While waiting at the Chapter's Bookstore cashier to buy a book several months ago, my eye caught the bright blue cover of A Million Little Pieces, the now infamous Oprah Book Club-elect.
A woman in front of me started singing its high praises, and I asked what it was about.
'Oh, about a drug addict.' she said.
'Does he get better at the end?' I asked.
She didn't seem to think that was important as much as him writing about his experience.
I really think that is what all these Oprah Book Club fans think. Not about the positive outcome, but rather the gory details.
I decided to pass this book, not even bothering to read the back cover.
Sure enough, the "gratuitous sex and violence", as one journalist put it, must have been the attractions in this book. After all, those are the parts the writer embellished in his "memoir".
So much for memoirs acting as “self-help”. All people want is the sordid details.
Monday, January 30, 2006
Book-Elect
Memoirs are Read for the Sordid Details
Saturday, January 28, 2006
Two Hundred and Fifty Years
January 27th: Mozart's Birthday
Some of my favorite Mozart pieces are the Horn Concertos. They are playful, lush and melodious.
One especially: No. 2 in E flat major (K. 417), the third movement Rondo.
It starts probably with two people enjoying each other's company going in a light canter through the woods, with rich foliage, sun beaming through the leaves, contended horses, and with time to view the scenery.
And near the end, one horse starts to slow down with small pauses - challenging the other rider for what seems like a final race.
And the piece ends with a lively gallop.
Some of my favorite Mozart pieces are the Horn Concertos. They are playful, lush and melodious.
One especially: No. 2 in E flat major (K. 417), the third movement Rondo.
It starts probably with two people enjoying each other's company going in a light canter through the woods, with rich foliage, sun beaming through the leaves, contended horses, and with time to view the scenery.
And near the end, one horse starts to slow down with small pauses - challenging the other rider for what seems like a final race.
And the piece ends with a lively gallop.
Wednesday, January 25, 2006
"It All Began with a Picture"
From the Mind to the Page
In a previous blog entry, I had remarked upon the astounding imagination of J.R.R. Tolkien, and wondered if he had made any drawings. I found (and posted) that Tolkien had actually made illustrations of his imaginary lands and their inhabitants.
It is not surprising, therefore, that C.S. Lewis would have an equally vivid imagination, where he describes his writing experience for The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe in an essay entitled It All Began with a Picture:
In a previous blog entry, I had remarked upon the astounding imagination of J.R.R. Tolkien, and wondered if he had made any drawings. I found (and posted) that Tolkien had actually made illustrations of his imaginary lands and their inhabitants.
It is not surprising, therefore, that C.S. Lewis would have an equally vivid imagination, where he describes his writing experience for The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe in an essay entitled It All Began with a Picture:
| One thing I am sure of. All my seven Narnian books, and my three science fiction books, began with seeing pictures in my head. At first they were not a story, just pictures. The Lion all began with a picture of a Faun carrying an umbrella and parcels in a snowy wood. This picture had been in my mind since I was about sixteen. Then one day, when I was about forty, I said to myself: 'Let's try to make a story about it.' |
Monday, January 23, 2006
Travels Through the Ottawa Valley
Frodo's Landscape
While traveling from Ottawa to Toronto by bus, I was able to take some digital photos of the clear, sunny landscape still covered with ice-like snow.
I was reading Tolkien's The Fellowship of the Ring throughout the ride, and I had reached the stage where the Frodo and his companions were also traveling, albeit on foot, towards Rivendell. Their landscape was also cold and icy, and at times the writing described exactly what I was looking at:
While traveling from Ottawa to Toronto by bus, I was able to take some digital photos of the clear, sunny landscape still covered with ice-like snow.
I was reading Tolkien's The Fellowship of the Ring throughout the ride, and I had reached the stage where the Frodo and his companions were also traveling, albeit on foot, towards Rivendell. Their landscape was also cold and icy, and at times the writing described exactly what I was looking at:
The sun was now high, and it shone down through the half-stripped branches of the trees, and lit the clearing with bright patches of light. |
Saturday, January 21, 2006
Lives Lived in Hotel Rooms
Itinerary to Self-awareness
Two movies provided an unexpected link for me in their reliance on hotels and hotel rooms.
Michelangelo Antonionis’s The Passenger, released at a downtown Toronto movie theatre, tells the story of a documentary filmmaker who stole the identity of a dead man in a hotel room.
