Amazing soundtrack. Check it out, grooveshark or whatever.
Nice feel-good movie about leaving your historical ballast behind. Three brothers, one train. India.
"He said the train was lost."
"How can a train be lost?! It's got tracks!"
Rita: What's wrong with you?
Jack: Let me think about that. I'll tell you the next time I see you.
"We haven't located us yet."
Great example of silly-story. Melodramatic? Yes. Who fucking cares.
Saturday, 12 October 2013
Thursday, 10 October 2013
Wednesday, 9 October 2013
Tillie Olsen - "I Stand Here Ironing"
Amazing, terrific short story about a mother contemplating the life of her daughter. (that *so* does not do it justice)
The strange thing is that I cannot immediatly point out how this story affirms life, how it instructs. Yet I will definitely defend it as a truly moral story. Is it for “Life’s potential for turning tragic” as being “a fact of our existence.” For describing this so well, so pointedly, with so much feeling? It is in no way didactic. On the contrary, the mother tells us of all the things she didn’t do, or the things she couldn’t do, for her daughter. Olsen shows how much the mother mourns this, is unable to change anything about it, though still asks desperately - knowing the answer too well - ‘but what could I have done?’ Is it this torment that can nudge us, that can help us fix our moral compass? Perhaps, perhaps. This story really, really got to me and perhaps that is why this is rambling along.
The strange thing is that I cannot immediatly point out how this story affirms life, how it instructs. Yet I will definitely defend it as a truly moral story. Is it for “Life’s potential for turning tragic” as being “a fact of our existence.” For describing this so well, so pointedly, with so much feeling? It is in no way didactic. On the contrary, the mother tells us of all the things she didn’t do, or the things she couldn’t do, for her daughter. Olsen shows how much the mother mourns this, is unable to change anything about it, though still asks desperately - knowing the answer too well - ‘but what could I have done?’ Is it this torment that can nudge us, that can help us fix our moral compass? Perhaps, perhaps. This story really, really got to me and perhaps that is why this is rambling along.
Tangerine Dreams - "Canyon Voices" (Canyon Dreams OST)
Instrumental, think Vangelis. But good as background music.
(Pandora's "Angelo Badalamenti" channel. Too bad about the panflute.)
(Pandora's "Angelo Badalamenti" channel. Too bad about the panflute.)
Francine Prose - “What Makes a Short Story?”
(from Alice LaPlante's "the Making of a Story")
[p168] “the anecdote, stripped of its trimmings, is insignificant and often inane.”
[p168] “a short story must be an idea … It must be a picture, it must illustrate something … something of the real essence of the subject.”
[p169] “It cannot be summarized or reduced without sacrificing the very qualities that do in fact distinguish an amusing dinner-party anecdote from a great work of art - depth, resonance, harmony”
[p170] “if we find a way to describe what the story is really about, not its plot but its essence … there is always something there” But this is so very true of novellas and novels as well. This is not a unique aspect of the short story.
Poe: everything should work towards an effect.
[p172] V.S. Pritchett: “The novel tends to tell us everything whereas the short story tells us only one thing, and that, intensely… It is, as some have said, a ‘glimpse through,’ resembling a painting or even a song which we can take in at once, yet bring the recesses and contours of larger experience to the mind.”
[p176] “To claim that every short story should include a moment of epiphany is like insisting that every talented, marvelous dog jump through the same narrow hoop.”
Why should everything in the world of a short story be “put there for a reason” [p177] Can its internal dissonance not be a major part of the story’s impact?
[p178] “we understand something new, something solid”, again, that is true for truly artistic (moral) novels too.
[p168] “the anecdote, stripped of its trimmings, is insignificant and often inane.”
[p168] “a short story must be an idea … It must be a picture, it must illustrate something … something of the real essence of the subject.”
[p169] “It cannot be summarized or reduced without sacrificing the very qualities that do in fact distinguish an amusing dinner-party anecdote from a great work of art - depth, resonance, harmony”
[p170] “if we find a way to describe what the story is really about, not its plot but its essence … there is always something there” But this is so very true of novellas and novels as well. This is not a unique aspect of the short story.
Poe: everything should work towards an effect.
[p172] V.S. Pritchett: “The novel tends to tell us everything whereas the short story tells us only one thing, and that, intensely… It is, as some have said, a ‘glimpse through,’ resembling a painting or even a song which we can take in at once, yet bring the recesses and contours of larger experience to the mind.”
[p176] “To claim that every short story should include a moment of epiphany is like insisting that every talented, marvelous dog jump through the same narrow hoop.”
Why should everything in the world of a short story be “put there for a reason” [p177] Can its internal dissonance not be a major part of the story’s impact?
[p178] “we understand something new, something solid”, again, that is true for truly artistic (moral) novels too.
Anne Lamott - "Shitty First Drafts"
A fun enough read - I would definitely shoot the little buggers in the head - about first drafts and the big Don’t. Be. Afraid. Of. Them.
