![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shadowkat1. While reading the NY Times this morning at the laundramat, which was a nice and warm, so much so the windows were literally sweating, I discovered that the Catholic church near me - been to Mass there five or six times, was where Al Capone got married. Its called St. Mary Star of the Sea and the congregation is made up of mostly Italian and Irish residents.
2. Again in the NY Times - this time the letters column, got even more information on the Transit Strike, causing me to realize this is not a black and white affair, not something you can really be definitive about.
Both sides were wrong and both sides were right. The Transit Union was right to want to keep their pensions, to have that security. Especially since they put money towards them at certain point. Although, I'm somewhat confused about that - since one group says they never put money towards their pension and don't think they should have to, and another says they have and don't want to lose that money. I can understand the desire for a pension and the fear of losing one - have that fear myself, having just joined a company that had one, which is merging with a company that does not and appears to be contemplating the idea of doing away with it completely.
On the other hand, I'm not sure that fear justifies walking off a job and endangering thousands of souls livilihoods, safety, health during a period in which those three things would be at greatest risk. Should a cop walk off a job if his pension is done away with? Yet - should we expect civil servants to be slaves for the public good? IS that what they do when they choose this line of work? Should we treat those we depend on and really cannot live without less well than movie stars and celebrities, who we most definitely can survive without? Why does the baseball player or movie star make 14 million a year and live in the mansion and the person who puts him or herself in danger each day making less than 60,000 if that? I don't know. The world makes very little logical sense most of the time, methinks.
3. Just read a lengthy article on Philip Pullman in the International Writers Edition of The New Yorker. Pullman is an oddity. I agree with half of what he says and half of it has me rolling my eyes. But I think part of that discrepancy has to do with dissimilar backgrounds. Pullman believes you story doesn't begin until you think or realize you've been born to the wrong family. But what about those of us who did not have dysfunctional families and feel we fit with ours? Are we instantly less creative, less artistic than those who had parents who more likely than not should have never had children? And what about Pullman's children - does he believe they should come to that realization about him? I do to a degree agree with this comment though - that while truth may not be a tangible object, if you think of it like an imaginary number - like the square root of minus one - you can use it to calculate all manner of things without it. I also agree with some of his criticism of Tolkien and CS Lewis. Did not realize he disliked Tolkien as much as he does. He considers "The Lord of The Rings - a fundamentally infantile work" - "Tolkien is not interested in the way grown-up, adult human beings interact with each other. He's interested in maps, plans, languages and codes." Yes, but what is wrong with that? Why should a story be only about the interaction? And I'm not completely sure this is true - how do you account for the father/child relationship/friendship between Gandalf and Bilbo Baggins, which keeps spinning about until you can't really tell who is which? Or the relationship between Frodo and Sam? Or Gollum, a character who is in an eternal struggle with his own baser instincts? Yes, the mythology on its surface may seem a tad simplistic, but
there are items within that which do provide depth. Tolkien wrote the story as an anti-war allegory. How can Pullman miss that? On the other hand, the books are a tad dense with language, maps, plans, codes and battle sequences that I can see how some readers may become a bit lost in them. But perhaps that was part of Tolkien's point? That we lose a bit of ourselves and our ability to interact by becoming far too distracted with the intricacies of what was originally created to make that interaction possible. Pullman does address this himself - stating his frustration with adult contemporary literature and preferring children's stories: "In adult literary fiction, stories are there on sufferance. Other things are flet to be more important:technique, style, literary knowingness...The present-day would-be George Eliots take up their stories with a pair of tongs. They're embarrassed by them. If they could write novels without stories in them, they would. Sometimes they do." Is this true though? Or is it a condemnation of style over substance found in some works notably William Gaddis' novels? You could say the same I suppose about Cormac McCarthy, except I found a beautiful story well-told in All The Pretty Horses. And same with James Joyce - whose tale of Leopold Bloom does not become buried by the technique so much as enriched by it. I guess it all depends on how you view story, how you see it.
Then there's his criticism of CS Lewis' Narnia series, which in some ways I always felt Pullman's own triology "His Dark Materials" was a counter to - even though it is based on Milton's Paradise Lost. I can't say I completely disagree, but I find it oddly interesting that as child I was completely unaware of the negative messages I see in the series as an adult, or if aware, I dismissed them and concentrated on the portions of the tale I wished to concentrate on. I think that's what people do actually - see what they want to see, push aside what they don't. So much information - you know. Impossible to take in all of it. Even now, here, I am taking bits and pieces of a ten page article - remembering what I wish from it, ignoring the rest. Interacting with it.
