‘The British Film Institute presents ImagineAsia: A Celebration of South Asian Film.’slrs

A survey of ‘Contemporary Malayalam Cinema’ on the bfi website—by Dr C S Venkiteswaran, who is faculty at the Centre for Taxation Studies (!), Thiruvananthapuram. I remember reading his articles in The Indian Express. This article is intended for a forthcoming bfi publication titled Contemporary South Asian Film and Television: A Survey.

One of the most enigmatic figures in Malayalam cinema during the period was John Abraham (1937-1987), in whom Ritwik Ghatak (the great Bengali filmmaker and his teacher), saw 'the future of Indian cinema'. As erratic and unpredictable in life as in his films, John's works are imbued with a deep humanity. In a way, they dealt with the very impossibility of being human and creative.

Good to hear from Fobbin that there are interesting things being done in Malayalam films even in the commercial mode.

The first review of a Malayalam film posted on Salon got me started on a web search on Malayalam films. Found some interesting sites and articles.

Violence

This is an entirely different movie as far as Malayalam movies are concerned. It provides enough clues to new directors, about the trends that are going to be dominating popular Malayalam movies in the near future. I am not going to list the shortcomings of this film, which are plenty. Everything about this film is new. New actors, new theme, new approach to situations.

The story is about a young goonda who once raped a novitiate nun, who in turn is rejected by the order when she is found pregnant. To escape ridicule from the locals she is staying with her lawyer’s friend in Cochin, who happens to be a famous soap actress. The heroine somehow had to use the help of the young goonda, but both of them do not recognize each other. By the end of the film he realises that she is the one whom he had raped and also that his son is alive in an orphanage. Now the goonda wants to change but he can’t because all such movies say so. In the end he dies (?) trying to save her.

Actor Vijayaraghavan is good as a corrupt police officer, but tends to overact occasionally. Casting of hero and heroine is good, but that of most of the other characters are below average. Gangster characters are presented almost naturally. But they tend to act in a way that is not improving the movie in any way. Like I always believe, never leave your movie to the actors. Don’t let them go solo. If you do so, what you get is a compilation of clippings, of good acting from your actors, but not the movie that you planned to make.

I don’t know whether the director of this movie really understood Tarantino properly. Because some of the characters and subplots in this film are not at all necessary. The truth is that the director doesn’t know how to use that method, of plot within the plot and charactors crashing into the scenes used brilliantly by Tarantino.

As I said earlier despite all the shortcomings I liked the film. It will definitely set certain trends in future Malayalam films. It is not a great film, but it will certainly inspire young moviemakers to try and experiment with form and content in cinema.slfr

Margaret is an American studying in Pune. She is very pleased with her India experience. The following passage from her blog is testimony to that:

"Margaret, why did you not want to take a 30-hour train ride?" you ask. Seek and ye shall receive. Trains in India are kinda dirty and broken, sort of like everything else. We were riding second class non-a.c., which is only a small step above cargo. The seats are '70s era vinyl, and they're bench seats, so you're pretty much cheek to cheek with the people next to you. Now, this would be uncomfortable enough. But to add an extra dimension of fun, the entire ride smells like poop. Why? Because people shit on the train tracks. The entire ride, back and forth, I never went more than seven or eight minutes without seeing someone outside dropping trou with their feet on the track to use this nationwide toilet. It's disgusting. Like, I'm sort of getting used to the whole idea that there's poop all over the place here, but I'm still having a hard time with actually having to see the people shit on the railroad. Yeech. If these close quarters and the all-India poopfest weren't enough, people wander up and down the aisle begging and hocking stuff. I can understand selling food and drinks and crap. But socks? OK, maybe your feet get cold on the train...even though it's 90 degrees. Key chains? OK, maybe you, uh, need a key chain. But whips? Who the fuck buys a whip? Who buys whips in general is one question, but who buys whips on a train? Then cue the 9 jillion beggars. I just couldn't take 30 hours of it.

Flattering. No?

saw malayalam film called violence, in the line of sathya.
tell you about it later

indiabike is a good resource for info on Indian two-wheelers. They also reproduce reviews and comparison tests from the Indian car & bike press.slrs

My earlier object of desire: the Enfield Lightning 535. Haunted my daydreams ever since I spotted her on a Fort Cochin street one evening. Now I hear Enfield has stopped production of the model.

By the way, Royal Enfield has a good website.

I need no one to tell me which looks better, but there is more to life, isn’t there? Or is there? Which has got to be my brand of Zen?





Enfield Thunderbird; Yamaha Enticer; Bajaj Pulsar

Now here’s a surfeit of film lists: the Village Voice’s Take One poll of 50-plus critics at the end of 1999 to select not only the best films of the year, but also of the century and of the decade, as well as the best directors of the decade. The individual critics’ selections are also listed.

Take 2 (2000)
Take 3 (2001)sll

Rather late in the year for this, but what the heck? Time’s Best of 2001: in cinema, tv/ads, books, design, sports, music, theatre and comics.sll

Time magazine made a selection of America’s best people in different fields at present. Here is the Artists & Entertainers section. Best actor: Sean Penn; novelist: Philip Roth; movie director: Ang Lee; movie star: Julia Roberts; rock band: Sleater-Kinney; songwriter: Lucinda Williams; singer: Cassandra Wilson; artist: Martin Puryear; and more.sll slrs

Adoor Gopalakrishnan’s top ten Indian films.sll

In association with the ImagineAsia festival, the British Film Institute have compiled a list of the top 20 Indian films ‘from the views of experts, critics, academics and practitioners’. Topping the list is Sholay—but what I can’t figure out is how a list that has John Abraham’s Amma Ariyan at no 9 have Dilwale Dulhaniya Le Jayenge at 12. Other undeserved inclusions in my opinion are Bombay and Lagaan—all the more so when there is no mention of Mrinal Sen, Aravindan or Adoor. I would even go so far as to say that Pather Panchali and Mother India are rated too highly. Yes, that’s what I said.

The long list of Indian films that were considered but failed to make the final cut.

On the Pakistani top ten list, you’ll spot this intriguing name: Haseena Atom Bomb. Not quite the type of bomb the Indian defence establishment need lose sleep over.sll

André Bazin: the French critic who practically invented film studies.

It's no exaggeration to say that Bazin is the single thinker most responsible for bestowing on cinema the prestige both of an artform and of an object of knowledge. While scattered attempts had been made before to define the "essence" of cinema..., Bazin's ideas were to prove the decisive ones in establishing its credentials as a separate and legitimate field of intellectual enquiry. In one of his essays from the 40s Bazin projected that distant day when film studies would enter the university curriculum – and it was Bazin more than anyone else who played the role of midwife.

Which are the finest documentary films of all time? Peter Matthews selects the following in Sight and Sound:

Robert Flaherty's Nanook of the North (1922)
Luis Buñuel's Land without Bread (1933)
Alain Resnais' Night and Fog (1955)
Jean Rouch's Chronicle of a Summer (1960)
Abbas Kiarostami's Homework (Mashq-e Shab, 1990)sll

The archive of online features from Sight and Sound magazine: read a case for an Abel Ferrara film to be considered as one of the best in cinema of the last three decades; another one for Kieslowski’s Blue; and one for Kiarostami’s docu Homework; J Hoberman’s take on one of my favourite films of the last few years—Three Kings; Spielberg confirming his status as ‘the greatest cinematic orchestrator of our time’ with Minority Report; and much more.slrs

From the British film Trainspotting:

Choose life. Choose a job. Choose a career. Choose a family. Choose a fucking big television. Choose washing machines, cars, compact disc players and electrical tin openers. Choose good health, low cholesterol, and dental insurance. Choose fixed interest mortgage repayments. Choose a starter home. Choose your friends. Choose leisurewear and matching fabrics. Choose DIY and wondering who the fuck you are on a Sunday morning. Choose sitting on that couch watching mind-numbing, spirit crushing game shows, stuffing junk food into your mouth. Choose rotting away at the end of it all, pishing your last in a miserable home, nothing more than an embarrassment to the selfish, fucked up brats you spawned to replace yourself. Choose a future. Choose life... But why would I want to do a thing like that?

slq

Bright Lights Film Journal's Banned Words.

