tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-41027322011-06-21T13:23:49.480-07:00The Clairvoyant ZoopraxiscopeThe daily journal/repository of Max Winter.Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.comBlogger831100tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1146832959566626192006-05-05T05:36:00.000-07:002006-08-01T01:49:26.503-07:00I tried, and failed, to watch Mike Figgis' Time Code last night. And in fact, I intend to return the movie to Netflix this morning. I was pleasantly distracted, at first, by the quadruple split-screen approach Figgis was using. I was also moved by the real-time quality of a lot of the action. And then I became upset, and then I fell asleep. Perhaps I was drowsy to begin with--I'd been out for Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1146417655955557212006-04-30T10:14:00.000-07:002007-02-21T02:48:19.533-08:00Just watched, again, Band of Outsiders. Fine work--what has happened to French cinema? I guess that's an old question. This just seemed so full of energy and life and spirit... has something happened to France? Watched, also, Code Unknown, which the critics I respect hated but really moved me...Have added J. Robert Lennon's Pieces for the Left Hand to the roster--100 short-shorts, seemingly of Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1144641430151422812006-04-09T20:51:00.000-07:002006-04-11T18:57:38.013-07:00Am reading Orhan Pamuk's Snow and Jonathan Lethem's Fortress of Solitude, having finished the Wahloo and the Malcolm. I have added A Sentimental Education. I also finished the Ryan and the St. John, both decent. None of these are terribly recent releases, which is a relief. I find myself perpetually trying to draw parallels between the events in the Flaubert and contemporary life--not sure if Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1143308172119006352006-03-25T09:25:00.000-08:002006-03-25T09:36:12.130-08:00Am reading Kay Ryan's Niagara Falls and David St. John's The Face right now. These too are more conservative than writers I might normally read, but also not. Ryan's poems have an odd, abrupt way of ending, and St. John's poems have spontaneity in them which I enjoy, even if they do talk about what Donald Rumsfeld would call "known unknowns." Am also reading The Poisonwood Bible, alongside a bookMaxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1141399856957369802006-03-03T07:25:00.000-08:002006-03-03T07:30:56.970-08:00Billy Wilder, Billy Wilder, Billy Wilder... I watched Irma La Douce the other night, and was totally impressed by Shirley Maclaine and Jack Lemmon. Their performances carry the performances of every other actor in the movie. It occurs to me that, over time, movies have tried less hard because the filmmakers have more and more resources. Entertainment has become a matter of technology, not sweat. Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1140576269447077342006-02-21T18:41:00.000-08:002006-02-21T18:44:29.456-08:00I could be wrong, but I feel as if I have been listening to music a lot more than I have been reading lately, which has led to my paying a lot more attention to lyrics. Used to be I just viewed lyrics as an extension of the music, not even really that important unless they were good lyrics. But now...Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1140409784192688702006-02-19T20:29:00.000-08:002007-04-09T18:43:16.910-07:00I and some of my nearest and dearest are starting a Dennis Hopper for President campaign. Anyone interested?Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1140409734688074162006-02-19T20:20:00.000-08:002007-02-06T03:13:07.436-08:00Tried, and failed, to watch 2046 tonight. Not sure what it is that held me back. Being what am and doing what I do, I should be drawn to films with less narrative structure. But the problem with the film, ultimately, was that the lack of narrative wasn't leading to anything, specifically, other than unspecified sadness, unnameable loneliness. The visuals are indeed nice, cannot complain about Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1139362797495141652006-02-07T17:32:00.000-08:002006-02-07T17:39:57.510-08:00On the subway I saw someone who looked a lot like Crispin Glover, followed by someone who looked a lot like Alec Baldwin, follwoed by someone who looked a lot like Jeff Daniels, followed by someone who looked a lot like Jennifer Lopez, followed by someone who looked a lot like Spalding Gray, followed by someone who looked a lot like Spalding Gray, followed by someone who looked a lot like John Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1138545831953204222006-01-29T06:42:00.000-08:002006-01-29T06:43:51.953-08:00Well, it's finally happened. Someone found my blog by doing a search for the phrase "open up a can of whoop ass." I feel like the eagle has landed, or at least like the universe is a funnier place than I thought it was.Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1138491125668140162006-01-28T15:25:00.000-08:002006-01-30T12:00:04.060-08:00If you're thinking something, chances are someone else is thinking it too.If you're eating something, chances are someone else is eating that same food.If you're hitting something, chances are someone else is hitting something too.If you're looking at something, chances are someone else is looking at something too.If you're drinking a glass of room-temperature water, chances are someone else, Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1138254425924986212006-01-25T21:44:00.000-08:002006-01-25T21:47:05.936-08:00Saw, on the subway coming home from work, three men spontaneously strike up a conversation. They didn't know each other but within seconds they were telling details about their life histories, smiling and laughing as if they were old friends. Later on a subway platform, I saw two isolated groups of men patting each other on the back, strangely gently. It made me wonder if this is in fact an Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1136809619263955512006-01-09T04:19:00.000-08:002007-02-05T15:13:42.080-08:00I suppose there are different kinds of insomnia, aren't there?There's deeply unpleasant insomnia, in which you're uncomfortable allnight.There's itchy insomnia, in which you have an itch you can't soothe, not with any amount of ointment or mind control.There's musical insomnia, in which a line of music goes through your head over and over again, usually not something you are all that interested Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1136781079861522902006-01-08T20:25:00.000-08:002006-01-08T20:31:19.876-08:00A long weekend with a lot of sleep and motion in it, an odd combination, but not so bad after the unusually busy and hectic week I had, getting back to work with all of its vagaries and last-minute surprises. Frequently I found myself wondering if I had lost some crucial part of my brain, trying to piece things together... And now a couple of different writing projects, one short, one a little Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1136521126351936482006-01-05T20:18:00.000-08:002006-01-05T20:18:46.360-08:00Can someone be said to be happy who has never known what it is to be sad? Old question, I know, but I'm thinking of, like, babies.Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1136514326880805932006-01-05T18:24:00.000-08:002006-01-05T18:25:26.890-08:00I've often thought that when we're tired, there's some problem we're not dealing with, or not facing, and the thought of dealing with that problem is too much too handle. Oversensitive comment? Yes. But true? Maybe.Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1136464262017629322006-01-05T04:22:00.000-08:002007-02-06T14:13:08.506-08:00Adding to the mix Poems in Spanish by Paul Hoover. The "hook" of the collection is that the poems all sound as if they were translated from Spanish. When Kenneth Koch was my teacher, 18 years ago, he used to hold that tone up as a standard, so I guess the book isn't as exciting to me as it could be. Still there are some very smart, even "cool" sentences here, such as:Nothing is less erotic than aMaxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1136292872588975092006-01-03T04:50:00.000-08:002007-02-05T15:08:44.146-08:00Have finished the Patchett (The Magician's Assistant) and have moved on to Auster's The Brooklyn Follies. Auster is a writer I like continually, despite the distrust he seems to receive from various circles. I tend to respond to the strength of a well-told story, which, in his hands, often turns into something strange and rather perverse. I'm interested in that metamorphosis. You can see it in Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1136156627382729712006-01-01T14:57:00.000-08:002006-06-19T03:42:10.283-07:00The business of poetry really is mean-spirited. The only time our ears perk up is when we hear about someone's lambasting of someone else's work, or when we witness, or engage in, lengthy angry exchanges about subjects which, really and truly, should not be raising such ire. Why is this? Is it because the writing of poetry is, like most other worthwhile pursuits, listless at times, and we're Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1135981373862761232005-12-30T14:20:00.000-08:002007-02-06T14:53:37.263-08:00As I get older, I find that multi-tasking becomes more and more of an assumed life and work skill. I don't know if I'm any good at it. I do a little of this thing, a little of that thing, then a little of t'other thing, then a little more of that thing, until finally, like planes, the projects (big things that they are) take off and eventually reach a cruising altitude.Was life always like this? Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1135870589690620332005-12-29T07:31:00.000-08:002005-12-29T07:36:29.713-08:00I'm reviewing again, it seems, and I'm finding myself returning to an earlier process, more methodically inclined, less impulsive. I don't know what this might mean for the review itself. Perhaps an improvement. There is a feeling, when writing anything, but especially when writing things "on spec," of hopelessness at a certain point, as if the thing is never going to complete itself, as if I Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1135792732504347932005-12-28T09:56:00.000-08:002007-02-06T13:20:23.540-08:00You probably haven't seen John Waters' A Dirty Shame, and if you haven't already, you probably won't. But that's not to say you shouldn't. I've never quite gotten John Waters, at all. I always found the overblown, showy nature of the humor in his movies to be too much, too late, not shocking, just loud. But in this case, he seems to have hit just the right note. I mean, geez, maybe my humor is Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1135742405200068132005-12-27T19:28:00.000-08:002007-02-05T13:54:47.186-08:00A lot of writers work in educational publishing. Young ones? Mike Topp, Cort Day, Jonathan Blum, Paul McCormick. Older ones? Well, John Ashbery and Toni Morrison used to. (Ashbery at Mighty McGraw-Hill, Toni Morrison at Holt, I believe.)The reasons for this could be numerous. One obvious reason would be that educational publishing can promote literacy when it's at its best. Textbooks, Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1135706875009155792005-12-27T10:06:00.000-08:002007-02-06T03:59:38.803-08:00Ahh..... at last my educational writing makes the news.Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1135352212415727922005-12-23T07:26:00.000-08:002005-12-23T07:36:52.426-08:00Finding it difficult, given the obscene length of my vacation (longer, even, than when I was working at Farrar Straus and thinking to myself, "Hm... maybe I can make dinner out of three green beans and 45 grains of brown rice...hmmm... can't believe we get a whole week off at Christmas!"), to move. Read a lot of good stuff in the new Believer, a magazine which started as a hip prose dump site andMaxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1134617489371766612005-12-14T19:24:00.000-08:002007-02-06T05:58:07.030-08:00And now we may add to the mix Maggie Nelson's Jane: A Murder, which I picked up at the office of the magazine where I hang my occasional hat. This is an interesting book for me to pick up right now because it matches what I'm interested in at the moment: direct language, direct ways of saying things. Directness has for too long been the province of less imaginative poets. There's something Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1134358400008219832005-12-11T19:25:00.000-08:002007-02-06T12:03:49.913-08:00The Saramago, yes, sure, but I am also adding a book by Ann Patchett called The Magician's Assistant. I was talking about Patchett with a writer friend today and she said Patchett's style was too plain. I guess you could say that, but I find the plainness more exciting than styles that grandstand or call attention to themselves. That sort of thing is to be realized and handled in grad school, I Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1133750446882517802005-12-04T18:32:00.000-08:002005-12-06T08:00:03.676-08:00I have finished the Marias and am considering adding Saramago to my list of books being read, which includes War and Peace, Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy, Sarah Gridley's Weather Eye Open, Testimony, and the occasional magazine. Saramago would be a worthy successor; they both fall in the category of European writers who write in long, flowing paragraphs and don't trouble themselves with pedestrianMaxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1133499486898021372005-12-01T20:50:00.000-08:002007-02-06T15:55:16.163-08:00I think I may be one of the only people who left who appreciates the sincerity of the Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer movie, narrated by Burl Ives. There are some wonderful things here, from Yukon Cornelius to the Island of Misfit Toys to the Aslan-esque lion who rules over the Island. What I guess struck me (I was a captive audience, besieged by heavy and largely dehydrating Chinese food) was theMaxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1132720138989791502005-11-22T20:17:00.000-08:002007-02-06T14:09:47.166-08:00One of the people I was having coffee with the other night, one of the two lost friends from high school, mentioned to me that I'd told him, "Whatever you do, don't go to ___________ Junior College." And then he reminded me that in fact he had gone to ____________ Junior College. The things we think we know. Or the things I thought I knew. That quality doesn't really go away, that knowingness, Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1132532097902813682005-11-20T19:13:00.000-08:002007-02-06T16:05:13.846-08:00Having coffee tonight with two people I have not seen in seventeen years, one of whom is an art director for Law and Order: SVU, the other of whom is a practicing roboticist. One of these folks lives 5 blocks away from me. Another person I went to high school with, also a roboticist, lives one block away from me. I know they say life is like high school, but...I suppose it should be no surprise Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1132241195280515432005-11-17T07:22:00.000-08:002007-02-05T13:42:17.196-08:00After careful research, I've discovered that Sufjan Stevens began his career as a writing student at the New School. I'd have to suspect it was poetry, too. Since he's a young guy, it can't have been that long ago. It makes me think that many of today's MFA students, particularly the ones who are producing faint, weird, not-quite-present work might have a lot of music in them... And good music Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1132111471448683302005-11-15T19:16:00.000-08:002005-11-15T19:24:31.446-08:00Reading Javier Marias's A Heart So White, happy to see a piece about him in the New Yorker by the man responsible for this...Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1132071053061963032005-11-15T08:09:00.000-08:002005-11-15T19:16:07.410-08:00Ha! Very good new post. If you've ever worked in an office, if you've ever been 4...Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1131937412875789852005-11-13T19:01:00.000-08:002007-02-05T17:08:54.313-08:00We should consider, along with the more lofty things we make time to consider, to what extent the everyday can inform the noteveryday, i.e., what knowing about fill valves and gas hoses can teach you about the fulfillment of the subjective dream.Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com14tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1131684129833315542005-11-10T20:40:00.000-08:002007-01-23T00:57:33.516-08:00How much of our lives is spent oscillating between two poles of laziness, and how much of it is spent in self-validating activity? What does it mean to labor? What does it mean to work intensely? Or what does it signify?Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com12tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1131598298214732912005-11-09T20:49:00.000-08:002005-11-09T20:51:38.223-08:00It strikes me that the more I say about the anonymous commenters, the more anonymous commenting I will get.Much like the misguided instructions we always get re: bullies. "Just ignore them." Tsk, tsk.Any comments on editorial pragmatism? On what makes a good editor of text versus a bad editor of text? Whether we have the right to inject ourselves, as editors, wholly into the text we're editing, Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com10tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1131550764180867712005-11-09T07:36:00.000-08:002007-02-06T13:37:53.913-08:00It strikes me that blogging is a bit like fishing. You cast out a line, and then another, and then lo and behold: an anonymous comment! There's something Eliotic about the anonymous comment, or at least modernist. It loiters, homelessly, waiting for someone to respond to it... Ah, poor little comment...Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1131058694653729652005-11-03T14:54:00.000-08:002007-02-06T05:00:55.360-08:00Hoooooooo doggies has it been a long time since I wrote anything here. I look at it occasionally, as I might look at a museum piece, just to see if it's still there, or if it's been invaded by vermin. But: neither has happened. A few comments from old friends, one comment from a really old friend. And some obscure comments from people I will never know. Who are you?Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1092710967001431272004-08-16T22:45:00.000-07:002007-02-06T17:43:32.936-08:00New Job. New Job like old job. Spooked some. Me have work to do at new job. No count sheep. Me have view of big buildings out window. Heap big Chrysler building. Heap food on the block. Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1092280886649773912004-08-11T23:19:00.000-07:002007-02-06T03:07:21.133-08:00I am relieved to see someone giving, at last, the Roches their fair due. They were important in my preteen and teen years, probably more important than they should have been. To be honest, I should have probably been listening to more men around that time. But anyway--their early albums had a remarkable clarity. And then their later albums sort of faded into a sort of chronic prettiness that I Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1092054197227404402004-08-09T05:22:00.001-07:002007-02-06T16:25:58.510-08:00Oh... I know. Jobs, anyone? Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1092054161862689342004-08-09T05:22:00.000-07:002007-02-06T15:19:55.936-08:00What to say about joblessness? Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1092054134600217972004-08-09T05:21:00.000-07:002004-08-09T05:22:14.600-07:00What to say about a string of strangely autumnal days? Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1090959748485110142004-07-27T13:21:00.000-07:002007-02-06T18:59:55.930-08:00Erhem--even as it is a movie all about talking, and the ways talking isn't adequate. Now that I think abt. it, that's pretty old-fashioned too...Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1090959627292198302004-07-27T13:17:00.000-07:002004-07-27T18:18:59.180-07:00What does it mean to look for the old-fashioned in the new, to appreciate old-fashioned ideas of structure and validation even as they are spun through vehicles that are seemingly rejections of those ideas? Case in point: Before Sunset, whose greatest virtue is the nature of its ending. And to a certain extent the old-fashioned idea of love and risk it supports. Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1090043304807934352004-07-16T22:46:00.000-07:002004-07-16T22:48:24.806-07:00It is important, for us bipeds, to be outdoors as much as possible. I ate dinner tonight at the boat Basin Cafe, a place which was so noisy as to almost make me forget how settled I momentarily felt.   We were outdoors. That, Watson, was the point. Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1089902117815439552004-07-15T07:34:00.000-07:002004-07-15T07:35:17.816-07:00And we are, by the end of the rainfall, to understand what the burden is, where it came from, etc.Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1089902021966486322004-07-15T07:31:00.000-07:002007-02-05T22:00:18.393-08:00I realize it's a cliche to say "rain is sad," but I do feel sometimes, as when we get several days--days, I tell you--of rain, as if the "natural world" is dropping some kind of burden off its shoulders onto ours. Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1089647873316085822004-07-12T08:56:00.000-07:002007-02-06T09:08:26.990-08:00Spent Sunday clompety-clomp-clomping around downtown, various shopping reasons. Very hot. Very humid. Upon coming home, met someone in my building who asked how I was. My answer was "It's so hot." But then there was a breeze at night that helped me forgive the sun. Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1089384874826770802004-07-09T07:53:00.000-07:002004-07-09T07:54:34.826-07:00I rode up on my elevator at work with a woman in a, uh, burkha (sp.). Second time in 6 years.Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1089384813290754902004-07-09T07:52:00.000-07:002004-07-09T07:53:33.290-07:00I wonder if this is the city of the happy, or if no one has time to think, or if perhaps they have too much... Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1089298162502090682004-07-08T07:46:00.000-07:002007-02-05T15:12:12.836-08:00I have bought, for a dollar, a book by Rafael Alberti called The Owl's Mirror, poems in Spanish translated by Mark Strand, for whom the act of translation acts as a productive muzzle. For seven more dollars, I bought Ishiguro's The Unconsoled, which I have read when lended, but never while owned. Ah what a great, great novel. Say what you want about about the complacency of the big-time novelist,Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1089128456230759372004-07-06T08:40:00.000-07:002004-07-06T08:40:56.230-07:00I marvel at the NY Post's inaccuracy. And a small part of me feels relieved that Edwards has been chosen...Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1089126604515555972004-07-06T08:09:00.000-07:002004-07-06T08:10:04.516-07:00Note to self: more! more! And better.Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1084386060625863552004-05-12T11:20:00.000-07:002004-05-12T11:21:00.626-07:00Overheard on the subway: A man that find a wife, find a wife.Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1083962067059204902004-05-07T13:30:00.000-07:002004-05-07T13:38:48.000-07:00-I cannot complete this task in 4 hours. -What do you mean? It's your job. -I can't. -That's not acceptable. -Would you do part of it for me? -What? Absolutely not! I have my own projects to complete! -Well then, we're back at square one. I can't finish it. -I find your attitude really offensive. -All I said was I can't finish it. -Well, doing part of it really isn't going to help. -I'll have to Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1083338488847804152004-04-30T08:20:00.000-07:002004-04-30T08:25:40.466-07:00Categories won't help. They make a false sense of security, somewhat like an edible insole. The only category that will help is the one you make for yourself.Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1081437448427779682004-04-08T08:16:00.000-07:002004-04-08T08:21:11.000-07:00Restlessness is important. That is, unless it is a substitute for having something to say. In which case, sit still and listen to yourself.Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1080932095761763032004-04-02T10:52:00.000-08:002004-04-02T10:58:30.013-08:00Conjugation: To Open Up a Can of Whoop Ass I open up a can of whoop ass. You open up a can of whoop ass. He/she/it opens up a can of whoop ass. We open up several respective cans of whoop ass. You (pl.) open up several respective cans of whoop ass. They open up several respective cans of whoop ass. Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1080838823412970292004-04-01T08:57:00.000-08:002004-04-01T09:04:06.700-08:00I wish I could say I was the kind of person who reads a newspaper every morning and has an unshakable grasp of world events. But instead, if I read the newspaper, I tend to search frantically for the items which would be specifically of interest to me--i.e., anecdotal stuff, anything that predicts the end of the Bush White House (or even seems to), stuff having to do with movies or those other Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1080838480958636842004-04-01T08:53:00.000-08:002004-04-01T08:58:13.793-08:00Cracked myself up this morning when thinking about an acquaintance like so: "He's great. Not a thing wrong with him." What am I, a product inspector? Am I supposed to affix a sticker every time I find someone is up to code?Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1079547917920582762004-03-17T10:19:00.000-08:002004-03-17T10:28:31.466-08:00Saw Monster yesterday and was struck at various points by the question: am I watching a less than stellar performance inside a shell of nervous-making makeup? Wuornos, when in a social milieu, always looks much more affected than those around her, although we know that they're all extras, working for less than Theron, of course, but nevertheless mindful of mimesis. I would have to do a little Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1079547530189822892004-03-17T10:12:00.000-08:002004-03-17T10:22:03.826-08:00I witnessed an argument between two subway riders yesterday, something about one woman's complaint that the other woman was muscling her over so that she would occupy two seats instead of one, an unusually long conversation given its subject, one of those conversations in which the momentum that carries it seems to coming from somewhere else entirely, WAY outside the conversation, and it occurredMaxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1079470301601935272004-03-16T12:47:00.000-08:002004-03-16T12:54:54.390-08:00I have been accused of not writing "posts" with enough moment in them. It's possible that's true. I tend to be drawn to things without much moment in them, because those are the things that keep us relatively sane, and I have an ongoing project in mind of accumulating bits of relative sanity into one large piece of sanity which might, if properly aimed and launched, make its own life, separate Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1079469969718433172004-03-16T12:38:00.000-08:002004-03-16T12:49:21.950-08:00Ah, Lordy. I was supposed to give my beloved (stranded in the outback, without an alarm clock) a wake-up call this morning, and I was so distracted by a reference to myself I found by accident that I forgot completely, only to be called by the already awakened aforementioned beloved with a more-than-faint note of dismay, only to greet the note of dismay with a symphony of (probably annoying) Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1079025887094766302004-03-11T09:20:00.000-08:002004-03-11T09:27:52.686-08:00Dehydration may, as I speak, be blamed for a great many things: thirst, general drowsiness that pains the sense, undue joint stiffness, unclassifiable malaise, difficulty swallowing, a longing for the age of simple toys--like those pens full of water they used to make in which, by tilting the pen one way or another, one gathered small plastic items into a small space, an inappropriate Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1078771047411997532004-03-08T10:32:00.000-08:002004-03-08T10:44:53.233-08:00On watching Godard's Weekend this weekend, I realized, with a burst of probably lukewarm inspiration, that the burning car sequence in Wild at Heart and the burning car scene in The Straight Story were probably nods to the similar sequence in the older movie. Hmmm.... Not sure what this correlation does for me, but I couldn't hold it down. Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1078336342543267032004-03-03T09:46:00.000-08:002004-03-03T09:55:17.200-08:00A lot of New Yorkers seemed to have accomplished the art of being hard-bitten without necessarily being angry. Which has led some, of course, to say they're more kind than nice. What passes for "nice" in other parts of the U.S. is a sort of distant cousin of "friendly," which is to say there's a lot of chatter, much of which involves the insertion of person A's proboscis into person B's business.Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1078155835758631462004-03-01T07:34:00.000-08:002004-03-08T10:41:40.873-08:00I had dinner with someone on Friday night who expressed hatred for numerous things. One of them was Lost In Translation--and perhaps it was the Merlot, or perhaps it was something in the lobster they used for the lobster ravioli I had (excellent--although most consider Pesce Pasta to be middlebrow, the food remains Dependable, which is more than one can say for so many joyless highbrow Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1077897425379497432004-02-27T07:39:00.000-08:002004-03-11T09:21:49.216-08:00Saw John Waters on TV in a mid-prandial rush to leave home this morning, speaking about a photography exhibit up at the New Museum. He commented that if you make a lot of people angry, that's usually a very good thing. Which of course is half true. There's good anger and bad anger, in relation to artistic response, in particular. If the anger is the anger of frustration, rage at