Here's a piece worth reading about acting. Interestingly, I noted at the end it was written by David Thompson, whose self-indulgent, digressive, frequently nasty, and in all but one instance subpar work I am otherwise familiar with from 'The New Republic' (his latest contribution there asserted that because Michelle Pfeiffer appears, to him, to no longer have fun on the screen--and was no longer sparklingly attractive--she could no longer honestly be called 'Michelle,' but should have to opt instead for something muddier like 'Maud'--like I say, don't read his work, elsewhere):
But this one is worth reading, notwithstanding some serious deficiencies in the research (Damon was thoroughly 'method' in his performance in '...Ripley,' and his pretenses within the role were never something the audience couldn't see through in a moment, and so are quite unremarkable--the Damon section of the article is a weak link, really) and the writer's understanding of his subject (i.e. the various schools of Stanislavski-based acting, and what they advocated, and what 'the Method' is/was). With all that in mind, it's a very useful article anyway--legitimately points up a few excesses and deficiencies of method actors in comparison to, say, Olivier.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704107104574571821619515590.html?mod=WSJ_article_comments#articleTabs%3Darticle
Re: Olivier, it occurs to me to respond, here, to one of the commenters on the WSJ site, who claimed, possibly at least partly correctly, that actors of the Jimmy Stewart / Cary Grant era (i.e. not Stanislavski-influenced) could not effectively communicate using your full 'instrument,' (i.e. the body--and my words, not theirs) the same way a modern method performer can.To that, it's easy to respond: go back and watch some Lawrence Olivier movies. I suggest just the opening scene or two of his version of Hamlet.
Monday, September 16, 2013
Sunday, September 15, 2013
Plato on poetry's relationship to truth...and that of philosophy. Aristotle adds a few neoclassical (as it were) assertions about art
Plato apparently says, in his Ion, that poetic works come from a divine madness (or at least an inspiration of such nature, depending on how literally/seriously you take him on this), and that 'Because the poet is subject to this divine madness, it is not his/her function to convey the truth.[wikipedia-'mimesis'] Thus, Plato says, truth is the concern only (or, like, mostly--at least in terms of....okay, there's clearly a massive gap in this formulation, because he's putting together a dichotomy of humanities that doesn't include, say, history. Anyway) or primarily of philosophy. Interesting.
Wikipedia goes on about Aristotle's contribution, the beginning of which is:' Aristotle also defined mimesis as the perfection and imitation of nature. Art is not only imitation but also the use of mathematical ideas and symmetry in the search for the perfect, the timeless....'
The article goes on:
'...and contrasting being with becoming. Nature is full of change, decay, and cycles, but art can also search for what is everlasting and the first causes of natural phenomena. Aristotle wrote about the idea of four causes in nature. The first formal cause is like a blueprint, or an immortal idea. The second cause is the material, or what a thing is made out of. The third cause is the process and the agent, in which the artist or creator makes the thing. The fourth cause is the good, or the purpose and end of a thing, known as telos.'
There's plenty more, but that's for you to look into, if you choose. This is plenty to chew on.
Wikipedia goes on about Aristotle's contribution, the beginning of which is:' Aristotle also defined mimesis as the perfection and imitation of nature. Art is not only imitation but also the use of mathematical ideas and symmetry in the search for the perfect, the timeless....'
The article goes on:
'...and contrasting being with becoming. Nature is full of change, decay, and cycles, but art can also search for what is everlasting and the first causes of natural phenomena. Aristotle wrote about the idea of four causes in nature. The first formal cause is like a blueprint, or an immortal idea. The second cause is the material, or what a thing is made out of. The third cause is the process and the agent, in which the artist or creator makes the thing. The fourth cause is the good, or the purpose and end of a thing, known as telos.'
There's plenty more, but that's for you to look into, if you choose. This is plenty to chew on.
Saturday, September 7, 2013
Wallace Shawn reads his work
A favorite actor of mine (also a playwright whose work I'm not familiar with) reads from his book of nonfiction essays, 'Essays.'
I feel a bit strange about this weird, since it seems to come from a place that's rather elitist and upper crust, a background and worldview (which he claims to be 'recovering from' in my view) I do not share, nothing about his seeming way of speaking from a stereotypical New York City centrism or, in some cases, generic left-wingery, is anything I identify with. But it's Wallace Shawn, so here he is:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=wmnSVEkSsoQ
*God, I think I like him less after hearing him read his work, here. All the hypocrisies and feelings of superiority he's pointing out to criticize here are abominable ways of thinking and being I have never shared in the first place. To me, they do not paint modern northeastern-upper-class-social-moderate-liberal-elites (the people who used to be Rockefeller Republicans and now vote Democratic because the modern GOP opposes gay marriage and is just too gauche for the dinner table, don't you think, Mr. Twiddlefingers) in a favorable light to me.
I feel a bit strange about this weird, since it seems to come from a place that's rather elitist and upper crust, a background and worldview (which he claims to be 'recovering from' in my view) I do not share, nothing about his seeming way of speaking from a stereotypical New York City centrism or, in some cases, generic left-wingery, is anything I identify with. But it's Wallace Shawn, so here he is:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=wmnSVEkSsoQ
*God, I think I like him less after hearing him read his work, here. All the hypocrisies and feelings of superiority he's pointing out to criticize here are abominable ways of thinking and being I have never shared in the first place. To me, they do not paint modern northeastern-upper-class-social-moderate-liberal-elites (the people who used to be Rockefeller Republicans and now vote Democratic because the modern GOP opposes gay marriage and is just too gauche for the dinner table, don't you think, Mr. Twiddlefingers) in a favorable light to me.
Saturday, August 31, 2013
'Massacres that would dwarf Hitler's or Ghengis Kahn's'
I wasn't aware of this quote.
