Man Martin's Blog, page 226
May 5, 2011
Saving the Cat
There's a useful, if reductionist, craft book on screenwriting called "Save the Cat." The title piece of advice is that somewhere in a story - and early on - the protagonist must do something to endear himself to the reader - show some kindness, be generous, be good - in short, "save a cat."
Is this really vital? Isn't it enough that the proagonist is put upon, that he suffers, that interesting things happen to him?
I've done a quick, casual surveyof books I've read and am reading. Lancelot, by Walker Percy, the title character, in a nuthouse after torching a house with his adulterous wife, is trying to communicate by coded knocks to the rape victim in the next room. Compassion. In Francine Prose's, My New American Life, Lula befriends an otherwise friendless teenager and agrees to hide a gun for some fellow Albanians. Okay, her motivations are mixed, but there's still an underlying likability. In Portis' True Grit, Mattie is on a quest to avenge her father. A sort of twisted version of saving the cat, but I still think it holds up.
Maybe this is part of the reason the classic tragedy is about nobility instead of commoners. It isn't just that falling from a great height is more interesting than tripping over a shoelace, but perhaps because being noble assures the audience that the characters have at least some redeeming qualities; it's a built-in save-the-cat card. Macbeth may be a cold-blooded killer later in the play, but at least we know he's brave at the outset. King Lear is a fool, but we know he's generous and kind. Creon is a blowhard, but he - well, actually it's hard to think of anything nice to write about Creon.
If readers do need a save the cat moment, what does this say about us? I think what it says is really very hopeful. It isn't enough to spectate a series of unfortunate incidents - we cannot engage with a character until we know he is worthy of our attention.
He has to save the cat.
Is this really vital? Isn't it enough that the proagonist is put upon, that he suffers, that interesting things happen to him?
I've done a quick, casual surveyof books I've read and am reading. Lancelot, by Walker Percy, the title character, in a nuthouse after torching a house with his adulterous wife, is trying to communicate by coded knocks to the rape victim in the next room. Compassion. In Francine Prose's, My New American Life, Lula befriends an otherwise friendless teenager and agrees to hide a gun for some fellow Albanians. Okay, her motivations are mixed, but there's still an underlying likability. In Portis' True Grit, Mattie is on a quest to avenge her father. A sort of twisted version of saving the cat, but I still think it holds up.
Maybe this is part of the reason the classic tragedy is about nobility instead of commoners. It isn't just that falling from a great height is more interesting than tripping over a shoelace, but perhaps because being noble assures the audience that the characters have at least some redeeming qualities; it's a built-in save-the-cat card. Macbeth may be a cold-blooded killer later in the play, but at least we know he's brave at the outset. King Lear is a fool, but we know he's generous and kind. Creon is a blowhard, but he - well, actually it's hard to think of anything nice to write about Creon.
If readers do need a save the cat moment, what does this say about us? I think what it says is really very hopeful. It isn't enough to spectate a series of unfortunate incidents - we cannot engage with a character until we know he is worthy of our attention.
He has to save the cat.
May 4, 2011
The Secret. No Secret
I was thinking about The Secret the other night, Deepak Chopra's book on visualizing things into being. It was introduced to me by one of my students. I haven't heard as much about it lately; perhaps it's no longer fashionable, and people are waiting for the next malarky cart to come by. His idea, baldly put, is that by eliminating negative thoughts and visualizing achieving goals, one's health will improve and desires will be fulfilled. This is owing to something he calls "the Law of Attraction," which says the universe stands ready to dole out its gifts to anyone who truly wants them.
It's familiar Norman Vincent Peale positive thinking mixed in with Christian Science, aromatically seasoned with Eastern Mysticism. What's particularly frustrating isn't that it's nonsense, but that it's so nearly true; for some reason though, it's the nonsense aspect that so entrances adherents, so much so they will forego a wheelbarrow of common sense for a teaspoon of hocus-pocus.
Wishful thinking ain't gonna get you Jack, my friend. The Universe ain't in the business of dishing out goodies. The Universe does not know you're here. BUT. It is indisputable - and also common sense, which is maybe what Chopra et al can't pedal it - that knowing what you want is the indispensible first step to getting it, and a powerful first step it is. As that other great mystic, Yogi Bera, put it, "If you don't know where you're going, you may not get there." How powerful is a person who knows what he wants. He's like a wakeful person in a world of sleepwalkers. Knowing what you want - and the more clearly you know it, the more powerful you are - is the real secret of visualization. It means you can see what you have to do to get it, and that you are free to take action.
