But there will never be another Tim O'Brien. And he wouldn't have to write another word, as far as I'm concerned; his reputation is cemented in the canon of great writing. It seemed, too, as if he, himself, agreed with this assessment, since for the past 17 years (since the 2002 release of <i>July, July</i>, in fact), there has not been a new book with his name on it. The word was out that he had unofficially "retired" from writing. And the more that time moved along, with no new books being produced from his desk, it appeared that he was, actually, done with it all...until this year, 2019, and his surprise latest release, <i>Dad's Maybe Book</i>. By some estimations, the book may be considered a bit of a mess, to be honest. But if so, it is a beautiful and brilliant mess. O'Brien is kind of all over the place in this work of nonfiction--his first book-form autobiographical style of writing since his 1973 debut, the memoir, <i>If I Die in a Combat Zone</i>. That first book of nonfiction was written by a 27 year-old young man who had served a tour of duty in Vietnam and then, while pursuing studies at Harvard, decided to give everything up and dedicate his full attention to writing. Which he did, but at the expense of everything else, sadly. And what that meant for O'Brien, anyway, was a notable and prize-winning career as a great American author, but it also meant a failed marriage and childlessness. Until, that is, a second marriage came along late in his life, and with it a chance, at long last, to be a dad--something that had always eluded him. With the birth of his sons, O'Brien made the decision to walk away from what he saw as the selfish lifestyle of a professional writer and to, instead, be present in the lives of his children. Which he did, and which explains the 17 years of silence from him in the publishing world. And yet...he didn't entirely stop writing. And this book is the proof. While his boys were growing up, O'Brien would make the time to jot down ideas, thoughts, memories, and observations. These jottings, as it turns out, were about life in general; and his life, specifically; and about his time in Vietnam; and about his thoughts on the current state of the world and of America; and about his strained and painful relationship with his own father, who was distant and alcoholic and abusive. O'Brien never wanted to be that kind of father. He did not want his sons to grow up feeling for their dad the same confused spectrum of emotions that he grew up feeling for his own dad. And so he wrote this "maybe" book ("maybe it's a book, and maybe it isn't," he would tell his sons when they would invariably ask him what he was writing). The conceit of his new book is simple, and it's messy, and it's profound: He is a 73 year-old father of two young sons, and he doesn't have to be told the preposterousness of that scenario. He realizes, sadly, that he will not be around to share in his sons' lives as they grow into young men, and husbands, and fathers. He realizes that his time with them is limited. It is not anyone's fault (and yet you can't help but sense, throughout, O'Brien's unrelenting guilt at the decisions he made as a young, hungry writer, desperate to make a name for himself, at the expense of all else). Still, he has the time with them now, and so he has used it well. And this book is his opportunity to impart whatever he can in the way of fatherly insight and advice and wisdom. It's a profoundly moving book. And, as such, I realize it may be O'Brien's last published words. I cherish it all the more for that.</div>
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<b>3.) <i>Meditations</i> -- by Marcus Aurelius (written 170-180 C.E.)</b><br />
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If you're anything like me, you've probably heard the name, Marcus Aurelius, somewhere before. Perhaps it was in high school, with some overzealous senior-year English teacher. Or maybe it was in college, sitting through some General Ed. Intro. to Logic class. Or it could be that the only thing you really know of the name, Marcus Aurelius, is from Richard Harris' abbreviated performance of the man in Ridley Scott's 2000 sandals-and-swords epic, <i>Gladiator</i>. Be that as it may, I wasn't fully prepared for the man--and the mind--that I met while first coming into contact this year with his famous book, <i>Meditations</i>. As Rome's Emperor for roughly 20 years, serving between the years 161-180, he was the last ruler of Rome to fulfill what the Greek philosopher, Plato, envisioned as his perfect ideal of a leader--the famed "Philosopher King." During Marcus Aurelius' rule, the Roman Empire would enjoy its last years of prosperity and peace, during the famous phase known as the Pax Romana (or "Roman Peace"). Marcus Aurelius was level-headed. And insightful. And foresightful. And just. And mighty. And intelligent. And while he sat at the head of Rome, he was also a voracious student of history, and of orators, and thinkers, and logicians. Names like Epictetus, Seneca, et al., were common as his counsel, and as such Marcus Aurelius was a devout student--and eventual practitioner and writer--of the philosophy of Stoicism. He never intended to write a book, certainly. He simply saw merit in recording (if for no other reader than himself) a journal of the wanderings of his mind--his thoughts, his insights into the qualities that make a good leader, that make a good citizen, that make a good person, leading (hopefully) to a meaningful, practical, well-balanced, and good life. <i>Meditations</i> is one of the first (and best) books of its kind--although, again, its author accordingly never intended to actually write a "book." He was just thinking to himself on paper in the evenings--scratching by candlelight--after a tiring day of leading the greatest empire the world had ever seen. As such, though, his <i>Meditations</i> is part memoir, part philosophical treatise, part self-help guide. And all in all, it's a one-of a-kind reading experience--a good tonic for the tumultuous times we live in, to be sure...albeit thousands of years after the time when the book was originally written.<br />
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<b> 2.) <i>All of Us: The Collected Poems</i> -- by Raymond Carver (2000)</b><br />
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I feel a little disclaimer is in order for this book, as well, seeing as how--technically--I had, at one time or another, read most of the poems in this collection. Most...but not all. In his relatively short life (he died at age 50 from lung cancer, after a lifetime of battling alcohol abuse), Raymond Carver etched a permanent place in America's post-modern literary canon with his extraordinary output of minimalist short stories. He was a master. I first became familiar with Carver's short fiction while in college, but it was at this time, also, while nosing around in a used bookstore, that I stumbled upon his first published book of poems, 1984's <i>Where Water Comes Together With Other Water</i>. I was nonplussed: I didn't even know Carver wrote poetry, and I was a great admirer of his short stories, so I plunked down the meager change for the book, and I read it in one night. I couldn't believe how great his poems were: short, succinct, zen-like, stripped to the bone, emotion laid absolutely bare, like his famous stories, but even more minimalist (if that could be believed). Here was modern writing at its barest essence. And it was stunningly, achingly beautiful. And sad. And funny. But sad... Then, two years later, in 1986, I picked up his second published collection of poems, <i>Ultramarine, </i>followed by his third, <i>A New Path to the Waterfall</i>, which appeared posthumously, a year after his death, in 1989. The wonderful symmetry to all of this--after being a fan of Carver's poetry for decades--is that I stumbled upon this book, <i>All of Us: The Collected Poems</i>, in a local Half-Price Books one afternoon. Of course, I had to have it. Included in this collection is an earlier, lesser-known collection of poems, as well as some unpublished work released after his death, along with the three collections that I already possessed and had fallen in love with years ago. As a short story writer and as a poet, there is no one quite like Raymond Carver:</div>
