I spent a lot of time on this book. I got it from the library the same time I got the last book I read, Crumbtown, and ended up having to renew it and then three weeks later cram in the last 150 pages to avoid a late fee. That last day was quite nice, though. I ought to spend five or six hour chunks reading more often. Good for the mind, good for the soul.
This is a roundabout, meandering way of explaning that this book is BIG. In many ways. Big in ambition, big in scope, big in number of pages; it comes with a substantial heft and would make a satisfactory projectile. It aims to cover the lives of around a dozen characters while accurately representing a historical period little known by its audience all while keeping the reader engaged. Does it succeed at all this? Commence the review.
Summarizing the plot is a challenge because there is so much going on. At its heart this is the tale of a trade dispute. It takes place in 1838 Canton (now Ghangzou), the heart of the opium trade. After years of unbalanced trade and societal issues the Chinese Emperor is trying to end once and for all the illegal opium trade in China. The British and Indian merchants who benefit from the trade fight against this and a war of words and politics ensue. Which sounds terribly boring but it's such a small portion of what is actually happening in the book. Really we are intimately following the lives of the myriad foreigners living in Canton. Some of them are merchants, yes, but most are artists and botanists and chefs and laborers, each on his or her own quest to take what China will give.
Each character is distinct in motivation and voice. Part of this is because Ghosh pays particular attention to language. Whenever possible he incorporates actual instances of Chinese or Bengali or the pidgin language that merchants developed for transactions between speakers of different languages. This is offered with as translation as possible; the reader is expected to rely on context clues to decipher what is being said. But even beyond which language is used, the way that it's being used differentiates each character. You could go through each section having blacked out all the names and still know who is speaking. It makes the balancing act of following a whole slew of characters much easier.
Reading this book I felt like I was a welcome intruder in a fully-formed and self-sustaining world, just watching people go about their business. Ghosh gives unbelievably explicit detail about the smallest thing. A character walks on a ship and we hear endless descriptions about the ship's floorboards and woodwork. There's ship that is used specifically for transporting new plants from China to England and in one of the most fascinating passages of the book Ghosh devotes a few pages to the crew's practice of composting everything they eat at Sea. I can't even fathom the amount of research that went into this book, but it pays off. Everything is so clear; you form a picture in your mind and it stays with you.
And this is the beauty of the reading experience. As a reader you just drift through this world, from character to character, concern to concern. I don't want to call it directionless because that sounds negative. Maybe free-flowing. When I was getting close to the day I had to return it to the library but only found myself halfway through I didn't fret at all. I figured I'd just inhabit this world as long as I could and then just move somewhere else. I was actually a little disappointed when, about two thirds of the way in, the plot took off. I understand the story has to go somewhere but I never wanted it to. Still I was so enthralled I powered through to the end and I have no regrets.
I discussed this with a friend who read Ghosh's last book and hated it, seemingly for the same reason for I loved it. I can understand, too. This is a certain type of book for a certain type of person. Maybe you don't want to hear about what different types of boats look like. Maybe when language is given in the pidgin language with minimal translation you can frustrated. If you are the type of person that needs to understand exactly what is happening in a book then this is the sort of book you'll have to read sitting by your computer, tuned in to a dictionary and Wikipedia at the same time. But if you're looking for an atmosphere to float through and observe, pick this up and enjoy the ride.
Wednesday, January 25, 2012
Thursday, January 19, 2012
The State of American Discourse, pt 1: Mitt Romney's Taxes
I'm not ashamed to admit that I love politics. By this I mean actual politics (people sharing and debating ideas to determine which course of action best solves society's problems) not what passes for politics today (a bunch of people trying to yell louder than one another). For this reason I, like many of you, am very disillusioned by the way politics is handled today, both in the media and by the politicians themselves. But not disillusioned enough to turn away. I have a curious fascination with it all. In the same way that film buffs sometimes love bad movies most of all, I am obsessed with bad politics and bad journalism. So I've decided to make a segment to discuss the many, MANY, MANY times that people remove political discourse from the realm of the useful and transplant it into the world of Shit That Does Not Matter At All, distracting you from what we should be discussing. So, without further ado...
The Republican primary race. Mitt Romney is in the lead, as he should be. Being the most centrist candidate and therefore the most likely to attract independent voters, anyone with the most basic understanding of presidential politics can see why he would emerge as the front runner. Anyone except Newt Gingrinch, who himself wants to be the front runner. Unfortunately his stance on the issues and his winning personality have only brought him to third place and he needs an extra push forward to get to the lead. Or instead of pushing to the lead he could just cut down everyone in front of him. Let's go with that one.
So his plan has been to pressure Romney into releasing his income tax returns, saying that it's important for voters to not have to face any surprise revelations later in the year. I love this tactic for its ridiculousness. Firstly, Romney is a career politician. He's held multiple elected positions over a long period of time; anything hiding in his tax returns would have come out by now. Secondly, since when did the party of no taxes start judging a candidate's character off of what he pays in income taxes? Best of all is just the process of watching a bunch of millionaires who spend most of their time defending millionaires suddenly spar over who is the biggest, elitist and therefore worst millionaire.
Mitt Romney will make his taxes public if he gets the nomination. He has to; it's the law. I can understand if Newt doesn't like this process, but it is the way it was before he started running for president. He wasn't asking anyone to release their tax returns back in Iowa. Why does he bring it up only when he's finding himself looking up the totem pole with precious little time? The American primary system is unique. It's downright bizarre. But no one was complaining about that during the few months every four years when candidates pretend they care about Iowa. No one complains as we dart from the Midwest to New England to the South weeding out potential candidates while a state like Hawaii, who is already basically left out of the presidential election by virtue of their late time zone, has no chance of impacting the race considering how late their primary is.
Newt Gingrich is painting this as a matter of integrity. If Mitt Romney was only more honest, he'd tell us how much money he makes. Yet Romney is the one behaving with dignity. He committed to the electoral system we have, with its strengths and weaknesses, and is following its flawed rules. He could even quell this whole thing by releasing his taxes, where he surely has nothing to hide, but that would be giving in to a bully. Whereas Newt had no problem with a primary system that favors the voice of some Americans over others until he found a rule that makes it personally harder for him to become president. Then it's an injustice. Where's the integrity in that?