I agree with Khalad Hosseni's comment on Book TV a while back - "Reading fiction is an interactive experience." But I'd extend that to all reading. We superimpose our own views and experience and understanding on to that which we read, taking from it what is useful to us, and disposing of the rest. That said, I do agree with the criticism of Lewis, a criticism I'd extend to a few other children's novelists here and there - "The idea of keeping childhood alive forever and ever and regretting the passage into adulthood - whether it's gentel, rose-tinged regret, or a passionate, full-blooded hatred, as it is in Lewis - is simply wrong." Yes, agreed. It was the problem I had with Lewis' later novels in the series and why I barely made it through some of them, even as a child who liked being a child and was in no hurry to grow up, I saw this as troublesome.
4. The above paragraph reminds me of a comment Wales made over the weekend - she was quoting her film professor, Wales has been taking film analysis courses: "Every film made is about the men struggling with their father and eventually becoming their father or the very thing they struggled with." After watching three episodes of La Femme Nikita yesterday and The Outsiders, can't say I disagree. So many of our stories are about the relationship between parent and child and the fear the child has of becoming the parent or either losing childhood or the desire to escape it as quickly as possible. In La Femme Nikita - the series ends with Nikita becoming more or less her father, metaphorically. Cool and distant, running his organization, as he has molded her to do. And in Angel the Series, we see Liam/Angel grapple with the fact that he in effect is no different than his own father - in his need to control his son's life and his struggle with that awareness. On the female side of the fence - depending on the writer - it tends to be more about not becoming or becoming one's mother.
That struggle. And watching each show unfold, I find myself wondering if only those who came from dysfunctional families are the ones that get their stories told? Or if we feel those are the only stories worth telling?
Perhaps not...I do see exceptions to that rule. Not all tales are about that. Nor all stories. So I'm not sure Wales' professor's generalization holds. But then that's the problem with generalizations, isn't it?
Now off to eat lunch and debate whether to see a movie - four to choose from: Memoirs of Geisha, Narnia, Brokeback Mountain, and Syriana at my local theater. Or sit home, veg, and watch DVDs. Nice to have options.
Need money though - laundry sort of took a good portion of it. Three loads - 12 dollars. Sigh.
2. Again in the NY Times - this time the letters column, got even more information on the Transit Strike, causing me to realize this is not a black and white affair, not something you can really be definitive about.
Both sides were wrong and both sides were right. The Transit Union was right to want to keep their pensions, to have that security. Especially since they put money towards them at certain point. Although, I'm somewhat confused about that - since one group says they never put money towards their pension and don't think they should have to, and another says they have and don't want to lose that money. I can understand the desire for a pension and the fear of losing one - have that fear myself, having just joined a company that had one, which is merging with a company that does not and appears to be contemplating the idea of doing away with it completely.
On the other hand, I'm not sure that fear justifies walking off a job and endangering thousands of souls livilihoods, safety, health during a period in which those three things would be at greatest risk. Should a cop walk off a job if his pension is done away with? Yet - should we expect civil servants to be slaves for the public good? IS that what they do when they choose this line of work? Should we treat those we depend on and really cannot live without less well than movie stars and celebrities, who we most definitely can survive without? Why does the baseball player or movie star make 14 million a year and live in the mansion and the person who puts him or herself in danger each day making less than 60,000 if that? I don't know. The world makes very little logical sense most of the time, methinks.