MEDITATION, n. This is in some ways the most insidious of these terms. It is the most sentimental, pretentious, fanciful, and misleading of this little group. Example: "Peckinpah's The Wild Bunch is a meditation on violence." Translation: "Peckinpah's The Wild Bunch is an extremely violent movie, filled with bullet-riddled bodies, women beaten to the ground by grunge-faced old cowpokes, Mexicans massacred in churchyards," etc. This concept of meditation is a way of disingenuously stating a concept — most often, violence — while sidestepping its implications and of course the authors' (both critic of the piece and director of the film) involvement, even complicity in it...

Walking with the Wind: Poems by Abbas Kiarostami

How merciful
That the turtle doesn't see
The little bird's effortless flight.

Photograph by Kiarostami

From Wired News, the hazards of working in the myriad ‘call centers’ in India:

[…] Partho let his accent slip and had to confess after being pointedly questioned that he was, in fact, an Indian sitting next to a telephone in Mumbai. "The man told me, 'You guys blew up the WTC,'" he said. "I tried to explain India had nothing to do with it, but he just banged the phone down."

Mandakini Pradhan, 21, once dialed an American home in an attempt to sell a caller ID system. The man told her, "Aren't you the girl who lives next door? Can you see me? I am naked."

‘Founded in 1959, Communication Arts is the leading trade journal for visual communications. It's the largest design magazine in the world and showcases the top work in graphic design, advertising, illustration, photography and interactive design.’slrs

“No live organism can continue for long to exist sanely under conditions of absolute reality; even larks and katydids are supposed, by some, to dream.”
- Shirley Jackson, The Haunting of Hill Houseslq

Like logos?

slrs

From the American Film Institute’s 100 greatest movie posters of the 20th century.


sll

In their September issue, the folks at Web User, the UK’s largest selling internet magazine, have selected their ten favourite weblogs. Here are their top three:

1. Beatnikpad
2. Rebecca Blood
3. Blogjam

Others on the list include Pop Culture Junk Mail and Swish Cottage.sll slrs

Found from a fellow blogger, who has a real classy looking blog at clagnut.com, a story in The Independent about a real Beckettian farce taking place in the London High Court. An excerpt:

Counsel: Now, Mr Chrysler – for let us assume that that is your name – you are accused of purloining in excess of 40,000 hotel coat hangers.

Chrysler: I am.

Counsel: Can you explain how this came about?

Chrysler: Yes. I had 40,000 coats which I needed to hang up.

Counsel: Is that true?

Chrysler: No.

Counsel: Then why did you say it?

Chrysler: To attempt to throw you off balance.

Counsel: Off balance?

Chrysler: Certainly. As you know, all barristers seek to undermine the confidence of any hostile witness, or defendant. Therefore it must be equally open to the witness, or defendant, to try to shake the confidence of a hostile barrister.

Counsel: On the contrary, you are not here to indulge in cut and thrust with me. You are only here to answer my questions.

Chrysler: Was that a question?

Counsel: No.

Chrysler: Then I can’t answer it.

Part II of the story here.

The 50 best romantic reads, from the British newspaper The Independent, list freak that I am…sll

Last month The Guardian announced the results of its Best British Weblog competition. The winner was Scaryduck by Alistair Coleman of Weymouth, Dorset. Just checked out the blog. The chap has a good sense of humour:

In the name of God! Pretty Woman is not - repeat IS NOT a modern fairy tale about true love and the American Dream. It's a sordid little movie about a man who drives around picking up prostitutes. He's a kerbcrawler! A sex pervert! He probably even had a small rodent stuffed up his arse while he was at it...

And under a photograph of a suspicious-looking cat, he writes: ‘LESBIAN RABBITS TURNED MY CAT MENTAL’.

Coleman also maintains Scaryduck’s House of Lies – which has some pretty good howlers.

sll slrs

Largecow is the website of British cartoonist and graphic novelist Hunt Emerson.



‘I was abducted by aliens once. They ate my trousers.’slrs

Nothing like a good annotated reading list to whet your appetite for books. Here’s one I found recently, from the September / October 1999 issue of the American Book Review. ‘The 20th Century’s Greatest Hits: 100 English Language Books of Fiction’ is by Larry McCaffery, who teaches American literature at San Diego State University and is co-editor of the journal Fiction International. Save it to a floppy and read it at home.

More great book lists can be found at LiteraryCritic.com.sll slrs

Right, I’ll get to Marquez on some bright sunny day, after I can get myself to stop puzzling at the ambiguous undulations that pigeons make as they sink downward to darkness on extended wings…

Right now I am reading (rereading) collected stories of Gabriel Garcia Marquez.

Dear Clement, don’t waste your precious life reading the definitions of life, love and art, read any of these stories, especially the stories of 60's and 70's.

The grand mother shrugged her shoulder and took care of the musician. She handed him a bundle of bills that matched the figure written in her ledger.

"Two hundred and fifty numbers," she told him. "At fifty cents apiece, plus thirty two on Sundays and holidays at sixty cents apiece, that's one hundred fifty-six twenty.

The musician wouldn't accept the money.

"It’s one hundred eighty-two forty," he said. “Waltzes cost more.'

"Why is that?'

"Because they are sadder," said the musician.

The grand mother made him take the money.

"Well, this week you'll play us two happy numbers for each waltz I owe you for and we'll be even."

- ‘Innocent Erendira and Her Heartless Grandmother'

Website of the Film and Television Institute of India here in Pune. Bad text, unattractive design, and the Admissions link does not work. Reminds you that the institute is run by the government. Seems like the private firm which designed the site learnt their trade from the Department of Audio-Visual Publicity (the notorious DAVP) of the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting.

The latest goof of the DAVP I heard about is the ad they published on Gandhi Jayanti in a Gujarati newspaper which read, ‘An ungrateful[!] nation pays homage to the Mahatma on his birthday.’ The Congress promptly declared that if not on purpose, the slip was surely Freudian, and alleged that the Hindutvawadis in Delhi are still after the Mahatma more than half a century after they assassinated him.

kamera.co.uk chats with Asif Kapadia – director of the acclaimed British made Hindi-language film The Warrior. Says Kapadia:

My co writer Tim Miller… pitched me something he had read in a book of Japanese tales, it was a four line footnote: “A young Boy training to be a samurai, was bought before the Shogun, shown a severed head and asked if it was his father. The Boy knew it was not his father but to save his father's life he lied and said it was. To prove it, the Boy pulled out his dagger and killed himself. He would rather be dead than live with the shame his father had bought onto the family.” I thought it was such a powerful scene…

...in the introduction to which Slate's cartoonist Daryl Cagle argues that 9/11 brought out the worst in editorial cartoons.
[Click on above pic.]

Cagle's Professional Cartoonists Index. HUGE collection of political cartoons.slrs

The NYT on American Desi.

