Briefly...

Have been meaning to post the link to this for Mr. Mitchell, just in case nobody else pointed it out to him or otherwise emailed it to him. Unfortunately, I saw the piece after the show had ended, so I didn't manage to see her work or how the show went, but I'm sure everything turned out just fine.

And now I get to make the long trip to go teach The Rape of Lucrece. The kids are going to hate that poem.... Ugh.

Other Passings

It's been a sad weekend. Over the past few days we've lost:

Elia Kazan, director of so many classic films including On The Waterfront and famed name-namer;

George Plimpton, author and founder of The Paris Review;

Donald O'Connor, the great comic actor and dancer, whose moves in Singin' In The Rain were unforgettable;

Althea Gibson, the first black tennis star;

and Edward Said, author of, among other works, Orientalism. I last saw Said on the tube just after the September 11th attacks, and it was sad to see him: he looked like an apologist and, worse, he looked like he was being outmsarted by, of all people, the vapid Paula Zahn.

O'Connor's death is the saddest of all, for me. He was always a figure of great energy and humour. "Make 'Em Laugh" remains one of my favourite screen memories.

March Sadly After

Yes, I'm back, after taking a short sabbatical from blogging, mainly because I really haven't felt like writing in the past few days. I'd like to thank those that expressed their concern and/or their condolences in the past stretch. I've debated whether or not to write anything more on the blog on Bandit's passing, and finally decided to write something here, not so much to 'express my feelings' on the matter but to describe matters in a one-off so I don't have to write about the whole thing again and again. Part of this is a manifest loathing on my part of repeating myself; the other is more somber, rooted in a desire to avoid the distasteful insincerity that can come with saying the same things repeatedly and exhaustively, with reaching the point after which one is moreorless just going through the motions.

All considered, my mother took Bandit's passing better than I expected, but it was, is, obviously very painful for her. As she has said, Bandit's passing -- and even the very idea of it-- was more painful for her than her own mother's death. (This is not a surprise: my grandmother wasn't exactly the personification of kindness or geniality.) I told her some time ago that when we decided to put Bandit down, I was going to be in the room with him until the end, and I think my commitment to doing so inadvertently prompted her to want to be with him, too, even though I'm sure it did her no good to see him go. (Dad waited outside, mainly, I'm sure, because there was one thing he couldn't bear to watch: Mom crying.) Somewhere along the line she decided this was 'what she had to do,' that her own desire not to see things was overruled by her belief that she was helping Bandit by being there at the last. In the end, I don't think it helped her at all, and I tried several times to get her to leave so she wouldn't see something she'd never be able to forget, but to no avail. I'm sure that memory will haunt her for a bit, unfortunately. At least she didn't see his face as he died: as I stroked his head and talked him through, I used my back to keep Mom from seeing his face, from seeing the fear in his eyes, from seeing the last seconds as his face twitched and his teeth chattered. I don't think she could have handled seeing him die. When we put an animal down, we tell ourselves that we're 'putting it to sleep,' a metaphor that is relatively apt but by no means accurate. But we use that metaphor because it makes things easier for us to deal with, and I was determined that Mom be able, as much as possible, to believe the metaphor, to believe that he went calmly and without pain. Sometimes our myths and metaphors are the only things that keep us from rending ourselves into emotional shreds.

As for me, Thursday was about doing things that had to be done, and about doing things right. I took Bandit for a last walk, even though he could only make it half way down the block because his hind legs had become so weak. It was more ceremony than walk, really; it was one last time for he and I to be alone together, doing what we used to do, as if to remember, to commemorate, how much our relationship had been built on those walks when both of us were considerably younger. There's something horribly poignant about doing something for the last time, especially when you know it's the last time. Every gesture has a goodbye in it, and every sound seems to have a note of death in it, as much as one tries not to think in such terms. And yet doing something for the last time is also an act of defiance: it accepts that an ending is coming, but seems to say 'but not yet.' In a way, for a while we were a boy and his puppy again, even if I was no longer a boy and he was no longer a pup. There was a sad lyricism to it all, as if there were a kind of tacit, reluctant acceptance of the inevitable parting of our ways.

I didn't cry, and I haven't cried, and I don't say that as if I were proud of it. I can't say I was trying to be stoic, and I can't say I 'held back.' It's been a period of sadness without catharsis, of loss without grieving. In many ways, Bandit was my best friend, and he was certainly my truest friend; he was the closest I'll ever know to a brother. As I've been writing this, I've been noticing all the sounds that I haven't heard-- the clatter of his collar, the click-clack of his claws on the linoleum, the sad thuds as he'd fall about the house. The house seems emptier without him, even a bit colder and a bit plainer. It's easy to forget how much a pet can bring to one's life, too easy.