“If the Zionists dare establish a state, the massacres we would unleash would dwarf anything which Genghis Khan and Hitler perpetrated.”
-Rahman Azzam Pasha, Secretary-General of the Arab League, April 30th 1946
Knew for a while that the 22 countries who collectively make up the Arab League (and suppress the 15-20 million strong Kurdish nation with assistance from Iran and the Turks) had made very clear they intended war in 1947-8, but this is a stronger statement from the secretary or an Arab head of state than I was aware of.
Here's another gem, from 1948, just as seven Arab armies began their assault on nascent Israel:“This will be a war of extermination and a momentous massacre which will be spoken of like the Mongolian massacres and the Crusades.”
-Rahman Azzam Pasha
My source is this Izrapundit post, which lionizes one of the Irgun's better moments. It's a terribly interesting read, but keep in mind as Konig speaks in glowing terms of the Irgun fighters that they would later commit the Jewish state's most prominent war crime, massacring nearly an entire Arab village with no tactical or strategic justification (the casualties were over 100), and then claiming to have killed even more than they had in order to terrify local Arabs into further flight (which was already ongoing) or compliance. Just saying. The Arabs may have failed in their attempt to wipe the Jewish state from the face of the earth, but Menachem Begin was as much murderer as hero.
“If the Zionists dare establish a state, the massacres we would unleash would dwarf anything which Genghis Khan and Hitler perpetrated.”
-Rahman Azzam Pasha, Secretary-General of the Arab League, April 30th 1946
Knew for a while that the 22 countries who collectively make up the Arab League (and suppress the 15-20 million strong Kurdish nation with assistance from Iran and the Turks) had made very clear they intended war in 1947-8, but this is a stronger statement from the secretary or an Arab head of state than I was aware of.
Here's another gem, from 1948, just as seven Arab armies began their assault on nascent Israel:“This will be a war of extermination and a momentous massacre which will be spoken of like the Mongolian massacres and the Crusades.”
-Rahman Azzam Pasha
My source is this Izrapundit post, which lionizes one of the Irgun's better moments. It's a terribly interesting read, but keep in mind as Konig speaks in glowing terms of the Irgun fighters that they would later commit the Jewish state's most prominent war crime, massacring nearly an entire Arab village with no tactical or strategic justification (the casualties were over 100), and then claiming to have killed even more than they had in order to terrify local Arabs into further flight (which was already ongoing) or compliance. Just saying. The Arabs may have failed in their attempt to wipe the Jewish state from the face of the earth, but Menachem Begin was as much murderer as hero.
Sunday, June 23, 2013
A bit of conversation on politics from social media
It began as a couple of apparently Libertarian fellows made, in my opinion, foolishly over-broad statements about the uniform evil of government, and I wished to preserve this conversation as, well, what it is (names and links redacted to preserve tender privacies, and I should clarify that, while I am sympathetic to a man who keeps it up when he's the only one left (notwithstanding a condescending statement or two on his part), I wish the quality of discourse were higher on all sides).
I should clarify, that none of us, neither the bear nor others weighing in on the same side, as it were, of this discussion, are, to my knowledge, folk who are insensitive to the phenomenon of government doing bad things sometimes and, more specifically, being penetrated by outside interests that subvert its aims. Nevertheless. To the content! (which includes a fairly large, if historically pretty grounded, rant my moi-meme):
I should clarify, that none of us, neither the bear nor others weighing in on the same side, as it were, of this discussion, are, to my knowledge, folk who are insensitive to the phenomenon of government doing bad things sometimes and, more specifically, being penetrated by outside interests that subvert its aims. Nevertheless. To the content! (which includes a fairly large, if historically pretty grounded, rant my moi-meme):
- (Enter a social media conversation in media res, as cynicism abounds in the wake of Edward Snowden releasing further details, with the immense evils of the US discussed. The charge that the US is entirely an immoral agent was broached by the author--who did not comment further, below:)
Cave Bear:
...As for the US not being a moral agent, well, tell that to all the women who'll be forced out of their businesses, out of school, out of driving [more rights listed]...etc., once the US leaves Af-Pak.
Tim a lot of people would also lose their jobs and become alcoholics if walmart were to leave my small town. it doesn't mean that walmart's central motives have anything to do with morality.- Cave Bear No. However, Wal-Mart employs people as a necessary part of its business model, and at the lowest cost possible, especially in benefits, whereas if the US were just interested in a gas pipeline across Afghanistan (as, by some accounts, the Bush administration partly was), they wouldn't bother trying to open thousands of schools to women or maintain law and order beyond what was minimally necessary to secure the path of such a pipeline; given how much money we spend on such wars--under administrations such as Obama's, which does not have ties to the energy industry, as well as Bush's--our strategic moves speak to larger and different goals than just creating profit for Halliburton. It's not like it's a subject that hasn't been intensively studied by security, geopolitics and energy experts the world over, and, no, the typical answer does not come down to 'they just want to create corporate profits.' But I suppose they could all be in on the conspiracy, couldn't they.
Kalju HOW MUCH ARE THEY PAYING YOU, YOU CORPORATE SHILL?- Tim: governments and most large corporations do good things to the extent that it serves their long term interests. they work to meet a certain quota of making citizens happy because it's simply easier that way. but it's still about the bottom line. it's still about maintaing, and expanding, the financial and political strength of the institution. sometimes good things can come out of that for secondary reasons. which is great, and we can all feel good about that. but no government or corporate institution uses their time and resources simply to go above and beyond, just for the goodness of the act in and of itself. and in 2013, it strange to me that anybody could even entertain that kind of illusion anymore. it's not conspiracy theory, it's blatant common sense.