The Republican primary race. Mitt Romney is in the lead, as he should be. Being the most centrist candidate and therefore the most likely to attract independent voters, anyone with the most basic understanding of presidential politics can see why he would emerge as the front runner. Anyone except Newt Gingrinch, who himself wants to be the front runner. Unfortunately his stance on the issues and his winning personality have only brought him to third place and he needs an extra push forward to get to the lead. Or instead of pushing to the lead he could just cut down everyone in front of him. Let's go with that one.
So his plan has been to pressure Romney into releasing his income tax returns, saying that it's important for voters to not have to face any surprise revelations later in the year. I love this tactic for its ridiculousness. Firstly, Romney is a career politician. He's held multiple elected positions over a long period of time; anything hiding in his tax returns would have come out by now. Secondly, since when did the party of no taxes start judging a candidate's character off of what he pays in income taxes? Best of all is just the process of watching a bunch of millionaires who spend most of their time defending millionaires suddenly spar over who is the biggest, elitist and therefore worst millionaire.
Mitt Romney will make his taxes public if he gets the nomination. He has to; it's the law. I can understand if Newt doesn't like this process, but it is the way it was before he started running for president. He wasn't asking anyone to release their tax returns back in Iowa. Why does he bring it up only when he's finding himself looking up the totem pole with precious little time? The American primary system is unique. It's downright bizarre. But no one was complaining about that during the few months every four years when candidates pretend they care about Iowa. No one complains as we dart from the Midwest to New England to the South weeding out potential candidates while a state like Hawaii, who is already basically left out of the presidential election by virtue of their late time zone, has no chance of impacting the race considering how late their primary is.
Newt Gingrich is painting this as a matter of integrity. If Mitt Romney was only more honest, he'd tell us how much money he makes. Yet Romney is the one behaving with dignity. He committed to the electoral system we have, with its strengths and weaknesses, and is following its flawed rules. He could even quell this whole thing by releasing his taxes, where he surely has nothing to hide, but that would be giving in to a bully. Whereas Newt had no problem with a primary system that favors the voice of some Americans over others until he found a rule that makes it personally harder for him to become president. Then it's an injustice. Where's the integrity in that?
Sunday, December 25, 2011
It was the Worst Christmas Special Ever
There is a lot of junk that comes along with Christmas. Junk presents, junk songs, junk movies, junk such as starting the shortened NBA season on Christmas Day as if it were a sport like football or baseball that people actually have a deep emotional connection to. These are the things we dredge through on the way to all the quality aspects of the holiday. Personally I prefer Christmas Eve over Christmas Day anyway, as my family has a fantastic tradition of each person making diverse and unique appetizers for dinner. But I digress. I'm here to talk about the junk. Specifically this Christmas special I saw on the usually reliable ABC Family last night.
'Twas the Night Before Christmas (link to Wikipedia synopsis. I'll send you to the YouTube at the end of this)
You would think perhaps from the title that this was a retelling of the popular but really not that good poem we all know (Fun Fact: actual title is "A Visit from St. Nicholas"). I'm fairly certain that this title was chosen simply to draw in unsuspecting viewers hoping for something familiar. What you get instead is a heavy-handed morality tale that itself is actually quite immoral.
The story is about a fictional town named Junctionville, NY where mice and humans oddly coexist. Someone from the town publishes an anonymous letter to Santa signed "All Of Us" proclaiming that we all know you're fake it's obvious there's no way you can possibly exist why did you lie to us. Santa for some reason reads the Junctionville Register (oh, that's how he keeps up on who's been naughty: police blotters in local papers) and returns all letters from Junctionville unopened. The town clockmaker tries to program their clock tower to play a song which will convince Santa he is still loved and cause him to come to town, but it breaks and EVERYTHING IS RUINED. Until the little mouse who wrote the letter in the first place comes and fixes the clock and Santa returns.
I'm not here to complain about the shoddy quality of the animation, the kind that's clearly turned out quickly for a Christmas special, though let's take a peak:
I take offense to the messages here. Christmas is one of those interesting cultural artifacts that everyone is trying to put their own definition on. "Christmas to me means..." And there are so many conflicting definitions. What's interesting is that no one is vetting these interpretations, except me and my warrior blog. Any time a song mentions Santa or winter or snow (but please not Jesus) it gets automatic radio play and becomes part of the cultural definition of the Christmas season. Doubly so with TV shows, as we have that week before Christmas where networks only play Christmas specials and we all gather around to watch them. But what comes of this is whenever someone has the power to to make a television special about Christmas, they have the power to redefine Christmas.
Generally this is a good thing. Not many people are going to disagree with the message of "It's A Wonderful Life." A good version of "The Christmas Carol" will teach you a lot about life. I saw one the other day with Patrick Stewart that apparently was made by the SyFy channel but it was AWESOME. It starts to get shakier between those two. Elf, for example. Excellent movie for its entertainment value and one of Will Ferrell's funniest roles. But you leave the movie with the message that Christmas is about singing a lot and being cheerful for no specific reason. Nice message, I guess, nothing wrong with positivity. My honest belief is that they loved the character of Buddy immensely (who wouldn't?) but just had no way to end the movie so they did it that way. Dumb message, but no harm done. Whereas "Twas the Night Before Christmas" is openly bullshit.
There's a very clear agenda going on in the story. The wording of little Albert the Mouse's proclamation to Santa sounds like an atheist manifesto where the word God has been crossed out and replaced it with Santa. This mouse is highly intelligent and into science so he doesn't have time for Santa. Boo hiss. Eventually he comes around to the Santa party and the message is that a man of science can still be a man of faith, which isn't a bad message, but it's so over the head. It's not a realization that you come to through the course of the story; it's evident in the first two minutes. The innuendos in Katy Perry songs are more subtle that the message of this film. But that's not what irks me; that's just bad scriptwriting. Plus it brings us such awesome wacky lines as "You may know algebra, son, but this time the whole town's counting on this clock.