A black and white classic Separate Tables shown on TV, describes the confined movements and restrained emotions of several characters staying at a small resort hotel.
The underlying theme in both movies is, as the titles suggest, lack of connections. The passenger is never still enough to find people or places he can bond with. He is always moving in rented cars from one rented hotel room to another. And separate tables wedge a persistent gap between a group of vacationing people.
Yet, Antonioni’s 1975 film constantly lies in the realm of nihilism and fantasy. People try to find meaning in dead-ends. The young woman in The Passenger, realizing that her travel mate has taken on the identity of a dead man, unquestioningly accepts this identity. True dead man walking here. It is as though all the characters in Antonioni’s film have given up on the real, and would rather submerge themselves in a shifting fantasy. “I might be a waiter in Gibraltar, or a writer in Cairo” says the main character. His new-found freedom hard to pin down.
In the 1958 film Separate Tables, we are sharply grounded in reality. We know the faults of the characters, and why they’ve ended up in this little resort hotel, on separate tables. They know it too. We are even forced to accept the happy/sardonic ending, since it is the best that the characters could come up with. Somehow, they manage to narrow the gaps between their tables.
I have to conclude that there is something about pre-1960s (American) films that encourages filmmakers to avoid nihilism and its subsequent reliance on the unreal. Something about life, culture, love and many other grounding qualities seem worth living for, and roots them in reality.
It is as though filmmakers like Antonioni have given up on their characters, and ultimately their film. A meaningless film surely translates to a meaningless life.
Now, the questions, which I will try to answer in subsequent blogs and essays are: Where did this nihilism come from? And how did it affect art in general? The short answer to the first question is: with loss of morals. The short answer to the second question is: with more fantasy.
Two movies provided an unexpected link for me in their reliance on hotels and hotel rooms.
Michelangelo Antonionis’s The Passenger, released at a downtown Toronto movie theatre, tells the story of a documentary filmmaker who stole the identity of a dead man in a hotel room.
A black and white classic Separate Tables shown on TV, describes the confined movements and restrained emotions of several characters staying at a small resort hotel.
The underlying theme in both movies is, as the titles suggest, lack of connections. The passenger is never still enough to find people or places he can bond with. He is always moving in rented cars from one rented hotel room to another. And separate tables wedge a persistent gap between a group of vacationing people.
Yet, Antonioni’s 1975 film constantly lies in the realm of nihilism and fantasy. People try to find meaning in dead-ends. The young woman in The Passenger, realizing that her travel mate has taken on the identity of a dead man, unquestioningly accepts this identity. True dead man walking here. It is as though all the characters in Antonioni’s film have given up on the real, and would rather submerge themselves in a shifting fantasy. “I might be a waiter in Gibraltar, or a writer in Cairo” says the main character. His new-found freedom hard to pin down.
In the 1958 film Separate Tables, we are sharply grounded in reality. We know the faults of the characters, and why they’ve ended up in this little resort hotel, on separate tables. They know it too. We are even forced to accept the happy/sardonic ending, since it is the best that the characters could come up with. Somehow, they manage to narrow the gaps between their tables.
I have to conclude that there is something about pre-1960s (American) films that encourages filmmakers to avoid nihilism and its subsequent reliance on the unreal. Something about life, culture, love and many other grounding qualities seem worth living for, and roots them in reality.
It is as though filmmakers like Antonioni have given up on their characters, and ultimately their film. A meaningless film surely translates to a meaningless life.
Now, the questions, which I will try to answer in subsequent blogs and essays are: Where did this nihilism come from? And how did it affect art in general? The short answer to the first question is: with loss of morals. The short answer to the second question is: with more fantasy.
Thursday, January 19, 2006
Modern-day Memorials
Missing the Grandeur
Berlin Holocaust Memorial
Memorials have a lot of emotions attached to them. In conventional war memorials, one feels the patriotism and symbolic triumph of the soldiers. Usually, the memorial is a sculpted representation of a soldier (or soldiers). Even memorials of individuals emanate a feeling of respect and admiration, usually once again represented in a realistic sculpture. These feelings are overwhelmingly positive.
Yet, I came across the Berlin Holocaust Memorial through internet links and digressions while reading an interview with American architect Peter Eisenman, who designed the memorial.
Eisenman’s memorial to the Jewish genocide in Germany constitutes of some 2,700 slabs of concrete steles in a huge area of land. It looks like a graveyard. The architect’s words describe it thus: “The place of no meaning”.