someone's Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1077827694639928842004-02-26T12:30:00.000-08:002004-02-26T12:38:33.560-08:00I had the experience this morning, all too common in NYC, of walking very nearly beside a stranger, slowing down, finding that that person was slowing down as well, speeding up, feeling a brief sense of relief, and then, upon finding I had put some distance between myself and the stranger, slowing down, only to find myself nearly parallel with the dratted person once more. We want to engage, but Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1077822031537578932004-02-26T10:52:00.000-08:002004-02-26T12:42:28.966-08:00The kind of debates that take place in Bertolucci's The Dreamers remind me of the sorts of conversations you might find in Dr. Zhivago or Anna Karenina, long aesthetic discussions which might take several pages, might have nothing to do with the plot, and yet are nevertheless reaches out into the world beyond the story which are essential. The conversations, to me, seem utterly genuine, a certainMaxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1077724112512020752004-02-25T07:38:00.000-08:002004-02-25T07:51:59.123-08:00A new addition to the list: Runaway Jury... It seems, at least to me, that Grisham's novels make satisfying, if not lasting, movies. The sparky elements of the story--the mysterious cooperation of John Cusack and Rachel Weisz, the watch-ish object John Cusack keeps looking at, the explosions and odd occurrences that take place in the court room, the suh-thun accent of Dustin Hoffman--are Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1077658816894656222004-02-24T13:34:00.000-08:002004-02-24T13:46:56.593-08:00Also watched Lost in Translation. Almost better on the small screen than it was on the larger one. I like the doubleness of it, that sense that nothing is happening, and yet somehow, when Bob Harris switches from tea to beer while having lunch with Charlotte, the moment takes on a Chekhovian, uh, moment. Or the way in which everyone in the film seems so gigantic so much of the time, because of Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1077647183800840782004-02-24T10:19:00.000-08:002004-02-24T10:29:08.263-08:00Watched Un jour se leve (Daybreak) (Marcel Carne) recently, felt often as if I had just taken a slow-acting anaesthetic that, before it sent you off to sleep, distorted your perceptions. I kept thinking, as I watched Jean Gabin and Arletty, 'Those people are really feeling emotions. Christ! Pass the guacamole!' And then there would be a swooping, bizarre camera angle--which has by now of course Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1077646482711615532004-02-24T10:09:00.000-08:002004-02-24T10:18:41.996-08:00Have been unpacking recently, found quite a few books I had thought I lost or had, with a false sense of relief, thought I didn't own, among them The Book of Questions, Edgar Rice Burroughs' The Chessmen of Mars, and a copy of The Two Towers with the cover torn off. It is important, though difficult, to balance one's reading, to make sure that the moments we allot to it, those quiet or perhaps Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1074628183158894952004-01-20T11:49:00.000-08:002004-01-20T11:51:41.216-08:00Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1074627694580387652004-01-20T11:40:00.000-08:002004-01-20T11:43:32.716-08:00Of course, if that were true, then how would you explain the monastic lifestyle? I know someone who hid from Spanish terrorists in a monastery for several months. Seems like a good beginning of a novel, or a twist in one.Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1074627572194155792004-01-20T11:38:00.000-08:002004-01-20T11:41:30.343-08:00It strikes me that to write a "blog" must be a product of inertia, of a kind, that you're fighting, fighting to free yourself of. Of course, that's why we speak. Except in Scandinavia, of course.Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-1059577023731338042003-07-30T07:57:00.000-07:002003-07-30T07:57:03.726-07:00The simple effort of expressing one's self steadily: there isn't really an alternative.Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-959575682003-06-23T13:28:00.000-07:002003-06-23T13:28:26.300-07:00What has happened to the poem? If anyone today were to quote or paraphrase Rilke's idea that the poem is like prayer, the laughter might go on for a decade... and perhaps rightfully. Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4102732.post-893115712003-02-18T07:59:00.000-08:002003-02-18T07:59:56.386-08:00Watched, more like witnessed, 8 Women. To me, although I know the point was a satire of the movie musical, the action seemed rather stiff, although it had its moments of lightness. Am reading John Tranter's The Floor of Heaven at the moment, a book-length narrative... It's interesting to ponder at what point the desire to narrate supercedes the need, when confronted with the poetic task, to Maxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18171731007326838375noreply@blogger.com0