Ross McElwee

Ross McElwee makes documentaries. "It seems I'm filming my life in order to have a life to film, like some primitive organism that somehow nourishes itself by devouring itself, growing as it diminishes." -RM



Read more about him here (PBS Frontline).

I absolutely love all of his work but if you are to pick only one I would say Sherman's March.

Sherman's March: A Meditation on the Possibility of Romantic Love in the South During an Era of Nuclear Weapons Proliferation, (1986) Autobiographical documentary on life, love, nuclear preparedness, and the various neuroses of General William Sherman.

- Sundance Film Festival
- Best Feature Documentary USA Film Festival, (Dallas)
- Cinema du Reel, Paris National Board of Film Critics, runner-up Best Feature Documentary, 1986
- Selected by Library of Congress National Registry International Doc. Assoc: Top 20 Documentaries of All Time

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And if you can't get over Charleen, which you most likely won't be able to, then you have to pick-up Charleen or How Long Has This Been Going On?.

Charleen, (1978) Portrait of North Carolina native Charleen Swansea, a protégé of Ezra Pound, poet, and innovative teacher in the public schools.

- Best Documentary American Film Festival (NYC)
- Red Ribbon Award Best Feature Documentary of 1980, Boston Society of Film Critics


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And then of course, you should watch Bright Leaves.



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Oh! There's this:

Christian Bök

This is an online flash version of Chapter E .

WARNING: IT IS INTERACTIVE

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This picture of Christian Bök during his marathon reading of Eunoia:





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Last night I was thumbing through Chirstin Bök's lexical exprmnt:

(I am quoting now straight from blogcritics.org's Mike Daley)

Eunoia. I picked this book up, with its accompanying CD, at Word on the Street in Toronto a couple of weekends ago. The deal is that Bök (pronounced "book") has written a novel that uses the five vowels, but only one chapter at a time. So chapter one is "A", and all of the words in the chapter contain "a" as their only vowel.

It's quite amazing what he does, and clearly virtuosic, which I like. Now, as a guy who can't tell his metonyms from his synecdoches, I am loath to offer much in the way of criticism or analysis. I'll leave that to bookish English-teachin', poetry-lovin' babes, in whose company I like to be seen.

Let me just say that to hear this stuff read aloud, as the author does on the disc, is a striking sonic experience, and very interesting from a musical standpoint. Here's why. With the constant reiteration of the short and long forms of one vowel, albeit punctuated with a variety of consonant closers and openers, a kind of rhythm and melody emerges. Vowels ARE the carriers of tone in language, doncha know. Of course, this melody and rhythm is always present in spoken language, and implicit in written language as well. But the sameness of the vowel sounds (which are really just timbral profiles, which are themselves just formant registers [language babes love when I talk linguistics]) really points up the musicality of the speech.

What's interesting too is that Bök doesn't shy away from giving affective labels to the different vowels ('u' is obscene, apparently). All of this, in my bök, is a recipe for fun. I'll be chewing on this one for a while. Side note: I'm reminded of one of my mum's (9 months gone yesterday) favourite jokes, which is in the form of a newspaper headline: "'Sex before marriage? Not in my book!' claims angry Noah Webster...."

Oldtimes 2

TIME STAMP:
Wednesday, June 07, 2006

TITLE:
worth living

BODY:
Life is very much a possession.

9:06 AM - 8 Comments - 2 Kudos - Add Comment - Edit - Remove
Thoracles Odinrocker


One of the more interesting depictions of the consequences of suicide upon the dead comes from Neil Gaiman's "Sandman" series: As in Catholic exegesis of scripture, those who commit suicide are condemned to Hell; Gaiman has them turn into gnarled trees, void of leaves. The Sandman remarks that after an one hundred year absence from visiting Hell (the later quarter of the 19th century and the first three-quarters of the 20th) what was once a grove has turned into a dense and sorrowful forest. I find the image to be heart-breaking, particularly in taking into consideration the commentary on modern society's effect(s) upon human moods etc implied in Sandman's remarks.

