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What are we reading? 25th October 2021
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Gpfr wrote: "Lljones wrote: "Shelflife_wasBooklooker wrote: "Any favourite aunts you can think of?..."jane Austen: Lady Bertram and Mrs Norris in Mansfield Park; Anne in Persuasion and Emma are both aunts; Mr..."
Lady Bracknell, in TIOBE? "a hand-bag????"
scarletnoir wrote: "Look at me! I'm so great, I can criticise the so-called 'great' Dostoyevsky! I'm better than he is!""I don't think it's really that. And I wonder even if beyond all that criticism doesn't lie a simple matter of style and language. Knowing how much stock Nabokov put in those two literary elements, and how sensitive he was as regards the original writing in Russian, maybe his complains were more in that direction.
Machenbach wrote: "scarletnoir wrote: "I have the feeling that Nabokov was envious of Dostoyevsky. It's clear that Nabokov considered himself as a 'great novelist' - it must have been infuriating for him to see that ..."very true about Dostoy and his outlook on life, i love both Turgenev and the Big D but they had very different world views and appreciating that when i started reading the russian classics was a vital part of the enjoyment. I feel Solzenheitsyn in his last years personified some of the conservative russian thoughts that Big D had been keen on and it seems that russian writers can look west or east or both ways but tend to end up choosing one or the other
scarletnoir wrote: "Bill wrote: "I realized that for years I've been thinking that Wes Anderson and Paul Thomas Anderson were the same person."Haha! So did I, for a long time - I wonder if this is a common confusion..."
At least I have the excuse of never having seen a movie by either one: when I recently said that I’d never seen a Wes Anderson movie, I was mentally including the oeuvre of P T Anderson as well.
I wasn’t even tempted by Inherent Vice. One of the many ways in which I apparently differ from the majority of readers is that I have no desire to see favorite books turned into films, which seems to be a frequently expressed desire in many forums, though not very much on eTL&S.
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The confusion is funnier when you consider how extremely different their films are! But both very talented. I love Wes Anderson films, and although I don't like all P T Anderson's films, I think he's a really interesting filmmaker.
Fuzzywuzz wrote: "Dr Knox was cleared of malfeasance, as he claimed not to know that people were killed."
Of course he was, and (to quote a later rather infamous young lady) he would say that wouldn't he?
On the subject of ipods, I am still using my 2008 ipod given as a 60th birthday present from my "local family" with a lovely inscription to that effect on the back. I use it mainly in the car, on shuffle, but it sometimes comes up with an error message, most annoyingly when I have just driven onto the motorway and can't reset it until I reach a service station!
FOR AB76A further thought on the book count, mine are:
All books 86
Read 77
Currently reading 2
I did have some on a dnf shelf which I decided to delete. Now I can't remember if there were as many as 7 or if I had put all the deleted ones into that shelf. But I wonder if that could be the discrepancy in the numbers?
giveusaclue wrote: "FOR AB76A further thought on the book count, mine are:
All books 86
Read 77
Currently reading 2
I did have some on a dnf shelf which I decided to delete. Now I can't remember if there were as m..."
that could be it...but why are deleted books still appearing....seems to be a problem there...
Just an advance apology for belated replies: Feeling a bit under the weather since the afternoon, will be back later (in the week). Have a good time, with books, aunts, counts and all.
giveusaclue wrote: "Fuzzywuzz wrote: "Dr Knox was cleared of malfeasance, as he claimed not to know that people were killed."
Of course he was, and (to quote a later rather infamous young lady) he would say that wo..."
There is always a glitch with technology isn't there? That must be infuriating having to do a reset. My ipod isn't reliable with battery charge - I can leave the house with 2/3 left and it will be flat after the second song or so has played. Cue some unmentionable muttering under my breath whilst out walking.
Today I downloaded the BBC Sound app on my phone which is great, but I will need to increase the data bundle so I can make good use of it. I'm coming into the 21st century it seems!