I don't know if it eased him at all that I was with him to the end, or that my ugly mug was the last thing he saw before he died. I hope so. No one deserves to die alone. And right now, for all the knowledge that what happened had to happen and that it was the right thing to do, I find myself oddly like Fowler at the end of Graham Greene's The Quiet American, not distressed or mournful, but wishing, as Greene put it, 'there existed someone to whom I could say that I was sorry.'

Selah. Selah.

With all that said, this blog will now return to its regular routine of performing for its own amusement and perhaps others.

Requiescat In Pace

1988-2003.


Good night, old friend.

'Lucie Always Wanted To Be A Cock...'

It goes without saying that some chicks have serious problems.

^~~That Just Means That I Would Rather Not^~~

I'd like to apologize to everyone who has been waiting for me to respond to private emails, and indeed some have been waiting for an exorbitant length of time. It's something of which I've become all too aware lately, that I dread writing private emails. This has nothing to do with becoming anti-social, and it has only a little to do with the good Doctor's recent tendency toward (mmmmm) apathy. But individual emails now seem to me more than a bit of a pain the ass because of the professional uses of email. By the time I sort through my 'must answer' email (the stuff relating to work, to my students, to keeping my head generally afloat in the world), I'm exhausted and P.O.'ed, because those emails tend so often to be repetitions of the same old things -- and answers to questions most people could find out for themselves rather than running straight to me. "It's not righteous indignation," the Man sings, "that makes me complain / It's the fact that I always have to explain." Uggidy ugh ugh ugh.

Unfortunately, this ends up making me delay my private correspondence, and we all know what happens when we delay something longer than we like-- we end up dreading catching up because that whole process will involve the inevitable and tiring self-explanations and apologies in addition to the correspondence itself. Worse, the delay ends up taking the initial correspondence out of its original (and immediate) context. The end result: email itself becomes laborious in its nature, more than it really should be.

The other result is this, that blogging becomes preferrable-- the broad saying of things that doesn't so much require answers as it requires common address. As much as it may seem like blogging is as much work as, or as time-consuming, as email, the fact is rather the opposite. Things I'm sure would be different if the times hadn't made email so crucial to so many of our professional lives, but there it is... So, if you've sent me an email and are waiting for a response, please be patient; I'll get it all done eventually-- or, rather, I'll get caught up on the current backlog at the sacrifice of the coming lot, which will become another backlog, which I'll then catch up, at the sacrifice of.... You know how the cycle goes...

*Shrug* My apologies to those waiting, all of whom must feel like Enron creditors.

Maybe It Is A Tumour...

The best and most logical reason to vote against Awh-nold: he thinks the film
Gladiator gives you a 'little bit of history.' Geez, Maureen Dowd is really giving the (He-)Man Who Would Be Governor an easy time of it; this piece is bloody close to being a paean.

The Bay of Poutine and The Damfleck Factor

It's reassuring that at least our recent border tension with India has been peaceably resolved. I haven't been this terrified since Gorbachev's ouster....

And as much as I'm reticent to link to anything about the split, real or imagined or otherwise architectonically designed, of Jennufleck, I do think this worth reading. They may have missed the real reason, though: "J.Lo Discovers Tube of Ben-Gay Probably Prophetic." Or maybe she realized that this corporate shill sounded better saying Ben's last name than she ever would.

I don't know... is it just me, or does The Onion seem to be getting more and more flaccid in its satire?

*Shrug*

Well, I guess I can't argue with this too much...


"You must remember this, a kiss is still a kiss."

Your romance is Casablanca. A classic story of love in trying times, chock full of both cynicism and hope. You obviously believe in true love, but you're also constantly aware of practicality and societal expectations. That's not always fun, but at least it's realistic. Try not to let the Nazis get you down too much.


What Romance Movie Best Represents Your Love Life?
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No Wonder They Cocked Up The 2000 Election

As if dimpled and hanging chads weren't bad enough symbols of Floridian legal lunacy, you can't even dye your pets.

The Paragon Of Animals, My Ass...

