Ersatz TLS discussion
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Weekly TLS
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What are we reading? 12 June 2023
Just put up a photo (with book and explanatory note) so Lisa doesn't have to. 😉 (hope this works as a snark)
RE Cormac McCarthy - Here's a link from the NYT. The headline explains why I have not read any of his books.https://www.nytimes.com/2023/06/13/bo...
story for Andy here...river derwent almost bone dry and its only June!https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2...
AB76 wrote: "story for Andy here...river derwent almost bone dry and its only June!https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2......"
https://sites.google.com/site/majorri...
You might want to bookmark this so you can feel cool on those hot days this summer.https://www.seattletimes.com/pacific-...
On the WA side of the mouth of the Columbia River
Bill wrote: "CCCubbon wrote: "Shhh ……I am whispering that I have a sneaky feeling that Robinson in Standing in the Shadow was guilty of padding."Edmund Wilson contended that padding (or, as he termed it, "exc..."
Wilson wanted Serious Fiction. A mystery writer has a different goal-- to give the reader a clue hidden in realistic detail. One must Play Fair. As Dorothy Sayers pointed out, "There it was! Under my nose all the time!" is the highest compliment to a mystery writer.
MK wrote: "May I suggest - Orchestrated Death?"Thanks for the recommendation. If any of my local libraries had a copy I’d give it a try, but since they don’t I’m not inclined to pursue it further afield. I’m basing this on the GR description:
Inspector Bill Slider struggles to find clues and a motive to the murder of a quiet violinist, while his home life runs amuck as he tries to choose between his wife and an exciting new love.I suspect that my definition of “padding” is broader than yours. Most of the few mystery novels I’ve read were from the 1930s and 1940s where the padding consisted of red herrings which the sleuth, and consequently the reader, spent several chapters pursuing and ultimately abandoning. My impression is that what I would term padding in modern mystery novels consists of introducing elements from other genres of fiction - such as historical fiction, romance, or domestic drama – to bulk up the basic mystery story to novel length. I’d prefer to take (or leave) these other genres on their own terms rather than having them wrapped around a mystery story. I never thought, while reading Updike for instance, “This would be a better novel if there were a murder at the beginning and Rabbit Angstrom had to solve it in addition to dealing with his other problems.”
I’ve enjoyed some mysteries, but almost all of them have been in the short story form. The crime and its context is set up, the various threads are disentangled in the course of the story, and the crime is solved, all within, say, 50 pages or less. Of course, I know that the short story form for mysteries has just about completely died out and there’s therefore no monetary incentive for authors to write them. Once again, the true criminal is Capitalism.
One feature of the daytime heat in the Shires, is wonderfully cool evenings, its going from a hot, sweaty 29c by day, to 14c by early morning, so the effect of the heat is less of a problem, i air the house by night and temps all fall back to 18c indoors, rising to 22c max indoorsHavent done much reading this week mainly due to the lassitude that envelopes me in warm conditions(despite a cool house) but am impressed with the start of the Camus novel and always excited by the prose of Paul Bowles, plus the analytical style of the Carafiglio novel
Just indulged in some series one Miami Vice from 1984-85.......
to be objective about the weather, i am aiming to experience the conditions in a mindful state, this is not a hot country and warmth can be enjoyed...i do like the feeling the body has in warm air....joints run smoother etc
Bill wrote: "scarletnoir wrote: "2. unspecified setting - nope"Perhaps we will be seeing more novels with unspecified settings, since Elizabeth Gilbert has indefinitely postponed publication of..."
Yeah. Punish artists who have nothing to do with Putin and his war, because you cannot punish the man himself. You know it makes sense. Dissidents? Well, they are Russians as well, tough luck.
In German "der Russ" (1st person singular) is a pejorative term meaning all Russians. It is only used by people of a certain ilk (it is also used for people of other countries, even continents)
Collective punishment meted out by those who are what? More civilized? Hugging the moral high ground?
Thanks for the link, Bill.
