Ed Blog

Fri, 27 Aug 2004 13:39:28 GMT

Is it strange that scientists should include in their favourite science fiction films Star Wars - 'Its use of science is sketchy at best' - and The Matrix - 'the science behind the fiction is conspicuously absent'? They should have asked them their favourite musicals.

And I have just read BS Johnson's See the old lady decently which he intended as the first part of a 'matrix' trilogy but killed himself before writing parts 2 or 3. Without wishing actual suicide on anyone, can I be transported to an alternative reality where the matrix outcomes are reversed please? Only without the first film either. Frank Kermode in LRB on BSJ is worth a look. According to Peter Ackroyd's review of STOLD, it was 'very fashionable to read and even enjoy BS Johnson' in 1975. And then 30 years in the darkness. Which is preferable to 30 years in The Darkness.

Via about last night, 5 tracks for every 20th century decade. More pleased at the retrospective recognition given to Arthur 'Big Boy' Crudup, than to the votes for Steppenwolf.
As if to remind us why we're all here, in the classroom web logs are the new bulletin boards.

Olympics-related notice as this is the blog all the athletes are reading: Paula, it's not too late to pull out with dignity. We're not strong enough.

Fri, 13 Aug 2004 13:26:39 GMT

One day I'll write about David Foster Wallace's Oblivion: Stories, but not yet. I don't think he knows how to end a story and while, oddly, this doesn't matter in Infinite Jest - perhaps because you're so relieved at being able to lay the bastard to one side - it does with these (long) short stories. There's also a review by George Walden, who obviously shouldn't be dismissed for being an ex-Tory MP with ideas above his station, in which he states that 'the absence of an authorial heart throbbing close to the surface is curiously refreshing' which is so completely and utterly nonsense that it could only have appeared in the Telegraph.

On Death in Venice: 'Death in Venice belongs to that group of short novels (or novellas, or long short stories) whose cultural importance is out of all proportion to their length'. If only cultural importance always depended on length.

Also from/via RP, some worst books, being more interesting than best books. My vote's for Brave New World and why itunes is bad for jazz-type liner notes obsessives (via city of sound).

Following on from Communicator's post about the attractiveness of names, some unsuitable ones. What's wrong with Bench?

Fri, 06 Aug 2004 15:04:30 GMT

I've always liked pylons. They're the only things that make walking in the countryside bearable.

Fri, 16 Jul 2004 15:40:35 GMT

On Monday I had a hatful of links to share with the world, or at least that shady corner of the world that might tiptoe across this site, but now they have evaporated and I am tired, I am weary.

I could point towards the estimable thingsmagazine with its pictures of Berlin, French fashion (why can't we all dress like this now?) and things. And some pictures of Bratislava only because I once accidentally, but very happily, attended a vegetarian festival there.

Reputation, trust, network closure - that kind of thing.

For people who like lists, there is an Independent best comic movie adaptations one, a bit of a niche market, but Batman at the top? For the Prince title tune perhaps but only for that.

And now, if you don't mind, I'm going on holiday.

Thu, 08 Jul 2004 12:08:00 GMT

The German (ZDF) Big Read is both bigger - 200 books - and broader than the mind-numbing, film-led BBC one. They don't limit it to novels and, as you would expect, are much less linguistically partisan - only one German book was on the BBC list and not a very German one at that. They include The Communist Manifesto, Klemperer's diaries, the Duden grammar, as well as all the usual stuff. If it were for best adapted title, it would have to be 'Bridget Jones - Chocolate for Breakfast'. My stomach turns in its grave.

NY Times have the 1,000 best movies ever made, which is taking things to extremes. Splinters links to a transcript of Newsnight reviewing Louis de Bernieres's new book which makes Bonnie Greer seem a wimp and Tom Paulin less so: 'You think, "What on earth is this omniscient narrator in his Georgian rectory built out of the money he has made from his rotten novel and rotten film writing another terrible novel."'.