Earlier today I started to write a long post-- a series of links (in typical Dr. J fashion) that illustrated all too well the infinite stupidity of some people ('O what a piece of work is man' was going through in a much more thoroughly ironic sense than Hamlet meant them). The links were numerous, to stories about an African man who cut off his own penis 'to teach his wife a lesson,' a woman suing the Coca Cola Bottling Company for not including instructions on how to open a pop bottle, an Australian advisory warning people against inserting ice cubes into the recta of overdose sufferers, a man who tried to smuggle dangerous snakes that were strapped to his legs, a celebrity who can't tell the difference between Peru and Brazil (and who has no idea what the word 'ironic' means), a church that is PC-ing up the Bible in the most insipid ways, a man who has redefined the term 'hot beef injection,' a house that gives new meaning to lowering the property values, and a game called Creepy Freaks that will certainly teach our children well. And in that surveyance I was, as always, aghast at the cosmic stupidity of our pitiful species. I simply could not, and in many ways cannot, believe these people were of the same species as Shakespeare, Milton, Homer, Gandhi, Mozart, Dante and Michelangelo. Yes, it's an old thought, an old rant even, one I think we're all given to at various points in our existence. But let us just say that it hit me with unusual force today, and prompted me to think not only that this world is too much with us, but that this brave new world is unfortunate to have some of us in it. As Einstein once said, "There are only two things that are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former." (Or something to that effect, anyway.)

And then something screwed up: Blogger registered some sort of internal error, and the whole damned post was lost, and I frankly couldn't be bothered to go back and get the links to do it all again.

Then I was coasting around and happened upon a few sites that helped to restore at least some of hope for humankind. They're worth checking out:

A Poetry-Lover's Guide To the World-Wide Web has some nice links on -- guess what-- poetry...

Leon Malinofsky has an interesting collection of material too on poetry, including a lot of good sound files...

And there's a surprisingly rich collection of material on poetry in English at this site in Japan

And then there's Hobson's Choice, a blog primarily on public policy run by a regular visitor to this site, a blog (he says repeating himself) on public policy that is two things most such things are not, erudite and interesting. And no, I am not saying that because it says something very kind about this site.

Suffice it to say, it's tempting to think the world a bunch of incredible cow-fucking, penis-slicing people incapable of opening a bottle of cola without injuring themselves and blaming it on somebody else. And while I can't agree with Leonard Cohen's F. that the world is 'all diamond,' it's at least consoling to remember that there is diamond amidst the shit. It just gets too easy to be repelled by the effluent aroma.

And I need to think things as positively as possible today. Very much so. Once more unto the crap, dear friends.

Blogger Problems

For whatever reasons, Blogger has taken most of the archives offline. They promise the archives will be back soon, but we shall see. Sorry for any inconvenience this may be causing.

Toward The Moon

I don't know exactly why, but I love this image, from Richard Waters' site. Click here to see some more images at his site.

And Another Stella Connection

Apparently in England there's a 'ghost' that likes Artois. Or perhaps he doesn't like it, if he's wasting it...

Some Good Laughs and The Stella Awards

Some of the stuff at this site is absolutely hilarious, especially the bits "All I Want For Christmas," "If Microsoft Made Cars" and "Quotations in American History," the last of which is certainly guilty hilarity but hilarity nonetheless.

Also check this out if you want to be infuriated, The Stella Awards. And remember to sue if you trip over your own damned kid in a store. *Shakes head*

Ah, To Be Repeatedly Spawned On By Aggressive Male Salmon...

Dave Barry's column this week is on a kayaking trip he took through Idaho-- and it's hilarious. Actually, Dave's column normally appears on Mondays, but it looks like this site has jumped the gun, to my great amusement.

KAY-AK!

Articles From Today's NYTimes

There's some interesting stuff in today's Times which you need the free subscription to read but which are worth going through the registration process if you haven't already.

To start with the most provocative (or, really, incendiary). The deate surrounding Mel Gibson's The Passion-- about Christ's crucifixion-- has been pretty intense, and Frank Rich has a pretty broad condemnation of the debate as Gibson-provoked media publicity. Admittedly, Gibson hasn't been particularly 'sensitive' in his statements about the film or about his and its critics, but it does seem to me that Rich's argument is of the level of snide retort that tends to undermine the points he does make. I also find it suspicious that Gibson's critics keep bringing up his father, which seems like visiting the ideological sins of the father upon the son. It'll be interesting to see the consensus of reaction when the film is finally released.

Maureen Dowd has a surprisingly sympathetic column on the (*sigh*) difficulties of being Arnold Schwarzenegger.

Paul Krugman has a good article on the difficulties in Iraq, and he makes a good case, that the dangers of policing Iraq are not going to be relieved until the US administration finds a way to keep the silent majority of Iraqis convinced that what is happening is not a typical American involvement, but a 'long-haul' attempt to create a new Iraq. In short, Iraqis need to be convinced that they're not just going to end up like the people of Grenada-- or Afghanistan in the 1980s.