- Cave Bear: Right, no government ever did anything good for the sake of that thing alone. It was all about power. I'll remember that when reconsidering the expansion of government power implied in the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Voting Rights Act of 1965, the Social Security Act of 1965--which did indeed, as Reagan warned us, lead to a descent into tyrranical socialism (and not just subsidized, cheap programs to provide much-needed health-care for the poor and elderly). In addition, I'll remember the use of US 'government power and resources' in the late 1940s and 1950 to rebuild Europe's economy through the Marshall plan, and facilitate West Germany's reconstruction to the point we could withdraw as they domestically elected their own democratic leadership--no doubt this increased our power over Germany above and beyond what we could have maintained through our US-appointed governor-generalship alone; after all, the US is widely regarded as the de facto suzerain of a unified Germany to this day, notwithstanding massive disagreements over economic and security policy.
I'll also have to review my assumption that US regulation of the financial industry starting with the Securities Act of 1933 was simply an attempt to stabilize the US economic system and avoid another Great Depression--indeed, in retrospect, it WAS primarily a power grab, wasn't it! Why, the financial titans of 1935-1980 could barely issue a single bad loan or leverage themselves up a single trillion dollars they didn't have without the government peeping over their shoulder! Good thing Reagan and his successors rolled back regulation starting in 1981, allowing the financial industry to be free and serve the common good since then; self-regulation is, indeed, a proven success.
In the meantime, I have to admit it's quite obvious that progressive movement era Federal outlawing of things like child labor was another power-grab over industry--they have never been truly at liberty, since. Simply a PR-friendly excuse to extend the heavy hand of state power over the virtuous entrepreneurs and managers who wished to use the willingly given labor of vigorous, red-cheeked ten-year olds at ten cents an hour to power American dynamism into the twentieth century. And Theodore Roosevelt was clearly wrong to use the power of government to protect the interests of the broader populace from private monopolization of industry through his (in retrospect, widely despised) 'trust busting' and other laws aimed--we were told--to 'increase competition and fairness in the marketplace.' Granted, prices did come down in monopolized industries for a while, making previously unaffordable products available to the growing middle class (created partly through the heinous power of trade-unions, government-sanctioned since the Wagner Act to negotiate on an even basis with employers for a fair portion of profits), but at what cost to the abstract principles of freedom? Freedom for big business, I mean, obviously. Not for, like, regular people who don't possess institutional and corporate power on their own--such members of society do best when following the directions of captains of industry; as we can see, this system functions better, today in the modern economy, when government support of 'unions' and 'competition' has been rolled back in favor of greater control of the marketplace by the large, private enterprises which form the backbone of our free society. Yes, wages are down a little, and 121% of the economic benefits of the recovery have been captured by the top 1% of Americans, while the middle class lacks the bargaining power or legal protection to maintain its economic status, but is this not a small price to pay for greater freedom from the heavy, self-serving hand of government? Were not the Bush II years truly a miracle of the free market? Why, eight-million jobs were created during his era, until five million were lost at the end (temporarily! A blip!) and several million more during the first months of his successor. Granted, the peaks of the 21st century economy never quite approached those of the 1960s, when government played such a larger role in regulating clean air, workplace safety, and all that nonsense, and unemployment typically hovered around 3 or 4%--but at what cost, then, to the cherished ideals of our nation, to the businessman's freedom to work his employees to the bone without paying them a dime more than strictly necessary for them to survive? --And they are free, free to quit, we must remember, at any time! There are other jobs to be had, after all--well, actually, no there aren't--still four applicants available for every opening, nationwide, but the theory, you must admit, is truly beautiful, and has served us well, in the sense that our economic performance has been very nearly half as good since the age of Reagan started than during the oppressive era in our history--in which Americans generally trusted and expected government to do the right thing and protect their interests--we now know, ironically, as the 'New Deal Coalition' era of 1932-1970.
We must always, and eternally, remember Reagan's formulation, in 1981, that 'government is the problem'! And reject, with our ballots and our minds and all the energy of our meager hearts, such foolish thoughts of FDR's or TR's as 'The only sure bulwark of continuing liberty is a government strong enough to protect the interests of the people, and a people strong enough and well enough informed to maintain its sovereign control over the goverment.' Fools, both of them--I mean, granted, the former led us successfully through our greatest economic crisis, returning us to prosperity from 25% unemployment, and also used a wing of the government known as 'the military' to defeat the most dangerous threat to human civilization the world has ever known (I forget the name, Nazi-ism, Fascism, something--it doesn't really matter--in any case, FDR wasn't able to maintain his dictatorial powers, as the US dissolved 93% or so of its forces after the war, ending his power-grab and allowing freedom to be restored), but that is really minor stuff, the exception that proves the rule. - Kalju careful, [redacted] is [flattering statement, in which I am likened to a steamroller, also redacted out of embarrassment]
Clancy The claim that the government ONLY serves capitalism is insane. As a critical theorist, I'm sensitive to the idea that capitalism infiltrates and dictates the trajectory of much legislation. To say that the ONLY thing the government is after is its own bottom line I rank right up there with the worst a priori, unsubstantiated, unprovable and inane drivel that the Tea Party vomits out on a regular basis. It's the worst sort of naive, unresearched and useless kind of accusation that is neither productive nor generative of useful discourse.- Kalju clancy's more wrecking ball, apparently
- Tim you guys think too much.
- Kalju thank you sir5 hours ago · Unlike · 2
- Clancy Yea, I'll take that.5 hours ago · Unlike · 1
In fairness, the gentleman exited with grace thereafter.
Friday, June 7, 2013
Why deploy a peace-keeping force if you're going to leave at the first sign of opposition!?
Austria to the mideast: 'Now that the Golan has actually become a security issue, and our soldiers might have to do their job (and a Filipino soldier has been 'injured'), we are withdrawing them from the peacekeeping force there. It's unacceptable to us to keep soldiers deployed if they might face danger.'