Changed Salon’s archive template; got a drop-down menu for it. Changed archiving frequency to monthly. I dunno but all this seems to have solved the trouble with posting too. Everything fine then. Good.

For the archive template, used Phil Ringnalda’s Archive Script Generator, which I recommend. Because it uses JavaScript, which I have no idea of, I couldn’t get the archive pages to open in a new window.

The art of the graphic novel – an article from December 2000 in The Observer.

Top 10’s in the Guardian’s Books section: selections of favourite ten books in all sorts of genres and sub-sub-genres of publishing, by writers, editors, academics, et al. One life ain’t enough, man!

Sample: The Observer's literary editor Robert McCrum’s ‘favourite books of the twentieth century’:

1. A La Recherche Du Temps Perdu by Marcel Proust
2. Ulysses by James Joyce
3. The Man without Qualities by Robert Musil
4. The Trial by Franz Kafka
5. Murphy by Samuel Beckett
6. One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
7. The Good Soldier by Ford Madox Ford
8. The Tin Drum by Gunter Grass
9. A Bend in the River by VS Naipaul
10. Nostromo by Josef Conrad

It is also possible that you may discover something special: ‘The best comic strip of all time. The best illustrated book of all time. The best sustained work of surrealism of all time. A magisterial whodunwhat, full of little deaths and high adventure, insurrection and freedom.’ China Miéville here is talking about one book – Une Semaine de Bonte by Max Ernst.sll slrs

- René Magritte: The Lovers, 1928

You liked ‘A to Z of Surrealism’? There’s more where that came from. Last year the Tate Gallery in London hosted an exhibition titled ‘Surrealism: Desire Unbound’. The BBC had many programmes in connexion with this event. The very interesting material is compiled here.

A selection of works from the exhibition.slrs

From the transcript on the BBC website of a live chat with Jonathan Meades – author, journalist and critic – on Surrealism:

Q: True or false, intelligent people can't make art?
JM: That's a very good question, I think if you're too sensient and too intelligent you probably can't do it. I think perhaps that would be a quality that you don't know what you're doing - because if you know what you're doing you can't do it.
[Interesting, no?]

Q: What would happen if someone were to break the rules for Surrealism? Is it possible to be too surrealistic for Surrealism?
JM: Well think September the 11th. Well evidently you can look at the film of what was happening on that day and say as Carl Heinz Stockhausen said 'This is a great work of art' - that was a crass thing to say. However, it was possible to see that from the clouds and flames it looked like all of Max Ernst premonitions had come true.

Q: What is it that fascinates you so much about the fantastical dogma of the Catholic church?
JM: I'm a card-carrying Atheist but if I smoked cigarettes I would smoke Capstan full-strength rather than Marlborough Light.
[Them’s my sentiments!]

Q: What relationship does Surrealism have to anarchy? Exploring outside the realms of common sense and common rules?
JM: I don't know, I think that art does not attempt to control people in any way. It might suggest roots by which people can behave. It doesn't try to lay down forms for behaviour. It might suggest a way of behaving but it doesn't set out templates of behaviour - it is not prescriptive.

Q: With Surrealist art the theory is to express the spontaneous. But how can a work of art, which takes time and effort to produce be spontaneous?
JM: I think it's very improbable that any work of art of any merit has been spontaneous. The only kind of spontaneity is the kind of spontaneity that has been very well rehearsed and thought out beforehand - That's knocking the idea of spontaneity right on the head.
[Again interesting, eh?]

Style for Men, from the About web portal: shaving, hairstyles, fashion. Am I being trivial?slrs

The following is from the page titled ‘The Fine Print’ on plagiarist.com. It’s pretty long – I couldn’t decide on a part to select and so here’s the whole thing. It’s a fun compendium. Reminded me of a particular Radiohead song. But Radiohead is another topic…

Plagiarist provides these poems as is, with no warranty or guarantee of any kind, either written or implied. Plagiarist reserves the right to alter the site or even remove it entirely at the slightest capricious whim. Void where prohibited by law. Subject to change without notice. PA residents add 6% sales tax. Free shipping for orders over $1,000,000. Offer not available in Alaska, Hawaii, or New Jersey. Batteries not included. No purchase necessary. For a limited time only. You may cancel at any time. Keep off the grass. Violators will be prosecuted. Slippery when wet. Any resemblance to persons living or dead is purely coincidental. Some assembly required. Contents may settle during shipping. Weight reflects pre-cooked state. Times approximate. Simulated picture. Do not use while operating a motor vehicle or heavy equipment. Apply only to affected area. May cause itching, burning, inflammation of the lower extremities, choking, vomiting, explosive diarrhea, memory loss, sudden and severe weight loss, boils, abrasions, flatulence, sneezing, blurry vision, voting Republican, dancing, gasping desperately for breath, asphyxiation, tumors, hernias, hemorrhages, and a propensity to watch sitcoms. If condition persists, consult your physician. Use only as recommended. Due to some violent content, viewer discretion is advised. This is CNN. Open other end. This side up. This means you. For recreational use only. As seen on TV. No user- serviceable parts inside. Freshest if used before date stamped on carton. No postage necessary if mailed in the United States. Breaking seal constitutes acceptance of agreement. Colours may fade over time. For off-road use only. One size fits all. Many suitcases look alike. Contains a substantial amount of non-tobacco ingredients. Slippery when wet. For office use only. Edited for television. Keep cool; process promptly. Post office will not deliver without postage. List was current at time of printing. Return to sender, no forwarding order on file, unable to forward. Not responsible for direct, indirect, incidental or consequential damages resulting from any defect, error or failure to perform. At participating locations only. Penalty for private use. See label for sequence. Substantial penalty for early withdrawal. Do not write below this line. Falling rock. Lost ticket pays maximum rate. Your canceled check is your receipt. Add toner. Place stamp here. Avoid contact with skin. Sanitized for your protection. Be sure each item is properly endorsed. Sign here without admitting guilt. Slightly higher west of the Mississippi. Employees and their families are not eligible. Beware of dog. Contestants have been briefed on some questions before the show. You must be present to win. No passes accepted for this engagement. Processed at location stamped in code at top of carton. Shading within a garment may occur. Use only in a well-ventilated area. Keep away from fire or flames. Replace with same type. Approved for veterans. Booths for two or more. Check here if tax deductible. Some equipment shown is optional. Price does not include taxes. No Canadian coins. Not recommended for children. Prerecorded for this time zone. Reproduction strictly prohibited. No solicitors. No alcohol, dogs or horses. No anchovies unless otherwise specified. Restaurant package, not for resale. List at least two alternate dates. First pull up, then pull down. No MSG used. This film has been modified from its original version. It has been formatted to fit your TV. Driver does not carry cash. Some of the trademarks mentioned in this product appear for identification purposes only. Record additional transactions on back of previous stub. Unix is a registered trademark of AT&T. Do not fold, spindle or mutilate. No transfers issued until the bus comes to a complete stop. Package sold by weight, not volume. Your mileage may vary. This supersedes all previous notices. Repeat as necessary. Keep out of reach of children. Contents may be hot. Keep head and arms inside at all times. Dispose of properly. For external use only. Avoid contact with eyes. It is a violation of federal law to use this product in a manner inconsistent with its labeling. Close spout after use. Do not puncture or incinerate. Contents under pressure. If redness, irritation, swelling or pain persists or increases or if infection occurs, discontinue use and consult a physician. In case of accidental ingestion, seek professional assistance or contact a poison control center immediately. Intentional misuse by deliberately concentrating and inhaling the contents can be harmful or fatal. Do not spray while smoking or near fire. Products are not authorized for use as critical components in life support devices or systems. See reverse side for additional details. Do not write your Personal Identification Number on your card. Please retain this copy for your records. Unauthorized returns will not be accepted. Normal wear and tear of products or damage resulting from misuse, accidents, or alterations are not covered by this Limited Warranty. Within 15 days of change of name or address you are required by law to notify the Bureau in writing. This note is legal tender for all debts, public and private. Do not use if seal is broken or damaged. Refrigerate after opening. A copy of this deposition is being separately served to the defendant. Phenylketonurics: contains phenylalanine. The surgeon general has determined that prolonged exposure to high levels of radiation can be hazardous. Do not use this product with children under 6 years except under the supervision of a physician. May cause drowsiness. Do not use this product if you have high blood pressure, heart disease, diabetes, thyroid disease, asthma, glaucoma, or difficulty in urination. If you are pregnant or nursing a baby, seek the advice of a health care professional before using. This product has been shown to cause cancer in laboratory rats. For optimum performance and safety, please read these instructions carefully. Do not use the AC adapter provided with this player for other products. Do not play your headset at high volume. If you experience a ringing in your ears, reduce volume or discontinue use. Do not use while operating a motorized vehicle. Prices stated are USA prices only. This page intentionally left blank. Do not eat. This is not a toy. Do not taunt Happy Fun Ball. Plagiarist is a registered trademark of Plagiarist.com and Approximately, Inc. All rights reserved.