Here's the real problem. The way that Albert is convinced to come around is by everyone in the story being a complete dick and guilting. After it comes out that he wrote the letter his father takes him around to show him all the ways he ruined Christmas (his words, not mine). When the clockmaker's clock doesn't work the whole town turns on him as if HE had ruined Christmas, and then denies him further access to try and fix his mistakes. But worst of all is Santa. What the hell Santa? You see one letter claiming don't believe in you and you're so petty that you tell the whole town to piss off? This is where you can't just have any hack screenwriter churning out these Christmas specials. That's not how Santa would act, not at all.
I believe one of the many purposes of Santa is to begin to introduce children to the more difficult concepts of Christianity. Christianity Lite. A child's mind is not developed enough to understand ideas of sacrifice. But they can understand someone who gives and asks for nothing in return. They can't truly understand sin but they can understand that you do better if you're on the nice list. Yes it's weird to do it in such a commercial way; I'm not saying there's much of anything right with modern Christmas traditions. But whether or not you're a Christian I can't see anyone getting behind the idea that Santa gives out presents so that people will thank him and sing him songs. Or that Santa will stop as soon as we say one mean thing about him.
You may think I'm putting too much thought into this. I also realize that when put into words I sound a lot more fired up about this than I am; really I just found this to be a laughably bad Christmas special. But these shows are supposed to warm our hearts and inspire us to be nicer to each other, and all this one did was make me think Santa's an asshole.
'Twas the Night Before Christmas (link to Wikipedia synopsis. I'll send you to the YouTube at the end of this)
You would think perhaps from the title that this was a retelling of the popular but really not that good poem we all know (Fun Fact: actual title is "A Visit from St. Nicholas"). I'm fairly certain that this title was chosen simply to draw in unsuspecting viewers hoping for something familiar. What you get instead is a heavy-handed morality tale that itself is actually quite immoral.
The story is about a fictional town named Junctionville, NY where mice and humans oddly coexist. Someone from the town publishes an anonymous letter to Santa signed "All Of Us" proclaiming that we all know you're fake it's obvious there's no way you can possibly exist why did you lie to us. Santa for some reason reads the Junctionville Register (oh, that's how he keeps up on who's been naughty: police blotters in local papers) and returns all letters from Junctionville unopened. The town clockmaker tries to program their clock tower to play a song which will convince Santa he is still loved and cause him to come to town, but it breaks and EVERYTHING IS RUINED. Until the little mouse who wrote the letter in the first place comes and fixes the clock and Santa returns.
I'm not here to complain about the shoddy quality of the animation, the kind that's clearly turned out quickly for a Christmas special, though let's take a peak:
What is with your eyes, girl?
I take offense to the messages here. Christmas is one of those interesting cultural artifacts that everyone is trying to put their own definition on. "Christmas to me means..." And there are so many conflicting definitions. What's interesting is that no one is vetting these interpretations, except me and my warrior blog. Any time a song mentions Santa or winter or snow (but please not Jesus) it gets automatic radio play and becomes part of the cultural definition of the Christmas season. Doubly so with TV shows, as we have that week before Christmas where networks only play Christmas specials and we all gather around to watch them. But what comes of this is whenever someone has the power to to make a television special about Christmas, they have the power to redefine Christmas.
Generally this is a good thing. Not many people are going to disagree with the message of "It's A Wonderful Life." A good version of "The Christmas Carol" will teach you a lot about life. I saw one the other day with Patrick Stewart that apparently was made by the SyFy channel but it was AWESOME. It starts to get shakier between those two. Elf, for example. Excellent movie for its entertainment value and one of Will Ferrell's funniest roles. But you leave the movie with the message that Christmas is about singing a lot and being cheerful for no specific reason. Nice message, I guess, nothing wrong with positivity. My honest belief is that they loved the character of Buddy immensely (who wouldn't?) but just had no way to end the movie so they did it that way. Dumb message, but no harm done. Whereas "Twas the Night Before Christmas" is openly bullshit.
There's a very clear agenda going on in the story. The wording of little Albert the Mouse's proclamation to Santa sounds like an atheist manifesto where the word God has been crossed out and replaced it with Santa. This mouse is highly intelligent and into science so he doesn't have time for Santa. Boo hiss. Eventually he comes around to the Santa party and the message is that a man of science can still be a man of faith, which isn't a bad message, but it's so over the head. It's not a realization that you come to through the course of the story; it's evident in the first two minutes. The innuendos in Katy Perry songs are more subtle that the message of this film. But that's not what irks me; that's just bad scriptwriting. Plus it brings us such awesome wacky lines as "You may know algebra, son, but this time the whole town's counting on this clock.
Here's the real problem. The way that Albert is convinced to come around is by everyone in the story being a complete dick and guilting. After it comes out that he wrote the letter his father takes him around to show him all the ways he ruined Christmas (his words, not mine). When the clockmaker's clock doesn't work the whole town turns on him as if HE had ruined Christmas, and then denies him further access to try and fix his mistakes. But worst of all is Santa. What the hell Santa? You see one letter claiming don't believe in you and you're so petty that you tell the whole town to piss off? This is where you can't just have any hack screenwriter churning out these Christmas specials. That's not how Santa would act, not at all.
I believe one of the many purposes of Santa is to begin to introduce children to the more difficult concepts of Christianity. Christianity Lite. A child's mind is not developed enough to understand ideas of sacrifice. But they can understand someone who gives and asks for nothing in return. They can't truly understand sin but they can understand that you do better if you're on the nice list. Yes it's weird to do it in such a commercial way; I'm not saying there's much of anything right with modern Christmas traditions. But whether or not you're a Christian I can't see anyone getting behind the idea that Santa gives out presents so that people will thank him and sing him songs. Or that Santa will stop as soon as we say one mean thing about him.
You may think I'm putting too much thought into this. I also realize that when put into words I sound a lot more fired up about this than I am; really I just found this to be a laughably bad Christmas special. But these shows are supposed to warm our hearts and inspire us to be nicer to each other, and all this one did was make me think Santa's an asshole.