When you are thirsty, you do not ponder, but go and get yourself some water. If all your desires were as clear to you as that need, your course of action would be as obvious as walking to the sink. That's the "Secret." It's no secret.
It's familiar Norman Vincent Peale positive thinking mixed in with Christian Science, aromatically seasoned with Eastern Mysticism. What's particularly frustrating isn't that it's nonsense, but that it's so nearly true; for some reason though, it's the nonsense aspect that so entrances adherents, so much so they will forego a wheelbarrow of common sense for a teaspoon of hocus-pocus.
Wishful thinking ain't gonna get you Jack, my friend. The Universe ain't in the business of dishing out goodies. The Universe does not know you're here. BUT. It is indisputable - and also common sense, which is maybe what Chopra et al can't pedal it - that knowing what you want is the indispensible first step to getting it, and a powerful first step it is. As that other great mystic, Yogi Bera, put it, "If you don't know where you're going, you may not get there." How powerful is a person who knows what he wants. He's like a wakeful person in a world of sleepwalkers. Knowing what you want - and the more clearly you know it, the more powerful you are - is the real secret of visualization. It means you can see what you have to do to get it, and that you are free to take action.
When you are thirsty, you do not ponder, but go and get yourself some water. If all your desires were as clear to you as that need, your course of action would be as obvious as walking to the sink. That's the "Secret." It's no secret.
May 3, 2011
Osama bin Laden
What I'm about to say may make me seem like a party-pooper, or even unpatriotic, so I don't want to be misunderstood. To start with, I am as fervent a patriot as breathes. I think the Constitution is a miracle so great, it beggars the imagination trying to believe God himself didn't have a hand in it. I believe in the two-party system. When I get to the words, "liberty and justice for all," in the Pledge of Allegiance, I swell with pride. The lyrics to "The Star Spangled Banner," I consider as moving as any poetry every written. (The melody is another matter, but I've even heard renditions of that which gave me goosebumps.)
I am a patriot. I say unabashedly, this is the greatest country on earth.
Also, in regards to the death penalty, I say there are some criminals so bad our only recourse is execution. I say this without a qualm.
Osama bin Laden was an evil man. It is good he is dead. He had to die. The world is a better place without him.
Still.
I see crowds of cheering people and ask myself; is this the appropriate response? Is this how we, as Americans (and I am proud to be an American) should behave? I am glad bin Laden is dead, but to cheer? Perhaps I am judging too harshly. I understand the relief people feel, and I had no friends or family die in 911; perhaps if I had, I would see things differently. But it seems to me there are things we cheer, and things for which we should be solemnly grateful. Imagine - heaven forfend - that Obama were killed in a covert action from another country; think of the sight of gleeful radical Islamists cheering and hooting at his death.
Please, please, please do not misunderstand me! I am absolutely not drawing any moral equivalence between bin Laden and our President. Obama, though I often disagree with him, is fundamentally a moral man. Bin Laden, not. Obama is better than bin Laden, and so are we. That is my point. If we are better, this contest between reason and democracy on one side and fanatical hatred on the other, can't be reduced to something like a football rivalry, where our side cheers when we win, and their side cheers when they win. The ultimate and most horrific possible victory of terrorism would be if we turn into the mirror of the evil we oppose.
If bin Laden's death could bring back to life just one person who died in the Twin Towers, I would cheer, too.
In the meantime, I will greet his death, with - as I say - solemn gratitude. He had to die. It is good he is dead. But I will cheer no man's death, even his.
I am a patriot. I say unabashedly, this is the greatest country on earth.
Also, in regards to the death penalty, I say there are some criminals so bad our only recourse is execution. I say this without a qualm.
Osama bin Laden was an evil man. It is good he is dead. He had to die. The world is a better place without him.
Still.
I see crowds of cheering people and ask myself; is this the appropriate response? Is this how we, as Americans (and I am proud to be an American) should behave? I am glad bin Laden is dead, but to cheer? Perhaps I am judging too harshly. I understand the relief people feel, and I had no friends or family die in 911; perhaps if I had, I would see things differently. But it seems to me there are things we cheer, and things for which we should be solemnly grateful. Imagine - heaven forfend - that Obama were killed in a covert action from another country; think of the sight of gleeful radical Islamists cheering and hooting at his death.
Please, please, please do not misunderstand me! I am absolutely not drawing any moral equivalence between bin Laden and our President. Obama, though I often disagree with him, is fundamentally a moral man. Bin Laden, not. Obama is better than bin Laden, and so are we. That is my point. If we are better, this contest between reason and democracy on one side and fanatical hatred on the other, can't be reduced to something like a football rivalry, where our side cheers when we win, and their side cheers when they win. The ultimate and most horrific possible victory of terrorism would be if we turn into the mirror of the evil we oppose.