Discovered:
A website called plagiarist.com – a good site with a bad name. It is ‘a repository of classic and modern poetry’. Classic poetry is comparatively easy to find on the web. But this site is pretty strong on modern poetry too.slrs

To Fobbin:

I didn’t comment on your Monologue of a Bush Postman because it’s good and it shows. Typical of your stuff too. I feel like I’m beginning to get the hang of your ‘artistic vision’ (pardon the bombast). But maybe I’m too hasty. Let’s have more of your stuff, and I’ll tell you.

‘Passages, chambers, storages and altars’ – for some reason I like that. ‘Silver streaks’, ‘blinding glimmer’, ‘green breasts [beasts?]’, ‘broken mirrors’, ‘gnarled thighs’, ‘dark green silence’ – painter, aren’t you?

I’m telling you man, having read part of your African story as well as this monologue, you’ve got a good thing going with this bushman stuff. Can you get out of this something more sustained?

There’s some problem with Blogger. Whenever a post is made, it shows the message: ‘Cannot load template – we are working on this.’ And the last post does not appear on Salon even after refreshing the page. But everything is fine after a couple of minutes or so. So don’t bother if your post doesn’t appear immediately.

Life is moving fast like a bull let loose. And I being responsible for whatever it does. Sometimes rewarded, sometimes punished.
Offering explanations and justifications. Providing theories for life's dynamics, never really grasping it.
But I am addicted and stuck with it, like a woman to her charming, irresponsible husband.slcw

'A to Z of surrealism' is great. I discovered painter 'Yves Tanguy'.

How is my Monologue of a bush postman ?

Ezra Loomis Pound

'... hysterias, trench confessions, laughter out of dead bellies.'

His support for Mussolini led to his confinement in a US mental hospital (1946-58).

'The apparition of these faces in the crowd;
Petals on a wet, black bough.'

Just browsed through the BBC website. Fantastic! Huge, comprehensive and authoritative. Easy to get lost in all that content. Some day I’ll have a permanent connection to the net and will spend my time reading all that stuff. Some day.

AboutMusic is their in-depth section on music of all persuasions, where Debussy jostles with Dylan and Davis.

AboutMusic’s profile of Beethoven with more links and recommendations. I suppose the site would also be a worthy aural experience, but the net café has no facilities for sound.



The informative entry on Dylan (‘unquestionably the greatest musical poet of the 20th century’) from the Encyclopedia of Popular Music reproduced on the site.

‘Paris in the Twenties’ – a feature article in AboutMusic.



The A to Z of Surrealism: … B is for Andre Breton:

The founder, chief theoretician and presiding spirit of Surrealism, who became such a ferocious and possessive guardian of its purity across the decades that he became known by cynics as its “Pope”.

slrs

Having looked around to find out what else other than Gandhi’s birth occurred on Oct 2, I was interested to know about the events that took place on my birthday – June 26. Here’s what I found:

In 1284, the Pied Piper lured 130 children of the town of Hamelin away. In 1894, Karl Benz received US patent for gasoline-driven auto. In 1896, the first movie theatre in the US opened. In 1945, in San Francisco, the UN Charter was signed by 50 nations. In India, the Emergency was declared in 1975. In 1989, the US Supreme Court ruled that 16 year olds can receive the death penalty. In 1997 the Court struck down the Internet indecency law; and, on the same day, upheld the ban on doctor-assisted suicide.

In 1870, June 26 saw the premiere of Richard Wagner’s Valkyrie in Munich; and in 1912 Mahler’s 9th Symphony premiered in Vienna. The Beatles released A Hard Day’s Night in 1964; and in 1977 Elvis Presley gave the last performance of his career, in Indianapolis.

People born on June 26 include the scientist Lord Kelvin, the writers Andre Maurois and Pearl S Buck, the blues singer/guitarist ‘Big Bill’ Broonzy and the conductor Claudio Abbado, the actor Peter Lorre, and the director Paul Thomas Anderson.

Alfred Doblin, who, in his novel Berlin Alexanderplatz, gave Berlin the same treatment that Joyce gave Dublin in Ulysses, died on this date. (The novel was made into a film, which, at 15 ½ hours, is the longest narrative film ever, by Rainer Werner Fassbinder.)

Wallace Stevens

'We live in an old chaos of the sun,
Or old dependency of day and night,
Or island solitude, unsponsored, free,
Of that wide water, inescapable.
Deer walk upon our mountains, and the quail
Whistle about us their spontaneous cries;
Sweet berries ripen in the wilderness;
And, in the isolation of the sky,
At evening, casual flocks of pigeons make
Ambiguous undulations as they sink,
Downward to darkness, on extended wings.'
- 'Sunday Morning' (1923) st. 8slq

Yesterday was October 2: Gandhi's birthday.



Others born on this day include Richard III, Wallace Stevens, Graham Greene, Groucho Marx, Bud Abbott and Sting.

The day also marks the first time the world saw a comic-strip featuring Charlie Brown and Snoopy (1950) and the premieres of 'Alfred Hitchcock Presents' (1955) and 'Twilight Zone' (1959).

On October 2, 1187, Saladin captured Jerusalem from the Crusaders; and in 1941, Hitler began his ill-advised Operation Typhoon to bring Russia to her knees.

On this day in 322 BC Aristotle died of indigestion; and in 1955, James Dean died in a car crash.