Friday, December 23, 2011
Book Review: Crumbtown by Joe Connelly
This ended up being a good palate cleanser after two really heavy books. Something short and light-hearted and comical. Another find on the library stacks, this one jumped at me but had its warning signs, too. On the book jacket there were a ton of positive reviews for the author's first book, and none for this one. Highly suspicious. So let's jump right in and see what I thought about it.
The concept of the book at least in terms of plot is brilliant. A serial criminal spends multiple stints in prison, the last of which is for a Robin Hood-style bank robbery where he throws cash to people on the street. But he lives in a town so desolate and run-down that television studios have made it a habit of filming their crime shows there ("It looks more like New York than New York does, they say"). This leads to the prison creating a program where prisoners can receive early parole if they take on jobs on movie sets as crime consultants. Our main character, Don, becomes a consultant for a show romanticizing his own crime spree.
I misjudged the direction of the book at first. I thought it was going to be a story of redemption slowly played out through the making of the show. As it turned out, it was actually a comedy of errors. Within an hour Don goes back to his thieving ways and unleashes a string of chaotic events - including an attempt at robbing the scene of the reenactment of his bank robbery, which for some inexplicable reason is using real money.
In a lot of ways this was a good thing. The story plays out like a modern day Ulysses (which I haven't read and therefore will make no deeper comparisons). It's fascinating to see how one day in one town can change so many lives irreparably. At least it would be fascinating if the whole situation weren't so contrived and impossible.
The style of the book is very punk rock. Things move quickly. People make rash decisions. The chapters fly by in a blur of noise and music. More noise than music. You'll find it almost a chore to keep track of which characters are which, not just because there are so many of them in such a rapid succession. The real reason is because there is so little discerning them. Everyone's a drunk or a junkie with a regrettable past, and it tends to be that the only thing that separates characters are their afflictions. It's not until the final act (the story is divided into acts, like Shakespeare I guess?) that you start to get a feel for any of the individual character's souls. There are some beautiful moments then, but for the most point the train has already come off the tracks and you're left wondering why Connelly didn't build them up when he still had the reader on his side.
This even extends to the main character, who should at least be a little more defined. His first day out of prison, his first hour out of prison, he's immediately into trouble. He's required by law to keep in touch with his parole officer by phone and always answer when she calls. But when he can't figure out how to answer his cell phone (it's 2003 and he's been in prison for 15 years) he panics, runs out of his hotel room and then goes on a crime spree. Now I understand the idea that criminal behavior can be a disease that one never recovers from; I'm sympathetic to that. But after 260 pages I still have absolutely no idea what caused Don to make every possible mistake a person can make.
If I had to go back through and count how many times someone was bit by a car in this book, I don't think I could. Same thing with people getting shot. And people falling in love. There is a woman in the book, Rita. She is the muse of the man writing the TV show that sets everything into motion. She is also the muse of every criminal in the story. And just about everyone who meets here. Yet we know absolutely nothing about her as a person except that she's beautiful, has a Russian accent and is constantly bored/annoyed. Nothing to inspire the reader to love her. I got the feeling that Connelly based her on someone he knows in life, someone he felt deeply in love with. And in the way that a man falls for a woman suddenly and inexplicably, he thought by just writing about her it would make perfect sense to the reader the way it makes perfect sense to him. That or he just writes very one-dimensional female characters.
Reading this far you would think I found nothing positive about this book, but I did. There was a lot of good happening too. There is one fascinating character who is such an obsessive method actor that when asked to play the role of a criminal he becomes a criminal. There's a beautiful moment where a man is reading his list of demands to police and it quickly morphs from a humorous list of things the police could never provide (I want Ted Williams to play baseball again) to a heartbreaking list of things the police could never provide (I want my mother to understand me). There is a man who even as he lies dying from being shot by his wife still tries everything in his power to make her happy.
These moments are powerful but are few and far between. The rest of the book plays out too quickly with too little substance. In a lot of ways it's paced like a TV show. Being a book about a TV show, that could possibly be seen as an interesting commentary. I just felt like my time would have been better spent actually watching TV.
The concept of the book at least in terms of plot is brilliant. A serial criminal spends multiple stints in prison, the last of which is for a Robin Hood-style bank robbery where he throws cash to people on the street. But he lives in a town so desolate and run-down that television studios have made it a habit of filming their crime shows there ("It looks more like New York than New York does, they say"). This leads to the prison creating a program where prisoners can receive early parole if they take on jobs on movie sets as crime consultants. Our main character, Don, becomes a consultant for a show romanticizing his own crime spree.
I misjudged the direction of the book at first. I thought it was going to be a story of redemption slowly played out through the making of the show. As it turned out, it was actually a comedy of errors. Within an hour Don goes back to his thieving ways and unleashes a string of chaotic events - including an attempt at robbing the scene of the reenactment of his bank robbery, which for some inexplicable reason is using real money.
In a lot of ways this was a good thing. The story plays out like a modern day Ulysses (which I haven't read and therefore will make no deeper comparisons). It's fascinating to see how one day in one town can change so many lives irreparably. At least it would be fascinating if the whole situation weren't so contrived and impossible.
The style of the book is very punk rock. Things move quickly. People make rash decisions. The chapters fly by in a blur of noise and music. More noise than music. You'll find it almost a chore to keep track of which characters are which, not just because there are so many of them in such a rapid succession. The real reason is because there is so little discerning them. Everyone's a drunk or a junkie with a regrettable past, and it tends to be that the only thing that separates characters are their afflictions. It's not until the final act (the story is divided into acts, like Shakespeare I guess?) that you start to get a feel for any of the individual character's souls. There are some beautiful moments then, but for the most point the train has already come off the tracks and you're left wondering why Connelly didn't build them up when he still had the reader on his side.
This even extends to the main character, who should at least be a little more defined. His first day out of prison, his first hour out of prison, he's immediately into trouble. He's required by law to keep in touch with his parole officer by phone and always answer when she calls. But when he can't figure out how to answer his cell phone (it's 2003 and he's been in prison for 15 years) he panics, runs out of his hotel room and then goes on a crime spree. Now I understand the idea that criminal behavior can be a disease that one never recovers from; I'm sympathetic to that. But after 260 pages I still have absolutely no idea what caused Don to make every possible mistake a person can make.