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jun/06/israel-angry-austria-golan-heights
"PS: Remember how the UN had 30,000+ troops in Cambodia in the 90s to safeguard democratic elections and enforce a transition to peaceful governance...but we didn't actually support the democratic winners in implementing the results of those elections after militias threatened violence--because holding the line on our mandate would have disturbed the peace--and let the loser, Hun Sen, formerly of the Khmer Rouge, take power as part of a coalition, and then execute a coup to become sole dictator of the country? This is sort of like that. If you're confused about the point of deploying troops to enforce a UN mandate without the will to even keep them there when ancillary conflicts suggest potential danger, we share your confusion, but we're leaving anyway."
</end rant>
From the article:
'In Israel, the troop withdrawal was read as a betrayal of the United Nation's commitment to regional security, pledged during Israeli disengagement from Syria in 1974. Austria, along with troops from India and the Philippines, has provided a critical portion of the United Nations Disengagement Observer Force (Undof) charged with ensuring quiet on this sensitive border for the past 40 years.
"The only reason you want anyone there in the first place is in time of trouble," one senior Israeli official told the Guardian. "For the first time in 40 years, it's not easy so the presence ends? That sends a very problematic message to the Israeli public.
"This means that in any future deal with the Palestinians, we won't accept any disengagement forces from the United Nations because at the first sign of trouble, they'll disappear." '
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jun/06/israel-angry-austria-golan-heights
"If our peacekeeping missions ever become
bothersome to the regional ambitions of any of your actors, just make enough
noise and 'chaos' so it looks like we might actually have to fight someone, and
we'll just withdraw. We are completely useless."
- Austria"PS: Remember how the UN had 30,000+ troops in Cambodia in the 90s to safeguard democratic elections and enforce a transition to peaceful governance...but we didn't actually support the democratic winners in implementing the results of those elections after militias threatened violence--because holding the line on our mandate would have disturbed the peace--and let the loser, Hun Sen, formerly of the Khmer Rouge, take power as part of a coalition, and then execute a coup to become sole dictator of the country? This is sort of like that. If you're confused about the point of deploying troops to enforce a UN mandate without the will to even keep them there when ancillary conflicts suggest potential danger, we share your confusion, but we're leaving anyway."
</end rant>
From the article:
'In Israel, the troop withdrawal was read as a betrayal of the United Nation's commitment to regional security, pledged during Israeli disengagement from Syria in 1974. Austria, along with troops from India and the Philippines, has provided a critical portion of the United Nations Disengagement Observer Force (Undof) charged with ensuring quiet on this sensitive border for the past 40 years.
"The only reason you want anyone there in the first place is in time of trouble," one senior Israeli official told the Guardian. "For the first time in 40 years, it's not easy so the presence ends? That sends a very problematic message to the Israeli public.
"This means that in any future deal with the Palestinians, we won't accept any disengagement forces from the United Nations because at the first sign of trouble, they'll disappear." '
Thursday, May 30, 2013
Clonable mammoth? (corpse found with liquid blood)
The frozen (but not too frozen) body of a mammoth has been found in Siberia in pure ice, with perfectly preserved muscle tissue 'the natural red color of fresh meat' and liquid blood that ran out of the corpse when it was penetrated. I suppose it's extremely unlikely that, even though the blood was liquid at present, it hasn't been frozen and unfrozen many times in the last ten-thousand years, eliminating the likelihood of intact cells. Still:http://talkingpointsmemo.com/news/russians-find-mammoth-carcass-with-liquid-blood.php?ref=fpb
Wednesday, May 15, 2013
more crap
“When those you love deeply reject you, leave you, or die, your heart
will be broken. But that should not hold you back from loving deeply.
The pain that comes from deep love makes your love ever more fruitful.”
What the fuck does that even mean? The pain that comes from 'deep love' lost makes your love better somehow...? 'More fruitful'? How does that even apply when the first part of the statement is about love that's lost, and thus there's...nothing left except a broken system, pain attached to an object that's no longer there, so the whole thing's dysfunctional except as an evolutionary deterrent for casually discarding relationships (I assume this is its function), or...maybe not even that; perhaps the pain is just a side-effect of the way our brains form and dissolve attachments? (though this seems unlikely from what little we know--somewhere along the line, evolution decided to light up the anterior subgenual cingulate cortex when relationships are dissolved, in the case of an unwanted breakup, anyway--something that appears to be normally reserved for other purposes [unpleasant ones, like being depressed] ).
So, the original quote sounds like BS to me: circular Western new age optimism masquerading as a deep thought. Nothing more--a useful delusion to some, but grossly insensitive to those with difficulty controlling and living through the pain of a broken heart.
I see little value in 'the pain that comes from deep love.' In my experience, it very unfortunately transforms memories and associations once positive into points of bitterness and pain difficult to speak of or think about, and which can make it hard to converse with the relevant person without a great deal of restraint and social fakery.
All I can say is that I'm determined to let such pain impress itself on my psyche and control my life and actions as little as possible, and to prevent, as far as I can, the bitterness from finding foothold in me now and in the future.
Such a shallow quote.
What the fuck does that even mean? The pain that comes from 'deep love' lost makes your love better somehow...? 'More fruitful'? How does that even apply when the first part of the statement is about love that's lost, and thus there's...nothing left except a broken system, pain attached to an object that's no longer there, so the whole thing's dysfunctional except as an evolutionary deterrent for casually discarding relationships (I assume this is its function), or...maybe not even that; perhaps the pain is just a side-effect of the way our brains form and dissolve attachments? (though this seems unlikely from what little we know--somewhere along the line, evolution decided to light up the anterior subgenual cingulate cortex when relationships are dissolved, in the case of an unwanted breakup, anyway--something that appears to be normally reserved for other purposes [unpleasant ones, like being depressed] ).
