Reading (&) the Body
Courtesy of Penelope Illustration
I’m re-reading a little Peter Brooks in column A and in column B thinking a lot about reading and the body, reading as consumption, reading while eating, reading while shitting, reading while smoking, the frenetic idleness of reading finding its counterpoint in various bodily acts/needs/processes.
From Brooks’s Reading for the Plot:
Speaking reductively, without nuance, one might say that on the one hand narrative tends toward a thematics of the desired, potentially possessable body, and on the other toward a readerly experience of consuming, a having that, in an era of triumphant capitalism, is bound to take on commercial forms, giving to the commerce in narrative understandings a specifically commercial tinge.
What do you do when you read? Or do you just read?
The Five Stages of Zack de la Rocha
THE FIVE STAGES OF ZACK DE LA ROCHA
1. Denial that the washing machine is being used.
2. Rage against the machine, but mostly at his roommate who waits do to seven loads of laundry at once.
3. Bargaining with roommate for temporary use of the machine, and also who’s turn it is to clean the bathroom.
4. Depression over the fact that he’s 40 years old and still lives with a roommate (that and Capitalism).
5. Acceptance that he will not be doing any laundry, and that he has a Ph.D. in Anthropology.
Matthew Simmons—
A link from my friend Dan: Sri Randal Randal stands on a ladder and connects people to disembodied spirits. LA readers, please go see this man for me.
16
The Night LOST Became A Soap Opera
I’m really impressed by all the journalists who could calmly sit down and bust out a thoughtful response to the finale of LOST last night or even this morning. Not me. It was such a royal disappointment, I can hardly put my words together. After a six year commitment, I am left feeling like maybe I should have broken up with it five and a half years ago.
Why?
Because last night the writers of the show invalidated all of the things that made the show unique and intriguing by opting to focus on the human characters rather than the one character that made the show what it was, the island. I sure as hell wasn’t tuning in every week to find out whether or not Sayid would redeem himself or Ben would turn out to be a good guy or who Kate would choose to make out with or if Charlie was ever gonna kick his heroin addiction. That’s the soap opera shit that you can find on any television show. No, I tuned in every week because of the mystery, the mythology, the numbers, the Others, the Egyptian shit, the time traveling, the donkey wheel, the electromagnetism, the Dharma Initiative, the Hanso Foundation, the smoke monster, the disease, the question of fertility, quantum physics, immortality, whispering ghosts, haunted cabins, magical ash, fountains of youth, glowing caves, etc.
Unfortunately, the writers decided those things were superfluous. And thus, they chose to turn a brilliant and mysterious epic into a mere soap opera. Ask yourself: without the island, how is LOST any different than Days of Our Lives?
(*As a side note, this is exactly why Battlestar Galactica ended up sucking: it, too, lost sight of what made it unique and succumbed to becoming a soap opera.)
This is a mess
Ever feel like this?
Like most writers, I have this knack for suffering, for being a complete mess. Maybe this is disclosing too much about myself, but I’ve had this conception that to be a writer—an artist—means that I have to suffer, that happiness somehow inauthenticates my “work.” Even though I know this is a myth, I fall for it every time. I’m a fool like that.
Friday “Inane Music Videos”: 206
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_6LB0MQI4V4
Love Battery is my favorite Seattle band.
No, Mash Hall is my favorite Seattle band.
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MW99Y6VenQk&feature=related
No, Bill Horist is my favorite Seattle band.
***
Matthew Simmons—
On Dennis Cooper’s blog, there’s a really great collection of videos and quotes about “hypnagogic pop.”
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It is Friday: Go Right Ahead
I was sitting in another bar with the Mexican who spoke English.
The world is deluged with tranquilizers and energy drinks.
Birds, please assemble!
And I was unreal to the others.
To the drinker as well as the drunk.
I found myself spanking a tequila.
But you got it? Yes, I got it.
thhraaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaagggggggggggggggggggggggggh
Thermodynamic SHOW-Down.
“That’s a problem,” she said.
Things could start crumbling fast now.
Ha Ha.
Violin Hating: Nerd Fight
A few months ago, I was on this really big nerdy Tchaikovsky Violin Concerto kick, and I listened to more versions of the piece than I’m comfortable mentioning, usually one after another like crack. Somewhere along the way, I found out about the Tchaikovsky Competition, which led me to a goldmine of translations of the concerto. Well, you know YouTube works, and one click led to another, until I’d watched all the finalists for the competition during its various stages.
A few years ago, Mayuko Kamio won. Here is an excerpt of one of the stages of the competition. It would seem as though everyone had to play Waxman’s Carmen Fantasy, which I don’t particularly care for, I much prefer Sarasate’s version, but whatever.
Her interpretation of Waxman is problematic, sure. Think what you will about her playing, what I care about most is how people responded in the comments section. They’re brutal. Most of them seem to have a working knowledge about music, though they’re probably not actually musicians. Many of them are racist. At least no one was blatantly sexist.
Famous Action Artists
By Mike Leavitt @ This Blog Rules, including Banksy, Ed Roth, David Lynch, Amy Sol, Andy Warhol…