If I had to go back through and count how many times someone was bit by a car in this book, I don't think I could. Same thing with people getting shot. And people falling in love. There is a woman in the book, Rita. She is the muse of the man writing the TV show that sets everything into motion. She is also the muse of every criminal in the story. And just about everyone who meets here. Yet we know absolutely nothing about her as a person except that she's beautiful, has a Russian accent and is constantly bored/annoyed. Nothing to inspire the reader to love her. I got the feeling that Connelly based her on someone he knows in life, someone he felt deeply in love with. And in the way that a man falls for a woman suddenly and inexplicably, he thought by just writing about her it would make perfect sense to the reader the way it makes perfect sense to him. That or he just writes very one-dimensional female characters.
Reading this far you would think I found nothing positive about this book, but I did. There was a lot of good happening too. There is one fascinating character who is such an obsessive method actor that when asked to play the role of a criminal he becomes a criminal. There's a beautiful moment where a man is reading his list of demands to police and it quickly morphs from a humorous list of things the police could never provide (I want Ted Williams to play baseball again) to a heartbreaking list of things the police could never provide (I want my mother to understand me). There is a man who even as he lies dying from being shot by his wife still tries everything in his power to make her happy.
These moments are powerful but are few and far between. The rest of the book plays out too quickly with too little substance. In a lot of ways it's paced like a TV show. Being a book about a TV show, that could possibly be seen as an interesting commentary. I just felt like my time would have been better spent actually watching TV.
Monday, December 19, 2011
Time and the Passing of it
I've been considering the idea recently that I'm addicted to wasing time. It's definitely an activity I would consider myself an expert at. The amount of my free time I spend on activies which provide no real benefit to my life is outstanding. Internet and TV mainly. The usual suspects; Facebook, Twitter, Reddit. It's become a bit of a problem, and something I'm seeking to understand so that I can work to correct it.
I know that addiction is not a word to be used lightly, and I don't intend to. If this is indeed an addiction it is a low-level one without any of the consequences of worse afflictions. But I do acknowledge that inproper use of time or procrastination can be considered self-destructive behaviors. They decrease someone's confidence, self-worth and can have lasting effects on their success. When I'm more than an hour into browsing the internet I'm usually not having any fun. After two hours I'm actively frustrated with myself but often won't just walk away. After three hours we get into the realm of guilt and self-loathing. But something keeps drawing me back.
A lot of the anger I feel with myself when wasting time has to do with the way I view time. Since my sophomore year of college - when I got serious about my studies - I've always mentally divided my activities into useful and useless time and am constantly categorizing everything I do. This is a double-edged sword. On one hand it does keep me focused or at least keeps my eyes on the prize. On the other hand it causes me great amounts of stress and, as I mentioned earlier, guilt. Especially when I feel I can't control how I use my time or get myself to stop doing things I want to do.
I'm also frustratingly arbitrary about the way I categorize my time. Time spent reading a book is useful time. Time spent on the internet is usually considered wasted time, even though I'm often doing just as much reading. I really only use text-based websites; most of the time I'm reading news articles. Time spent watching TV isn't always wasted. If there's a show I watch every week, that's just part of my routine. The problem is if it's 10 am and I just flip on Sportscenter for half an hour even though there are better things I could be doing and really I kind of hate Sportscenter. Writing in the blog is considered useful, though I can never just consistently write; I always feel a need to keep flipping back to social networking sites between paragraphs. Some activities seem obviously productive, like playing bass or exercising. But if I think about them in terms of my long-term goals (finding a career and a place to live), do they get me any closer? I'm not going to be a professional bassist or an athlete. How are they more useful than reading the news?
This last question had frustrated me for a while. I've come close to answering it recently, with a realization about the importance of enjoying life. I feel better if I'm making music; it doesn't matter if it won't ever bring me financial success. After a good workout I feel like a million bucks. I shouldn't feel guilty about spending time with friends instead of searching for jobs, because it improves the quality of my life. These things don't worry me anymore. But wasting time on Reddit doesn't improve the quality of my life in anyway. Yet I can't pull myself away.
The actual addiction I'm referring to here is a physiological need for dopamine. Recent research has shown that the novelty we experience finding new things on time-wasting websites releases dopamine in our brain, which we become addicted to. Unforuntaely the only article I have about it is from the always reliable, never biased Huffington Post, but here ya go: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/russell-poldrack/multitasking-the-brain-se_b_334674.html
Classifying it as an addiction actually makes it easier for me, especially since it really is a low-level addiction. But if I can acknowledge that it makes it easier to approach it as a physiological problem that can be addressed in steps instead of a character weakness. I am not a person incapable of using time productively. I just have a problem that needs to be fixed.
I'm never going to reach a point where I wake up at 6 am and then write, read run and play bass nonstop until I go to bed at midnight and start all over the next day. But I will take steps to reduce my wasted time and resist the urge for a constant dopamine rush. And if I can train myself to see my time-wasting activities as a reward at the end of a productive day instead of my go-to activity, I know I'll enjoy life much better. And like I said earlier, any time spent enjoying life is time well spent.
I know that addiction is not a word to be used lightly, and I don't intend to. If this is indeed an addiction it is a low-level one without any of the consequences of worse afflictions. But I do acknowledge that inproper use of time or procrastination can be considered self-destructive behaviors. They decrease someone's confidence, self-worth and can have lasting effects on their success. When I'm more than an hour into browsing the internet I'm usually not having any fun. After two hours I'm actively frustrated with myself but often won't just walk away. After three hours we get into the realm of guilt and self-loathing. But something keeps drawing me back.
A lot of the anger I feel with myself when wasting time has to do with the way I view time. Since my sophomore year of college - when I got serious about my studies - I've always mentally divided my activities into useful and useless time and am constantly categorizing everything I do. This is a double-edged sword. On one hand it does keep me focused or at least keeps my eyes on the prize. On the other hand it causes me great amounts of stress and, as I mentioned earlier, guilt. Especially when I feel I can't control how I use my time or get myself to stop doing things I want to do.