Bill wrote: "scarletnoir wrote: "Britomart'', eh?"...I imagined a store specializing in products from the UK like digestive biscuits and spotted dick."
A vision to inspire any rhyming poet or questing knight. Had Spenser lived, I’ll bet this would have been the subject of Books 7 to 12.
Wait a minute, I think I’ve just found a missing fragment.
Of treekle pudden we should now discurse,
Let sweete aromas rise, and suette steeme:
To syr’ppy rivers is no wight averse,
E’en lumpy costarde maketh visage beeme.
Sir Tescobaldi on his steede did dreame,
While homewarde bent, fulle of his kitchen pot
Wherein those gladd’ning flavours richly teme,
And spurr’d his wearie mounte to faster trotte,
Lest pudden, s’rupp an’ all be cold ere there he gotte.
A vision to inspire any rhyming poet or questing knight. Had Spenser lived, I’ll bet this would have been the subject of Books 7 to 12.
Wait a minute, I think I’ve just found a missing fragment.
Of treekle pudden we should now discurse,
Let sweete aromas rise, and suette steeme:
To syr’ppy rivers is no wight averse,
E’en lumpy costarde maketh visage beeme.
Sir Tescobaldi on his steede did dreame,
While homewarde bent, fulle of his kitchen pot
Wherein those gladd’ning flavours richly teme,
And spurr’d his wearie mounte to faster trotte,
Lest pudden, s’rupp an’ all be cold ere there he gotte.
Russell wrote: "Wait a minute, I think I’ve just found a missing fragment..."Haha! Excellent.
My whispered comment about padding generated some interesting comments regarding what we consider as such. I don’t mind crime novels as a series where the investigating characters are gradually developed throughout the books. For me it is as though the series becomes the book and the individual crimes incidents in the book - if that makes sense to you.
But I do find padded out books, the ones with over a hundred short chapters, the bits where nothing happens, no conversation - over described boredom get me thinking ‘is the author being paid by the word’. Where’s the editor?
The last Robinson book is slow going . It sends me to sleep. chapters are set roughly twenty years apart backwards and forwards and this does not aid continuity.
Earlier in the day I am still reading and enjoying Fallen Glory about twenty different buildings and have reached the Rome forum.
CCCubbon wrote: "My whispered comment about padding generated some interesting comments regarding what we consider as such. I don’t mind crime novels as a series where the investigating characters are gradually de..."
One obvious example of padding in crime novels - the unnecessary description of how our investigators get from A to B. Film makers a long time ago ditched the use of this filler for the most part, as audiences no longer needed to be shown the journey to figure out what was going on. (Of course, there are exceptions - those who may have seen French cop show Mongeville can confirm that the 'tec and his sidekick frequently hop into their Peugeot and waste a few minutes to get to their destination, whilst chewing the fat.)
I commented on this more than once recently, mainly in connection with the otherwise very good 'Costas Haritos' series by Petros Markaris. The author seems to find it necessary to describe in some detail how our hero makes his way around Athens, including frequent comments on the heat and pollution and the best ways to avoid jams - once is enough, but there is a fair amount of this sort of thing! The only time it is justified IMO is in the books dealing with the financial crisis - the roads magically become almost traffic-free, as few people can afford to run their cars. That fits well with the author's main purpose, which is to paint a picture of Greek society over a period of time.
In more 'literary' books, some authors take a perverse pleasure in providing their version of 'four pages about the living room carpet' or the equivalent, in order (I assume) to display their great erudition by disgorging the semi-digested contents of some thesaurus or other, as well as their recently acquired expertise on the processes of carpet-making (or whatever). This makes me want to scream: "JUST GET ON WITH IT!"
I really have zero patience for that sort of 'fine writing'.
(Poetic descriptions which link to the protagonist's feelings about what they are experiencing are another matter entirely, as for example in Antoine de Saint-Exupéry's brilliant Wind, Sand and Stars)
Russell wrote: "Bill wrote: "scarletnoir wrote: "Britomart'', eh?"...I imagined a store specializing in products from the UK like digestive biscuits and spotted dick."A vision to inspire any rhyming poet or ques..."