The above post should have read 'BBC Sounds'
Fuzzywuzz wrote: "The above post should have read 'BBC Sounds'"you can edit the older post by clicking the edit button (second to the left, below the text), to make the changes and then repost, which I do often as I'm not the worlds best speller, anyway that will save you from reposting about the odd error...
Lljones wrote: "Shelflife_wasBooklooker wrote: "Any favourite aunts you can think of?..."Betsey Trotwood
Auntie Mame
Tom Sawyer's Aunt Polly"
Bertie Wooster's Aunt Dahlia and Aunt Agatha
Hello, everyone. New thread will be tomorrow.
Shelflife_wasBooklooker wrote: "Aunts in literature often are quite the characters, aren't they? "The one that came to mind was the moustachioed protagonist in Patrick White's The Aunt Story. I don't think she was very memorable as a character (aside from the moustache), she is rather an elusive specimen of auntship.
BUNTHORNE I don’t think you quite appreciate the consequences of thwarting me.GROSVENOR I don’t care what they are.
BUN. Suppose – I won’t go so far as to say that I will do it – but suppose for one moment I were to curse you? (GROSVENOR quails.) Ah! Very well. Take care.
GROS. But surely you would never do that? (In great alarm.)
BUN. I don’t know. It would be an extreme measure, no doubt. Still –
GROS. (wildly). But you would not do it – I am sure you would not.
(Throwing himself at BUNTHORNE’s knees, and clinging to him.) Oh, reflect, reflect! You, had a mother once.
BUN. Never!
GROS. Then you had an aunt! (BUNTHORNE affected.) Ah! I see you had! By the memory of that aunt, I implore you to pause ere you resort to this last fearful expedient. Oh, Mr. Bunthorne, reflect, reflect! (Weeping.)
BUN. (aside, after a struggle with himself). I must not allow myself to be unmanned! (Aloud.) It is useless. Consent at once, or may a nephew’s curse –
- W. S. Gilbert Patience; or, Bunthorne's Bride
I read the third chapter in ‘ When we cease to understand the World’ but this one filled me with unease. Ostensibly it’s about a Japanese mathematician named Mochizucki and his mathematical conjecture (a + b = c) but it turns out to be a recounting of the odd life of another mathematician called Grothendieck. I finished the chapter with a feeling that the author had recited a list of mathematical terms which he didn’t appear to understand, nor did he understand this man he was writing about, I doubt anyone did for if what is written is true he sounds rather insane in later life.
Again in this chapter an element of scientists and mathematicians bringing harm on the world. There is no mention of the good that they do with discoveries. I am reminded of Newton ‘standing on the shoulders of giants’ - discoveries always build on what has gone before.
Shelflife_wasBooklooker wrote: "Just an advance apology for belated replies: Feeling a bit under the weather since the afternoon, will be back later (in the week). Have a good time, with books, aunts, counts and all."Hope you are better soon
AB76 wrote: "giveusaclue wrote: "FOR AB76A further thought on the book count, mine are:
All books 86
Read 77
Currently reading 2
I did have some on a dnf shelf which I decided to delete. Now I can't remembe..."
Fuzzywuzz wrote: "giveusaclue wrote: "Fuzzywuzz wrote: "Dr Knox was cleared of malfeasance, as he claimed not to know that people were killed.
"
Of course he was, and (to quote a later rather infamous young lady) ..."
The books don't appear but may still be in the count. 🤔
Fuzzywuzz wrote: "There is always a glitch with technology isn't there? That must be infuriating having to do a reset. My ipod isn't reliable with battery charge - I can leave the house with 2/3 left and it will be flat after the second song or so has played. Cue some unmentionable muttering under my breath whilst out walking."Always! I only every use mine for music and have it plugged into the usb connection in my car so don't have a problem with the battery going flat. 🙏
I do have a situation recently where my ereader goes happily along until the battery gets to 50% than drops a bit quicker to 40% then a bit more quickly to 30% then drops like a stone! I still get 40+ hours on a charge so hope it does not escalate.