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<b> LATE FRAGMENT</b></div>
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And did you get what</div>
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you wanted from this life, even so?</div>
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I did.</div>
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And what did you want?</div>
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To call myself beloved, to feel myself</div>
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beloved on the earth.</div>
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<b>1.) <i>The Overstory: A Novel </i>-- by Richard Powers</b></div>
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How to best explain this book? I'm not sure... I could say, to begin with, that Richard Powers has been called "the most intelligent American novelist at work today," and that might begin to scratch the surface a bit of what you have here. I could also say that the novel is constructed like a patchwork-quilt, in a way, made up of various chapters (which, seen independently, could also be viewed as separate, stand-alone short stories), all of which begin to reverberate and echo within one another as characters and events slowly begin to cross and intercut with one another, and an overarching plot begins to emerge. I could also say that it is an ecological "warning cry," if you will, a Transcendentalist plea on behalf of the trees. <i>The Overstory</i> is a celebration of life, and of nature, and of our world, and of the notion of time, and of endurance, and of love. I could say that there are passages and sentences and entire sections of this book that deserve to be read slowly, savored, and re-read, and read out loud, hearing the music of Richard Powers' talent as a wordsmith. It is a beautiful book. A prose poem, in places. A celebration of nature and of human nature. It's a book that lingers long in the mind well after you finish the last sentence and close its cover. It's a moving novel. It's beautiful. It's powerful. It's a book that gives me hope--as a reader--in the future of great writing. (Great writing is still with us, as it turns out; it's not going anywhere.) I could say all of these things, regarding Powers' Pulitzer Prize-winning novel, and I would be right. Or I could simply say this: <i>The Overstory</i> is the best book I read over these past 12 months.</div>
David Newsomhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02698845610286763351noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1218241678607183535.post-66114242188522830382019-04-19T11:40:00.001-07:002020-01-10T22:15:29.796-08:00Dog Years<br />
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1</div>
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I don't know if there is such a place as a heaven for dogs,</div>
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although the world's beliefs would have you believe</div>
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it comes down to a clinical discourse on faith and theology</div>
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and the definitions of such words as "afterlife," "salvation," and "soul,"</div>
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and a particular animated film from the 1980s definitively argued</div>
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for the affirmative.</div>
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Still....</div>
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All I know is that I had him for the past 10 years of my life,</div>
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which would have been 70 years for him.</div>
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(All things being equal, too, I don't think I could have </div>
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put up with me for those 70 long years.)</div>
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And so for that--if for no other reason--</div>
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he earned his eternal reward in dog heaven, I think,</div>
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if there is such a place.</div>
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2</div>
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On matters of faith, it is never simple math.</div>
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Take the Judeo-Christian Bible, for instance,</div>
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if one chooses to believe the stories.</div>
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I am aware of the importance of symbols, though,</div>
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and that throughout the book's long text, if looking for it,</div>
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you will find over 700 references to the number 7.</div>
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In terms of that book's circular and circuitous mythology,</div>
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that number would appear to be of some importance, then.</div>
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"Divine," perhaps.</div>
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"God-made," to some.</div>
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"Perfect," in a way.</div>
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"Complete," in manners no other number can seem to mean,</div>
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no matter the faith</div>
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or the math.</div>
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3</div>
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He liked to have his ears scratched.</div>
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He would lean into it, he loved it so.</div>
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He lost himself, bending into the pressure and the weight of it.</div>
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He would moan and then look up at me when I removed my hand,</div>
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his brown, soft eyes that burrowed and said,</div>
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<i>"What?... That's it?"</i></div>
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He liked to lay in the patches of sunlight</div>
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as the day would move across the sky.</div>
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He would move along with it, when he could,</div>
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and when it appeared in elongated geometric designs</div>
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spilled across the carpet.</div>
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He sought out warm light,</div>