I saw his 'The Faerie Queene' on sale in Oxfam yesterday. It's huge... I wasn't drawn to it at all, somehow...
Hello everyone. I haven't been around for a while and am looking forward to catching up with you and your reading. I'm reading - sporadically, 'cos of y'know, life, - Katherine Rundell's Super-Infinite and enjoying it very much.
Anne wrote: "Hello everyone. I haven't been around for a while and am looking forward to catching up with you and your reading. I'm reading - sporadically, 'cos of y'know, life, - Katherine Rundell's Super-Infi..."Nice to hear from you again Anne, hope you are well.
CCCubbon wrote: "My whispered comment about padding generated some interesting comments regarding what we consider as such. I don’t mind crime novels as a series where the investigating characters are gradually de..."
I know what you mean abut a crime series, I also enjoy following the lives of the investigators as well as the crime solving.
Russell wrote: "Wait a minute, I think I’ve just found a missing fragment."Wonderful! I'll add that to my copy of The Brand-X Anthology of Poetry.
(Goodreads does not have an image of the "Burnt Norton Edition" which I own, with its William Blake-ish cover parody.)
scarletnoir wrote (#64): "CCCubbon wrote: "My whispered comment about padding generated some interesting comments regarding what we consider as such. I don’t mind crime novels as a series where the investigating characters..."
Ah, scarlet, I have just thought about a book that would probably drive you around the bend.
In Bill's sense a most memorable book for me. Though not in a good way. There was so much that intensely irritated, even infuriated me in that over-hyped "masterpiece".
Not least the "padding". Which makes up about 70% of the book. It came in three different variations.
I could have lived with the more or less interesting snippets of more or less unrelated information (some factual, some made up) he forcibly weds to the story to make his "apeirogon". As it was at the heart of that pretentious construction maybe I shouldn't call it padding, to be fair.
It got more difficult when he replayed the key scenes, the moments the girls were killed, again and again. And again. It just dulls the initial impact.
And then came the "paid-by-the-word [questionmark]" bit. Altogether amounting to some hundreds of pages of extremely detailed trivial drivel.
For example:
Travelling by car, in the dark. Getting through checkpoints. Again and again and again and again.
A man pads his pockets to find his cigarettes. He opens the packet. He takes out the cigarette. Then he has to find his lighter. Then he lights the cigarette. That takes up just under one page (I am not kidding).
One of the highlights: one protagonist imagines how the soldier who killed his enemy-turned-friend's daughter might now live. In a good hotel, where nobody knows him. The reader is treated to a meticulous description of the furnishings of that imaginary place, carpeted floors and all. And while he is at it McCann also throws in an imaginary woman who lives next door, a well-dressed lady of a certain age with an imaginary pampered pooch. That takes about four or five pages iirc.
But, as I am sure McCann wasn't paid by the word count, the padding in this book might save a purpose. In any case it fits quite well with, maybe even detracts in a way from the overall shallowness with which he treated his main subject throughout imo.
Sorry if somebody who loved the book should feel offended by this comment. It is only my personal opinion. Just keep in mind that you can dismiss it as easily as I could dismiss the stupid thing Mark Twain (who I love) said about Jane Austen (who I love even more) ;-)
Georg wrote: "Ah, scarlet, I have just thought about a book that would probably drive you around the bend."Thanks for that detailed account - you are almost certainly correct! I remember the hype surrounding this book, but after reading shorter descriptions I refrained from buying it.
Just as well, probably.
CCCubbon wrote: "I don’t mind crime novels as a series where the investigating characters are gradually developed throughout the books. For me it is as though the series becomes the book and the individual crimes incidents in the book - if that makes sense to you."I guess I actually think the same way, though for me the combination of crime and domestic drama aspects seem like they’re more of a marriage of convenience rather than having the kind of organic / thematic relationship I expect in the various threads that make up a novel.