Travel advice: Don't write the word 'bomb' on a (paper on a) plane in the US. They may be a little paranoid (via elegantvariation).

Fri, 02 Jul 2004 15:32:38 GMT

How does summer/holiday reading differ from other kinds of reading? I've never understood. If I did I might be tempted by George Bush: Dark Prince of Love. In demand enough to be going for £0.01. Surely, that won't be the case for In Praise of Nepotism: A History of Family Enterprise from King David to George W. Bush.

Which makes me think of Nicholson Baker's new book. One day I want to have form to return to.

The Guardian has some odd hated films. Not sure how you could work up the energy to hate something like Showgirls or Swept Away. Far worse are films that promise and fail to deliver or have 'matrix' in the title.

Thingsmagazine points me to the stupidity of advertising taglines at Designobserver which also quotes Roland Barthes on the pen: "I have an almost obsessive relation to writing instruments." But then deep down I think we all knew that somehow.

Fri, 25 Jun 2004 10:54:32 GMT

Determined to shake off today's sport-induced torpor, I am distracting myself with the notion of George W as a 'post turtle', via flaschenpost which has some amusingly inappropriate comments if you can get to them.

Also some more serious stuff about GW's mental state

Thu, 24 Jun 2004 12:39:24 GMT

Last week passed me by. This week the world is invited by Prospect magazine to vote on the doubly oxymoronic-sounding 'top 100 British public intellectuals'. They don't really say why. And David Willetts?

They do these things better in Poland - Adam Michnik on democracy and Iraq (via arts & letters). Plus Dutch hoaxes about bribing the Czechs to beat the Germans at some sporting event - as if they needed any help. Odd things people find in books, adaptable MIT buildings, harsh criticism of 1974 design and Eduforge: collaborative e-learning and innovation open access spaces because that's why we're here (via elearnspace).

Interviews: Nicholas Negroponte of MIT on the future, Joel Coen on The Ladykillers, JG Ballard

Fri, 18 Jun 2004 16:09:29 GMT

Didn't like this list of contemporary novels chosen by the blinkered at Hay-on-Wye and discussed in admirable detail by Ex-Communicator. I prefer this one instead (via rake's progress).

And I'd like one of these bikes

Fri, 11 Jun 2004 14:09:24 GMT

I rarely want to be rich but this shower makes me want to be richer (via apartment therapy)

Independent is full of all kinds of things, notably David Thomson on the Coens' decline. I'm not sure he's entirely right. I watched Intolerably Cruelty at the weekend and, although it's nowhere near as good as most of their films, it is a) pleasingly short like the best Woody Allen films b) miles better than the average mainstream American film comedy c) much better than this during the first half i.e. until the George Clooney character falls in love and starts pulling stupid faces d) less irritating than Raising Arizona. And I can forgive them remaking The Ladykillers but not Tom Hanks.

A Sight and Sound article on KillBill2 which is alternately interesting and irritating (that's what SAS is for). Apparently in horror survivor film terms, the Uma Thurman character is the 'Final Girl' because the Final Girl 'always has a gender-neutral or male name'. But she's called Beatrix.

Voting is a lonely business.

Tue, 08 Jun 2004 16:04:28 GMT

Missed my slot last week. But then Ron died and it would be a mistake not to link to Christopher Hitchens pouring scorn in Slate - apparently when he didn't like a question RR turned into a 'cruel and stupid lizard'. So David Icke was right. If you're fed up with the tributes and the nonsense about winning the cold war, read AM Homes' story 'The Former First Lady and the Football Hero'. That'll put you right.

Somewhere there was a link to Groucho meeting TS Eliot and so I wander off to the Guardian in search of the Stephen Merchant article about the brothers the other day and find a Marx Brothers quiz on the front page. (Only 7 out of 10). The Guardian is a wonderful place. And more here for future reference. Anyone got any spare DVDs?

Momus, nonsense about Morrissey, and more, then Viennese cafés linked to for its description of a 'Melange' - more delicious to say than even to drink - which demonstrates the beauty of German: 'Bohnenkaffee mit aufgeschäumter/gequirlter Milch und Schokoladeflocken'.