J B Priestly - quote

"For what is essential is that the novelist, whatever else he does, should be able to show us people who by some means or other, through delighted fascination, repulsion, or mere conviction that in their own world they exist, catch and hold our imagination. if his characters fail to do this, then the novelist has failed. A novel in which the people do not seem to us to come alive cannot succeed as a novel, no matter what merits it may have as a piece of writing.
Vital relationship between us and its characters, or atleast some of them, remains central in fiction, its keystone."
J B Priestly

J B Priestly - quote

"Enjoying modern poetry was no longer like enjoying a glass of wine, spring blossom, the operas of mozart, but began to suggest some difficult and mysterious hobby, solving cryptograms or learning to write chinese. The gap between the poet of genius or great talent and society in general was now far wider than it had been when the age began.
contemporary poetry seemed to be written by and for specialists.And here is the tragic irony of the situation, For poetry does not represent the specialization and separation of men, cannot be another of the barriers between them. Poetry is the break-through, the whole man addressing other whole men. but now modern poetry, in its sincere effort to be more purely poetical, lost most of its audience, and just when that audience was in need of it. So if the poets were unlucky, so was the age."
J B Priestly

J B Priestly - quote

"Strictly speaking, 'A hero of our time' (Lermentov)is not a novel at all but a series of five tales,and no matter how beautifully they are told,five tales do not add up to a novel, just as five pavillions cannot equal in their architectural importance a splendid palace.
A great novel has a scope and sweep, a broad continuity of narrative, a massive fundamental structure, with which, fortunately for the writer of the tales, episodes,anecdotes,novelettes, has not to concern himself."
J B Priestly.

Santayana - quote

" I think Dickens is one of the best friends mankind has ever had."
Santayana.

J B Priestly - quote

Dickens possess in full measure that fiercely creative will in which Thackeray a big but slack and soft man is defficient. He had all the gifts of a master except the fiercely creative will that lifts an artist above bad luck and an unpropitius time.
J B Priestly. 'Literature and Western man'

Art

"art is like digging up a hundred tonnes of dirt, carrying it out of the hole a sack at a time, then sifting and washing the whole of it to get a gram of gold and making exquisite jewellery out of it"
fobbin
slcw

Monologue of a bush postman

Monologue of a bush postman

There is no growth as such. Life is just a wasted time spent carrying tears and joys between people. It is spent walking the muddy shores of this river.
All the rivers are coming from this bush. The mud sucks in my legs. And my eyes are straining to see the silver streaks of fish among the blinding glimmer of the river.
Green breasts speckled with broken mirrors carrying the sun on the their faces. I wish I could sit somewhere. I wish I could rest my head on the gnarled thighs of that tree, within the dark green silence. But my rest is broken by the fact that, under me beneath this roots a million ants are toiling forever, building passages, chambers, storages and altars. The need of what they build are neither explained nor felt. I got up. Started walking again.slcw

Samuel L Jackson as Jules

From Quentin Tarantino's blazing hot Pulp Fiction:

[Jules and Vinnie take Marvin with them in their car and Vinnie's gun goes off and blows Marvin's head off]
Jules: Oh! Fuck's happening!
Vincent: Man, I shot Marvin in the face.
Jules: Why the fuck did you do that! Oh man I've seen some crazy ass shit in my time!
Vincent: Chill out, man. I told you it was an accident. You probably went over a bump or something.
Jules: Hey, the car didn't hit no motherfucking bump.
Vincent: Hey, look man, I didn't mean to shoot the son of a bitch! The gun went off. I don't know why.
Jules: Well look at this fucking mess, man. We're on a city street in broad daylight.
Vincent: I don't believe it.
Jules: Well believe it now, motherfucker! We gotta get this car off the road. You know cops tend to notice shit like your driving a car drenched in fucking blood.
Vincent: Take it to a friendly place, that's all.
Jules: We're in the Valley, Vincent! Marcellus ain't got no friendly places in the Valley.
...
Jimmie: Now let me ask you a question, Jules. When you drove in here, did you notice a sign out in front that said, "Dead nigger storage"?
Jules: Jimmie...
Jimmie: Answer the question! Did you see a sign out in front of my house that said "Dead nigger storage"?
Jules: Naw man, I didn't.
Jimmie: You know why you didn't see that sign?
Jules: Why?
Jimmie: 'Cause storin' dead niggers ain't my fuckin' business!
...
Jules: Hey, sewer rat may taste like pumpkin pie but I'd never know 'cause I wouldn't eat the filthy motherfuckers. Pigs sleep and root in shit. That's a filthy animal. I ain't eat nothin' that ain't got enough sense to disregard its own faeces.
Vincent: How about a dog? Dogs eat their own feces.
Jules: I don't eat dog either.
Vincent: Yeah, but do you consider a dog to be a filthy animal?
Jules: I wouldn't go so far as to call a dog filthy but they're definitely dirty. But, a dog's got personality. Personality goes a long way.
Vincent: Ah, so by that rationale, if a pig had a better personality, it'd cease to be a filthy animal. Is that true?
Jules: Well we gotta be talkin' about one charmin' motherfuckin' pig. I mean he'd have to be ten times more charmin' than that Arnold on Green Acres, you know what I'm sayin'?
...
Jules: There's a passage I got memorized. Ezekiel 25:17. "The path of the righteous man is beset on all sides by the inequities of the selfish and the tyranny of evil men. Blessed is he who, in the name of charity and good will, shepherds the weak through the valley of the darkness. For he is truly his brother's keeper and the finder of lost children. And I will strike down upon thee with great vengeance and furious anger those who attempt to poison and destroy my brothers. And you will know I am the Lord when I lay my vengeance upon you." I been sayin' that shit for years. And if you ever heard it, it meant your ass. I never really questioned what it meant. I thought it was just a cold-blooded thing to say to a motherfucker before you popped a cap in his ass. But I saw some shit this mornin' made me think twice. Now I'm thinkin': it could mean you're the evil man. And I'm the righteous man. And Mr. 9mm here, he's the shepherd protecting my righteous ass in the valley of darkness. Or it could be you're the righteous man and I'm the shepherd and it's the world that's evil and selfish. I'd like that. But that shit ain't the truth. The truth is you're the weak. And I'm the tyranny of evil men. But I'm tryin', Ringo. I'm tryin' real hard to be a shepherd.
...
Fabienne: Whose motorcycle is this?
Butch: It's a chopper, baby.
Fabienne: Whose chopper is this?
Butch: It's Zed's.
Fabienne: Who's Zed?
Butch: Zed's dead, baby. Zed's dead.
...
Captain Koons: The way your dad looked at it, this watch was your birthright. He'd be damned if any of the slopes were gonna get their greasy yellow hands on his boy's birthright. So he hid it in the one place he knew he could hide something: his ass. Five long years, he wore this watch up his ass. Then when he died of dysentery, he gave me the watch. I hid this uncomfortable piece of metal up my ass for two years. Then, after seven years, I was sent home to my family. And now, little man, I give the watch to you.
...
Esmeralda: What is your name?
Butch: Butch.
Esmeralda: What does it mean?
Butch: I'm American, honey. Our names don't mean shit.

And I'm wondering why the hell this film ain't on my favourites list.

From the verse of A C Swinburne:

Ah, yet would God this flesh of mine might be
Where air might wash and long leaves cover me;
Where tides of grass break into foam of flowers,
Or where the wind's feet shine along the sea.
- 'Laus Veneris' (1866)

I will go back to the great sweet mother,
Mother and lover of men, the sea.
I will go down to her, I and no other,
Close with her, kiss her and mix her with me.
- 'The Triumph of Time' (1866)

For the crown of our life as it closes
Is darkness, the fruit thereof dust;
No thorns go as deep as a rose's,
And love is more cruel than lust.
Time turns the old days to derision,
Our loves into corpses or wives;
And marriage and death and division
Make barren our lives.
- 'Dolores' (1866)

'Sea Fever' (1902) by John Masefield

I must down to the seas again, to the lonely sea and the sky,
And all I ask is a tall ship and a star to steer her by,
And the wheel's kick and the wind's song and the white sail's shaking,
And a grey mist on the sea's face and a grey dawn breaking.

