New Review

I have a new review up over at The Second Pass. Here's an excerpt:

It is hard to explain why the American, except in his exhortatory and passionately argumentative moods, has not struck deep into American life, why his stories and verses are, for the most part, only pretty things, nicely unimportant. Anthony Trollope had a theory that the absence of international copyright threw our market open too unrestrictedly to the British product, that the American novel was an unprotected infant industry; we printed Dickens and the rest without paying royalty and starved the domestic manufacturer. This theory does not explain.

Wait a second. No. That's not right. My review is of a book called The Magicians. It's about, uhm, Magicians. College age kids. Anyway, read it. What else do you have to do?

(The above quote, by the way, comes from "American Literature" an essay written in 1921 by John Macy).

It's Coming

My friend Dez, over at GNABB, has just finished compiling a list of his "Top Fifty Movies of All Time."  It's got me thinking.  It's got me inspired.  It's got me riled.  And so, my fellow readers, be prepared.  Soon, I too will have a list.  Magnificent and shining it will be as a beacon, giving light succor to the blighted citizens of our weak and weary world.

Probably it will feature The Muppets.

Really.

Name That Tune

The following is excerpted from a classic work of literature.  My challenge: can you identify the book in question?  It's one I believe many of my readers have read.  It was written in the last 150 years, in English, and continues to be read to this day.  I've removed all proper names, so as not to give it all away.

By the way, in case it's not clear: the passage opens with someone speaking.

`And you, you will come too, young brother; for the days pass, and never return, and the South still waits for you. Take the Adventure, heed the call, now ere the irrevocable moment passes!' 'Tis but a banging of the door behind you, a blithesome step forward, and you are out of the old life and into the new! Then some day, some day long hence, jog home here if you will, when the cup has been drained and the play has been played, and sit down by your quiet river with a store of goodly memories for company. You can easily overtake me on the road, for you are young, and I am ageing and go softly. I will linger, and look back; and at last I will surely see you coming, eager and light- hearted, with all the South in your face!'

The voice died away and ceased as an insect's tiny trumpet dwindles swiftly into silence; and _____, paralysed and staring, saw at last but a distant speck on the white surface of the road.

Mechanically he rose and proceeded to repack the luncheon-basket, carefully and without haste. Mechanically he returned home, gathered together a few small necessaries and special treasures he was fond of, and put them in a satchel; acting with slow deliberation, moving about the room like a sleep-walker; listening ever with parted lips. He swung the satchel over his shoulder, carefully selected a stout stick for his wayfaring, and with no haste, but with no hesitation at all, he stepped across the threshold just as ____ appeared at the door.

`Why, where are you off to, ___?' asked ___ in great surprise, grasping him by the arm.

`Going South, with the rest of them,' murmured ___ in a dreamy monotone, never looking at him. `Seawards first and then on shipboard, and so to the shores that are calling me!'

He pressed resolutely forward, still without haste, but with dogged fixity of purpose; but ___, now thoroughly alarmed, placed himself in front of him, and looking into his eyes saw that they were glazed and set and turned a streaked and shifting grey--not his friend's eyes, but the eyes of some other animal! Grappling with him strongly he dragged him inside, threw him down, and held him.

___ struggled desperately for a few moments, and then his strength seemed suddenly to leave him, and he lay still and exhausted, with closed eyes, trembling. Presently ___ assisted him to rise and placed him in a chair, where he sat collapsed and shrunken into himself, his body shaken by a violent shivering, passing in time into an hysterical fit of dry sobbing.

In other words, is not a person

My favorite moment in the July 20th New Yorker is below.  It describes the attempts to hand-count every ballot in the closely-contested Franken/Coleman Senate election.

Each challenged ballot was projected onto a large screen visible to a roomful of observers from the public and the press. The members of the Canvassing Board scrutinized and debated the markings on each ballot to decide the voter’s intent, and their deliberations were videotaped and streamed live over the Internet. Minnesotans found the process mesmerizing.

Some ballots presented little difficulty; in one instance, a voter had clearly filled in the bubble beside Coleman’s name but had accidentally, or in a moment of indecision, touched his pencil tip in Franken’s bubble, leaving a small dot. The judges gave the vote to Coleman. Other ballots provoked long, absurdist exchanges. One ballot—from Beltrami County—became locally famous. The voter had filled in the bubble for Franken but had printed “Lizard People” in the write-in area. After a few minutes of discussion, Marc Elias, a lawyer for Franken, spoke up. “My argument would be that ‘Lizard People’ is not a genuine write-in,” Elias said. “In other words, is not a person.”

“Do we know that for sure?” one of the judges asked.

Another asked, “If it said ‘Moon Unit Zappa,’ would you say, ‘Oh, no, there is no such person as Moon Unit Zappa?’ ”

“I would say that that would be permissible,” Elias said.

“Well, but you don’t know that there’s not someone named Lizard People. You don’t!”

The judges voted to have the ballot tossed out.

Self Promotion

Over at The Second Pass, John asks contributors to write about their most overrated classic--about canonical books you're allowed NOT to read.  My contribution comes at the end.  It's on A Tale of Two Cities.  The whole piece is worth reading, though.  I particularly admired--and agreed with--the entry on Lawrence's The Rainbow.  In the immortal words of Krusty the Clown: "Ughh.  That just kept on going."

Rubik's Art

TOP 10
Uploaded by extermitent. - Independent web videos.

This more or less blew my mind.  (Hat Tip: Andrew Sullivan).