Gequirlter Milch is something to covet (and I like coffee black).

Fri, 28 May 2004 12:20:00 GMT

Things fall apart. Misplaced some links, couldn't decypher scribbled others and then accidentially discarded a whole post. Will quit before I'm in danger of getting ahead. So, in brief:

Reminder of Bob Dylan when he was funny and strange in 1960s
George Saunders on exiting Iraq - Make him President
Batman being filmed at Senate House (but not yesterday when I walked past by chance)
Countries making you drive on which side (I love this. I think we should change overnight just for the hell of it. Preferably at the same time as adopting the single currency and making mayonnaise on chips compulsory) and implosions via thingsmagzne.

Or cut out the middle man and go there direct. They're a bit more organised.

[LATER - When I posted this, the original entry also appeared. Has the whole world gone completely mad? I'll have deleted it by now]

Fri, 21 May 2004 14:15:24 GMT

Little doing this week. I quite liked Deirdre Day-MacLeod's piece on Britney and navels which 'first ran on Britannica.com's site when the venerable company was making an attempt to (in the words of one journalist) "make itself more attractive to the young and trendy generation." When the article appeared more than 17 million people attempted to log on to the site over the last month locking up the site's web servers and causing trouble that lasted an entire month. I assume the traffic was prompted more by the accompanying shot of Britney than by my semiotic analysis.' That'll teach them.

Beautiful Jacques Tati site, discovered just after he disappeared from the top-left corner. You can't have too much Tati.

New England ruins via thingsmag and the lyrics to Jonathan Richman's incomparable'New England' - 'Doddly-doodly-do-do-doo-do-do Dum-de-dum-de-dum-dum-da-dum-day'.

Fri, 14 May 2004 13:43:10 GMT

In a stolen moment, Coetzee on Bellow - harsh, and a commentary on this at Reading Experience - harsher. To adopt their black and whiteness for a second, they're wrong. Even more harshness from the usually sensible David Thomson about Performance - best film Mick Jagger ever made.

Aesthetics section - a fetching Sonic fabric dress via boingboing, old levacar, and more lovely old buildings via thingsmgz

And a Joyce concordance - good in itself perhaps but even better for containing Joyce Hangman (via languagehat). And more than you could ever need about Captain Beefheart - and that's saying something.

Fri, 07 May 2004 13:42:20 GMT

Reading experience on music and fiction that defy expectations. Apparently some people think this is a bad thing. But penguin have it sussed - 'From June 2004, Penguin will make reading more attractive to young men - by making young men who read more attractive to women. We will make reading sexy for the first time, we'll turn books into fashion accessories, grow the market and have men & women all over the UK asking: ARE YOU GOOD BOOKING?'. Desperate times.

Lovely art deco buildings in London via tgsmg.

Still haven't made up my mind about KillBill 2 - maybe because there isn't enough there to make up a mind about. Spiked is harsh but not far away. I watched Johnny Guitar last night for the first time, which has a strong woman at the centre (effectively playing the male lead) and is at least as stylised as KB2 but felt more satisfying I think because the stylisation is not just limited to references to other films. But then it wouldn't matter if Tarantino wasn't so good at the technical stuff.

And, sadly, no stupid list in the Independent this week but an interview with Charlie Kaufman instead. Doesn't overcome my disappointment with the whole Jim Carrey thing though.

Fri, 30 Apr 2004 12:47:06 GMT

The Independent seem to be running a very odd film Top 10 every Friday and I'm not one to pass up an opportunity for cheap abuse - this week it's Top 10 films from literature. There's something cogent to be said here about good adapted films being much better than their sources and lateral adaptations being superior to literal ones but this list contains Forrest Gump so I can't bring myself. The choice of Dekalog backs me up though as all the bits I've seen are brilliant.