I must down to the seas again, for the call of the running tide
Is a wild call and a clear call that may not be denied;
And all I ask is a windy day with the white clouds flying,
And the flung spray and the blown spume, and the sea-gulls crying.

I must down to the seas again to the vagrant gypsy life.
To the gull's way and the whale's way where the wind's like a whetted knife;
And all I ask is a merry yarn from a laughing fellow-rover,
And quiet sleep and a sweet dream when the long trick's over.

The Chicago Tribune is bowled over by Sanjay Leela Bhansali’s Devdas, calling the first Bollywood film to feature in the competition section at Cannes ‘an exceptionally moving and deeply satisfying work.’

But the Observer’s Ryan Gilbey ‘cannot fathom why everyone is literally making such a song and dance about… a violent alcoholic narcissist with pyromaniac tendencies.’

Tunku Varadarajan, deputy editorial features editor and chief television and media critic of The Wall Street Journal, surveys the best and worst of 9/11 books.

The Postmodernism Generator. If you try this link you’ll find an essay that ‘is completely meaningless and was randomly generated by the Postmodernism Generator.’ Refresh the page and you’ll find another one. Good stuff!slrs

Fuck. An enlightening and entertaining article on the four-letter word.

Along with "cunt," "fuck" was excluded from dictionaries and almost all writing from the middle of the eighteenth century until 1960, when the Lady Chatterley trial was held, and both words were welcomed back from the Siberian gulags of condemned words. Not without difficulty, it has since made its way onto stage and screen. It must be said that an activity that is so popular and widespread has been poorly served by polite language.

Is the traditional concert-hall performance of classical music unsuitable for our excessively visual times?

In a concert, everyone has a role to play. The performer's artistry involves the controlled revelation of a structure in sound. The audience's responsibility is stillness and silence.

Sam Mendes's follow-up to American Beauty, The Road to Perdition stars Tom Hanks and Paul Newman.

Lou Lumenick of the New York Post says Shekhar Kapur's new film The Four Feathers is the year's first serious Oscar contender. '...splendidly spectacular, intelligent and very well-acted...'

How Iranian filmmaker Abbas Kiarostami learned his craft making films about oral hygiene and school discipline.

Art / Design

'Art has to move you and design does not, unless it's a good design for a bus.'
- David Hockney

'Art is the imposing of a pattern on experience, and our aesthetic enjoyment is recognition of the pattern.'
- A N Whitehead

'Art does not reproduce what we see. It makes us see... it is the expression of the profoundest thoughts in the simplest way.'
- Albert Einstein

'Art washes away from the soul the dust of everyday life.'
- Pablo Picasso

'Everyone wants to understand art. Why not try to understand the song of a bird? Why does one love the night, flowers, everything around one, without trying to understand them?'
- Pablo Picassoslq

Either/Or

'Beauty will save the world.'
- Dostoevsky

'It is amazing how complete is the delusion that beauty is goodness.'
- Tolstoyslq

The New York Times reviews Agni Varsha.

'The nature of reality is this: It is hidden, and it is hidden, and it is hidden.'
- Rumislq

'Sanity is madness put to good uses.'
- George Santayanaslq

'Anyone who isn't confused doesn't really understand the situation,' Edward R Murrow commented on the Vietnam war, but I suppose our ordinary lives too qualify for that description.slq

'You're mad because they lied to you? They lie to everyone! They lie to the fish!'
- Robert Duvall to Michael Douglas in Joel Schumacher's Falling Downslq

- 'Marciano vs. Simmons', by Eliot Elisofon (1951) for Life magazine

- Four Seasons III by Charles Wysocki

Surrealism

'The simplest Surrealist act consists of dashing down into the street, pistol in hand, and firing blindly, as fast as you can pull the trigger, into the crowd.'
- Andre Breton, Second Manifesto of Surrealism

'Surrealism, as I envisage it, proclaims loudly enough our absolute nonconformity, that there may be no question of calling it, in the case against the real world, as a witness for the defense. It could only account, on the contrary, for the complete state of distraction which we hope to attain here below. Kant's absentmindedness about women, Pasteur's absentmindedness about "grapes," Curie's absentmindedness about vehicles, are in this respect, deeply symptomatic[*].'
- Andre Breton, 1924, Manifeste du Surrealisme

*'There is an ascending gradation here in the consequences of absentmindedness. Kant was a confirmed bachelor who completely ignored women all his life. Pasteur on the other hand was involved once in a rather ridiculous incident when, during a meal, he carefully washed grapes in a glass of water, explaining to his guests the importance of eliminating germs from food--and then, distracted, drank the soiled water in the glass. As for Curie, his absentmindedness caused his death: he was run over by a carriage and killed while crossing a street.'
- Marcel Jean, The Autobiography of Surrealism

- The Elephant Celebes (1921) by Max Ernst

Ernst: 'How to overcome the disgust and fatal boredom that military life and the horrors of war create? Howl? Blaspheme? Vomit?'

In 1920 Ernst organized one of the Dada movement's most famous exhibitions in the conservatory of a restaurant in Cologne. Visitors entered through the lavatories and axes were provided so they could smash the exhibits if they felt so inclined.

...

'On one occasion [Max Ernst's father] omitted a tree from one of his landscapes. This was an embarrassment, and he went back to the forest to saw down the tree in question.'
- Wayne Andrews; The Surrealist Parade

Salvador Dali: 'The only difference between myself and a madman is that I am not mad.'slq

When asked the question "What is art?" Kurt Schwitters replied, "What isn't?"slq

A few strange, crazy verses from his brilliant 'Desolation Row' from the same album:

'Now the moon is almost hidden
The stars are beginning to hide
The fortunetelling lady
Has even taken all her things inside
All except for Cain and Abel
And the hunchback of Notre Dame
Everybody is making love
Or else expecting rain
And the Good Samaritan, he's dressing
He's getting ready for the show
He's going to the carnival tonight
On Desolation Row'

'Einstein, disguised as Robin Hood
With his memories in a trunk
Passed this way an hour ago
With his friend, a jealous monk
He looked so immaculately frightful
As he bummed a cigarette
Then he went off sniffing drainpipes
And reciting the alphabet
Now you would not think to look at him
But he was famous long ago
For playing the electric violin
On Desolation Row'

'Praise be to Nero's Neptune
The Titanic sails at dawn
And everybody's shouting
"Which Side Are You On?"
And Ezra Pound and T. S. Eliot
Fighting in the captain's tower
While calypso singers laugh at them
And fishermen hold flowers
Between the windows of the sea
Where lovely mermaids flow
And nobody has to think too much
About Desolation Row'

For Fobbin. 'Just Like Tom Thumb's Blues' from Dylan's great album Highway 61 Revisited:

When you're lost in the rain in Juarez
And it's Eastertime too
And your gravity fails
And negativity don't pull you through
Don't put on any airs
When you're down on Rue Morgue Avenue
They got some hungry women there
And they really make a mess outa you

Now if you see Saint Annie
Please tell her thanks a lot
I cannot move
My fingers are all in a knot
I don't have the strength
To get up and take another shot
And my best friend, my doctor
Won't even say what it is I've got

Sweet Melinda
The peasants call her the goddess of gloom
She speaks good English
And she invites you up into her room
And you're so kind
And careful not to go to her too soon
And she takes your voice
And leaves you howling at the moon

Up on Housing Project Hill
It's either fortune or fame
You must pick up one or the other
Though neither of them are to be what they claim
If you're lookin' to get silly
You better go back to from where you came
Because the cops don't need you
And man they expect the same

Now all the authorities
They just stand around and boast
How they blackmailed the sergeant-at-arms
Into leaving his post
And picking up Angel who
Just arrived here from the coast
Who looked so fine at first
But left looking just like a ghost

I started out on burgundy
But soon hit the harder stuff
Everybody said they'd stand behind me
When the game got rough
But the joke was on me
There was nobody even there to call my bluff
I'm going back to New York City
I do believe I've had enough

Sam Peckinpah made a film called Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid (1973). Bob Dylan did the soundtrack to the film and made a guest appearance on it too. The soundtrack had one of Dylan's most famous songs--'Knockin' on Heaven's Door':


Dylan

'Mama, take this badge off of me
I can't use it anymore.
It's gettin' dark, too dark for me to see
I feel like I'm knockin' on heaven's door.

