IdleRich

IdleRich
I'd never heard of Amanda Palmer until I saw this fairly poor comedy called Drifters on Channel 4 - fairly poor that is apart from the theme tune which is spectacularly bad. Lots of comedy programmes have bad music, it almost seems to be a rule, but this one really properly stinks so much I had to look it up. It goes "Someday someday Leeds United" and my research told me it was by Amanda Palmer. So an American(?) who wrote a terrible song that seems to be about a sport she probably doesn't understand is what I know. Oh and she is married to Neil Gaiman and there was some sort of scandal about her not paying her musicians - but it's that stupid theme song that means I could never be interested in her as a musician.
 

IdleRich

IdleRich
Neil Gaiman I read cos I was in Russia and I ran out of books to read so I asked my girlfriend and her brother if it would be possible to purchase books in English there, how many foreign language books are available in a fairly provincial (though large) Russian town? They assured me that any half-decent bookshop should have an English section and I visited a few and discovered they were correct. Each shop had a couple of stands full of books in English (though they weren't all English books) and the selections fascinated me. As well as the inevitable Shakey and Dickens, and Three Men in a Boat which I already knew to be massive in Russia, the main thing that was represented was sci-fi. Every shop had loads of it, Ray Bradbury was always there as was Neil Gaiman. I mean, those are both fairly big authors here but it was a surprise to me that every single shop picked these two as part of their quotient of ten or so US/UK authors. Also they had some of the more 'classic' sci-fi authors such as HG Wells and the RL Stevenson stuff. So, I wish I could remember what else they had, I think it could be interesting to think about how English populist literature appears when it comes through this kind of filter. But I can't remember much more and all I can really say is that due to a limited selection of stuff I hadn't read, I had my first stab at Bradbury and Gaiman. Both were ok I guess, American Gods certainly passed the time. I know some who are harder to please than me who describe the book and Gaiman in general as offensively awful but I find that pretentiously dishonest. It aint that bad. Nor that good to be fair. There is a tv show based on it coming out, I can't imagine I'll go too far out of my way to watch it.
 

IdleRich

IdleRich
Neil Gaiman I read cos I was in Russia and I ran out of books to read so I asked my girlfriend and her brother if it would be possible to purchase books in English there, how many foreign language books are available in a fairly provincial (though large) Russian town? They assured me that any half-decent bookshop should have an English section and I visited a few and discovered they were correct. Each shop had a couple of stands full of books in English (though they weren't all English books) and the selections fascinated me. As well as the inevitable Shakey and Dickens, and Three Men in a Boat which I already knew to be massive in Russia, the main thing that was represented was sci-fi. Every shop had loads of it, Ray Bradbury was always there as was Neil Gaiman. I mean, those are both fairly big authors here but it was a surprise to me that every single shop picked these two as part of their quotient of ten or so US/UK authors. Also they had some of the more 'classic' sci-fi authors such as HG Wells and the RL Stevenson stuff. So, I wish I could remember what else they had, I think it could be interesting to think about how English populist literature appears when it comes through this kind of filter. But I can't remember much more and all I can really say is that due to a limited selection of stuff I hadn't read, I had my first stab at Bradbury and Gaiman. Both were ok I guess, American Gods certainly passed the time. I know some who are harder to please than me who describe the book and Gaiman in general as offensively awful but I find that pretentiously dishonest. It aint that bad. Nor that good to be fair. There is a tv show based on it coming out, I can't imagine I'll go too far out of my way to watch it.
 

empty mirror

remember the jackalope
Gaiman and Palmer makes sense, he used to be emotionally close to Tori Amos and they wrote each other's characters into their respective works; he's closer to that kind of geek than you might realize.

Just read W.E.B Du Bois' "The Comet" and wished it was longer.

i like Tori Amos up through The Choir Girl Hotel, if I'm being honest

i am almost done J. Edgar Wideman's Writing to Save a Life. it is about Louis Till, father of Emmett Till, who was hanged by the US Army in Italy on rape and murder charges. Really good. J Edgar Wideman mixes non-fiction, memoir, and fiction. The story about the Emmett Till accuser coming out to say that Emmett Till never wolf-whistled at her came out while I was reading this book. Seems unfortunate that J. Edgar Wideman was not able to wrestle with that piece of information for this book.

Emmett Till also came up in the March graphic novels by John Lewis (unsurprisingly) and I spent some time last year obsessing over the Emmett Till story while reading Miles Davis' autobiography - Miles spent a little time reflecting on it in the book.