If bin Laden's death could bring back to life just one person who died in the Twin Towers, I would cheer, too.
In the meantime, I will greet his death, with - as I say - solemn gratitude. He had to die. It is good he is dead. But I will cheer no man's death, even his.
May 2, 2011
What You CAN Write vs What You NEED to Write
I teach high school English, and I recently assigned my young'uns to write an original short story. Some were really quite good, but I had to wade through an awful lot of dialogue like, "Hey, shawdy, 'sup?" "Not much. You doin' anything?" "Nah, what're you up to?" "Not much."
You get the idea, I won't tortue you with any more. Also a lot of scenes with kids sitting in classrooms listening to - or more realistically - ignoring teachers. Then, when the story got interesting, a lot of times the scenes were glossed over.
Now don't feel so superior, you grown-up writers out there. My students fell prey to a weakness that we all share: the tendency to write the scenes we CAN render, rather that the scenes we NEED to. My students wrote pages of aimless phone conversation, devoted loving detail to the process of getting dressed in the morning, and maundered endlessly about the tedium of the schoolday because that's what they knew. Adult writers waste equal amounts of valuable reader time detailing shopping trips, aimless phone conversations, and the endless tedium of work.
This puts to the lie that old dictum, write what you know.
Hell, don't write what you know, write what the reader wants to know.
I'm not interested in your boring life, my life is boring enough as it is. I want to see things happening.
Go back and read Wild Bill; he is ruthless at eliminating unneccessary padding, and his plots move with shocking speed. Othello goes from being a newlywed in the first scene to murdering his wife in the last; do you think Shakespeare ever meditated having a scene where Desdemona prepares her yummy coq-au-vin? Romeo's in love with Roseline and ninety minutes later he's killed himself over Juliet. Lear's fat and happy when we first see him, rushing headlong into disaster without a detour to talk about how tedious kinghood is. Shakespeare never wastes a moment with a scene he could easily write but gets straight to the grist, and he doesn't worry overly about disorienting the audience. We've barely met Gloucester, when he says something to the effect, "That kid over there? He's my bastard." And we know trouble's afoot.
There's the ticket. Don't write what you know. Write what you don't know. Chances are, that's what your story's about.
You get the idea, I won't tortue you with any more. Also a lot of scenes with kids sitting in classrooms listening to - or more realistically - ignoring teachers. Then, when the story got interesting, a lot of times the scenes were glossed over.
Now don't feel so superior, you grown-up writers out there. My students fell prey to a weakness that we all share: the tendency to write the scenes we CAN render, rather that the scenes we NEED to. My students wrote pages of aimless phone conversation, devoted loving detail to the process of getting dressed in the morning, and maundered endlessly about the tedium of the schoolday because that's what they knew. Adult writers waste equal amounts of valuable reader time detailing shopping trips, aimless phone conversations, and the endless tedium of work.
This puts to the lie that old dictum, write what you know.
Hell, don't write what you know, write what the reader wants to know.
I'm not interested in your boring life, my life is boring enough as it is. I want to see things happening.
Go back and read Wild Bill; he is ruthless at eliminating unneccessary padding, and his plots move with shocking speed. Othello goes from being a newlywed in the first scene to murdering his wife in the last; do you think Shakespeare ever meditated having a scene where Desdemona prepares her yummy coq-au-vin? Romeo's in love with Roseline and ninety minutes later he's killed himself over Juliet. Lear's fat and happy when we first see him, rushing headlong into disaster without a detour to talk about how tedious kinghood is. Shakespeare never wastes a moment with a scene he could easily write but gets straight to the grist, and he doesn't worry overly about disorienting the audience. We've barely met Gloucester, when he says something to the effect, "That kid over there? He's my bastard." And we know trouble's afoot.
There's the ticket. Don't write what you know. Write what you don't know. Chances are, that's what your story's about.
May 1, 2011
Holy Shmoly
Pope John Paul II is on his way to sainthood, which I don't mind and scarcely noticed, but then Nancy pointed out to me that during his papacy, John Paul II canonized 483 saints. 483! That seems excessive, but maybe it's just me.
The fact is, we Protestants love saints; we secretly envy the Catholics this rich and mystical tradition. And honestly, it's a shame, even as an outsider, to think the significance of sainthood is being watered down. It's not that there aren't 483 exceptionally good people out there - people who, unlike Mother Teresa, may not be showered with international media attention, but nevertheless go about humbly serving God and fellow man and in many cases giving their lives, but 483 new saints? If sainthood is going to represent a special category of humanity, a person you might turn to in prayer to intercede with God, it seems to me the number should be a tad bit lower. I'm not saying 483 threatens to turn sainthood into the equivalent of Employee of the Month, but it still seems high.