'Knock, knock, knockin' on heaven's door
Knock, knock, knockin' on heaven's door
Knock, knock, knockin' on heaven's door
Knock, knock, knockin' on heaven's door

'Mama, put my guns in the ground
I can't shoot them anymore.
That long black cloud is comin' down
I feel like I'm knockin' on heaven's door.'

Another song, titled 'Billy 1', from the album:

'There's guns across the river aimin' at ya
Lawman on your trail, he'd like to catch ya
Bounty hunters, too, they'd like to get ya
Billy, they don't like you to be so free.

'Campin' out all night on the berenda
Dealin' cards 'til dawn in the hacienda
Up to Boot Hill they'd like to send ya
Billy, don't you turn your back on me.

'Playin' around with some sweet senorita
Into her dark hallway she will lead ya
In some lonesome shadows she will greet ya
Billy, you're so far away from home.

'There's eyes behind the mirrors in empty places
Bullet holes and scars between the spaces
There's always one more notch and ten more paces
Billy, and you're walkin' all alone.

'They say that Pat Garrett's got your number
So sleep with one eye open when you slumber
Every little sound just might be thunder
Thunder from the barrel of his gun.

'Guitars will play your grand finale
Down in some Tularosa alley,
Maybe in the Rio Pecos valley
Billy, you're so far away from home.

'There's always some new stranger sneakin' glances
Some trigger-happy fool willin' to take chances
And some old whore from San Pedro to make advances
Advances on your spirit and your soul.

'The businessmen from Taos want you to go down
They've hired Pat Garrett to force a showdown.
Billy, don't it make ya feel so low-down
To be shot down by the man who was your friend?

'Hang on to your woman if you got one
Remember in El Paso, once, you shot one.
She may have been a whore, but she was a hot one
Billy, you been runnin' for so long.

'Guitars will play your grand finale
Down in some Tularosa alley
Maybe in the Rio Pecos valley
Billy, you're so far away from home.'

A useful link for researching literature: www.linkstoliterature.comslrs

Chapter 1 of Dostoevsky's Notes from the Underground:

I am a sick man. ... I am a spiteful man. I am an unattractive man. I believe my liver is diseased. However, I know nothing at all about my disease, and do not know for certain what ails me. I don't consult a doctor for it, and never have, though I have a respect for medicine and doctors. Besides, I am extremely superstitious, sufficiently so to respect medicine, anyway (I am well-educated enough not to be superstitious, but I am superstitious). No, I refuse to consult a doctor from spite. That you probably will not understand. Well, I understand it, though. Of course, I can't explain who it is precisely that I am mortifying in this case by my spite: I am perfectly well aware that I cannot "pay out" the doctors by not consulting them; I know better than anyone that by all this I am only injuring myself and no one else. But still, if I don't consult a doctor it is from spite. My liver is bad, well--let it get worse!

I have been going on like that for a long time--twenty years. Now I am forty. I used to be in the government service, but am no longer. I was a spiteful official. I was rude and took pleasure in being so. I did not take bribes, you see, so I was bound to find a recompense in that, at least. (A poor jest, but I will not scratch it out. I wrote it thinking it would sound very witty; but now that I have seen myself that I only wanted to show off in a despicable way, I will not scratch it out on purpose!)

When petitioners used to come for information to the table at which I sat, I used to grind my teeth at them, and felt intense enjoyment when I succeeded in making anybody unhappy. I almost did succeed. For the most part they were all timid people--of course, they were petitioners. But of the uppish ones there was one officer in particular I could not endure. He simply would not be humble, and clanked his sword in a disgusting way. I carried on a feud with him for eighteen months over that sword. At last I got the better of him. He left off clanking it. That happened in my youth, though. But do you know, gentlemen, what was the chief point about my spite? Why, the whole point, the real sting of it lay in the fact that continually, even in the moment of the acutest spleen, I was inwardly conscious with shame that I was not only not a spiteful but not even an embittered man, that I was simply scaring sparrows at random and amusing myself by it. I might foam at the mouth, but bring me a doll to play with, give me a cup of tea with sugar in it, and maybe I should be appeased. I might even be genuinely touched, though probably I should grind my teeth at myself afterwards and lie awake at night with shame for months after. That was my way.

I was lying when I said just now that I was a spiteful official. I was lying from spite. I was simply amusing myself with the petitioners and with the officer, and in reality I never could become spiteful. I was conscious every moment in myself of many, very many elements absolutely opposite to that. I felt them positively swarming in me, these opposite elements. I knew that they had been swarming in me all my life and craving some outlet from me, but I would not let them, would not let them, purposely would not let them come out. They tormented me till I was ashamed: they drove me to convulsions and--sickened me, at last, how they sickened me! Now, are not you fancying, gentlemen, that I am expressing remorse for something now, that I am asking your forgiveness for something? I am sure you are fancying that ... However, I assure you I do not care if you are. ...

It was not only that I could not become spiteful, I did not know how to become anything; neither spiteful nor kind, neither a rascal nor an honest man, neither a hero nor an insect. Now, I am living out my life in my corner, taunting myself with the spiteful and useless consolation that an intelligent man cannot become anything seriously, and it is only the fool who becomes anything. Yes, a man in the nineteenth century must and morally ought to be pre-eminently a characterless creature; a man of character, an active man is pre-eminently a limited creature. That is my conviction of forty years. I am forty years old now, and you know forty years is a whole lifetime; you know it is extreme old age. To live longer than forty years is bad manners, is vulgar, immoral. Who does live beyond forty? Answer that, sincerely and honestly I will tell you who do: fools and worthless fellows. I tell all old men that to their face, all these venerable old men, all these silver-haired and reverend seniors! I tell the whole world that to its face! I have a right to say so, for I shall go on living to sixty myself. To seventy! To eighty! ... Stay, let me take breath ...

You imagine no doubt, gentlemen, that I want to amuse you. You are mistaken in that, too. I am by no means such a mirthful person as you imagine, or as you may imagine; however, irritated by all this babble (and I feel that you are irritated) you think fit to ask me who I am--then my answer is, I am a collegiate assessor. I was in the service that I might have something to eat (and solely for that reason), and when last year a distant relation left me six thousand roubles in his will I immediately retired from the service and settled down in my corner. I used to live in this corner before, but now I have settled down in it. My room is a wretched, horrid one in the outskirts of the town. My servant is an old country- woman, ill-natured from stupidity, and, moreover, there is always a nasty smell about her. I am told that the Petersburg climate is bad for me, and that with my small means it is very expensive to live in Petersburg. I know all that better than all these sage and experienced counsellors and monitors. ... But I am remaining in Petersburg; I am not going away from Petersburg! I am not going away because ... ech! Why, it is absolutely no matter whether I am going away or not going away.

But what can a decent man speak of with most pleasure?

Answer: Of himself.