I'm also frustratingly arbitrary about the way I categorize my time. Time spent reading a book is useful time. Time spent on the internet is usually considered wasted time, even though I'm often doing just as much reading. I really only use text-based websites; most of the time I'm reading news articles. Time spent watching TV isn't always wasted. If there's a show I watch every week, that's just part of my routine. The problem is if it's 10 am and I just flip on Sportscenter for half an hour even though there are better things I could be doing and really I kind of hate Sportscenter. Writing in the blog is considered useful, though I can never just consistently write; I always feel a need to keep flipping back to social networking sites between paragraphs. Some activities seem obviously productive, like playing bass or exercising. But if I think about them in terms of my long-term goals (finding a career and a place to live), do they get me any closer? I'm not going to be a professional bassist or an athlete. How are they more useful than reading the news?
This last question had frustrated me for a while. I've come close to answering it recently, with a realization about the importance of enjoying life. I feel better if I'm making music; it doesn't matter if it won't ever bring me financial success. After a good workout I feel like a million bucks. I shouldn't feel guilty about spending time with friends instead of searching for jobs, because it improves the quality of my life. These things don't worry me anymore. But wasting time on Reddit doesn't improve the quality of my life in anyway. Yet I can't pull myself away.
The actual addiction I'm referring to here is a physiological need for dopamine. Recent research has shown that the novelty we experience finding new things on time-wasting websites releases dopamine in our brain, which we become addicted to. Unforuntaely the only article I have about it is from the always reliable, never biased Huffington Post, but here ya go: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/russell-poldrack/multitasking-the-brain-se_b_334674.html
Classifying it as an addiction actually makes it easier for me, especially since it really is a low-level addiction. But if I can acknowledge that it makes it easier to approach it as a physiological problem that can be addressed in steps instead of a character weakness. I am not a person incapable of using time productively. I just have a problem that needs to be fixed.
I'm never going to reach a point where I wake up at 6 am and then write, read run and play bass nonstop until I go to bed at midnight and start all over the next day. But I will take steps to reduce my wasted time and resist the urge for a constant dopamine rush. And if I can train myself to see my time-wasting activities as a reward at the end of a productive day instead of my go-to activity, I know I'll enjoy life much better. And like I said earlier, any time spent enjoying life is time well spent.
Monday, December 12, 2011
Book Review: The Shining by Stephen King
I am not a reader of horror. In fact, I've never read a horror story before this (except Goosebumps and works of a similar vein as a kid). It's sort of strange that I ended up reading this book. But I was at the library a few weeks back, completely directionless as to what I should read next. So I started walking through the stacks and in the K section The Shining caught my eye.
I had never read anything by King before, besides a nonfiction essay in an English class once. But that essay was fantastic. After years of failed lectures from teahers it was the only thing that ever convinced me that passive voice is something to be avoided. But I had never felt a need to pick up any of his novels. I've always had a negative stereotype of both the horror and mystery genres. I guess I associate them with dime-a-dozen pulp novels. I know it's a totally unfair characterization so I figured I'd take a chance to challenge it by picking up something by the king of horror. I was also curious about if a horror novel could actually scare me. I'm a very visual person so I imagined it would be hard to get me frightened over something I can't see. But the movie of The Shining is the most terrifying thing I've ever seen, so I figured it stood a chance.
I was amazed right away, though I know I shouldn't have been, by the quality of the writing. Horror is by no means a lesser genre. In terms of literature there is a lot of good being done here. The descriptions and characterizations are very clear and astute. For the most part, at least in the beginning, it feels like very real people with real concerns. The first half of the story, the better half of the story, is actually a lot more about a struggling family and a father's battle with alcoholism than any paranormal activity. It's about a man who has made mistakes and is trying once more to piece his family together. He gets a job as the winter caretaker of a hotel up in the mountains because it's the only job he can get after the mistakes he's made but also because it will allow him and his wife and kid more time together .
Things start to go wrong as the evil forces at the hotel begin to affect him negatively, and as the snow comes and the family is fully isolated it all goes from bad to worse. The horror starts. I was actually dissapointed with how this transformation comes about. King does a good job of taking his time building into the paranormal stuff, but in the beginning there is a really good tension where we don't yet know how much of this is real. Are there really ghosts at the hotel or are isolation and personal demons causing hallucinations? I was excited about this question and then dissapointed to see how early King answered it for us. I would have preferred more mystery and more time in limbo.
I had a tendency while reading to compare the book to the movie. I know this a mistake, but I'm a novice reviewer and I'm doing this as a hobby so who cares? It's inevitable. It actually made the read more fun. There were things I preferred about King's version, such as the aforementioned depth of character. But Kubrick's version is signifcantly more frightening, and not just because you can actually see what's happening. I didn't feel like this book was much of a horror story at all; it's more of a psychological game. All of the frightening moments are based on the feeling you get leaving a basement that you don't feel comfortable in. You know something is behind you but you're not going to look back, you're just going to walk a little faster. Walk, don't run, because if you let it know you're aware of it it will pounce. You rush out of there and then turn to find it was never there but you KNOW it had to be. This happens multiple times in the story, and even though it's relatable it seems like a weak way to try and scare the reader.
I am fascinated by isolation. I was very drawn to the idea of the hotel as a place far away from the world. This isolation is what draws Jack and his family in - a reprieve from his mistakes and from anxiety and alcohol and all the pressures of everyday life. But it eventually becomes what does them in. Isolation is no longer an advantage when you realize the hotel is not a place, it is a character, and its intentions are not pure.
Overall I enjoyed the book, I would recommend it, but there is a major weakness in the fact that King does not (or at least did not at the time) know how to write children. He sets up Danny as being incredily intelligent for his age, and the parents take pride in never talking down to him, but his thought process is way above that of a child his age. And then King tries to make him more childlike by cutely misspelling or misunderstanding words (i.e. Presidential Sweet) and it just comes off as a failed attempt. I'll give you an excerpt as an example. The first three paragraphs are actually third-person narration, but they're describing Danny's wandering thoughts, and then the quote at the end is him interjecting:
But it wasn't really empty. Because here in the Overlook things just went on and on. Here in the Overlook all times were one. There was an endless night in August of 1945, with laughter and drinks and a chosen shining few going up and coming down in the elevator, drinking champagne and popping party favors in each other's faces. It was a not-yet-light morning in June some twenty years later and the organization hitters endlessly pumped shotgun shells into the torn and bleeding bodies of three men who went through their agony endlessly. In a room on the second floor a woman lolled in her tub and waited for visitors.
