Phone Quicky
In Manhattan Murder Mystery (1993), Larry Lipton (Woody Allen) struggles to keep the telephone cord away from his face as his wife Carol Lipton (Diane Keaton) goes over the details of a recent neighbor’s death. The still does little to fully convey Larry’s frustration, but I found the best moment I could. I thought about how this humorous scene would not be possible now, as Carol would either be on her cell phone, or wireless landline — which sounds almost as ponderous as landmine. It seems so primitive to be tethered, as technology has convinced us we are free. Our cellular voices are sent to space and back, as if edited or revised by aliens. 1993 is hence immortalized, like “I will always love you,” “Creep,” and “Everybody Hurts,” which all came out the same year. I feel nostalgic towards technology quickly disgraced with time. The best moment in an early-90s movie is when someone picks up a phone the size of a toaster and puts it next to their face. HELLO? they always seem to say. In a convertible, they always seem to be driving. It isn’t his best movie, but this post is less about Woody Allen than the cultural traces we inadvertently leave behind. The way we talk. The way we sleep. Carol goes on to ask if Larry still finds her attractive, and he defensively mentions something about sex once a week, as an excuse. Some things are timeless.
Reading Comics
Now is an exciting time for comic book lovers and newbies alike, in part because DC comics has decided to restart their entire catalog. “The New 52” they’re calling it. A complete reboot: new writers, new artists, new storylines, and a reset to issue #1 for everything. I’ve decided to use this event as a motivator to get myself more involved with comic books. Over the past few years my interest in them has grown, but it’s still an unfamiliar world and I have a lot to learn, which is both exciting and a little intimidating. On that note, I thought perhaps I’d share with you some ideas, reactions, commentary about the comic books I’m reading — maybe make this an ongoing thing, a new series: “Reading Comics.” Perhaps I’ll also ask a few writers that I know of who are into comics to contribute to the series. (If you’re interested in contributing a few words about reading comics, email me at higgs dot chris at gmail.)
To begin, new comics come out on Wednesday. Here’s what I got today:
Swamp Thing #1
Animal Man #1
Frankenstein: Agent of S.H.A.D.E. #1
Severed #1 & #2
After the jump, I’ll share a bit about my history with comic books in order to contextualize my perspective. Then, in the not too distant future, I’ll offer a few thoughts about the comics on that list. So far I’ve read the Animal Man and Severed #1. Both are really good!
2.4 cents
41 Endings: Cheever [with comment (mixed)]
I gave this to Ralphie and went home. [Only I didn’t say “Fudge”]
Then he went away, and, although the race was beginning, she saw instead the white snow and the wolves of Nascosta, the pack coming up the Via Cavour and crossing the piazza as if they were bent on some errand of that darkness that she knew to lie at the heart of life, and, remembering the cold on her skin and the whiteness of the snow and the stealth of the wolves, she wondered why the good God had opened up so many choices and made life so strange and diverse. [Pretty damn 19th century and pretty damn good. The next ‘experimental writer’ will actually write like Thomas Hardy]
She was always on the move, dreaming of bacon-lettuce-and-tomato sandwiches. [That’s very Brautigan, sir]
“I’m walking the dog,” I said cheerfully. There was no dog in sight, but they didn’t look. “Here, Toby! Here, Toby! Here, Toby! Good dog!” I called and off I went, whistling merrily in the dark. [I use this same tired move, only I say I’m “returning the movies.” A friend of mine “goes for donuts” and returns tired, with gin on her breath]
“Oh, we thought, signore,” he said, ‘that you were merely a poet.” [Like Yeats?]
The touchstone of their euphoria remained potent, and while Larry gave up the fire truck he could still be seen at the communion rail, the fifty-yard line, the 8:03, and the Chamber Music Club, and through the prudence and shrewdness of Helen’s broker they got richer and richer and lived happily, happily, happily, happily. [I got nothing. Excellent fucking ending line. That’s why you are you and I am me. Well done]
Then he put his head back on the pillow and died—indeed, these were his dying words, and the dying words, it seemed to me, of generations of storytellers, for how could this snowy and trumped-up pass, with its trio of travelers, hope to celebrate a world that lies spread out around us like a bewildering and stupendous dream? [Conrad? I hope a PhD is studying how long these ending sentences—dissertation, dis?]
Nothing less will get us past the armed sentry and over the mountainous border. [A bit Hemingway, but it’s cool, we all do that]
misericords (foul ball!) 11
11. Agatha Christie on a surf board. Jack Kerouac playing football. Simone de Beauvoir (with posing cad Sartre by her side). Etc.
4. The new Diagram is sick like recycled mustache combs.
3. Anderbo.com wishes to post up to the first 36 manuscript pages of an unpublished novel on its website by December 21st, 2011 for at least the following six months. They will look at the FIRST 36 PAGES (up to 9,000 words) of your e-manuscript submitted to editors@anderbo.com and decide within 60 days of its arrival if want to see more.
2. Glow: “I do not want to read, draw, talk or see tonight. I hope this doesn’t last long,” wrote Francesca Woodman, the photographer who used her own naked teenage body in her work and then killed herself at twenty-two. The day she died, according to her father, she found out she’d lost a grant, and she’d had her bike stolen.
2. The best site on Pac-Man I’ve seen so far.
2. Things about Erroll Morris and his eye/s.
2. An old Diane di Prima sonnet sequence.
1. Wow. Édouard Levé.
0. Here is that link to the Sadness Museum.
A Request From Kate Durbin
Dear Panty Wearer,
Reading the new issue of Action, Yes
i’ll fuck before the winter’s out
Having read the new issue of Action, Yes while listening to Slayer’s Reign in Blood — except for when I got to “sounds for soloists” by Sebastian Eskildsen and Cia Rinne, which required me to pause Slayer — I continue to return to the final line of “Winter Diary” by Lidija Praizovic, translated from the Swedish by Johannes Göransson. The conjunction of the profane with the rhythmic beauty of its iambic tetrameter (da-DUM da-DUM da-DUM da-DUM) really appeals to me. I back up and re-read the second half of the final stanza:
GETCOCK&FUCK
yes
yes
yes
i simply say this: and i’ll stick to it
over my dead body
over my dead body
over my dead body
i’ll fuck before the winter’s out
yes
yes
yes
i simply say this: and i’ll stick to it
over my dead body
over my dead body
over my dead body
i’ll fuck before the winter’s out
11 greebles and twangers (of e)
1. Best nonfiction books of all time, etc.
2. A list of novels about lonely people.
3. Shelia McClear interview about psychology, sexism, stripping, memoir.
I just totally want to defend someone’s right to do that sort of work whether it’s a peep show or prostitution. I mean, I don’t want to be a prostitute. I would just defend it, because I’ve had a lot of jobs, and many of them were more demoralizing than the peep show.
11. WTF? Murakami wrote yet another story about cats…
httpv://youtu.be/-ahVTorF2OI
The sounds Stafford make at 4:05-ish are pretty epic. Also enjoyed, “Yeh. Get the fuck off me!”
12. Barf bag collector site. Enjoy.