Well, so I will talk about myself.

An essay on fictional biographies such as Billy the Kid in the Australian Broadcasting Corporation's magazine Headspace titled 'The Fantasy of Authenticity.' One example of the genre is J M Coetzee's The Master of Petersburg, based on the life of Dostoevsky. The following extract from the book is a monologue of the fictional Dostoevsky:

'What is it that frightens you, Councillor Maximov? When you read about Karamzin or Karamzov or whatever his name is, when Karamzin’s skull is cracked open like an egg, what is the truth: do you suffer with him, or do you secretly exult behind the arm that swings the axe? You don’t answer? Let me tell you then: reading is being the arm and being the axe and being the skull: reading is giving yourself up, not holding yourself at a distance and jeering.'

During my last vacation in Kochi, Fobbin handed me a book by Michael Ondaatje which he liked very much--The Collected Works of Billy the Kid: Left-handed Poems. I do not feel that my current fragmented state of mind is very suited to reading and so had not read a book through for quite a while. [Pierre Hadot wrote in Spiritual Exercises, 'Every era has to start this task afresh: learning to read and reread "old truths." We pass our lives in "reading,"... but we no longer know how to read, that is to stop, to free ourselves from our concerns, to return to ourselves, to leave aside our quest for subtlety and originality, to meditate calmly, to ruminate, to let the texts speak to us. It is a spiritual exercise, one of the most difficult: "People," said Goethe, "do not realize how much time and effort it takes to learn to read. It took me eighty years, and I am not even certain whether I have succeeded."'] But the fragmented style of Ondaatje's book seemed to vibe well with my mindscape and I found it an enjoyable browse-through.


Ondaatje

From the book:
'while i've been going on
the blood from my wrist
has travelled to my heart
and my fingers touch
this soft blue paper notebook
control a pencil that shifts up and sideways
mapping my thinking going its own way'

and

'Jesus I never knew that did you
The nerves shot out
The liver running around out there
Like a headless hen jerking
Brown all over the yard
Seen that too at my aunt’s
never eaten hen since then'

On the book, from the web:
* The New York Times review from 1977
* Essay in the internet magazine it's a bunny
* A student's prize-winning essay

Laton A Huffman, whose photographs are used in the book.

Taking a look at the dozen films I have listed as my favourite in the section introducing myself on this weblog, I felt that if at all any among my choices would surprise a cineaste it would be The Mission. I took a look at what other critics say about this film directed by Roland Joffe and written by Robert Bolt.



Here are two reviews, both from the Washington Post:

1 ‘… as ponderous as it is powerful’

2 ‘… everything a movie should be – magnificently produced, epic in scope, serious in theme – everything, that is, but good’

Among the awards this film starring Jeremy Irons and Robert de Niro won are the Palme d’Or at Cannes, the Academy Award for best cinematography and the BAFTA award for best score.

***

Another fact I noticed is that apart from The Mission, there are two other films in my list from 1986! (A spectacularly good year then, eh?) Andrei Tarkovsky’s The Sacrifice won the Special Jury Prize at Cannes that year and Oliver Stone’s Platoon was the recipient of the Best Film Academy Award.

The Observer asked its readers what they thought were the most memorable moments in film history. From more than 15,000 votes the paper compiled the 100 greatest film moments.

[If you are yet to see The Usual Suspects, don’t read about moment No 1. You’ll spoil the fun. Ditto about some others too, eg Seven. You’ve been warned.]

Came across in this list: Batty the android’s final speech as he is about to die at the end of Ridley Scott’s Blade Runner:

‘I've seen things you people wouldn't believe. Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion. I watched c-beams glitter in the dark near the Tanhauser Gate. All these moments will be lost in time. Like tears in rain. Time to die.’

Neil Jordan comments that the lines had always seemed to him to be a quote from Paradise Lost. I agree.sll

Derek Malcolm’s top 100 films. The list, which is limited to one film for a director, has two films from India – Ray’s Jalsaghar and (surprise!) Kamal Amrohi’s Pakeezah (‘one of the most extraordinary musical melodramas ever made’).



And a certain Mr Steven Spielberg doesn’t figure in the list.sll

The British Film Institute’s magazine Sight and Sound polls the world’s leading critics and filmmakers every 10 years to determine which films are currently considered the greatest of all time. Its editor Nick James claims the results to be ‘a touchstone for worldwide film opinion’. The results of the latest poll were published last month:

The Critics’ Choice:
1 Citizen Kane (Welles)
2 Vertigo (Hitchcock)
3 La Règle du jeu (Renoir)
4 The Godfather and The Godfather Part II (Coppola)
5 Tokyo Story (Ozu)
6 2001: A Space Odyssey (Kubrick)
7 Battleship Potemkin (Eisenstein)
8 Sunrise (Murnau)
9 8½ (Fellini)
10 Singin' in the Rain (Kelly, Donen)
11 Seven Samurai (Kurosawa)
12 The Searchers (Ford)
13 Rashomon (Kurosawa)
14 The Passion of Joan of Arc (Dreyer)
15 À bout de soufe (Godard)
16 L'Atalante (Vigo)
17 The General (Keaton)
18 Touch of Evil (Welles)
19 Au hasard Balthazar (Bresson)
20 Jules et Jim (Truffaut)
21 L'avventura (Antonioni)
22 Le Mépris (Godard)
23 Pather Panchali (S. Ray)
24 La dolce vita (Fellini)
25 M (Lang)
26 The Story of the Late Chrysanthemums (Mizoguchi)
27 Barry Lyndon (Kubrick)
28 Ivan the Terrible (Eisenstein)
29 Les Enfants du paradis (Carné)
30 Man with a Movie Camera (Vertov)
31 Metropolis (Lang)
32 Some Like It Hot (Wilder)
33 Ugetsu Monogatari (Mizoguchi)
34 Wild Strawberries (Bergman)
35 Andrei Rublev (Tarkovsky)
36 The 400 Blows (Truffaut)
37 Fanny and Alexander (Bergman)
38 La Grande Illusion (Renoir)
39 The Magnificent Ambersons (Welles)
40 Modern Times (Chaplin)
41 Psycho (Hitchcock)
42 The Seventh Seal (Bergman)
43 Taxi Driver (Scorsese)
44 The Third Man (Reed)
45 Bicycle Thieves (De Sica)
46 Blade Runner (Scott)
47 City Lights (Chaplin)
48 Greed (von Stroheim)
49 Intolerance (Griffith)
50 Lawrence of Arabia (Lean)

The Directors’ Choice:
1 Citizen Kane (Welles)
2 The Godfather and The Godfather Part II (Coppola)
3 8½ (Fellini)
4 Lawrence of Arabia (Lean)
5 Dr Strangelove (Kubrick)
6 Bicycle Thieves (De Sica)
6= Raging Bull (Scorsese)
6= Vertigo (Hitchcock)
9 Rashomon (Kurosawa)
9= La Règle du jeu (Renoir)
9= Seven Samurai (Kurosawa)

***

Philip French of The Observer discusses the nature of the changes in this poll’s results over the last six decades. He also lists his own top ten and his choice of the best films made in the last two decades.sll

Peter Mullan's The Magdalene Sisters wins the Golden Lion at the Venice film festival.

Ever wondered whatever happened to Barry Norman – the BBC TV film critic who suddenly vanished from his regular spot on the channel a few years back? I found out from the Guardian.



Tributes in the British media when ‘Britain's best-known film critic’ quit reviewing films last year – from the Guardian and The Independent.

Back in Pune. Back to the usual.