I am bound to ask by the subject matter of this blog: are you thinking about suicide? Because if so, I better be the person you take with you....We cannot carry the Post Deenaism torch without you to guide the haphazard way.

Posted by Thoracles Odinrocker on Wednesday, June 07, 2006 at 10:10 AM
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Exeter


The thought that a day may come when Deenaism becomes Post is more than a little upsetting.

Posted by Exeter on Thursday, June 08, 2006 at 5:39 AM
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The Bashamo


old school jonathan, you're the sweetest!

Posted by The Bashamo on Thursday, June 08, 2006 at 10:37 AM
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The Bashamo


I am thinking about suicide as a subject matter, not as a course of action.
I'm way too much of a positive thinker and I have way to much to do to be suicidal right now. Maybe later.
But the plan is that I'll have eaten so much fatty foods, drank, smoked, etc that I won't have to deal with too much of a decline and I'll die early enough after having done enough.

Posted by The Bashamo on Wednesday, June 07, 2006 at 10:54 AM
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anna


i don't know enough about philosophy to make an educated argument, but i can share my opinion. the only time suicide seems logical - if you can even call it that - is if you know your life from this point on will be devoid of any significant pleasure. although a masochist may look forward to pain, i'm not really considering him. so, if you know you will only experience pain from here on out, you may as well kill yourself. the problem is that we can never know and therefore, may deprive ourselves from something wonderful. however, if we're dead we won't know what we're missing anyway.

Posted by anna on Thursday, June 08, 2006 at 8:52 AM
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Christopher el Mexicano Barbudo Rojo


There is, to be sure, something to what you are saying here, but might I suggest, to help differentiate between the types of suicides which you enumerate, that we, perhaps, reintroduce the concept of the martyr?

I, of course, decry suicide of all types, as it is the ultimate attack on all life, on your own, and on the world's, it is, from a subjective point of view, a final and ultimate attack on reality--but of course, reality still wins. But to abandon one's life for the sake of another, if that be suicide, is a very different sort of thing--I don't know if that is what you mean by a "bold suicide" or not, but that is all I can think that it might mean. I would highly recommend that you read G.K. Chesterton's comments on suicide in his book Orthodoxy; as much as the work is not "serious" philosophy, it is one of the finest and most thorough treatments of the issue I have ever read.

Happy thinking, enjoy the fatty foods, and God Bless.

Posted by Christopher el Mexicano Barbudo Rojo on Thursday, June 08, 2006 at 9:01 PM
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Thoracles Odinrocker


There are only two suicides that currently come to mind as being even close to "right" or justifiable:

1) Hunter S. Thompson. He is the expression of a right that is often ignored by many, but is always there nonetheless: the right to die. At the end of his life he couldn't even make it up a simple flight of stairs on his own. For someone who embodies the ideal of freedom, being held hostage on the first floor of one's own home is a terrible prison ("In prison I hear there's time to be good, but the first thing you see is the last thing you should" - Black Rebel Motorcycle Club). There is something to be said for dying well, and you have to ask yourself if extending a life of physical pain and torment accompanied by psychological deterioration is a life worth living at all. What good can you accomplish for yourselves or others other than to remind them of the person you once were, and to placate their fears of a world without you - particularly when the world with you has become a burden to them beyond what is considered a reasonable cross to bear which brings me to my second suicide....

2) Jesus/God. Okay, so all of you Catholics out there are now most likely too furious with me to continue reading my argument, so go ahead and stop now and write that dastardly response that is itching under the cuticles of your righteous fingers. For the rest of you: according to Christian scripture God gave himself in the form of Jesus - a being who is/was 100% Divine and 100% human - in order to save us all. God did not have to do this, as God can do anything, but since he rigged the game in the Garden of Eden...heck even from Lucifer the Morningstar's rebellion (but this is another discussion that calls for much wine and some pompously proposterous cheese), he felt it was necessary to die an unnatural death (ie a violent one; one not brought about by time and old age...which one would also have to wonder if Jesus would EVER had died since he was, well, God...man we need to open up a Circle K with all these cans of worms...). He for-knew his death (see the Garden of Gethsemene (totally butchered the spelling, I am sorry)) and he allowed it to happen. Of course this is only suicide if you view allowing your death to take place at the violent hands of another when you could have easily stopped it as suicide. Anyway, for those of you still reading, you must really hate your job. Get back to the TPS Reports. That'd be great. Uh huh. Yeah.