This memorial took more than ten years to build, wrought with controversies from the start.
But the question is: “Can memorials be built on negative emotions?"
The Holocaust Memorial in Berlin is built on such negativities, so much so that the architect felt it necessary to build it resembling a nameless cemetery.
Another memorial of such profound significance is the Vietnam Memorial in Washington D.C. Protestors were so resistant to the converging shiny granite stones, again reminiscent of gravestones, that the designers had to include a sculpture of three soldiers alongside it. These soldiers apparently conveyed a better sense of patriotism and heroism that are often part of war memorials.
It might just be the problem with the modern world, where memorials no longer reflect deep, positive feelings. Instead, these very great modern ones seem to have been built to expiate our sins, or at the very least to find a quick ground to commemorate those we should be commemorating.
The grandeur and dignity no longer exists, and all we’re left with is empty feelings.
Berlin Holocaust Memorial
Memorials have a lot of emotions attached to them. In conventional war memorials, one feels the patriotism and symbolic triumph of the soldiers. Usually, the memorial is a sculpted representation of a soldier (or soldiers). Even memorials of individuals emanate a feeling of respect and admiration, usually once again represented in a realistic sculpture. These feelings are overwhelmingly positive.
Yet, I came across the Berlin Holocaust Memorial through internet links and digressions while reading an interview with American architect Peter Eisenman, who designed the memorial.
Eisenman’s memorial to the Jewish genocide in Germany constitutes of some 2,700 slabs of concrete steles in a huge area of land. It looks like a graveyard. The architect’s words describe it thus: “The place of no meaning”.
This memorial took more than ten years to build, wrought with controversies from the start.
But the question is: “Can memorials be built on negative emotions?"
The Holocaust Memorial in Berlin is built on such negativities, so much so that the architect felt it necessary to build it resembling a nameless cemetery.
Another memorial of such profound significance is the Vietnam Memorial in Washington D.C. Protestors were so resistant to the converging shiny granite stones, again reminiscent of gravestones, that the designers had to include a sculpture of three soldiers alongside it. These soldiers apparently conveyed a better sense of patriotism and heroism that are often part of war memorials.
It might just be the problem with the modern world, where memorials no longer reflect deep, positive feelings. Instead, these very great modern ones seem to have been built to expiate our sins, or at the very least to find a quick ground to commemorate those we should be commemorating.
The grandeur and dignity no longer exists, and all we’re left with is empty feelings.
Tuesday, January 17, 2006
The Synthesis of Beauty
From Strength and Kindness
Excerpt from The Death of Jacob by Rabbi Ari Kahn, via BadEagle.
In this descriptive explanation of Jacob’s death, and his revelation to his sons of their roles in the future (as the twelve tribes of Israel), the author talks about the three patriarchs - Abraham, Isaac and Jacob - and how they connect with each other.
Abraham is identified with kindness, Isaac with the opposite strength, and Jacob with beauty.
Excerpt from The Death of Jacob by Rabbi Ari Kahn, via BadEagle.
Abraham, Isaac and Jacob were not merely three highly accomplished spiritual individuals. They formed a dynasty, in Hebrew shalshelet, which is derived from shalosh, meaning "three." According to Kabbalistic thought, each of the three patriarchs created a different spiritual awareness in the world, each becoming one of the three pillars necessary to support the establishment of the nation. Abraham is identified with chesed or "kindness." Isaac is identified with the opposites of kindness, namely gevurah or "strength" and din or "justice." And Jacob is identified with the merging of the above -- tiferet or "beauty." Thus, the patriarchs represent (to borrow the Hegalian model) thesis, antithesis, and synthesis. Once synthesis is achieved, the nation can emerge. |
In this descriptive explanation of Jacob’s death, and his revelation to his sons of their roles in the future (as the twelve tribes of Israel), the author talks about the three patriarchs - Abraham, Isaac and Jacob - and how they connect with each other.
Abraham is identified with kindness, Isaac with the opposite strength, and Jacob with beauty.
In fact, Jacob is the synthesis of the two (thesis and antithesis).
That beauty is a synthesis of kindness and strength makes perfect sense.
Any work of art that is too strong will come off as harsh and unconnected
Any work that is too kind will appear weak and sentimental.
Beautiful works of art need to combine harshness and sentimentality to bring us closer to an authentic feeling, that is neither too cold nor too mawkish, in reaction to the work.
So, Jacob as beauty (work of art) must have been just the right combination of strength and kindness to produce the authentic tribes of Israel.