3. Just read a lengthy article on Philip Pullman in the International Writers Edition of The New Yorker. Pullman is an oddity. I agree with half of what he says and half of it has me rolling my eyes. But I think part of that discrepancy has to do with dissimilar backgrounds. Pullman believes you story doesn't begin until you think or realize you've been born to the wrong family. But what about those of us who did not have dysfunctional families and feel we fit with ours? Are we instantly less creative, less artistic than those who had parents who more likely than not should have never had children? And what about Pullman's children - does he believe they should come to that realization about him? I do to a degree agree with this comment though - that while truth may not be a tangible object, if you think of it like an imaginary number - like the square root of minus one - you can use it to calculate all manner of things without it. I also agree with some of his criticism of Tolkien and CS Lewis. Did not realize he disliked Tolkien as much as he does. He considers "The Lord of The Rings - a fundamentally infantile work" - "Tolkien is not interested in the way grown-up, adult human beings interact with each other. He's interested in maps, plans, languages and codes." Yes, but what is wrong with that? Why should a story be only about the interaction? And I'm not completely sure this is true - how do you account for the father/child relationship/friendship between Gandalf and Bilbo Baggins, which keeps spinning about until you can't really tell who is which? Or the relationship between Frodo and Sam? Or Gollum, a character who is in an eternal struggle with his own baser instincts? Yes, the mythology on its surface may seem a tad simplistic, but
there are items within that which do provide depth. Tolkien wrote the story as an anti-war allegory. How can Pullman miss that? On the other hand, the books are a tad dense with language, maps, plans, codes and battle sequences that I can see how some readers may become a bit lost in them. But perhaps that was part of Tolkien's point? That we lose a bit of ourselves and our ability to interact by becoming far too distracted with the intricacies of what was originally created to make that interaction possible. Pullman does address this himself - stating his frustration with adult contemporary literature and preferring children's stories: "In adult literary fiction, stories are there on sufferance. Other things are flet to be more important:technique, style, literary knowingness...The present-day would-be George Eliots take up their stories with a pair of tongs. They're embarrassed by them. If they could write novels without stories in them, they would. Sometimes they do." Is this true though? Or is it a condemnation of style over substance found in some works notably William Gaddis' novels? You could say the same I suppose about Cormac McCarthy, except I found a beautiful story well-told in All The Pretty Horses. And same with James Joyce - whose tale of Leopold Bloom does not become buried by the technique so much as enriched by it. I guess it all depends on how you view story, how you see it.
Then there's his criticism of CS Lewis' Narnia series, which in some ways I always felt Pullman's own triology "His Dark Materials" was a counter to - even though it is based on Milton's Paradise Lost. I can't say I completely disagree, but I find it oddly interesting that as child I was completely unaware of the negative messages I see in the series as an adult, or if aware, I dismissed them and concentrated on the portions of the tale I wished to concentrate on. I think that's what people do actually - see what they want to see, push aside what they don't. So much information - you know. Impossible to take in all of it. Even now, here, I am taking bits and pieces of a ten page article - remembering what I wish from it, ignoring the rest. Interacting with it.
I agree with Khalad Hosseni's comment on Book TV a while back - "Reading fiction is an interactive experience." But I'd extend that to all reading. We superimpose our own views and experience and understanding on to that which we read, taking from it what is useful to us, and disposing of the rest. That said, I do agree with the criticism of Lewis, a criticism I'd extend to a few other children's novelists here and there - "The idea of keeping childhood alive forever and ever and regretting the passage into adulthood - whether it's gentel, rose-tinged regret, or a passionate, full-blooded hatred, as it is in Lewis - is simply wrong." Yes, agreed. It was the problem I had with Lewis' later novels in the series and why I barely made it through some of them, even as a child who liked being a child and was in no hurry to grow up, I saw this as troublesome.
4. The above paragraph reminds me of a comment Wales made over the weekend - she was quoting her film professor, Wales has been taking film analysis courses: "Every film made is about the men struggling with their father and eventually becoming their father or the very thing they struggled with." After watching three episodes of La Femme Nikita yesterday and The Outsiders, can't say I disagree. So many of our stories are about the relationship between parent and child and the fear the child has of becoming the parent or either losing childhood or the desire to escape it as quickly as possible. In La Femme Nikita - the series ends with Nikita becoming more or less her father, metaphorically. Cool and distant, running his organization, as he has molded her to do. And in Angel the Series, we see Liam/Angel grapple with the fact that he in effect is no different than his own father - in his need to control his son's life and his struggle with that awareness. On the female side of the fence - depending on the writer - it tends to be more about not becoming or becoming one's mother.
That struggle. And watching each show unfold, I find myself wondering if only those who came from dysfunctional families are the ones that get their stories told? Or if we feel those are the only stories worth telling?
Perhaps not...I do see exceptions to that rule. Not all tales are about that. Nor all stories. So I'm not sure Wales' professor's generalization holds. But then that's the problem with generalizations, isn't it?
Now off to eat lunch and debate whether to see a movie - four to choose from: Memoirs of Geisha, Narnia, Brokeback Mountain, and Syriana at my local theater. Or sit home, veg, and watch DVDs. Nice to have options.
Need money though - laundry sort of took a good portion of it. Three loads - 12 dollars. Sigh.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2006-01-02 05:32 pm (UTC)I would love it if someone asked your question:
"And what about Pullman's children - does he believe they should come to that realization about him?"