It’s sort of a figure / ground problem: if I read for the crime, the domestic drama is the padding; if I read for the character development, the crime element becomes the padding. Also, I kind of resent the idea of having to invest the money, or at least the time, to read a story of domestic life which is spread over many individual novels, something I think should be contained in a single book (or at most a purposefully limited series of books).
Tam wrote: "I saw his 'The Faerie Queene' on sale in Oxfam yesterday. It's huge... I wasn't drawn to it at all, somehow..."You didn't have your wheelbarrow handy?
Georg wrote: "In Bill's sense a most memorable book for me. Though not in a good way. There was so much that intensely irritated, even infuriated me in that over-hyped "masterpiece"."Georg, I think you missed Dwight Garner's review when I originally posted it (to much criticism from fellow Ersatzers who are, it seems, mostly big McCann fans (I never read him)). Here is a gift link to the review,
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/19/bo...
“Apeirogon” — the title refers to a shape with a limitless number of sides — is so solemn, so certain of its own goodness and moral value, that it tips almost instantly over into camp, into corn. It’s as if the author were gunning for the Paulo Coelho Chair in Maudlin Schlock.
In an author’s note at the front of this novel, McCann writes: “We live our lives, suggested Rilke, in widening circles that reach out across the entire expanse.” McCann has a gift for quoting others at their most flatulent: “The only interesting thing is to live, said Mitterand”; “Hertzl wrote: If you divide death by life, you will find a circle.”
For added effect, McCann repeats lines he likes, such as the Mitterand quote, again and again. Often these phrases are his own, such as “the rim of a tightening lung.”
Bill wrote: "..For added effect, McCann repeats lines he likes, such as the Mitterand quote, again and again. Often these phrases are his own, such as “the rim of a tightening lung.”"...lung
Phew!
Bill wrote: "MK wrote: "May I suggest - Orchestrated Death?"Thanks for the recommendation. If any of my local libraries had a copy I’d give it a try, but since they don’t I’m not inclined to pursue it further..."
We are a motley crew here, aren't we? I am philosophical about red herrings and padding, too. Perhaps this comes from all those hours testing software before release. Talk about red herrings and rabbit holes!
Here's another rabbit hole. Buried in this article about Picasso is a reference to 'The Silent Woman', a restaurant that I ate in and appropriated an ashtray from long ago. I still have the ashtray. It's sitting under a plant pot.
NYT link - https://www.nytimes.com/2023/06/15/ar...
And here's more about 'The Silent (AKA headless) Woman' - https://www.worthpoint.com/worthopedi...
Bill wrote: "Dwight Garner's review (of 'Apeirogon')..."Thanks for the link, Bill... it made me laugh. Here are a few quotes which would have dissuaded me from making a purchase:
We’re evicted from the narrative on almost every page so that McCann can tweezer in arty and only vaguely relevant facts...
McCann’s shards are set apart from one another on the page by a thumb’s-width of white space. They are tiles without grout. This trending method of organizing a novel... exaggerates a writer’s weaknesses.
...his work can be humorless and self-important.
When you insist on a lot of white space between paragraphs and sometimes between single sentences... it’s as if the reader has been given 10 seconds and a bong hit between each one; time to squint and nod and say, “So true.”
I came across a similar self-conscious layout problem in Girl, Woman, Other. It was one of the reasons I abandoned that book.
As for the meaning of the word 'apeirogon' - I'm suspicious of literary works which seem to attempt to spuriously link themselves to some scientific or mathematical principle, as some sort of artificial constraint or inspiration. What's that about? It reminds me of Lawrence Durrell's 'Alexandria Quartet':
As Durrell explains in his preface to Balthazar, the four novels are an exploration of relativity and the notions of continuum and subject–object relation, with modern love as the theme. The Quartet's first three books offer the same sequence of events through several points of view, allowing individual perspectives of a single set of events. The fourth book shows change over time.
I have no problem at all with showing the same events from different perspectives, but why (apart from inherent pretentiousness) link that to relativity? I ask you.