Joan of Arc, now she's a saint. After leading the French army to several crucial victories, making possible the coronation of Charles VII, she was sold out to the English, who tried her as a witch and burned her at the stake. She was only 19. Twenty five years later, in 1456, Pope Callixtus III reexamined her trial and declared her a martyr. In 1909 she was beatified. In 1920 she was canonized. The whole process took a little under five hundred years.
Again, it's none of my business and I'm not in charge or anything and it's a good job I'm not in charge, but I think that ought to be the standard. 500 years. And you can't just do good works, either, and even miracles won't cut it; to really be a saint, you should be betrayed, martyred, rejected, and neglected. If you die at the hands of your enemies, that's ok, but to really be a saint, you should die at the hands of your friends.
Harsh I know, but we're not talking any ordinary honor here, we're talking sainthood. But again, maybe that's just me.
The fact is, we Protestants love saints; we secretly envy the Catholics this rich and mystical tradition. And honestly, it's a shame, even as an outsider, to think the significance of sainthood is being watered down. It's not that there aren't 483 exceptionally good people out there - people who, unlike Mother Teresa, may not be showered with international media attention, but nevertheless go about humbly serving God and fellow man and in many cases giving their lives, but 483 new saints? If sainthood is going to represent a special category of humanity, a person you might turn to in prayer to intercede with God, it seems to me the number should be a tad bit lower. I'm not saying 483 threatens to turn sainthood into the equivalent of Employee of the Month, but it still seems high.
Joan of Arc, now she's a saint. After leading the French army to several crucial victories, making possible the coronation of Charles VII, she was sold out to the English, who tried her as a witch and burned her at the stake. She was only 19. Twenty five years later, in 1456, Pope Callixtus III reexamined her trial and declared her a martyr. In 1909 she was beatified. In 1920 she was canonized. The whole process took a little under five hundred years.
Again, it's none of my business and I'm not in charge or anything and it's a good job I'm not in charge, but I think that ought to be the standard. 500 years. And you can't just do good works, either, and even miracles won't cut it; to really be a saint, you should be betrayed, martyred, rejected, and neglected. If you die at the hands of your enemies, that's ok, but to really be a saint, you should die at the hands of your friends.
Harsh I know, but we're not talking any ordinary honor here, we're talking sainthood. But again, maybe that's just me.
April 30, 2011
Redundancies
For no very good reason, I began thinking about redundancies. I was going to come up with a list of my own, but then I decided to find a list on the internet because if I'm inveighing against repetition, why duplicate effort, right? I then shortened the list and wrote a commentary by some of them.
absolutely essential, absolutely necessary (Are these really redundancies? Isn't there a difference between something that's merely necessary and absolutely necessary? "Water is necessary for the maintainance of life." "It's absolutely necessary I find a bathroom in the next three minutes." See what I mean?)
ACT test (There should be a special category for our tendency to add a word already included in an acronymn. ATM Machine, KFC Chicken, PIN number)
advance warning (add to this "potential threat," pre-planning, advance planning.)
free gift, full satisfaction, always and forever (Usually used to advertising, avowals of love, and other lies more convincing.)
awful bad (The people who think this is a redundancy don't understand the idiomatic use of "awful." Awful doesn't mean bad; it doesn't even mean "awe-inspiring" which is its original definition. It just means "a lot" or "extreme." Somewhere there's a movie line where a young girl praises an opera star's caterwauling, "Don't you think she's awful wonderful?" The mother responds, "I think she's wonderful awful.")
bunny rabbit (Another one I think is unfairly on the list. A bunny rabbit is cute and fluffy and is a different critter than the one that's been getting into your garden, and VERY different from what you had last night for dinner.)
cash money (Again, a very specific concept mistaken as a plain redundancy. There is money in the conceptual sense - money you have in the bank, money you are owed, money you can borrow, money you will be paid at the end of the week. Cash money is actual wrinkled bills you have in a jar under your arm or in your back pocket, warmed from contact with your hip and smelling of leather from your wallet.)
cease and desist (Dang it, another non-redundancy. And I'm not defending this just because it's a legal term. Cease means you stop doing something. Desist means you don't start doing it again.)
close proximity, combined together
complete monopoly (We're missing the top hat and the deed to Park Place, so we have an incomplete Monopoly. Ah-ha-ha-ha-ha!)