It is well written, in the sense that a writer reading this must recognize his own behaviour in the words, his tremors and angst. Followed by her calming, soothing advice: don’t worry. We all do it.
It is trying a bit too much to be funny once or twice, and I wouldn’t say it is amazing in its coverage and examination, but… maybe that is exactly the point. Don’t get all academic about it. It’s just a first draft. Just go with it. Hate it as much as you like, definitely don’t analyze it, but know that it *will* help you.
I recognize a lot and will definitely try the mousy voices exercise. Won’t hurt. How I feel after a first draft? Depends on what I was drinking while I wrote it. I’ve been everywhere: from elated to depressed, from curious (hey this might actually be something) to downright nihilistic. The latter mostly happens when I look at my bookcase, see all these splendid writers, and start to convince myself: I will never be able to come even close to that.
The next steps after a first draft do not follow the same path. Sometimes I totally neglect it. Sometimes I remember the thoughts and feelings that made me write it in the first place, and even though it is shitty I sent it to a good friend. Sometimes I start working on it. Rereading, or drafting characters, plotlines, style. In short, I mess around. And sometimes even that works.
It is well written, in the sense that a writer reading this must recognize his own behaviour in the words, his tremors and angst. Followed by her calming, soothing advice: don’t worry. We all do it.
It is trying a bit too much to be funny once or twice, and I wouldn’t say it is amazing in its coverage and examination, but… maybe that is exactly the point. Don’t get all academic about it. It’s just a first draft. Just go with it. Hate it as much as you like, definitely don’t analyze it, but know that it *will* help you.
I recognize a lot and will definitely try the mousy voices exercise. Won’t hurt. How I feel after a first draft? Depends on what I was drinking while I wrote it. I’ve been everywhere: from elated to depressed, from curious (hey this might actually be something) to downright nihilistic. The latter mostly happens when I look at my bookcase, see all these splendid writers, and start to convince myself: I will never be able to come even close to that.
The next steps after a first draft do not follow the same path. Sometimes I totally neglect it. Sometimes I remember the thoughts and feelings that made me write it in the first place, and even though it is shitty I sent it to a good friend. Sometimes I start working on it. Rereading, or drafting characters, plotlines, style. In short, I mess around. And sometimes even that works.
Squarepusher - "Iambic 5 Poetry" (Budakhan Mindphone)
Instrumental, on Pandora's "Angelo Badalamenti" channel.
Perhaps good for writing?
Perhaps good for writing?
House of Cards
Amazing series (Netflix) featuring Kevin Spacey as a ruthless Democrat from South Carolina, playing the majority Whip while secretly aiming for the job of vice president.
Not a single boring moment. Fast script, intriguing characters. Can't wait for season 2.
Not a single boring moment. Fast script, intriguing characters. Can't wait for season 2.
Moby - "Innocents"
All very Moby-like.
Damien Jurado : sounds both like the Crazy Clown guy from David Lynch's album, as well as Flaming Lippish... and his song "Almost Home" irritates me big time.
Damien Jurado : sounds both like the Crazy Clown guy from David Lynch's album, as well as Flaming Lippish... and his song "Almost Home" irritates me big time.
Tuesday, 8 October 2013
Monday, 7 October 2013
words from Gardner's "On Moral Fiction"
- sequacious - lacking independence or originality of thought
- audiculous - timorously audacious
- timorous - showing or suffering from nervousness, fear, or a lack of confidence
- audacious - showing a willingness to take surprisingly bold risks
- abnegation - the act of renouncing or rejecting something
Joyce Carol Oates - "Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?"
from Alice LaPlante's "The Making of a Story"
A teenage girl is stalked by a strange guy. It gets intense near the end, but the moment when she is engulfed by insanity (my impression) is not very strong.
A teenage girl is stalked by a strange guy. It gets intense near the end, but the moment when she is engulfed by insanity (my impression) is not very strong.
Denis Johnson - "Emergency"
'Fuckhead' - the main character - and Georgie leave the hospital and go on a tiny drug fueled trip. Some pretty intense sentences where he states the facts don't matter, but there is still truth in it.
Joan Didion - "On Keeping a Notebook"
Nice read because it explains so well the urge to record everything, even though out of context it looses its meaning, and over time it looses any coherence it once might have had.
Alice LaPlante - "The Making of a Story"
A Norton Guide to creative writing.
Wonderful book with exercises. Too many things to quote here, except; "It's important to understand that there are two aspects to creating truly compelling writing. ... what's needed is both method and madness. The method is what can be learned in an academically rigorous, systematic manner. ... But then there's the madness part - what is more frequently called the inspiration."
Wonderful book with exercises. Too many things to quote here, except; "It's important to understand that there are two aspects to creating truly compelling writing. ... what's needed is both method and madness. The method is what can be learned in an academically rigorous, systematic manner. ... But then there's the madness part - what is more frequently called the inspiration."
Tindersticks - "Across Six Leap Years"
Pretty amazing, very Tindersticks. Old songs, never published before, have been recorded in the Abbey Road studio.
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