MK wrote: "Buried in this article about Picasso is a reference to 'The Silent Woman', a restaurant that I ate in and appropriated an ashtray from long ago."I associate The Silent Woman with Ben Jonson's play with that subtitle (later adapted into an opera by Richard Strauss and Stefan Zweig).
Tam wrote: "I saw his 'The Faerie Queene' on sale in Oxfam yesterday. It's huge... I wasn't drawn to it at all, somehow."Well, it's not as long as The Anatomy of Melancholy.
Mod
I haven't (yet) read Apeirogon, but I loved Let the Great World Spin and Songdogs (which I cited in this week's Top 10 about missing persons).
I've got Dancer by McCann, Colum (2003) Paperback waiting to be read.
Bill wrote: "MK wrote: "Buried in this article about Picasso is a reference to 'The Silent Woman', a restaurant that I ate in and appropriated an ashtray from long ago."I associate The Silent Woman with Ben J..."
But she has a head!
scarletnoir wrote: "Bill wrote: "Dwight Garner's review (of 'Apeirogon')..."Thanks for the link, Bill... it made me laugh. Here are a few quotes which would have dissuaded me from making a purchase:
We’re evicted ..."
I think it is linked to one of the fundamental ideas of ''Modernism'. Cubism was very much inspired by the likes of mathematician, and philosopher, Henri Bergson, and indeed Einstein. It is generally thought that Cezanne was the first artist to explore multiple perspectives, over time, being portrayed within the same image, with his multiple paintings of Mont St Victoire in France.
So the linking to mathematical ideas is not coming from nowhere, Picasso was a prime innovator of the multiple perspective, and many literary greats of those times took up some of those intrinsic ideas within it. I don't think of it as being pretentious, but perhaps that is only because I have studied the phenomena of Modernism. The intrinsic ideas of Modernism were wide enough to include all kinds of experimental affiliation, so I can see both Durrell and Mc Cann thinking ah yes I can give it a go as well!... James Joyce and T S Elliot seemed to do quite well out of their poetic and literary, renditions.
I have not read the Mc Cann book so I cant comment on that, in particular. What it does though is rarify the possible connection that those without having the rather niche background info, will have, in terms of understanding quite what the author was attempting to do. And yes, repetition, from a slightly different angle, was quite a large part of the idea.... so really not surprising that it seems to play such a large part, though your examples used do seem very banal to me, so all I can say is that other than what I have said is that "I couldn't possibly comment"!...
this might entertain some...https://scholarworks.umt.edu/cgi/view...
Luckily I had a space (just one!) on my hold list and have managed to get in line for https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0070819/... in memoriam for Glenda Jackson.I know this should be in movies, but I can't remember the last time I went to one or put a DVD in the slot, so it's here.
MK wrote: "Bill wrote: "MK wrote: "May I suggest - Orchestrated Death?"Thanks for the recommendation. If any of my local libraries had a copy I’d give it a try, but since they don’t I’m not inclined to purs..."
i'm not too worried about padding, i am more annoyed when you get modern novels trying to be too clever by half, ticking every woke box and almost devoid of realism...
Bill wrote: "Tam wrote: "I saw his 'The Faerie Queene' on sale in Oxfam yesterday. It's huge... I wasn't drawn to it at all, somehow."Well, it's not as long as The Anatomy of Melancholy."
Well I'm quite glad that I don't seem to be the melancholic type, but each to their own as somebody once said...
Anne wrote: "Hello everyone. I haven't been around for a while and am looking forward to catching up with you and your reading. I'm reading - sporadically, 'cos of y'know, life, - Katherine Rundell's Super-Infi..."Hello Anne. That Super-Infinite book is great. Almost my favourite poet, Donne. I say almost because I cannot make up my mind between others - suppose it depends on my mood. Cannot stay away from Eliot or other times there are some women poets or then I re read Stevens by the seaside or the snowman or Auden walking out one evening…..
The Golden Mole by Rundall is rather good too.
Hope all well.