So, the original quote sounds like BS to me: circular Western new age optimism masquerading as a deep thought. Nothing more--a useful delusion to some, but grossly insensitive to those with difficulty controlling and living through the pain of a broken heart.
I see little value in 'the pain that comes from deep love.' In my experience, it very unfortunately transforms memories and associations once positive into points of bitterness and pain difficult to speak of or think about, and which can make it hard to converse with the relevant person without a great deal of restraint and social fakery.
All I can say is that I'm determined to let such pain impress itself on my psyche and control my life and actions as little as possible, and to prevent, as far as I can, the bitterness from finding foothold in me now and in the future.
Such a shallow quote.
Tuesday, May 14, 2013
passionate temperaments and changing the world blah blah blah
“intense experience and suffering instruct us in ways that less intense
emotions can never do . . . and that those who have particularly
passionate temperaments and questioning minds leave the world a
different place for their having been there.”
I guess. If they can get out of bed in the morning, first.
I guess. If they can get out of bed in the morning, first.
Friday, May 10, 2013
Digression: Why Ariel Castro (the kidnapper) may deserve death for abuse and kidnapping of 3 women, including 5 forced miscarriages
'On Thursday, Cuyahoga County prosecutor Tim McGinty said the murder
charges were based on evidence from Michelle Knight that Mr Castro had
impregnated her, then physically abused and starved her in order to
induce five miscarriages while she was being held captive in his house
in Cleveland.'
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-22475771 (via UltraMorgnus)
Complex case, or beacon of moral clarity? Maneuverings to establish precedent to punish those who induce abortions as murderers, or not?
IMO, these men's heinous crimes should make them liable for the death penalty regardless of whether a murder, per se, occurred [the Democratic prosecutor is attempting to charge Ariel Castro with murder for five forced miscarriages]. I do agree with one Ethan Bremner that forcing a woman to miscarry should be a crime substantially beyond simple assault, though it should not qualify as murder--Roe vs Wade was correct, philosophically and ethically, IMO, in locating the crix of the abortion debate in whether an embryo or fetus is a 'person': a fetus isn't developed enough before birth to have the capacity for anything we'd recognize as cognition, emotion, personhood, or a soul, medical science shows--notwithstanding propaganda culled selectively from ultrasound videos by dishonest right-wing propagandists (and more sincere folk who pass on such info) which appears to suggest the opposite. Anyway, though I'd note that we're very strongly evolutionarily driven, psychologically, to interpret a fetus as a person, and that Roe vs Wade's -legal- (as opposed to ethical) arguments seem to me quite thin (though the right to privacy the case used to protect women's rights to choice in the first two trimesters with that ruling was drawn from the establishment clause of the 14th amendment, not the 'penumbra' of several sections of the bill of rights, contrary to what the right has claimed [the 14th amendment is a stronger argument] ), Justice Blackmun was correct ethically in his ruling, and it is indeed the ETHICS of this issue that, IMO, should guide our consideration of the appropriate punishment for Ariel Castro and his accomplices--not a set of laws 226 years old which are nearly impossible to amend and which did not provide for many future controversies, and which, by the way, originally restricted full citizenship to white mean of wealth (specifically, those who owned substantial amounts of property), and counted blacks as 60% of a human being for demographic purposes (so the slave-states would have more representation in Congress, though of course only rich white planters and their friends could elect that representation).
I digress. If Mr. Castro is guilty of what he's accused of, try him, ascertain his guilt in a speedy trial, and execute the bastard, fake murders or no. Keeping (and abusing) kidnapped female sex slaves for ten years is quite enough to warrant that; murder is not the only horrific crime commensurate with punishment through execution. Most societies have understood this throughout history; it's only as the modern, western elites have become insulated from the darker realities of life--the millions of (relative) innocents dying of hunger and repression every year, that anti-capital punishment views have become at all widespread (majorities of the populace in nearly all of Europe still favor its return). It's obviously unjust that Milosevic was allowed by the Europeans to slaughter hundreds of thousands before he eventually lived out his life in a cushy cell in the hague until the end of an interminably long trial. That did nothing at all of value except allow the calculating, xenophobic dictator-murderer to die a natural death, thus evading any legal punishment for his crimes against the human race.
Let Ariel Castro be dispatched fairly and efficiently, with the maximum sentence the law allows (no, this does not include murder charges), if the charges are proven, and let states alter their laws hereafter to allow the execution of others who commit such heinous crimes.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-22475771 (via UltraMorgnus)
Complex case, or beacon of moral clarity? Maneuverings to establish precedent to punish those who induce abortions as murderers, or not?
IMO, these men's heinous crimes should make them liable for the death penalty regardless of whether a murder, per se, occurred [the Democratic prosecutor is attempting to charge Ariel Castro with murder for five forced miscarriages]. I do agree with one Ethan Bremner that forcing a woman to miscarry should be a crime substantially beyond simple assault, though it should not qualify as murder--Roe vs Wade was correct, philosophically and ethically, IMO, in locating the crix of the abortion debate in whether an embryo or fetus is a 'person': a fetus isn't developed enough before birth to have the capacity for anything we'd recognize as cognition, emotion, personhood, or a soul, medical science shows--notwithstanding propaganda culled selectively from ultrasound videos by dishonest right-wing propagandists (and more sincere folk who pass on such info) which appears to suggest the opposite. Anyway, though I'd note that we're very strongly evolutionarily driven, psychologically, to interpret a fetus as a person, and that Roe vs Wade's -legal- (as opposed to ethical) arguments seem to me quite thin (though the right to privacy the case used to protect women's rights to choice in the first two trimesters with that ruling was drawn from the establishment clause of the 14th amendment, not the 'penumbra' of several sections of the bill of rights, contrary to what the right has claimed [the 14th amendment is a stronger argument] ), Justice Blackmun was correct ethically in his ruling, and it is indeed the ETHICS of this issue that, IMO, should guide our consideration of the appropriate punishment for Ariel Castro and his accomplices--not a set of laws 226 years old which are nearly impossible to amend and which did not provide for many future controversies, and which, by the way, originally restricted full citizenship to white mean of wealth (specifically, those who owned substantial amounts of property), and counted blacks as 60% of a human being for demographic purposes (so the slave-states would have more representation in Congress, though of course only rich white planters and their friends could elect that representation).