In the Overlook all things had a sort of life. It was as if the whole place had been wound up with a silver key. The clock was running. The clock was running.
He was that key, Danny thought sadly. Tony had warned him and he just let things go on.
"I'm just five!"
Indeed he is just five. So how is he coming up with this very complex, very adult, very metaphorical thought process? I think this example shows a lot of the inconsistency in this early writing of King. There are unbalances like this throughout a book. A lot of quality ideas executed poorly. It's not surprising to me that Stanley Kubrick took the shell of this story and led it in a more complete direction, even rejecting a script written by King. I'm sure King felt writing this book the way I feel with these attempts at reviews; I know exactly what I want to say but not quite how to organize and present it. This book serves as an interesting stepping stone on the path to him eventually becoming a great writer. Or at least someone people say is a great writer. I wouldn't know. I've only ever read one horror story.
I had never read anything by King before, besides a nonfiction essay in an English class once. But that essay was fantastic. After years of failed lectures from teahers it was the only thing that ever convinced me that passive voice is something to be avoided. But I had never felt a need to pick up any of his novels. I've always had a negative stereotype of both the horror and mystery genres. I guess I associate them with dime-a-dozen pulp novels. I know it's a totally unfair characterization so I figured I'd take a chance to challenge it by picking up something by the king of horror. I was also curious about if a horror novel could actually scare me. I'm a very visual person so I imagined it would be hard to get me frightened over something I can't see. But the movie of The Shining is the most terrifying thing I've ever seen, so I figured it stood a chance.
I was amazed right away, though I know I shouldn't have been, by the quality of the writing. Horror is by no means a lesser genre. In terms of literature there is a lot of good being done here. The descriptions and characterizations are very clear and astute. For the most part, at least in the beginning, it feels like very real people with real concerns. The first half of the story, the better half of the story, is actually a lot more about a struggling family and a father's battle with alcoholism than any paranormal activity. It's about a man who has made mistakes and is trying once more to piece his family together. He gets a job as the winter caretaker of a hotel up in the mountains because it's the only job he can get after the mistakes he's made but also because it will allow him and his wife and kid more time together .
Things start to go wrong as the evil forces at the hotel begin to affect him negatively, and as the snow comes and the family is fully isolated it all goes from bad to worse. The horror starts. I was actually dissapointed with how this transformation comes about. King does a good job of taking his time building into the paranormal stuff, but in the beginning there is a really good tension where we don't yet know how much of this is real. Are there really ghosts at the hotel or are isolation and personal demons causing hallucinations? I was excited about this question and then dissapointed to see how early King answered it for us. I would have preferred more mystery and more time in limbo.
I had a tendency while reading to compare the book to the movie. I know this a mistake, but I'm a novice reviewer and I'm doing this as a hobby so who cares? It's inevitable. It actually made the read more fun. There were things I preferred about King's version, such as the aforementioned depth of character. But Kubrick's version is signifcantly more frightening, and not just because you can actually see what's happening. I didn't feel like this book was much of a horror story at all; it's more of a psychological game. All of the frightening moments are based on the feeling you get leaving a basement that you don't feel comfortable in. You know something is behind you but you're not going to look back, you're just going to walk a little faster. Walk, don't run, because if you let it know you're aware of it it will pounce. You rush out of there and then turn to find it was never there but you KNOW it had to be. This happens multiple times in the story, and even though it's relatable it seems like a weak way to try and scare the reader.
I am fascinated by isolation. I was very drawn to the idea of the hotel as a place far away from the world. This isolation is what draws Jack and his family in - a reprieve from his mistakes and from anxiety and alcohol and all the pressures of everyday life. But it eventually becomes what does them in. Isolation is no longer an advantage when you realize the hotel is not a place, it is a character, and its intentions are not pure.
Overall I enjoyed the book, I would recommend it, but there is a major weakness in the fact that King does not (or at least did not at the time) know how to write children. He sets up Danny as being incredily intelligent for his age, and the parents take pride in never talking down to him, but his thought process is way above that of a child his age. And then King tries to make him more childlike by cutely misspelling or misunderstanding words (i.e. Presidential Sweet) and it just comes off as a failed attempt. I'll give you an excerpt as an example. The first three paragraphs are actually third-person narration, but they're describing Danny's wandering thoughts, and then the quote at the end is him interjecting:
But it wasn't really empty. Because here in the Overlook things just went on and on. Here in the Overlook all times were one. There was an endless night in August of 1945, with laughter and drinks and a chosen shining few going up and coming down in the elevator, drinking champagne and popping party favors in each other's faces. It was a not-yet-light morning in June some twenty years later and the organization hitters endlessly pumped shotgun shells into the torn and bleeding bodies of three men who went through their agony endlessly. In a room on the second floor a woman lolled in her tub and waited for visitors.
In the Overlook all things had a sort of life. It was as if the whole place had been wound up with a silver key. The clock was running. The clock was running.
He was that key, Danny thought sadly. Tony had warned him and he just let things go on.
"I'm just five!"
Indeed he is just five. So how is he coming up with this very complex, very adult, very metaphorical thought process? I think this example shows a lot of the inconsistency in this early writing of King. There are unbalances like this throughout a book. A lot of quality ideas executed poorly. It's not surprising to me that Stanley Kubrick took the shell of this story and led it in a more complete direction, even rejecting a script written by King. I'm sure King felt writing this book the way I feel with these attempts at reviews; I know exactly what I want to say but not quite how to organize and present it. This book serves as an interesting stepping stone on the path to him eventually becoming a great writer. Or at least someone people say is a great writer. I wouldn't know. I've only ever read one horror story.
Sunday, December 4, 2011
Music and Musicians
I had the pleasure of seeing my favorite band live last night. Here's the obligatory plug for their website, which is quite nice: thedaredevilchristopherwright.com/ . It has their new EP streaming for free, and a video of them performing by a hotel pool in Canada.