Bill wrote: "Georg wrote: "In Bill's sense a most memorable book for me. Though not in a good way. There was so much that intensely irritated, even infuriated me in that over-hyped "masterpiece"."Georg, I thi..."
I don't know which translation you have used to quote Rilke here, but in my translation he does not quote the grandiose "reach out across the entire expanse" which makes it appear as if he has done a world conquering thing. I don't think it is, in this version, he just says he's on his way, but might not get that far. The 'last one' is his own limitation, where his own life ends, whereas the world in its entirety will truck on, quite happily, very much without him...
Widening Circles
I live my life in widening circles
that reach out across the world.
I may not complete this last one
but I give myself to it.
I circle around God, around the primordial tower.
I’ve been circling for thousands of years
and I still don’t know: am I a falcon,
a storm, or a great song?
Rainer Maria Rilke, ‘Book of Hours’ (Pub. 1905)
Bill wrote: "Georg wrote: "In Bill's sense a most memorable book for me. Though not in a good way. There was so much that intensely irritated, even infuriated me in that over-hyped "masterpiece"."Georg, I thi..."
Aargh! " If you divide death by life, you will find a circle." I had already forgotten that. It was recycled at least three times. Cringeworthy gobbledygook.
I didn't miss your link to the Garner review then. For some reason I thought it was by Dirda. Maybe because that is the name I connect with you. So I read it again. Well worth it.
There is one sentence I slightly disagree with:
But his analysis of the predicaments that face the Middle East is not raw or original or sophisticated.
There is no analysis whatsoever. Because history and the current political situation are strictly off-limits in McCanns book. The best you get is a sentence that mentions events like the 7-day-war or the 2nd Intifada every now and again. I do understand that this is heavily mined territory where a writer should think long and hard before they only dip their toe in. McCann decided to cram several hordes of elephants into a room and keep his toe out. I cannot blame him for that, nevertheless I minded the elephants.
He doesn't even write about the direct background on which his story rests: the considerable political (as opposed to personal) bi-partisan (or non-partisan?) peace movement. Izhak Rabin (to name only the most prominent of them) anybody?
The only other critical review I could find was in "Forward". Less about the arty-farty aspects, yet not fundamentally different in view.
https://forward.com/culture/440450/ap...
The Silence of the Wave by Gianrico Carafiglio is a remarkable modern novel, i am loving every moment and taking it slowly.Hard and analytical, without humour or levity, it is a novel of a damaged former undercover Carabinieri and his difficult recovery from extended sick leave. So far the right notes are hit every time, sections that make you think and ponder on life and pyschology, memory and trauma
It is written in the style of the great italian realist writers of the 1950s and 1960s, the same dry, hard and gritty style but intellectual too, dealing with the bigger questions and not the trivial.
I hope the last 30 pages are not a let down, as right now its up there with Matterhorn(by Marlantes) and The Colonel(by Dowlatbadi).
I love novels like this, the mind is always thinking and questioning as you read...superb
NB. Matterhorn is an epic tale of slogging it out in the Vietnam war, while The Colonel is a dark, forbidding tale from Iran, which never lessens its dark dread and serious focus...superb
Mod
Glad you're back here, too!
Mod
I was going to ask if you'd read any McCann or any reviews other than Garner's...and then I wandered off to water my garden.
Lljones wrote: "I was going to ask if you'd read any McCann or any reviews other than Garner's...and then I wandered off to water my garden."After reading Garner's review, I knew the NY Times wouldn't leave it at that. A serious novel about a serious issue like the Israel-Palestinian conflict by a writer of McCann's prestige can't be dismissed so easily by the paper of record. I expected a positive review to show up in the Sunday Book Review and indeed it did:
“Apeirogon” is an empathy engine, utterly collapsing the gulf between teller and listener. By replicating the messy nonlinear passage of time, by dealing in unexpected juxtapositions that reveal latent truths, it allows us to inhabit the interiority of human beings who are not ourselves. It achieves its aim by merging acts of imagination and extrapolation with historical fact. But it’s indisputably a novel, and, to my mind, an exceedingly important one. It does far more than make an argument for peace; it is, itself, an agent of change.