component parts
continuing on
Each and every (I really hate this one)
end result
falling down (Add to this, standing up, sitting down, lying down, climbing up)
I thought to myself (Add to this, asked a question.)
live audience (This has a special meaning for Zombie movies)
my personal opinion
past experience, previous history
unique individual
bare naked (I can't explain it, but bare naked is nakeder than just naked. I think the skin is shinier.)
brief moment
first priority
it's raining outside
killed dead (Again, a necessary distinction in my personal opinion. See "bare naked.")
postponed until later
Rio Grande River
surrounded on all sides
absolutely essential, absolutely necessary (Are these really redundancies? Isn't there a difference between something that's merely necessary and absolutely necessary? "Water is necessary for the maintainance of life." "It's absolutely necessary I find a bathroom in the next three minutes." See what I mean?)
ACT test (There should be a special category for our tendency to add a word already included in an acronymn. ATM Machine, KFC Chicken, PIN number)
advance warning (add to this "potential threat," pre-planning, advance planning.)
free gift, full satisfaction, always and forever (Usually used to advertising, avowals of love, and other lies more convincing.)
awful bad (The people who think this is a redundancy don't understand the idiomatic use of "awful." Awful doesn't mean bad; it doesn't even mean "awe-inspiring" which is its original definition. It just means "a lot" or "extreme." Somewhere there's a movie line where a young girl praises an opera star's caterwauling, "Don't you think she's awful wonderful?" The mother responds, "I think she's wonderful awful.")
bunny rabbit (Another one I think is unfairly on the list. A bunny rabbit is cute and fluffy and is a different critter than the one that's been getting into your garden, and VERY different from what you had last night for dinner.)
cash money (Again, a very specific concept mistaken as a plain redundancy. There is money in the conceptual sense - money you have in the bank, money you are owed, money you can borrow, money you will be paid at the end of the week. Cash money is actual wrinkled bills you have in a jar under your arm or in your back pocket, warmed from contact with your hip and smelling of leather from your wallet.)
cease and desist (Dang it, another non-redundancy. And I'm not defending this just because it's a legal term. Cease means you stop doing something. Desist means you don't start doing it again.)
close proximity, combined together
complete monopoly (We're missing the top hat and the deed to Park Place, so we have an incomplete Monopoly. Ah-ha-ha-ha-ha!)
component parts
continuing on
Each and every (I really hate this one)
end result
falling down (Add to this, standing up, sitting down, lying down, climbing up)
I thought to myself (Add to this, asked a question.)
live audience (This has a special meaning for Zombie movies)
my personal opinion
past experience, previous history
unique individual
bare naked (I can't explain it, but bare naked is nakeder than just naked. I think the skin is shinier.)
brief moment
first priority
it's raining outside
killed dead (Again, a necessary distinction in my personal opinion. See "bare naked.")
postponed until later
Rio Grande River
surrounded on all sides
April 29, 2011
Writing Should Make You a Better Person
Are writers good people - are they happier, wiser, and kinder than the general run of humanity? Do they have whiter, straighter teeth?
They should. After all, they're up to their elbows in the human condition every day - not just as spectators or even participants, but fashioners - pitting desire against circumstance in pleasing arrangements of rise and fall. We should know better than anyone what Man is. We ought to be the tenderest most humane people on the planet. Failing that, we ought to be the blackest and bitterest of misanthropes. There should be no in between.
Are writers good people?
I'm not entitled to say because I'm a very poor judge. I'm alway starstruck in the presence of writers: these people go off in private - like a tiger to lay her egg - and make stuff! They come up with things! Look at that: a tiger's egg! So I can't really tell what sort of people writers are - they're always obscured in the dim glow of my admiration.
In The Blues Brothers, when asked who they are, one of them - Elrod, I think - says, "We're musicians. We're on a mission from God." It's funny because the statement is factually true - they're raising money to save a Catholic orphanage - but it sounds as if they're doing God's will just being musicians.
This - this absurd, half joking megalomania - is how it feels to be a writer, at least for me. There is this notion, delusional and selfish, but sincere, that creativity is evidence of some Higher Purpose, that you must create, that there is a path laid out for you, a destiny, and not fulfilling it disapoints some greater being than yourself.
Nonsense, of course - but if I believe - however irrationally - that God wants me to be a writer, shouldn't that make me a better person? Shouldn't I at least strive to be a better person? Even if I were the most total of total atheists, oughtn't I as a writer, strive to be the best writer I can be, and doesn't that entail in some corrolary way being the best self I can be?
So even writers who are utter schmucks and heels - and there are a few of them, come to think of it - presumably are slightly less schmucky and heelesque than they would be if they weren't writers.