Monday, January 9, 2006
Science Fiction Cannot Substitute for the Bible
But it Can Bring us Closer to God
Why did both C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien felt it necessary to write allegorical novels, especially C.S. Lewis, underlying their fantasy characters for what appear to be Biblical messages?
Is the Bible not complete enough, complex enough and incredible enough to keep us reading and re-reading its texts for a lifetime?
Each time I read Rachel’s forgiveness of her sister, and the elderly Sarah’s challenge of God’s wish for her and Abraham, and the extraordinary birth of Jesus, His continuously fantastic encounter with the world below His Father’s Heaven, I wonder how anyone can ever make these stories any better.
Can science fiction out-perform the Bible?
The answer is of course no. Just as the many sublime paintings, hymns, chorals, anthems, sculptures and any other works of art can never be a substitute for the real thing.
But I believe these two writers, and all the other artists, are so much enthralled in the celebration of God, that they have to create these pieces in order to show God how thankful they are to Him.
It is a emanation of their love for Him. Their gifts to Him. And with these gifts, they make our lives just a little fuller with the presence of God Himself.
Why did both C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien felt it necessary to write allegorical novels, especially C.S. Lewis, underlying their fantasy characters for what appear to be Biblical messages?
Is the Bible not complete enough, complex enough and incredible enough to keep us reading and re-reading its texts for a lifetime?
Each time I read Rachel’s forgiveness of her sister, and the elderly Sarah’s challenge of God’s wish for her and Abraham, and the extraordinary birth of Jesus, His continuously fantastic encounter with the world below His Father’s Heaven, I wonder how anyone can ever make these stories any better.
Can science fiction out-perform the Bible?
The answer is of course no. Just as the many sublime paintings, hymns, chorals, anthems, sculptures and any other works of art can never be a substitute for the real thing.
But I believe these two writers, and all the other artists, are so much enthralled in the celebration of God, that they have to create these pieces in order to show God how thankful they are to Him.
It is a emanation of their love for Him. Their gifts to Him. And with these gifts, they make our lives just a little fuller with the presence of God Himself.
Thursday, January 5, 2006
Tolkien's World
Illustrations from his Imaginations
I started reading The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring having just seen the wonderful, colorful, digitally produced movie of C.S. Lewis' Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe.
I expected Tolkien's book to be complicated, and a little gloomy. But what an especial surprise (amongst others) to find a beautifully and vividly described landscape.
I'm only at the moment where Fodor has entered the Old Forest with the ring and his three companions. A dangerous forest filled with watchful trees. He is on his way to Rivendell, as advised by Gandalf the wizard.
Fangron Forest Illustration by Tolkien
Rivendell Illustration by Tolkien
With such an imaginative book - it really conjures up images of all kinds - I wondered if Tolkien himself had made any illustrations or drawings of his places and characters.
And indeed, he had. He drew, illustrated and designed several pieces after his various books.
..................
I started reading The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring having just seen the wonderful, colorful, digitally produced movie of C.S. Lewis' Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe.
I expected Tolkien's book to be complicated, and a little gloomy. But what an especial surprise (amongst others) to find a beautifully and vividly described landscape.
I'm only at the moment where Fodor has entered the Old Forest with the ring and his three companions. A dangerous forest filled with watchful trees. He is on his way to Rivendell, as advised by Gandalf the wizard.
Fangron Forest Illustration by Tolkien
"But in the meantime what course am I to take?" said Frodo "Towards danger; but not too rashly, nor too straight," answered the wizard [Gandalf]. "If you want my advice, make for Rivendell..." |
Rivendell Illustration by Tolkien
With such an imaginative book - it really conjures up images of all kinds - I wondered if Tolkien himself had made any illustrations or drawings of his places and characters.
And indeed, he had. He drew, illustrated and designed several pieces after his various books.
..................
Left: Moria Gate. Right: Tree of Amalion Illustrations by Tolkien
Tuesday, January 3, 2006
Good Things in 2006
Martha Stewart's New Year
The January 2006 edition of Martha Stewart Living Magazine celebrates its 15th year.
Martha Stewart is back, milder but no less talented. Her TV show (of which I had rather a large dose this Christmas vacation - albeit reruns) is back again for a new season. It is a pleasure to follow her precise instructions for perfectly made objects.
The satin bow, as described in her January magazine, is one of my favorite 'how-tos' of her 15 years of Good Things.
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