Posted by Thoracles Odinrocker on Friday, June 09, 2006 at 7:37 AM
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Christopher el Mexicano Barbudo Rojo


Hi, I'm Catholic and I don't think that my response is particularly righteous or anything, in fact, I merely wanted to say that I more or less agree with what you said about Christ (Hunter S. Thompson is another, as you put it, can of worms); the point, however, is the one I would employ to call Christ's "suicide" a sacrifice. There is and must be a differance. The man who throws himself on the grenade that his friends might not perish does not commit suicide, nor does he who allows himself to be crucified that we may live. That's all really. (oh, and your point about Christ not dying a natural death, being God and all, is a good one: it puts the sacrifice in context. He did not merely give up life like a mortal would, for all mortals must die, but Christ gave up eternal life. Death, after all, is the wage of sin, and since Christ had not sin it stands to reason that he would have suffered not death. Amazing really.)

I hope that wasn't a "dastardly" response.

Posted by Christopher el Mexicano Barbudo Rojo on Tuesday, June 13, 2006 at 12:48 PM
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Oldtimes

Severe judgmental culturally elite complex writing literary industry commercial prospects. This is fucked up serious damage.


TIME STAMP:
Tuesday, June 20, 2006

TITLE:
difficult gems

BODY:

key phrases to look out for:

- severe judgment
- This is fucked up
- culturally elite
- neatly equated
- complex writing
- serious damage
- commercial prospects
- literary industry

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Citing Ulysses as the ultimate scare text, he claims, that its frequent placement on top-ten lists of the best books of the twentieth century "sends this message to the common reader: Literature is horribly hard to read. And this message to the aspiring writer: Extreme difficulty is the way to earn respect. This is fucked up. It's particularly fucked up when the printed word is fighting other media for its very life."

Even while popular writing has quietly glided into the realm of the culturally elite, doling out its severe judgment of fiction that has not sold well, and we have entered a time when book sales and artistic merit can be neatly equated without much of a fuss, Franzen has argued that complex writing, as practiced by writers such as James Joyce and Samuel Beckett and their descendants, is being forced upon readers by powerful cultural institutions (this is me scanning the horizon for even the slightest evidence of this) and that this less approachable literature, or at least its esteemed reputation, is doing serious damage to the commercial prospects of the literary
industry.




-From a Harper's Article (you know about this Timothy)


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Do I agree?

There's plenty of accessible literature out there being sold and even SOLD-OUT. What's wrong with studying some difficult gems? What's wrong with pushing the limits? So maybe some people get left behind but there's always BEST SELLERS. There's still a middle between Donald Barthelme and The DaVinci Code.

And then there's movie adaptations.

Literature. Hmm...

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COMMENTS:

12:47 PM - 7 Comments - 4 Kudos - Add Comment - Edit - Remove
The Timothy Corporation


I do, I do.

Posted by The Timothy Corporation on Tuesday, June 20, 2006 at 12:58 PM
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anna


so maybe some people get left behind, but there's always left behind. now that's great literature.

Posted by anna on Tuesday, June 20, 2006 at 1:03 PM
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DeenaOdelle


there was a movie adaptation of that in 2000.
the IMDb tagline for the movie = "the future is clear"
bullshit!

Posted by DeenaOdelle on Tuesday, June 20, 2006 at 1:07 PM
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Exeter


As a card-carrying member of the countrys cultural elite please excuse me while I get out my soapbox. I think its grossly short sighted to say that the force feeding of difficult literature to popular society is such a bad thing. Furthermore I think that as painful as it may (or may not) be, its necessary. Not everyone enjoyed taking basic science and math classes in school, but without some sort of basic bank of societal knowledge about these things communication would be impossible. The same is true of literature.