This child being murdered by white dudes who bragged about doing it after they were cleared by a jury of their white peers was the catalyst for the civil rights movement. Are we too desensitized now for a child murder to spur any kind of action? Sandy Hook did not spur anyone to do anything about gun laws. The Charleston Church shooting didn't even prompt people to change their facebook photos in sympathy. What will it take to inspire real action now?
 

droid

Well-known member
Enjoying this:

A1XDhahQKML.jpg
 
I'm assuming someone here has read Rip It Up and Start Again? I've just started it and it's informative so far, so it's getting the job done. I really liked Energy Flash but got tired of his attempts at trying over and over again to describe how different tunes sounded (like a hurricane! a tsunami! A synth orgy on mars etc etc), so hopefully Rip It Up... doesn't go down that path
 

baboon2004

Darned cockwombles.
I'm assuming someone here has read Rip It Up and Start Again? I've just started it and it's informative so far, so it's getting the job done. I really liked Energy Flash but got tired of his attempts at trying over and over again to describe how different tunes sounded (like a hurricane! a tsunami! A synth orgy on mars etc etc), so hopefully Rip It Up... doesn't go down that path

I read it late last year, and absolutely loved it after not having read a Reynolds book for years. I know what you mean about Energy Flash, although I thought he was too good at the descriptions - certain tunes disappointed me when I actually got to hear them. Rip It Up is great story after great story; you won't get bored.

Cue a complaint in a couple of weeks that you found it really boring.
 

luka

Well-known member
How's your Shakespeare project coming along Corpsey? I done Anthony and Cleopatra this week. That was a good un
 

Corpsey

bandz ahoy
Urgh, don't remind me. Haven't read a SINGLE BLOODY PLAY.

It might have been a mistake to try chronologically, cos The Taming of the Shrew isn't all that and following that it's some of the lesser history plays. Obviously what I WANT to be reading is Othello, Macbeth, Hamlet, King Lear, Twelfth Night, The Tempest, Henry IV... etc. (Side note: I've actually read most of these already.)

Mostly though it's finding the time. The problem with Shakespeare AFAIC is that I have to constantly consult footnotes to decipher the bloody things. So even thought the plays are short, reading them represents a significant investment of time.

Of course, by common consent his plays are the pinnacle of Western literature so perhaps I should stop bitching and get reading.

I recently read 'Death in Venice' by Thomas Mann, twice, and now I'm reading 'Heart of Darkness', and hopefully will reread that too. It's struck me of late that I've been reading badly ever since university. Annotating everything, but not really meditating on what I've annotated. So now I aim to read without annotating the first time around, and then re read with the pencil handy.
 

Corpsey

bandz ahoy
Finished 'Heart of Darkness', finally, after many attempts had faltered around page 20 in the past. Hacking through the thick canopy of adjectives is initially challenging but there are rewards hidden in there for the intrepid - though not at the end of the river where, like 'Apocalypse Now', the novella nosedives in quality, roughly at the moment when Marlowe meets Kurtz.

I wondered if Conrad had deliberately made Kurtz so underwhelming, if the idea is that the great figure we have been led to expect turns out to be not much more than a rather sordid opportunist, a man incapable of restraining his appetites for adoration and murder?

Seemed to me that there were all sorts of similarities to 'Death in Venice', too. I'm not sure if that's a coincidence.
 

luka

Well-known member
Urgh, don't remind me. Haven't read a SINGLE BLOODY PLAY.

It might have been a mistake to try chronologically, cos The Taming of the Shrew isn't all that and following that it's some of the lesser history plays. Obviously what I WANT to be reading is Othello, Macbeth, Hamlet, King Lear, Twelfth Night, The Tempest, Henry IV... etc. (Side note: I've actually read most of these already.)

Mostly though it's finding the time. The problem with Shakespeare AFAIC is that I have to constantly consult footnotes to decipher the bloody things. So even thought the plays are short, reading them represents a significant investment of time.

Of course, by common consent his plays are the pinnacle of Western literature so perhaps I should stop bitching and get reading.

I recently read 'Death in Venice' by Thomas Mann, twice, and now I'm reading 'Heart of Darkness', and hopefully will reread that too. It's struck me of late that I've been reading badly ever since university. Annotating everything, but not really meditating on what I've annotated. So now I aim to read without annotating the first time around, and then re read with the pencil handy.

youre stressing out too much. if it feels like homework its a waste of time doing it. if youre consulting every footnote youre wasting youre time. the key to reading shakespeare is locating the rhythm. it often helps, i find it helps, to read aloud or subvocalise, using different voices, comedy ones are good, for each character. im not saying its always easy but it has musical qualities, and grasping that is the key to comprehension. 'locking in' to the rhythm to use a phrase used in the percussion thread. it clears up many more ambiguities than glossaries and footnotes.
 

luka

Well-known member
by giving you a guide to where the stresses lie it clarifies the meaning obscured by knotty or ambiguous syntax
 
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