Meanwhile, if I want to be a better writer, I should start by simply being better.
PS - Come see me at Eagle Eye Books in Decatur Georgia June 11. To RSVP click http://events.constantcontact.com/register/event?llr=y8wgqkfab&oeidk=a07e3rn8bi4ed51740b
They should. After all, they're up to their elbows in the human condition every day - not just as spectators or even participants, but fashioners - pitting desire against circumstance in pleasing arrangements of rise and fall. We should know better than anyone what Man is. We ought to be the tenderest most humane people on the planet. Failing that, we ought to be the blackest and bitterest of misanthropes. There should be no in between.
Are writers good people?
I'm not entitled to say because I'm a very poor judge. I'm alway starstruck in the presence of writers: these people go off in private - like a tiger to lay her egg - and make stuff! They come up with things! Look at that: a tiger's egg! So I can't really tell what sort of people writers are - they're always obscured in the dim glow of my admiration.
In The Blues Brothers, when asked who they are, one of them - Elrod, I think - says, "We're musicians. We're on a mission from God." It's funny because the statement is factually true - they're raising money to save a Catholic orphanage - but it sounds as if they're doing God's will just being musicians.
This - this absurd, half joking megalomania - is how it feels to be a writer, at least for me. There is this notion, delusional and selfish, but sincere, that creativity is evidence of some Higher Purpose, that you must create, that there is a path laid out for you, a destiny, and not fulfilling it disapoints some greater being than yourself.
Nonsense, of course - but if I believe - however irrationally - that God wants me to be a writer, shouldn't that make me a better person? Shouldn't I at least strive to be a better person? Even if I were the most total of total atheists, oughtn't I as a writer, strive to be the best writer I can be, and doesn't that entail in some corrolary way being the best self I can be?
So even writers who are utter schmucks and heels - and there are a few of them, come to think of it - presumably are slightly less schmucky and heelesque than they would be if they weren't writers.
Meanwhile, if I want to be a better writer, I should start by simply being better.
PS - Come see me at Eagle Eye Books in Decatur Georgia June 11. To RSVP click http://events.constantcontact.com/register/event?llr=y8wgqkfab&oeidk=a07e3rn8bi4ed51740b
April 28, 2011
Why I Really Don't Care for That Talk Show Lady
I really don't care for Oprah - I shouldn't pick on her because she's such an easy target and because she's going off the air soon anyway, and she's somebody everyone loves. But I don't like her.
I don't watch her but sometimes my wife does and I listen in. The first part of the show wasn't so bad; an interview with Michael Douglas who's recently recovering from cancer. He was there, of course, to promote his new movie, a bio-pic about Liberace, but I didn't mind that because it's interesting to hear an articulate fairly courageous person who's made it to the other side of a life-threatening ordeal.
Then came out the founder of Nike. In addition to talking about his phenomenal self-made success, they showed one of his commercials, which Oprah, gushed over. Then Night, the founder's name, presented Oprah with a custom-made pair of running shoes, which she gushed over. Then she told the audience in that gushing way she has that all of them were going home with a free pair of tennis shoes and the audience gushed. Lots of shots astonished faces - they just couldn't believe their luck! - as attractive young women presented everyone with a shoe box and a special gps watch. The audience was well-mannered enough not to open the boxes or betray disappointment that surely they were empty. The boxes had to be empty, right? Unless each audience member was required to give a shoe size which was then telegraphed to the warehouse, the boxes would have to be empty. The shoes will be mailed to them later. My guess is the process will take at least three weeks. Oprah didn't say "You'll get your shoes in three weeks, but in the meantime, you can have the box," because that would have marred the ecstasy of the moment.
Actually, the audience was extremely gracious about the whole thing. If someone told me I was going home with a free pair of tennis shoes and a gps watch, I'd be pleased, but I think I'd be able to contain my screams of joy. And this audience - no offense meant - as a whole, might have less use for these things than I do. Oprah was giving these people something so they could go home and exercise.
I don't mind that Oprah has found a way to turn the talk-show format into an infomercial, an infomercial with enormous ratings, so what? TV can't exist without commercials, we all know that. What creeps me out, is that when Oprah does this stuff, and she does it all the time, people think she's being generous. I swear to you, I think Oprah's thinks she's being generous. A gigantic ad displaying screaming women thrilled to get whatever merchandise is being dished out to them, after said merchandise is gushed over by the most influential pitchwoman on the planet, and people think this is generosity!
Ugh.