I saw them at a small club in Milwaukee with a few other local bands, put together by this group that promotes events in Milwaukee (do414.com, plugs aplenty today). They tend to always be at small clubs. They seem to be allergic to success, which is confusing because their music is excellent. But it's good for me because I never have to worry about their shows being too big to get in.
Don't worry. This is not one of those stories, about how the bands I like are more underground than the bands you like and I always see them in small clubs and I'm so cool. This is a story about how we react to encountering the people who write the music we love. Because when you see them in a small club you come face to face with these people. Standing next to them in the crowd, or handing them some equipment or you both end up watching the same basketball game on the bar TV.
I've never bought into the mythology of the Rock God, or the hero worship doled on anyone who plays guitar. I think this is because I'm a musician and spend time around musicians, so I know what we're like. A lot of us are selfish and narcisstic and just plain strange people. There's something to be said about someone who charges others money to hear them perform, and I can say that because it's something I've done. Not all musicians are bad, I wouldn't even say the majority of musicians are bad, but the assumption that someone is worthy of endless praise because that person makes good music is absolutely false.
I also wonder about the way in which musical skill is celebrated. Music is hard. Really hard. It takes years and years of practice and dedication. But so do a lot of things. There are so many skills that take just as much hard work, but don't receive the same adoration. You'll never hear someone screaming with joy at the sight of a doctor or journalist or firefighter (maybe the last one, if you are on fire and overjoyed to know that you will no longer be on fire). But this strange phenomenon occurs with music. You know what I'm talking about. The crowd going nuts because the guy on stage says "It's great to be here in (name of your city)!" This is especially strange these days, now that so many folk bands are popular. It's a little awkward to hear people losing their minds screaming over a man playing banjo, no matter how good he is.
I think a big factor in this is the emotional connection we feel to music. There's no denying that it's stronger than the connection we feel to other art forms, and to most things in life. To so many people, especially young people, music is everything. So I can understand that a lot of this passion you see at concerts comes from the deep emotional connection we share with the music. But it's weird to me as a musician who knows musicians. Knowing that guy on stage is not some hero. He's just as insecure and confused as every single one of us; he just happens to be the one singing about it right now.
So where does that leave me at my show last night? Too cynical maybe? I was super excited to see the band, I love love love their music. And their live shows are hugely entertaining. I just don't get into the hooting and hollering about every thing they say or every song they play. I enjoyed the music and clapped emphatically after each song and felt a deep emotional connection to the songs. I just didn't feel a need to worship the singers.
It wasn't until I was riding home, though, that it dawned on me. Yes these guys are just normal people like everyone else, and playing guitar is not a heroic feat. But all night I had been standing a few feet from the folks who created the music that for a few years has defined a part of me. I feel a deep connection to these songs, I feel they relate to my experience, but they come directly from the experiences of these gentlemen. The words and sounds sprang forth from their minds before they could ever reach my eyes and impact who I am.
I guess it's a lot cooler than I had led myself to believe. Maybe we do give too much praise to songwriters, but I realized I myself probably have not been giving enough.
I saw them at a small club in Milwaukee with a few other local bands, put together by this group that promotes events in Milwaukee (do414.com, plugs aplenty today). They tend to always be at small clubs. They seem to be allergic to success, which is confusing because their music is excellent. But it's good for me because I never have to worry about their shows being too big to get in.
Don't worry. This is not one of those stories, about how the bands I like are more underground than the bands you like and I always see them in small clubs and I'm so cool. This is a story about how we react to encountering the people who write the music we love. Because when you see them in a small club you come face to face with these people. Standing next to them in the crowd, or handing them some equipment or you both end up watching the same basketball game on the bar TV.
I've never bought into the mythology of the Rock God, or the hero worship doled on anyone who plays guitar. I think this is because I'm a musician and spend time around musicians, so I know what we're like. A lot of us are selfish and narcisstic and just plain strange people. There's something to be said about someone who charges others money to hear them perform, and I can say that because it's something I've done. Not all musicians are bad, I wouldn't even say the majority of musicians are bad, but the assumption that someone is worthy of endless praise because that person makes good music is absolutely false.
I also wonder about the way in which musical skill is celebrated. Music is hard. Really hard. It takes years and years of practice and dedication. But so do a lot of things. There are so many skills that take just as much hard work, but don't receive the same adoration. You'll never hear someone screaming with joy at the sight of a doctor or journalist or firefighter (maybe the last one, if you are on fire and overjoyed to know that you will no longer be on fire). But this strange phenomenon occurs with music. You know what I'm talking about. The crowd going nuts because the guy on stage says "It's great to be here in (name of your city)!" This is especially strange these days, now that so many folk bands are popular. It's a little awkward to hear people losing their minds screaming over a man playing banjo, no matter how good he is.
I think a big factor in this is the emotional connection we feel to music. There's no denying that it's stronger than the connection we feel to other art forms, and to most things in life. To so many people, especially young people, music is everything. So I can understand that a lot of this passion you see at concerts comes from the deep emotional connection we share with the music. But it's weird to me as a musician who knows musicians. Knowing that guy on stage is not some hero. He's just as insecure and confused as every single one of us; he just happens to be the one singing about it right now.
So where does that leave me at my show last night? Too cynical maybe? I was super excited to see the band, I love love love their music. And their live shows are hugely entertaining. I just don't get into the hooting and hollering about every thing they say or every song they play. I enjoyed the music and clapped emphatically after each song and felt a deep emotional connection to the songs. I just didn't feel a need to worship the singers.
It wasn't until I was riding home, though, that it dawned on me. Yes these guys are just normal people like everyone else, and playing guitar is not a heroic feat. But all night I had been standing a few feet from the folks who created the music that for a few years has defined a part of me. I feel a deep connection to these songs, I feel they relate to my experience, but they come directly from the experiences of these gentlemen. The words and sounds sprang forth from their minds before they could ever reach my eyes and impact who I am.
I guess it's a lot cooler than I had led myself to believe. Maybe we do give too much praise to songwriters, but I realized I myself probably have not been giving enough.
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