I digress. If Mr. Castro is guilty of what he's accused of, try him, ascertain his guilt in a speedy trial, and execute the bastard, fake murders or no. Keeping (and abusing) kidnapped female sex slaves for ten years is quite enough to warrant that; murder is not the only horrific crime commensurate with punishment through execution. Most societies have understood this throughout history; it's only as the modern, western elites have become insulated from the darker realities of life--the millions of (relative) innocents dying of hunger and repression every year, that anti-capital punishment views have become at all widespread (majorities of the populace in nearly all of Europe still favor its return). It's obviously unjust that Milosevic was allowed by the Europeans to slaughter hundreds of thousands before he eventually lived out his life in a cushy cell in the hague until the end of an interminably long trial. That did nothing at all of value except allow the calculating, xenophobic dictator-murderer to die a natural death, thus evading any legal punishment for his crimes against the human race.
Let Ariel Castro be dispatched fairly and efficiently, with the maximum sentence the law allows (no, this does not include murder charges), if the charges are proven, and let states alter their laws hereafter to allow the execution of others who commit such heinous crimes.
Friday, April 5, 2013
RR Martin links
Ross Douthat, the intellectually honest, socially conservative young New York Times columnist, is apparently a fantasy reader, and has an article and a link for us:
"Lanchester comes up with several reasons (besides, of course, the whole HBO thing) why Martin has managed to break out of the ghetto, including his ruthless willingness to kill his darlings (the major characters, that is) and the fact that his world is “low magic” and thus more accessible to people allergic to magic rings and wizard’s orbs. These are excellent points, to which I’d add that the whole “Wars of the Roses”-style frame that Martin’s story uses — the emphasis on gritty dynastic politics — lets him exploit what I’ve always thought was fantasy’s most underappreciated advantage as a genre: It’s ability to benefit from feudalism’s gift to fiction — the intermingling of family relationships and political machinations that so many historical stories, from Shakespeare’s York-Lancaster plays down to Hilary Mantel’s books today, rely on for their power — but with the added narrative bonus that even the best-informed the reader won’t have any idea how the fantasist’s story of betrayals and beheadings ultimately turns out."
http://douthat.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/03/29/games-of-thrones-and-the-fantasy-authors-challenge/
These meditations were inspired in part by this enthusiastic article on fantasy and the 'Game of Thrones' phenomenon (the tv show as much as the novel) in the 'London Review of Books':
http://www.lrb.co.uk/v35/n07/john-lanchester/when-did-you-get-hooked
"The climate change aspect of this is obvious to the contemporary audience, but there’s something more subtle and subtextual at work here too: another economic metaphor, another kind of difficult climate. Westeros is like our own world, in which hard times have arrived, and no one feels immune from their consequences, and no one knows how long the freeze will last. Our freeze is economic, but still. Put these two components together, and even the fantasy-averse, surely, can start to see the contemporary appeal of this story, this world. It’s a universe in which nobody is secure, and the climate is getting steadily harder, and no one knows when the good weather will return."
"Lanchester comes up with several reasons (besides, of course, the whole HBO thing) why Martin has managed to break out of the ghetto, including his ruthless willingness to kill his darlings (the major characters, that is) and the fact that his world is “low magic” and thus more accessible to people allergic to magic rings and wizard’s orbs. These are excellent points, to which I’d add that the whole “Wars of the Roses”-style frame that Martin’s story uses — the emphasis on gritty dynastic politics — lets him exploit what I’ve always thought was fantasy’s most underappreciated advantage as a genre: It’s ability to benefit from feudalism’s gift to fiction — the intermingling of family relationships and political machinations that so many historical stories, from Shakespeare’s York-Lancaster plays down to Hilary Mantel’s books today, rely on for their power — but with the added narrative bonus that even the best-informed the reader won’t have any idea how the fantasist’s story of betrayals and beheadings ultimately turns out."
http://douthat.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/03/29/games-of-thrones-and-the-fantasy-authors-challenge/
These meditations were inspired in part by this enthusiastic article on fantasy and the 'Game of Thrones' phenomenon (the tv show as much as the novel) in the 'London Review of Books':
http://www.lrb.co.uk/v35/n07/john-lanchester/when-did-you-get-hooked
"The climate change aspect of this is obvious to the contemporary audience, but there’s something more subtle and subtextual at work here too: another economic metaphor, another kind of difficult climate. Westeros is like our own world, in which hard times have arrived, and no one feels immune from their consequences, and no one knows how long the freeze will last. Our freeze is economic, but still. Put these two components together, and even the fantasy-averse, surely, can start to see the contemporary appeal of this story, this world. It’s a universe in which nobody is secure, and the climate is getting steadily harder, and no one knows when the good weather will return."
Sunday, March 31, 2013
Magic from Myth through Legend to the Present
Or 'presents,' actually--there have been a few of them, and we expect more, not to mention the fictional ones
Some discussion has occurred lately concerning the nature of magic, its limitations, and its history, in fantasy literature--old and new (and perhaps yet to be created):
http://doomthatcame.wordpress.com/2013/03/27/places-of-power/
Some have suggested (in the comments section to the blog above) that: " If you want to have the fantasy universe bear a strong resemblance to the real pre-industrial Earth, that requires that the available magic be sharply limited" (Doom goes on to explain that this leads him to write magic as a clandestine activity, with problems of associated sinisterness).