On another show a woman, I know not who, a movie star, I guess, was telling Oprah how "spiritual" she was. She denied having any particular "religion," she was just spiritual and opined this was superior to actually having a set of beliefs that tend to narrow one. I do understand her point, Lord knows what evil has been done by dogma and schism, but in the context of the Oprah show, it just irked me. The implication of the whole smug dialogue was that Oprah and her guest were both deeply spiritual women, spiritual in this undefined way that was neither Frisbee-Worshipper nor Methodist, and that these two women, famous and wealthy, had some great insight to share with the obscure housewife in Little Rock, whose kid just got picked up for dealing meth. Of course their spirituality wasn't a message, it was just spirituality. Somehow, against all odds, Oprah and this movie star and singer, had found contentment with their lives, such as they were. There wasn't anything to it. It was an empty shoebox.
Later in that same show Oprah gave away some free DVDs.
I don't watch her but sometimes my wife does and I listen in. The first part of the show wasn't so bad; an interview with Michael Douglas who's recently recovering from cancer. He was there, of course, to promote his new movie, a bio-pic about Liberace, but I didn't mind that because it's interesting to hear an articulate fairly courageous person who's made it to the other side of a life-threatening ordeal.
Then came out the founder of Nike. In addition to talking about his phenomenal self-made success, they showed one of his commercials, which Oprah, gushed over. Then Night, the founder's name, presented Oprah with a custom-made pair of running shoes, which she gushed over. Then she told the audience in that gushing way she has that all of them were going home with a free pair of tennis shoes and the audience gushed. Lots of shots astonished faces - they just couldn't believe their luck! - as attractive young women presented everyone with a shoe box and a special gps watch. The audience was well-mannered enough not to open the boxes or betray disappointment that surely they were empty. The boxes had to be empty, right? Unless each audience member was required to give a shoe size which was then telegraphed to the warehouse, the boxes would have to be empty. The shoes will be mailed to them later. My guess is the process will take at least three weeks. Oprah didn't say "You'll get your shoes in three weeks, but in the meantime, you can have the box," because that would have marred the ecstasy of the moment.
Actually, the audience was extremely gracious about the whole thing. If someone told me I was going home with a free pair of tennis shoes and a gps watch, I'd be pleased, but I think I'd be able to contain my screams of joy. And this audience - no offense meant - as a whole, might have less use for these things than I do. Oprah was giving these people something so they could go home and exercise.
I don't mind that Oprah has found a way to turn the talk-show format into an infomercial, an infomercial with enormous ratings, so what? TV can't exist without commercials, we all know that. What creeps me out, is that when Oprah does this stuff, and she does it all the time, people think she's being generous. I swear to you, I think Oprah's thinks she's being generous. A gigantic ad displaying screaming women thrilled to get whatever merchandise is being dished out to them, after said merchandise is gushed over by the most influential pitchwoman on the planet, and people think this is generosity!
Ugh.
On another show a woman, I know not who, a movie star, I guess, was telling Oprah how "spiritual" she was. She denied having any particular "religion," she was just spiritual and opined this was superior to actually having a set of beliefs that tend to narrow one. I do understand her point, Lord knows what evil has been done by dogma and schism, but in the context of the Oprah show, it just irked me. The implication of the whole smug dialogue was that Oprah and her guest were both deeply spiritual women, spiritual in this undefined way that was neither Frisbee-Worshipper nor Methodist, and that these two women, famous and wealthy, had some great insight to share with the obscure housewife in Little Rock, whose kid just got picked up for dealing meth. Of course their spirituality wasn't a message, it was just spirituality. Somehow, against all odds, Oprah and this movie star and singer, had found contentment with their lives, such as they were. There wasn't anything to it. It was an empty shoebox.
Later in that same show Oprah gave away some free DVDs.
April 27, 2011
Be Boring in Your Daily Life
The Romantic image of the author as an alcoholic, drug addicted wild man makes for great biography but doesn't tally with the facts. Poe, Hemmingway, Dylan Thomas, and Faulkner saw serious fall-offs in creative output as they sank into alcoholism. The real biggies - Shakespeare, Balzac, Dickens - led sober, industrious lives.
The reason for this is obvious. Writing is brainwork that requires focus and energy. Even before drinking starts to impair the brain, it saps the vigor needed for sustained creative effort.
The same can be said for torrid affairs and drug use.
I do drink, and probably more than I should, but my life for the most part is orderly and sober. I go to bed around nine and get up at five. I do a little writing work each day before going to my regular job, where I am conscientious and generally well respected. I come home each evening to my wife, read, watch tv, eat a balanced meal, walk the dog and sleep. This is my life and a happy life it is. Happy, that is, from the inside. Viewed from the outside, it would be tedium itself: nothing more uninteresting than someone else's order and contentment.