Because I'll bet he doesn't consider his children as anything other than an extension of himself, which is always the root of the struggle between parent and child anyway. IMO
no subject
Date: 2006-01-02 05:40 pm (UTC)I guess this is why I haven't made any films. I like my dad and don't really mind being like him. Also, I don't have a lot of drive.
no subject
Date: 2006-01-02 06:13 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-01-02 09:32 pm (UTC)Pullman has another view of story-telling that I do not entirely agree with and this may explain why he feels the need to disparage Lewis and Tolkien's works. He sees story-telling as a way of "teaching" morals to children, as its sole purpose. And I'm not sure I agree with that. Some stories are just there to entertain. To make us laugh. To make us cry. To let us escape for just a moment. The have no higher purpose than that and that is enough. Sometimes I need to escape from my head, to live in another world for a bit.
To have a bit of fun. A story can do that. For me - Narnia was fun.
That's not to say it didn't provide more for someone else. But who is Pullman or I for that matter to tell someone else with a different upbringing and different outlook - how to think or feel?
no subject
Date: 2006-01-02 09:39 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-01-02 09:44 pm (UTC)Do have drive, just unfocused drive....it seems to go every which way. hee.
no subject
Date: 2006-01-02 09:45 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-01-02 09:56 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-01-03 07:41 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-01-04 12:32 am (UTC)Oursin is right, not all films are like this, but a good portion of the mainstream hits and sci-fi fantasy films/tv serials seem to be at least in the US.
Yet, as I attempt to make a list I stumble on several that do not fit this category. And find less that do. Which is interesting and does provide weight to the argument that one must be careful about making generalizations, says she who seems to make about fifty a day. (Sigh).
(honestly if I can't break the generalization habit, how can I expect anyone else to? Am beginning to think it is impossible.)
no subject
Date: 2006-01-04 12:38 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-01-04 03:43 am (UTC)'Scrubs' is a campy sitcom, and yet it has that element in terms of how they choose to treat the patients or not treat them, and Dr. Cox's methods vs. JD's Instincts...
no subject
Date: 2006-01-04 01:25 pm (UTC)There are arguments in Conviction - that one should have conviction, belief - an argument that is reiterated in Serenity - and in both cases it is not good vs. evil, necessarily. Both individuals believe what they are doing is for the greater good - the question is how do you value life? Is one life as important as many? That's not necessarily any different than Giles/Buffy's arguments or Angel/Kate's.
No, there was definitely that theme in Angel S5 and in some ways I found Angel S5 murkier and grayer than the earlier seasons, certainly murkier than S4 and S1. Angel was part of the law firm he despised and in doing good, he discovered he was also doing evil, that it wasn't clearly delinated nor could he always define which was which. The Girl in Question certainly posed that, as does Hole in the World, Damage, and Hellbound. Sort of like our own government's defense department, can you honestly say that we aren't doing evil at the same time as good? It's not clear. You kill to save. You invade to free.
no subject
Date: 2006-01-04 01:57 pm (UTC)The arguments are there...Part of that may well be Meta, my awareness of Whedon tainting how I viewed it... but I think these arguments are never more than 'straw men'. There really is no point in AtS-5 where I had any serious doubt as to where Wheedon would go with the Law firm. Perhaps, had it gone the reverse - that Angel was discovering he could actually do real and measurable good at W&H... His entering belief was that it was an evil place that could never do as much good as it did evil... a place he entered for the sake of his son, rather than for it's own merits. And that paradigm, was never fundamentally challenged. IMHO, it was pretty much always presented as a Faustian bargain to me.
no subject
Date: 2006-01-04 08:47 pm (UTC)I see ATS more metaphorically than literally. And less in its entirety so much in parts. Also, to be honest, can you say that any season didn't close with Good vs. Bad clearly delineated?
Then again, I may be biased because I am identifying directly with the metaphors in a way I'm not sure most viewers have or I certainly hope they haven't.
no subject
Date: 2006-01-09 02:36 am (UTC)Not really. Possibly BtVS-5 with Giles murdering Ben. It could have been the case with BtVS-3 if the Council had been presented as an organization that was still good at core but with a conflicting approach - rather than fundamentally corrupt. In general, this is the sort of thing Whedon doesn't like to do. There is good and there is evil, and having a good reason to choose a lesser evil, or a good person having a good reason not to follow the initial good... these aren't really things Whedon likes to write. It leads to a murky, realpolitik sort of place, and that's the sort of thing Whedon would look to discard entirely.