Annie Are You Ok?

I once owned parachute pants.  I had a black jacket covered in zippers.  I did the Moonwalk-- whenever I had a chance.  (I had them more than you might think.)  When Michael Jackson was on the cover of Time magazine (1984?)--I harassed my mother until she went out and got it for me.  Then, I read the article about him over and over and over.  

When I got to college, I found out he'd done an album before Thriller.  Every few weeks or so, during my senior year, some friends of mine would clear out their living room of furniture, hang up a disco ball, and play Off The Wall over and over and over.  Disco Dance Party Nights, we called it.  When I started dating my wife, we used to paint together at my apartment; there were only two albums we ever listened to while we worked--There's A Riot Going On, and Off The Wall.  When I got married, I insisted that "Billie Jean" be one of the first songs our DJ played--not for the crowd, but for me.

What he had was joy.  Skill and musicality and moves--sure.  But it was more than that.  Michael Jackson made ME want to dance--a gangly, suburban white dude.  More than that: he made me think I could.

He probably went crazy in the end.  But on the way, he made some f***** incredible music.  

The world today is a little less funky.  

Bad Art

I'm thinking these days about what makes some art seem better than others.  In the process, I've come to think that most of the art to which we're exposed (or at least to which I'm exposed) is basically pretty good.   The Road may not have lived up to the hype, but it's not as if it was a self-published guide to selling tractor trailers.  If you actually want to understand good art, you need to think about bad art.  And bad art (not mediocre art) is often out of sight.  

Somehow this has lead me to the website for Boston's Museum of Bad Art.  I can't even begin to do justice to what's there; let's just say that it's worth your time.  Almost every single painting they have posted should be seen, but since I can only choose one, I've decided to go with...wait for it...."Sunday on the Pot With George."  (I know.  What a title!)  Someone on the site describes the painting as "the single most memorable artistic experience in his life--a bit like his recent bout with shingles."  Yes!

Ok, I'm sorry, but I have to show another one.  This one was painted on lace--four layers of lace, to be exact.    

The description is worth quoting in its entirety:

The texture of the lace lends a luster to the complexion. Careful placement of Christmas poinsettias adds an Easter Island element to this remarkable portrait of the sixteenth president's wife. A painting that could have changed the course of the Civil War.

Iran, Twitter, Kutcher

What's going on in Iran seems somehow to be hugely important--not just the events, but the way they've been covered.  The cable stations have been mostly terrible; they don't have many reporters there, and they've got a lot more experience hosting fake round tables in which pseudo-pundits repeat canned talking points about who's up and down in Washington than they do reporting on nascent revolutions.  Meanwhile, the blogosphere has been all over the story.  Andrew Sullivan especially has been great (it's an event made for his strengths), and if you haven't been reading his site regularly, I urge you to do so.  It's gripping stuff.  

And to think: without Twitter, none of this would be possible.  Maybe Ashton Kutcher was right.  The mind reels.

A Real American Wombat

G.I. JOE trailer in HD

Let’s be honest: This is probably going to be bad. Fine: it’s definitely going to be bad. Still, I’m going to see it. Because it has ninjas. Ninjas ninjas ninjas. Two of them, actually. You may reasonably ask why a high-tech, 21st century Special Ops military force would need a ninja. Aren’t throwing stars pretty useless in comparision to, I don’t know, anti-tank guns? That misses the point--badly. The point—as any ten-year old boy would happily tell you—is this: ninjas rule. They just do. And if one ninja is good, then obviously two ninjas are better. Way way better.

By the way: Snake Eyes and Storm Shadow. Those are their names. The ninjas.

Yep. It's gonna be goooood.

The 23rd Time MIGHT Be The Charm

Part of the enjoyment I'm getting from suddenly starting to care about the NBA is that I can now appreciate the full genius of ESPN.com columnist, Bill Simmons.  For those who don't follow sports, Simmons ("The Sports Guy") combines actual sports analysis with a fair amount of high-level ridicule.  At his best, he's very very funny.

The moment below is my favorite from his new mailbag (a regular feature in which he responds to reader questions).  The premise of THIS mailbag is that the people writing in aren't average readers, but sports celebrities.  (Obviously, the letters are all made up).  Here's his response to a question from Mike Brown--the coach of the Cleveland Cavaliers, a team that lost in a blowout to Orlando after almost everyone on Earth predicted they'd make the NBA Finals.

Q: What should I have done differently?
-- Mike Brown 

[+] Enlarge

Elsa/Getty Images"No, no, no -- just keep doing the same thing!"

SG: You mean, other than come up with offensive plays or a playbook? I will never understand two things. First, why you didn't mix things up at all : throw a zone at Orlando, try a zone press (which worked really well in the regular season), go super-small when Howard was on the bench and play LeBron at center; something, anything. You just let the Magic do their thing and made no real attempt to throw them off. Perplexing. And second, why did you insist on doubling Howard and leaving their shooters open? One of the reasons I picked you to kill Orlando in my now-infamous chat was because I thought you'd use 24 (and maybe even 30) fouls on Howard, single-team him, make him score 40 points a game to beat you and stay home on their shooters. You did the opposite. I will never in a million years figure out why. It was like watching someone hitting on various female celebrities at a Hollywood party by saying, "Hi, I'm a member of the paparazzi, I have no money, and I have VD" and going down in flames over and over again but feeling like the 23rd time would be the charm. Again, perplexing.