I think there are other ways of viewing magic, in literature we read and that we create, and that perhaps some of the other angles have actually been more successful. Specifically, I think another way of approaching the limitations in magic is to adopt the medieval (pagan) way of viewing such things: we have all sorts of legends, and many phenomena which are outside human control, yet the present day we see around us is rather clearly devoid of obvious magic. Combining that with their creation and other myths, it becomes natural to write as if many magical elements have passed out of the world or become more secret, replaced by a more prosaic age of man, with magical knowledge lost as well. Yet, there's a sense among those who put their thoughts down on paper that, especially as you travel farther back in time, and get into times which are part-legend and part-history, you're more likely to credit (and write down) perfectly reasonable assertions such as that Egil Skallagrimsson, the ninth century viking, came from a family who were werewolves or berserks on one side (it's not clear to what extent those two concepts overlapped in Germanic lore and custom; there is evidence of both for Egil's grandfather, and Berserk means 'bear shirt,' but the historical memory of them by 1200 [i.e. the age of sagas] seems to be rather dim). Another (huge) man who features early in that story--his name is Bjorgolf, and he's a northern local lord in Norway--has 'hill-giant blood' in his family. All this, including a later companion of Egil's, strong and doughty, of whom it's said 'people were of two minds over whether he was a shape-changer' comes from a text probably written just after 1200, but it's clear from other texts that Norwegians and Icelanders widely regarded a certain queen Gunnhild, wife of Eirik Bloodaxe (son of Harald Fine-hair) to have been skilled in witchcraft.
As for wizards, there's a sense in 'Egil's Saga' (obviously the one I've looked into most recently) of knowledge fading; an attempt at love-runes succeeds only in making its target ill, until the story's hero destroys them and makes a new set of runes. It's even suggested that Eirik was driven out of Norway by his brother Hakon due to a rune-stick planted against him by Egil (after King Eirik refused to give Egil justice in a legal matter), though it's deliberately left ambiguous whether there's any causality there.
If you take this idea to its logical extension, and assume that this Saga, like 'Sagas of Norwegian Kings' (which includes important legendary and mythic material at the beginning, some of it translated from myth into quasi-mortal legend) and 'The Prose Edda,' were all indeed 'put together' by Snorri Sturluson, then one can see a pretty clear line from a Cosmogony and age of As and other gods, and great works of creation, down through an age of (more active) gods and giants and a Midgard (i.e. our world) filled with heroes, wizards, and artifacts like the sword gram ('angry'), sharp enough to cut out a dragon's heart or slice apart a piece of willow fluff floating downstream toward its edge (and whose poetic material and brilliant 'Volsunga Saga' may be based on distant, 5th century Burgundian (a German tribe) characters...to the more proximate age of vikings (say, Egil's ninth century), when some magic was still remembered, a troll still found in the mountains here and there and Berserks (who may have been warriors who either used drugs or animal-god rituals to whip themselves into a frenzy fearful in battle, or else have had some other connection to bear and wolf spirits or gods--though I'd add Kveldulf's ['evening wolf') example of falling weak and ill after a battle, a phenomenon makes clear was known among Berserks, may suggest some sort of drug hangover in the days after a battle--still surrounded Norway's founding king, even if the texts no longer seem to remember quite what they were, and the occasional troll can still be found hiding up in the hills.
...And from there down to the present day, i.e. the 'present' of 1150 or 1250, when the sagas were written, or else the 'present' of a fantasy world with echoes of more powerful or active gods and sages in previous days. People might still go to an old woman for runes bearing Othin's wisdom (and, crucially, his name and deeds), but Christianity was otherwise central to the culture, and everyone could look around them and tell that if magic really had once been so pervasive as it was in the age of Sigurd, or Egil, or Woland--or Cuchulainn and Conall Cernach and Oisin; or Rama and Lakshman (and Hanuman); or Moses--then it had rather clearly faded. The Christian priest had control of the society's most important mystic powers (including over your soul), and no one quite seemed to know if Maponos had originally been a great hero...or the Sun God himself.
The main problem with this viewpoint, of course, this way of rendering and dealing with magic, is that our friend JRR has beaten this horse half to death in his latter work, 'The Lord of the Rings,' so filled with echoes of a past so much greater (why didn't he just write about that, if it was so much more goddamn magical? huh?). And writers influenced by him have since then beaten the horse another quarter of the way to oblivion. So one does need to be careful.
For an alternative, authored by the most influential fantasy author of the first half of the 20th century ('The Hobbit' may have been published before the war, but its influence wasn't felt until at least the 1950s), and quite possibly of the whole thing (hint: probably no Tolkien without him), I put forth 'The King of Elfland's Daughter':
http://www.powells.com/biblio/1-9780345431912-10
It's Edward Plunkett, Lord Dunsany's almost-masterwork, and its influence is clear in the writing of Michael Moorcock, among many others. And whoever buys this copy gets to support the world's greatest bookstore, which is a positive good to humanity (and which has a truly impressive selection of old and new books at reasonable prices). As for the plot?: 'we would be ruled by a magic lord' (further hint: be careful what you wish for...).
(PS - I'm sure Amazon has copies, too. Just search for 'elfland's daughter')
I have to go write some pages of my own, now, which, not coincidentally, include my own version of a search for magic. So Happy Easter (named for Eoster, presumed to be a West-Germanic fertility goddess, probably associated with the dawn. And bunnies, obviously) for 2013 (or whenever you're reading this), everyone.