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with the wisdom of The Beatles,</div>
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following the sun.</div>
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4</div>
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He loved to go for walks, although he was terrible at it.</div>
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I used to see other dog-owners with their charges</div>
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at the end of leashes</div>
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complacently at peace, strolling along sidewalks,</div>
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dog-calm, cool, collected.</div>
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And I wondered how they did it.</div>
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For he could never manage that.</div>
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Our leash was always taut as a plumb-line</div>
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or a rich fishing line, him out front, pulling me forward,</div>
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nose alert to everything, not enough time in the day to take it all in,</div>
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eyes backward at slowpoke me, struggling to keep pace,</div>
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with a mixed gaze of frustration and concern my way,</div>
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as if to say,</div>
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"<i>Are you all right? Come on.... Catch up</i>."</div>
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5</div>
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On our last walk together</div>
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I didn't need the leash, but I attached it to his collar on ceremony.</div>
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It would occur the day before I helped him to his sleep,</div>
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and I had no idea, then, of such words as</div>
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"ruptured spleen" or "critical anemia."</div>
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I just knew there was something wrong.</div>
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With a slackened line, it was an unusually slow walk for us.</div>
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Haggard. Determined. It was work for him to take a step.</div>
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We didn't go far--to the end of the sidewalk and back.</div>
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I carried him the last of the way, in through the door,</div>
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and lay him down on his bed,</div>
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which he also loved beyond compare</div>
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and from which he would never stand again</div>
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on his own will.</div>
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6</div>
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Dogs seem to know things we don't.</div>
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As much as we love them,</div>
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I believe they love us more.</div>
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Seven times more, by my rough accounting.</div>
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And they forgive us seven-times-seventy times,</div>
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more than we can humanly comprehend.</div>
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They sense things seven times stronger.</div>
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They feel things seven times greater.</div>
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They are, after all, seven years ahead of us</div>
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in what it means to be</div>
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Divine,</div>
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God-made,</div>
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Perfect,</div>
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Complete.</div>
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7</div>
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You know it's going to hurt, this inevitability of love--</div>
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so irrational and unconditional and true,</div>
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the very meaning of the words, in fact--</div>
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but what you can't possibly know is how much.</div>
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I have already been asked several times</div>
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if I'm going to get another dog.</div>
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And my immediate response is, "No."</div>
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But in my heart, maybe, "Yes."</div>
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In time.</div>
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Maybe in seven years, I wonder.</div>
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Maybe then I will know what he already knew.</div>
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Maybe then, like some indelible image from Whitman,</div>
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I will find him ahead of me, as always, patiently looking back,</div>
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and I will finally be able to catch up to him.</div>
<b></b><i></i><u></u><sub></sub><sup></sup><strike></strike><span style="font-family: "calibri";"></span>David Newsomhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02698845610286763351noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1218241678607183535.post-1825909998557201742018-12-18T13:53:00.000-08:002020-01-10T22:15:56.301-08:00PowerLast night was a winter storm,<br />
the kind with weighted ice-snow and winds<br />
from the north--<br />
the kind of winter storm leaving frozen shells<br />
around power lines and tree limbs.<br />
Not a good pairing, the two,<br />
when loaded branches crack and tumble<br />
in a glacial cascade of ice and sparks atop<br />
electric lines, so power full.<br />
<br />
That was the kind of storm we had last night.<br />
The kind of winter storm that one falls asleep to,<br />
its oddly lulling whistle of wind<br />
seeping through window seams--<br />
the sound of nature <i>in extremis</i>--<br />
and waking in the morning to a breathless house,<br />
and frozen vistas outside the windows,<br />
and vacant, blank LED lights on clocks throughout,<br />
no red and green and blue deathstare of time, now powerless.<br />
<br />
It is only me this morning, and the dog, in the quiet<br />
where normally there is muted buzz of electric surge,<br />
and vented hiss of heated air, and gentle flow of time.<br />
But now the house rests empty of energy.<br />
Now time has stopped<br />
in this house which I quickly scour for blankets,<br />
knitted warmth, quilted fabric of memory and hours.<br />
This house where--once life has been restored--<br />
empowered, I will decide to leave the clocks alone.David Newsomhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02698845610286763351noreply@blogger.com0