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/24/bo...
(Sorry, but that's not a gift link.)
I thought they might get a bigger name than Julie Orringer for the review, perhaps someone who, like McCann, had won a National Book Award.
(C'mon, you have to admit "If you divide death by life, you will find a circle," is pretty meaningless, at best a kind of verbal Rorschach.)
Bill wrote: "...The Brand-X Anthology of Poetry..."
Not a book I know, and definitely one to seek out.
That cover picture is clever - you would swear it is a Blake - but of course it's a book of parodies.
Not a book I know, and definitely one to seek out.
That cover picture is clever - you would swear it is a Blake - but of course it's a book of parodies.
Re-reading my pull quote from that last, positive review of the McCann novel, I started thinking about novels which served as "agents of change" and came up with very few. I could only think of 3 novels, all from the US, that had, or probably had, real-world effects: Uncle Tom's Cabin, The Jungle, and The Turner Diaries. (That last doesn't seem to be on Goodreads nor, I believe, is it sold on Amazon. Evidently it's too powerful an agent of highly undesirable change to be casually handled.)
Perhaps one could expand the list to include novels that were involved in censorship battles in court such as Ulysses, The Well of Loneliness, Lady Chatterley's Lover, Lolita, and Tropic of Cancer.
Bill wrote: "Re-reading my pull quote from that last, positive review of the McCann novel, I started thinking about novels which served as "agents of change" and came up with very few. I could only think of 3..."
we did Uncle Toms Cabin at school, aged 12-14, i dont think it would be allowed now as the "n" word would set of all kind of woke triggers but i think it should be a set text in all schools
Seeing MK's photo of the 1984book from FB, it has reminded that i have been tempted to do a rare re-read this summer of the novelOddly, its my least favourite Orwell, though it is an amazing work of literature and stands up as one of the best 50 novels in have read. I can remember as a kid my mother telling us about the novel and being fascinated by the ideas presented
Orwell was a cold warrior before the cold war took off, fervently anti-communist which i love, despite a fascination i have with western european communism in the cold war (especially in Italy with Togliatti and Berlinguer)
Tam wrote: "I think it is linked to one of the fundamental ideas of ''Modernism'. Cubism was very much inspired by the likes of mathematician, and philosopher, Henri Bergson, and indeed Einstein. It is generally thought that Cezanne was the first artist to explore multiple perspectives, over time, being portrayed within the same image, with his multiple paintings of Mont St Victoire in France."As always, I am willing to be instructed/corrected in matters where I have no expertise, but...
1. Did Cezanne link his paintings to any scientific or mathematical theories? (If he did, I'm not aware of it but I'm not an art historian.)
2. Was Cubism consciously connected to Bergson's ideas from the start, or was that link made later?
(FWIW, I don't care for Picasso's cubist art - or most cubist art - and have doubts about Bergson's ideas though it's a long time ago since I read anything linked to those, so specific criticisms are not available!)
3. Was Einstein aware that the Cubists had co-opted him to their cause, and if so, what did he think of that?
As for 'Modernism', I must say that it seems like a singularly unhelpful term so long as the list on Wikipedia can be trusted (probably, it can't be)... it includes a huge number of writers, including a few I like and many I don't. So - go figure.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of...
Bill wrote: "I started thinking about novels which served as "agents of change" and came up with very few..."I'm pretty sceptical about this notion. If there are any, they'll only have a 'regional' effect - I note yours are all USA-based.
Books that 'changed the world' are (for better or worse) those adopted by (or jumped on by) individuals who seek power, such as the influential religious texts (the Bible, Torah, Koran etc.) or possibly 'The Communist Manifesto'. I suppose you could include 'Mein Kampf' - if so inclined.
These are tools with which to oppress nay-sayers of all stripes. They are not necessarily profound or consistent. Their 'users' don't care, though. Suppressing the awkward squad is all they care about.