This concludes the intellectual diarrhea.

I love D.O.H.

Posted by Exeter on Tuesday, June 20, 2006 at 2:00 PM
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Thoracles Odinrocker


The problem is we no longer have to courage to say something sucks, or I don't understand it (and just because you personally don't understand it, doesn't make it stupid), and we have no idea what constitutes "good literature." I'm not saying that I do, but I do know that there is a difference between "good literature" and "writing that is good only because it makes you turn the page." The latter is a psychological device that can be expertly crafted, but will not push the bounds of literature to new levels of anything except summer-time book sales and terrible movie adaptations. Our children will not read The DiVinci Code; they will read Tim O'Brien's work.

Posted by Thoracles Odinrocker on Tuesday, June 20, 2006 at 2:57 PM
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The Timothy Corporation


Accessibility and experimentation are not mutually exclusive. There are plenty of writers able to push the boundaries of language and narrative form without sacrificing one iota of their readership. To me, that's the definition of literary genius.

(Name-dropping time! Writers like Alice Munro, George Saunders, and Robert Coover are perfect examples of authors who maintain that balance.)

ps..My mom LOVES the Left Behind series.

Posted by The Timothy Corporation on Tuesday, June 20, 2006 at 6:25 PM
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Christopher el Mexicano Barbudo Rojo


An observation, perhaps even a thought: There is more to the quote than the idea that "difficult" literature is being force fed, so I think. The problem, and I do believe it is a problem, and grevious one, is that there has been established a great gulf between what academics might call literature and what people are reading. No doubt there is a lot of literature that is accesable, but there is, it must be stated, much that is not. Why? Joyce, and he does deserve to be cited here, and the other modernists, especially later in their careers, filled there works with as much "stuff"--to use the technical term--as was possible. This makes it difficult for your average, even for your exceptional, reader. Anyone can pick up pretty much any 19th century novelist of poet and read and enjoy with little effort or education; the same cannot be said regarding many of the "greats" of the 20th century. The modernists, in an attempt to make literature more rich, made it also more obscure, this necessarily limited their audience. We have seen over the last many decades an increasing academization of literature. It is becoming a specialist field. This is not yet so clear in prose as in poetry, which is will serve as a more stark example. Poetry is no longer written for people, but is written for poets and critics. Eliot himself said that only a poet can criticize a poem. This is a new and exclusionary idea. Poetry is no longer for the people. Prose is going the same way. "But what?" you say, "there is so much literature being printed." And to be sure, there is. But compare this to the prose of a century ago. In the 19th century, newspapers were filled with serialized authors such as Dumas, Hugo, Tolstoy, and Dosteoevsky--names which are not venerable merely because they are old--imagine such a thing today. Imagine even serialized novels. Difficult, I know. Why? That is a big question which I should not attempt to answer in a blog comment. But it must be acknowledged that literature occupies a very different, and much more narrow, space in the lives of people today. At least one factor affecting this, is, I strongly believe, that people do think "real literature"--a term that you will hear them say--is too hard. Perhaps the idea of real literature needs be redefined (or, for that matter, defined at all). You see the same thing in philosophy and music. Few today will read Aristotle for leisure or listen to Palestrina for contemplation. No, there is an aversion to the "difficult stuff." I do believe that "cultural institutions"--we call those universities where I come from--force an idea about literature on people, and I believe this idea is very incorrect. We are losing the middle ground, so it seems, between literature as something to be enjoyed, and literature as something to be studied. Before guys like Joyce & co., it was not necessary to "study" literature. Anyone can enjoy Milton without getting all of his references; without getting all of his references--and who does?--Pound's Cantos are unintelligable. This is a big difference, and I would argue, a big problem. Ok, that's the observation and the thought, I shall close with a recommendation: Read Dana Gioia's book, Can Poetry Matter, and perhaps also some works on criticism and literature by G.K. Chesterton and C.S. Lewis. Pushing the envelope may be a good, but not at the expense of the letter.