Crunching some stats about the private sector in the DDR in the 1970s (part of my Wolle reading) and interested to look back and see a pretty healthy 30% of employees in private sector in the mid 50s.Not a fan of private sector to be honest but i like to see it have some (small 30% max) presence in a nation, i was shocked to see barely 6% of Czech employees were in private sector work just before the Prague Spring but that tallies with the DDR state from 1969 which shows only 9% in private sector
Of course with Eastern Bloc statistics on private sector or religion, behind the data is the fervent work sponsored by the communist party to reduce both influences in public life, at which all of the communist nations were very successful, with the exeception of Poland regarding the Catholic church.
Gpfr wrote: "scarletnoir wrote: "The confusion is funnier when you consider how extremely different their films are! But both very talented. I love Wes Anderson films, and although I don't like all P T Anderson's films, I think he's a really interesting filmmaker."At least I didn’t confuse them with Lindsay Anderson.
Last night I watched the film Sunday in New York on TCM and was reminded of O Lucky Man!: in both films the musicians who provide the soundtrack also make an appearance as characters in the film itself. The only other films (other than concert films and musicals) that I can recall where this is the case is The Man Who Knew Too Much (1956), Anatomy of a Murder, and Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid.
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OK, one of those is easy for me, let's see if I can get the other two:
PG&BtK: Dylan
Anatomy: Duke
TMWKTM: dunno, someone in the Albert Hall scene?
See also: To Have and Have Not - Hoagy Carmichael? Seems like there were a number of swing/jazz artists that were featured as characters in movies where their songs were played.
Also seems like Tom Waits should be on the list, but I can't pull it up...
Lljones wrote: "TMWKTM: dunno, someone in the Royal Albert Hall scene?"Right on the other two (I knew you'd know Dylan).
Yes - the orchestra is conducted by Bernard Hermann - his name appears on the poster outside the hall.
Bill wrote: " the musicians who provide the soundtrack also make an appearance as characters in the film itself"Another I just remembered - Down by Law.
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I was surprised you knew that!
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Ah - there's Waits! Now I'm working on Ry Cooder.
scarletnoir wrote: "Anne wrote: "Hello, everyone. Welcome to this fortnight's thread.No round-up this week as I'm on holiday. On holiday at home, that is, which, as we all know, is not the same as a staycation. Knos..."
Knossos? What a wonderful thing to see.
I've got a bottle of Writers' Tears Irish Whiskey, and I was amused by the blurb on their website:19th and early 20th century Ireland was a golden era both for Irish whiskey and, perhaps coincidentally, for great Irish novelists, poets and playwrights.
"Perhaps coincidentally" - marvellous.
Machenbach wrote: "My own feeling - which I've expressed here many times - is that writers are generally very enlightening about the writers they admire (usually writers similar to themselves) and bafflingly short-sighted about those they don't."Good comment, and quite possibly accurate... but it does seem as if Nabokov was especially prone to bitching about other writers, which I strongly suspect arises from some weird competitive instinct: "I'm better than they are, so I'll bring them down!"
Not all writers by any means feel the need to stab others in the back - or the front - or to drive a stake into their no-longer beating hearts.
Of course, Nabokov is not the only one...
As for D.'s writing - the key, as I have said before, is that what he writes about matters. It's all about the content and moral dilemmas. Others can write using a lot of fancy language, but if the content isn't interesting, then I can't be bothered.
(Edit: I tend to agree with Nabokov - for once - about Solzhenitsyn and Pasternak! It still doesn't make me want to read his own books, though.)