I do think it is possible to discuss books which changed - or maybe just 'directed' - each one of us as individuals, though. Every (serious) reader may well have been influenced by a few key texts.
Georg wrote: "The only other critical review I could find was in "Forward". Less about the arty-farty aspects, yet not fundamentally different in view..."I could easily identify with this comment in that review:
An apeirogon, to quote the book’s press release, is “a shape with countably infinite sides.” As a title, it’s designed to make the heart plummet: A writer could hardly give a more exaggerated hint that they intend to boldly demonstrate just how amazing and complicated it all is.
I came across another critical review, told from a Palestinian perspective by Susan Abulhawa on the Al Jazeera website:
https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/20....
As you will know from what I've written before, I abhor what happened to the Jews during WW2 (and, indeed, in other historical periods.) This does not, however, allow us to turn away from the 'Palestinian problem'. Two wrongs don't make a right, as they say. (I've seen the results of inter-cultural conflict at close quarters during three years spent in Northern Ireland - 1971-74. It is not a pretty sight, and there are no easy answers here or elsewhere: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Tro...)
scarletnoir wrote: "Tam wrote: "I think it is linked to one of the fundamental ideas of ''Modernism'. Cubism was very much inspired by the likes of mathematician, and philosopher, Henri Bergson, and indeed Einstein. I..."These are all good questions
1. As far as I know Cezanne was retrospectively collected into the cannon of what Modernism became. Even the experts in Modernism, at the time that I studied it (around 2006 I think) could not put a beginning date to it. But then it wasn't Modernism whilst it was happening. These terms are retrospective in application. He certainly was a huge influence on the artists that came after him, and many of those are later referred to as Modernists, but just as many were not... Bergson's Theory of 'la duree' was first published in 1889. Cezanne has an exhibition in Paris in 1895. The Paris 'salon' phenomena was a huge thing in those days. Anyone who was anybody wanted to attend their favourite gatherings, and the salons were open to a very wide selection of speakers as well as artists showing their work.
Cezanne continued to paint his Mont St Victoire series up until his death in 1906. So there is possible overlap, as Bergson spoke at various salons in Paris, for Cezanne to have been influenced by his ideas of 'la Duree'. But 'proof' is beyond my knowledge I'm afraid.
2. The link was made by some artists that were inspired by Bergson, (and others) and went on to experiment with ideas of portraying time in pictorial form. Those who come to mind are Robert and Sonia Delaunay. But Georges Braque and Picasso were the best known adherents I guess.
3. I did some research in art college 1980's as to which came first (with no internet then it took me quite a long time to find out!...) Les Demoiselles d'Avignon (1907) or Einsteins 'Theory of Relativity' (1905). So Einstein has it... though it did take him 10 years to develop it!... up until 2015. I'm not educated enough to know the difference between 'special' and 'general' relativity, though its a surprise to me that 'special' came before 'general'...
That list is just the writers, Modernism consists of so much more. I find myself wondering, as a lot of those writers are long deceased, whether any of them, if still alive, would be horrified at the idea of being considered a 'Modernist'... ? I find the whole era fascinating, but that is because I am very attracted to the nature of borders, and so am drawn to elements in society that abrasively rub against each other, especially ideas, so the late 19th and early 20th century is a very rich territory for me to think about, and is a curious and entertaining foil for my other love, of medieval illuminations and marginalia...
Hope that might help a bit....
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Ersatz TLS
Books mentioned in this topic
Dante’s Inferno for Kids and Curious Parents (other topics)The Faerie Queene (other topics)
Apeirogon (other topics)
The Bombay Prince (other topics)
Apeirogon (other topics)
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Authors mentioned in this topic
Abir Mukherjee (other topics)Alexander Theroux (other topics)
Jeffrey Toobin (other topics)
Helen Vendler (other topics)
Jeffrey Toobin (other topics)
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Edmund Wilson contended that padding (or, as he termed it, "exc..."
May I suggest - Orchestrated Death?