I always get DJ Taylor and AN Wilson mixed up. Maybe because I don't trust people without a first name - women don't do this much, sensibly. It should only be allowed for modernist poets and cricketers. Anyway DJ overcomes my prejudice with articles about the paucity of foreign language literature in London bookshops and stupid book marketing. He's right on both counts. And the former article turns out in fact to be by AN Wilson which just proves my point. I bring these articles together with the example of Party im Blitz, newly-published, posthumous autobiography by Elias Canetti which I've mentioned before. It got some coverage in the Guardian and elsewhere but almost exclusively because he's very disparaging about Irish Murdoch with whom he had an affair. So foreign language stuff is OK as long as it has sex and gossip about British things. Backing up Wilson/Taylor (ever seen them together?), I had to buy it online though.

People chemistry on film - good that it goes back more than about 15 years for once and includes man on man chemistry (so to speak). But Mel Gibson and Danny Glover?

And pets TV on plastic bag - reason to keep the licence fee (not sarcastically intended).

Fri, 23 Apr 2004 14:27:23 GMT

Resting, not gone you see.

Some lists - 10 best auteur films (even viewed charitably this is crap) and Top 10 predictable favourite novels. I have a love-hate thing with these lists. They should have a qualifying factor to make them interesting like Top 10 novels containing a scene set in a sea-life centre or something.

The top-notch thngsmg has an excellent image of future London from the 1954 TV 1984. Seems very empty.

Amusingly written article via arts n letters on the bizarre notion that Nabokov stole his most famous book from a 1916 story called 'Lolita' and, to confuse us, kept the title. I'm sure he wouldn't have predicted the literary detectives' skill in uncovering his deviousness in a mere 50 years. Then Slate on George W's incredibility and lots of good stuff about blogs and education and that kind of thing as usual at elearnspace.

Brad Pitt to present a radio 2 documentary on Nick Drake. The best thing about this is that the writer feels compelled to inform any readers attracted by the Nick Drake element alone that he is 'married to actress Jennifer Aniston'. Oh that Brad Pitt. I last saw Brad on a Jeff Buckley documentary - excellent taste but I wouldn't want him djing at my party thank you very much.

And this week I've mainly been listening to a CD by a singer called Franz Ferdinand which is splendid in terms of both music and typeface. I predict he'll go far.

Thu, 08 Apr 2004 13:44:33 GMT

Only animals on the underground are keeping me going today.

Fri, 02 Apr 2004 12:07:26 GMT

The New Yorker on why Americans are getting shorter than Europeans, google email for people who never delete (via elearnspace), blogging for business (via demos), and swiss army knives with USB keys (via thngsmgzne).

The Pixies reunion - I didn't know they used sometimes to play songs in alphabetical order or start with the encore and work backwards but it makes me happy that they did.

Tue, 30 Mar 2004 13:39:58 GMT

50 quid bloke seems quite fun, from which we find Horticultural which wins me over with a Bette Midler quote top left. Bette doesn't let you down.

Book blogs and the like defended at Reading Experience; depressing thoughts about declining language learning in England in the Guardian and I crumble in despair.

But apparently Beatles impersonators are losing out in the tribute band stakes to people pretending to be Robbie Williams or Neil Diamond. (Neil Diamond?) Isn't life short enough as it is?

Thu, 25 Mar 2004 13:28:07 GMT

Levelling out at one post a week, let things begin with Slate laying into the current US administration's allergy to anything to do with its predecessor. What worries me most is their certainty. Isn't that one of the main reasons they're so affronted by the very idea of terrorism, because it disrupts their simplistic world-view?

I like uncertainty in fictions too, not the reductive urge you find in people who want to tie things down, as discussed at length in the splendidly-minded Reading Experience. Its too many words that's the problem, not too much writing.

And so to clichés, Is even rocket science really rocket science in the sense it's usually used? I have a lingering fondness for 'a rock and a hard place' because it's good to hear such an odd image being thrown around on the radio every other morning.