Bill wrote: "One of the many ways in which I apparently differ from the majority of readers is that I have no desire to see favorite books turned into films, which seems to be a frequently expressed desire in many forums..."I have a sort of theory that the greatest works of art can only work properly in their original form, so any adaptation needs to be a 're-creation' for it to work. I'm not much fussed if books I like are adapted as films or TV series, as those adaptations often fail in their attempts to 're-create' the work successfully, though there are exceptions.
Of course, some writers also work as screenwriters, and maybe have half an eye on translating their works into movies. I'm pretty sure that I saw Howard Hawks's brilliant film version of 'The Big Sleep' before reading Chandler's book The Big Sleep - both work very well, but are different... the film even has a different ending.
Conversely, some of the greatest films could not possibly work as novels (IMO) - such as Fellini's '8 1/2'... I don't see how the terror of the claustraphobic beginning, followed by freedom, and then the shock of the fall could be conveyed by other means:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SD_kj...
That opening has one of the best sound editing sequences ever; another brilliant example of that skill comes in the opening of 'Apocalypse Now' - another sequence which it's difficult to imagine being conveyed in words:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e5L61...
(Apologies for recycling these examples from another eTLS topic...)
Shelflife_wasBooklooker wrote: "Just an advance apology for belated replies: Feeling a bit under the weather since the afternoon, will be back later (in the week). Have a good time, with books, aunts, counts and all."Get well soon!
Bill wrote: "At least I didn’t confuse them with Lindsay Anderson."I prefer Lindsay Anderson to either of the contemporary ones.
As for musicians appearing in films for which they wrote the soundtrack... not sure how to categorise that. Does "A Hard Day's Night" count? All songs by the Beatles, not a concert film - it's a sort of fictionalised biography - though there is a scene of a TV recording of a song or two.
@bl: sorry to hear you are unwell, I hope you do feel better soon...@Swelter: "the musicians who provide the soundtrack also make an appearance as characters in the film itself"
This Is Spinal Tap. (Although they do make much more than just an "appearance"!)
Edit: Decent list here (not all having contributed to the soundtracks though I think): https://discover.ticketmaster.co.uk/m...
Which reminds me: Björk in Dancer in the Dark
Machenbach wrote (562): ... it would seem to be evident that there can be no treatment of complex subject-matter without a certain minimal level of linguistic competence.Serious question: what exactly would be "a minimal level of linguistic competence" when it comes to a literary writer? (I associate that expression more with a student of a foreign language, or a child, reaching some milestone).
Machenbach wrote: "Georg wrote: "Serious question: what exactly would be "a minimal level of linguistic competence" when it comes to a literary writer? (I associate that expression more with a student of a foreign la..."Sorry for being (obviously) obtuse, but I am none the wiser. I've always thought "minimal linguistic competence" is the condition sine qua non to get published as a literary writer.
If we take that as a given you seem to argue that complex ideas or emotions can not be conveyed in a simple style/simple words?
I might be wrong, but in that case you'll surely be able to set me right.
I have been thinking about this in broader terms:
A Shaker cabinet would stick out like a sore thumb in Versailles.
Yet there are people who would argue that its beauty is in the use of simple materials, its sublime proportions and its beautiful craftsmanship.
Yes, I know, that this, lets call it parallel, limps. Cabinets cannot be compared to books. But I am sure you get my gist.
Replies to various posts:@Lljones: I tend to notice soundtracks while watching a film and tend to remember films, though in general not as well as books (maybe a matter of time spent with them). With Pat Garrett, I remember them shooting a chicken, but you could play the entire soundtrack for me and I probably wouldn’t recall one song. The same is true of Leonard Cohen’s soundtrack to Mc Cabe and Mrs Miller. Tom Waits’ Rain Dogs on the other hand impressed me enough to buy the album.
@scarletnoir: I think The Beatles seem something of a special case, though I haven’t seen any of their films – I got the impression that the films were constructed around them and their music to start with.