My goal is to someday be so famous, a biographer will decide to do my life story, but then, on examining the facts of my life - good health, good marriage, good habits - will throw up his hands in despair and exclaim, "Why bother!"
The reason for this is obvious. Writing is brainwork that requires focus and energy. Even before drinking starts to impair the brain, it saps the vigor needed for sustained creative effort.
The same can be said for torrid affairs and drug use.
I do drink, and probably more than I should, but my life for the most part is orderly and sober. I go to bed around nine and get up at five. I do a little writing work each day before going to my regular job, where I am conscientious and generally well respected. I come home each evening to my wife, read, watch tv, eat a balanced meal, walk the dog and sleep. This is my life and a happy life it is. Happy, that is, from the inside. Viewed from the outside, it would be tedium itself: nothing more uninteresting than someone else's order and contentment.
My goal is to someday be so famous, a biographer will decide to do my life story, but then, on examining the facts of my life - good health, good marriage, good habits - will throw up his hands in despair and exclaim, "Why bother!"
April 26, 2011
Figures of Speech
Years ago, it was pointed out to me in a literature class that chiasmus - a figure of speech involving a reversal of terms as in Robert Frost's misanthropic aphorism, "Keep off each other and keep each other off" - literally means crossing, so that this figure of speech can be represented graphically:
The picture looks forbidding with that big crossbar in the middle, but that's Frost's intent.
What would happen if we represented other figures of speech as actual "figures," that is drawn images based on the names they possess. A parallelism, such as from Tennyson's "Ulysses," "to strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield..." would be represented by parallel lines.
It looks a little like a flag or a banner, which perhaps Ulysses had on the prow of his ship as he spoke these words.Not quite so smooth is a non sequitur, literally something that "does not follow." We think Groucho Marx is making perfect sense until he executes and abrubt right turn in "time flies like an arrow, but fruit flies like a banana."
Circumlocution is literally talking in circles. I can quite recall a line from Schultz's Peanuts comic strip, but Linus says something to the effect of, "That's a terrible feeling to have the feeling of having."
Sometimes we don't speak in circles, but in ellipses. Ellipsis is when words are left out; this is represented in punctuation by a series of periods... In geometry, an ellipse also has something left out. It's like a circle viewed from the side, so it's foreshortened. It might be an open manhole cover or else a flying saucer. Either way, it might elicit an elliptical remark.FLYING SAUCER:
OPEN MANHOLE:
Speaking of conic sections, another is the hyperbola, usually represented by two identical but opposite curves, pointing towards each other. Is the related figure of speech - hyperbole, a wild exaggeration - so named because the exaggeration points towards the truth before flying off into the opposite direction?I'M SO HUNGRY, I COULD EAT A HORSE
A final conic section is the parabola, which is a single curve, named from a Latin word meaning "balance" or "compare." It's easy to see the relationship between Parabola and Parable, a figure of speech that strikes a comparison.
The picture looks forbidding with that big crossbar in the middle, but that's Frost's intent.What would happen if we represented other figures of speech as actual "figures," that is drawn images based on the names they possess. A parallelism, such as from Tennyson's "Ulysses," "to strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield..." would be represented by parallel lines.
It looks a little like a flag or a banner, which perhaps Ulysses had on the prow of his ship as he spoke these words.Not quite so smooth is a non sequitur, literally something that "does not follow." We think Groucho Marx is making perfect sense until he executes and abrubt right turn in "time flies like an arrow, but fruit flies like a banana."
Circumlocution is literally talking in circles. I can quite recall a line from Schultz's Peanuts comic strip, but Linus says something to the effect of, "That's a terrible feeling to have the feeling of having."
Sometimes we don't speak in circles, but in ellipses. Ellipsis is when words are left out; this is represented in punctuation by a series of periods... In geometry, an ellipse also has something left out. It's like a circle viewed from the side, so it's foreshortened. It might be an open manhole cover or else a flying saucer. Either way, it might elicit an elliptical remark.FLYING SAUCER:
OPEN MANHOLE:
Speaking of conic sections, another is the hyperbola, usually represented by two identical but opposite curves, pointing towards each other. Is the related figure of speech - hyperbole, a wild exaggeration - so named because the exaggeration points towards the truth before flying off into the opposite direction?I'M SO HUNGRY, I COULD EAT A HORSE
A final conic section is the parabola, which is a single curve, named from a Latin word meaning "balance" or "compare." It's easy to see the relationship between Parabola and Parable, a figure of speech that strikes a comparison.