London Calling (Mar 9 - no better link) on the opening to the Mary Tyler Moore Show - can't someone repeat that instead of Dad's Army? I think my easily-pleased status with regard to almost any American sitcom has something to do with the practice of naming them after the star, rather than a character or a breakfast dish. It's the Brecht in me.

Stylus has the top 101-200 albums of all time and some amusing analysis of Stone Roses lyrics which are their own justification.

Wed, 17 Mar 2004 16:58:35 GMT

A few splattered links at the end of the day.

Michael Moore is closely identified with stupidity according to Maud Newton. A Demos attempt to link the Madrid bombing with network and complexity theory - good try but not quite I think. Odeon - more later but hopefully less Christ-passion. Interesting stuff on London and nice pictures of Kraftwerk.

Tue, 09 Mar 2004 13:23:21 GMT

Increasing social capital with cul de sacs and free bus tickets via iwire. There are some useful ideas here: I live in a kind of cul de sac and I find avoiding the neighbours a constant challenge.

Is it wrong to get irritated by Alain de Botton? I quite liked his first book many years ago but why is he allowed to get away with this (amusingly reviewed) nonsense now? If only shopping malls had become Vienna and some overwrought thoughts about adolescent adults (via arts and letters daily). And Edubabble - very close to home (via elearnspace).

Masters of cinema is full of all kinds of serious filmic things, but you have to concede their concerns as they list all kinds of films unavailable on DVD while noting that there is a 7 disc Police Academy box set due. I don't understand box sets - isn't life too short? But then I used to worry about losing 15 minutes of my life every time I listened to the extended remix of I Feel Love.

And things the internet was invented for part 18 - the Suntory scene from Lost in Translation translated (found by chance via various neon-lit web alleys). I watched it last night - it's very good indeed - and I still feel jet-lagged.

Wed, 03 Mar 2004 12:48:54 GMT

New Philip Roth book in October will be an alternative history thing according to Elegant Variation which is a very good sign, harking back to The Counterlife and the less realist-appearing stuff. And is the complete review disappearing up itself, especially with this pompous point-missing about advertising through fiction? I can see why they don't allow comments.

Looked longingly at Celluloid Skyline: New York and the Movies in the library yesterday and today I find the associated website. It's beautiful.

Thngsmgzne point me to undiscovered: a fortean weblog. Interview with Brian Greene about string theory via identitytheory. And metafilter points me to a cover songs database which would be deeply predictable and tedious did not The Ramones come third in the most covered artist section. Not bad considering they basically wrote one song (but what a song).

Why did Channel 4 part-fund Beckett on film if it is only going to show them (some for the first time) in the mornings this week without publicity? Why? And then I forgot to set the video today for Happy Days - the one with the Fonz scrabbling around the half-buried Mrs Cunningham. If only all Beckett's plays had inspired sitcoms...

Thu, 26 Feb 2004 12:51:10 GMT

Suddenly there are links everywhere and I'm in acknowledging mood. Demos outdoes itself with links to the Australian govt taking money from people wanting to invest in invented innovations such as geep farms (goat/sheep cross) to show them how stupid they are. Sadly they returned the cash. And a fascinating Future Foundation report on leisure in the UK in 2001, written in 1972. All that leisure - where's it gone?

Friendly demos rivals at iwire link to Michael Bull, or Professor Ipod in the typical crap headline, who knows everything about personal stereos and will soon know everything about ipods.

Literary saloon points us towards English Pen's The Bigger Read which aims to correct the anglocentric nonsense of the Big Read. At least most of their list haven't been made into films lately. Where are the Czechs though? (Kafka and Kundera don't really count.) Tamil literature in Malyaysia also seems sadly absent from the list. I once worked with a man who'd been an esteemed poet in Sri Lanka (although I only had his word for it). Like me he was washing up in a German kitchen. Perhaps I should have told him I was a poet too. And have I expressed my irritation at literary saloon's constant and pompous use of 'we' in everything they write? Is it bad to be so ungrateful?

And stuff on boingboing - mad, unlikely CIA gadgets, Chinese adult toys and reproduction health exhibitions. That kind of thing.