@Machenbach: I didn’t consider Pal Joey or any other films that are primarily musicals, like Absolute Beginners. I’ve seen a number of Sinatra’s dramatic films, but don’t recall him performing on the soundtrack of any of them. Perhaps The Tender Trap, which I haven’t seen, but just from the title it sounds like it needs a theme song with vocals. I haven’t seen 9 to 5.
@hushpuppy: I also left films like Spinal Tap out of consideration – it’s a kind of parody concert film / music documentary, along the lines of Stop Making Sense or Don’t Look Back.
Georg wrote: "Serious question: what exactly would be "a minimal level of linguistic competence" when it comes to a literary writer?"I would offer the Gothic novel Zofloya, or The Moor by Charlotte Dacre as an example of a writer just a bit on the wrong side of the "linguistic competence" line. I was amused by this line in Kim Ian Michasiw's introduction to the Oxford World’s Classics edition:
Dacre’s sometimes overwrought attempts to wring emotional intensity from common, ‘debased’ language will perhaps find more sympathetic readers in a period, like ours, distrustful of linguistic mastery.
Any people here who visited Joburg in the 1960s? Just scrolling through a few photos, i find evidence of the appalling "african colonial" style of brick buildings with square fronts and the look of dormitories to them. London has a many similar monstrosities, which seem to be stamped with 1960s eyesore all over.It reminds me of HK and the double panelled windows which seemed pointless in such heat but may have been used to keep noise out . Presumably some British architect was building a lot of this fading empire rubbish
Just found this, Pevsner on Joburg, so its 1950s actually:
https://www.architectural-review.com/...
Bill wrote: "Replies to various posts:"I see, so no film that revolves around the music, or where the musician(s) are the main protagonists... This certainly reduces the count (no Beatles, no Spinal Tap, no Dancer in the Dark, no musicals indeed).
Imdb reliably tells me that Aimee Mann makes an uncredited cameo in Magnolia. That'd work then, plus it'd have the added bonus of being a - wait for it - Paul Thomas Anderson film (and a good one at that, although I haven't seen it in a very long while)!
Hushpuppy wrote: "Imdb reliably tells me that Aimee Mann makes an uncredited cameo in Magnolia. That'd work then, plus it'd have the added bonus of being a - wait for it - Paul Thomas Anderson film (and a good one at that, although I haven't seen it in a very long while)!"I remember when that film came out - a co-worker who knew of my interest in Forteana mentioned a scene with a rain of frogs, though that wasn't tempting enough to lure me to the theater.
I will be closing this thread in about an hour.
Mod
Machenbach wrote: "Hushpuppy wrote: "Imdb reliably tells me that Aimee Mann makes an uncredited cameo in Magnolia"I always get confused between Aimee Mann and Thomas Mann."
Easy - Aimee Mann is the one with the quaint colour palette that's emulated some instagram account https://www.instagram.com/accidentall...
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Ersatz TLS
Books mentioned in this topic
Zofloya, or The Moor (other topics)The Big Sleep (other topics)
Travels with My Aunt (other topics)
Travels with My Aunt (other topics)
Singing The Sadness (other topics)
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Authors mentioned in this topic
Reginald Hill (other topics)Nadine Gordimer (other topics)
Diedrich Diederichsen (other topics)
Jackie Kay (other topics)
Jackie Collins (other topics)
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Stefan Wolle does very good work, hope you will like ..."
Roth was a joy to read, i found myself chuckling and researching places he visited and am glad i read it. Am wary of collections of short works, which can be a little too scant to fully engage with but Granta and Hoffman have done a good deal with 250 odd pages of great writing.
Here is Wolle himself on the day Stasi HQ was stormed:
https://www.ddr-museum.de/en/blog/201...
i'm so lucky that Wolle's work is being translated and i have noticed a few modern works about Germany in the 20th century,originally written in German being translated. As a massive Germanophile, i like to read German accounts of their own history
By the way, have you read Christa Wolfs novel "They Divided The Sky" set in Wolles hometown of Halle. I think its a very important female view of the DDR