-Randall (Anglosaxon for 'noble wolf')
Some discussion has occurred lately concerning the nature of magic, its limitations, and its history, in fantasy literature--old and new (and perhaps yet to be created):
http://doomthatcame.wordpress.com/2013/03/27/places-of-power/
Some have suggested (in the comments section to the blog above) that: " If you want to have the fantasy universe bear a strong resemblance to the real pre-industrial Earth, that requires that the available magic be sharply limited" (Doom goes on to explain that this leads him to write magic as a clandestine activity, with problems of associated sinisterness).
I think there are other ways of viewing magic, in literature we read and that we create, and that perhaps some of the other angles have actually been more successful. Specifically, I think another way of approaching the limitations in magic is to adopt the medieval (pagan) way of viewing such things: we have all sorts of legends, and many phenomena which are outside human control, yet the present day we see around us is rather clearly devoid of obvious magic. Combining that with their creation and other myths, it becomes natural to write as if many magical elements have passed out of the world or become more secret, replaced by a more prosaic age of man, with magical knowledge lost as well. Yet, there's a sense among those who put their thoughts down on paper that, especially as you travel farther back in time, and get into times which are part-legend and part-history, you're more likely to credit (and write down) perfectly reasonable assertions such as that Egil Skallagrimsson, the ninth century viking, came from a family who were werewolves or berserks on one side (it's not clear to what extent those two concepts overlapped in Germanic lore and custom; there is evidence of both for Egil's grandfather, and Berserk means 'bear shirt,' but the historical memory of them by 1200 [i.e. the age of sagas] seems to be rather dim). Another (huge) man who features early in that story--his name is Bjorgolf, and he's a northern local lord in Norway--has 'hill-giant blood' in his family. All this, including a later companion of Egil's, strong and doughty, of whom it's said 'people were of two minds over whether he was a shape-changer' comes from a text probably written just after 1200, but it's clear from other texts that Norwegians and Icelanders widely regarded a certain queen Gunnhild, wife of Eirik Bloodaxe (son of Harald Fine-hair) to have been skilled in witchcraft.
As for wizards, there's a sense in 'Egil's Saga' (obviously the one I've looked into most recently) of knowledge fading; an attempt at love-runes succeeds only in making its target ill, until the story's hero destroys them and makes a new set of runes. It's even suggested that Eirik was driven out of Norway by his brother Hakon due to a rune-stick planted against him by Egil (after King Eirik refused to give Egil justice in a legal matter), though it's deliberately left ambiguous whether there's any causality there.
If you take this idea to its logical extension, and assume that this Saga, like 'Sagas of Norwegian Kings' (which includes important legendary and mythic material at the beginning, some of it translated from myth into quasi-mortal legend) and 'The Prose Edda,' were all indeed 'put together' by Snorri Sturluson, then one can see a pretty clear line from a Cosmogony and age of As and other gods, and great works of creation, down through an age of (more active) gods and giants and a Midgard (i.e. our world) filled with heroes, wizards, and artifacts like the sword gram ('angry'), sharp enough to cut out a dragon's heart or slice apart a piece of willow fluff floating downstream toward its edge (and whose poetic material and brilliant 'Volsunga Saga' may be based on distant, 5th century Burgundian (a German tribe) characters...to the more proximate age of vikings (say, Egil's ninth century), when some magic was still remembered, a troll still found in the mountains here and there and Berserks (who may have been warriors who either used drugs or animal-god rituals to whip themselves into a frenzy fearful in battle, or else have had some other connection to bear and wolf spirits or gods--though I'd add Kveldulf's ['evening wolf') example of falling weak and ill after a battle, a phenomenon makes clear was known among Berserks, may suggest some sort of drug hangover in the days after a battle--still surrounded Norway's founding king, even if the texts no longer seem to remember quite what they were, and the occasional troll can still be found hiding up in the hills.
...And from there down to the present day, i.e. the 'present' of 1150 or 1250, when the sagas were written, or else the 'present' of a fantasy world with echoes of more powerful or active gods and sages in previous days. People might still go to an old woman for runes bearing Othin's wisdom (and, crucially, his name and deeds), but Christianity was otherwise central to the culture, and everyone could look around them and tell that if magic really had once been so pervasive as it was in the age of Sigurd, or Egil, or Woland--or Cuchulainn and Conall Cernach and Oisin; or Rama and Lakshman (and Hanuman); or Moses--then it had rather clearly faded. The Christian priest had control of the society's most important mystic powers (including over your soul), and no one quite seemed to know if Maponos had originally been a great hero...or the Sun God himself.
The main problem with this viewpoint, of course, this way of rendering and dealing with magic, is that our friend JRR has beaten this horse half to death in his latter work, 'The Lord of the Rings,' so filled with echoes of a past so much greater (why didn't he just write about that, if it was so much more goddamn magical? huh?). And writers influenced by him have since then beaten the horse another quarter of the way to oblivion. So one does need to be careful.
For an alternative, authored by the most influential fantasy author of the first half of the 20th century ('The Hobbit' may have been published before the war, but its influence wasn't felt until at least the 1950s), and quite possibly of the whole thing (hint: probably no Tolkien without him), I put forth 'The King of Elfland's Daughter':
http://www.powells.com/biblio/1-9780345431912-10
It's Edward Plunkett, Lord Dunsany's almost-masterwork, and its influence is clear in the writing of Michael Moorcock, among many others. And whoever buys this copy gets to support the world's greatest bookstore, which is a positive good to humanity (and which has a truly impressive selection of old and new books at reasonable prices). As for the plot?: 'we would be ruled by a magic lord' (further hint: be careful what you wish for...).
(PS - I'm sure Amazon has copies, too. Just search for 'elfland's daughter')
I have to go write some pages of my own, now, which, not coincidentally, include my own version of a search for magic. So Happy Easter (named for Eoster, presumed to be a West-Germanic fertility goddess, probably associated with the dawn. And bunnies, obviously) for 2013 (or whenever you're reading this), everyone.
-Randall (Anglosaxon for 'noble wolf')
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