And here is a good discussion of the resume of Democratic candidate General Wesley Clark. Whatever else he is, Clark is an interesting figure, and it'll be something to watch how handles the process of campaigning. He's the one 'unknown' in the equation right now, and it's always good sport to watch the unknown determine itself.

Happy Birthday, Leonard

It's Mr. Cohen's birthday today, 69 years young. Chances are he's spending it in the company of young ladies a third his age, signing shoes "Magic is a foot." Now, Mr. Cohen, if you'll only sit down and write another book. It's been twenty years, after all, since The Book of Mercy... Cheers, you whose suffering has been so traditional.

Back On Down The Road

Yeah! A rare pleasant surprise! Discovered a small case of compact discs that I feared had disappeared forever some time ago, discs that I very much missed, including Van Morrison's Down The Road, his lovely evocative album from 2002. As I write this entry I'm listening to it again for the first time in what seems a dog's age, and it brings back some wistful memories I'll not explain here. It also makes me wonder how someone is doing, not particularly in the romantic sense, but in the sense of reflecting on times passed and gone and at least in part missed. More often than not, it's better to remember the beauty of the days gone by than the blemishes. It's amazing how helpful music can be in helping one do that, not beating an antique drum but appreciating the life of significant soil. Slainte. 'And keep me young as I grow old...'

Dying On Stage

I really hope this is just a fraud and not a publicity stunt of truly macabre proportions. As sympathetic as I indeed can be to the 'Right to Die' movement, the prospect of this is truly horrifying, especially for those of us who remember American politican R. Budd Dwyer-- who shot himself at a press conference in the late eighties (87? 88?). Crikees.

Mmmm Mmmm Good...

This is so disgusting, I think I'd sue, too. Mind you, they say the marrow makes the broth tastier.... *shudder*

Not Another Woody Allen Movie

The latest Woody Allen feature Anything Else is garnering considerably more attention than most of his recent efforts, with some generally positive reviews, and an ad campaign that wisely tends to show as many images as possible of Christina Ricci in underwear instead of the typical images of Allen futzing and putzing about. I'm not much of an Allen fan, though I admit he can be a genius when the mood strikes him, and it seems this one may be decent, with Allen removing himself as the romantic lead in favour of Jason Biggs, who is in love with a neurotic and manipulative beauty, played by Ricci.

(Aside: fem-crits, before you gather your arsenal of pejoratives like 'misogynistic' to attack the script prematurely, suffice it to say that there are many, many, many women like Amanda-- the Ricci character, the archetypal Girl From Hell-- in the real world, and to think otherwise is little more than idealistic, or sexually narcissistic, denial. Kudos to Allen for daring to write such a comic figure in these everso PC times. Such archetypes exist because they have existed, and do exist, in reality: deal with it. Deal with it just as men have to deal with the equally unflattering archetypes of the infatiguably stupid male and the cheating, wife-beating bastard that too have their geneses in equally unfortunate realities.)

All in all, the movie looks clever and funny, with a great cast that includes Stockard Channing, Danny DeVito and Jimmy Fallon, and it has won praise from some very disparate critical corners. Click here for a review from the Times. Looks like it may be worth a return to Allen-- if only to see the impossibly adorable Ricci, a strong actress with the loveliest manipulative doe-eyes of her generation, play an archetype all but forbidden in movies these days. And any movie that lets Stockard Channing do her thing has to have something going for it.

Evening Shadows

The Ontario election seems all but sewn up, and the interesting thing about the election-- aside from a series of unbelievably idiotic missteps from the Tory campaign machine-- is that no one is voting for anything, but against things. Dalton McGuinty and the Liberals seem to have absolutely no public support per se, but they're poised to win by default, by a kind of sympathy vote against the Tory ad campaigns and the general impulse of antipathy toward the Tories. Ernie Eves and the governing Tories have thrown away what seemed just months ago what could have been a cakewalk, especially with the uninspiring McGuinty having all the charisma and conviction of a piece of corkboard. And then there's the NDP and Howard Hampton; the NDP platforms have largely been liked, Hampton has been surprisingly effective and respected as party leader, but the party itself still languishes in the basement, largely because of the Bob Rae hangover. So, how does all this add up? We won't vote for Hampton because of Bob Rae, and because we don't trust the NDP, however much they may be saying what a lot of people want them to say; we won't vote for Eves and the Tories because they've been in power and they've proven themselves arrogant and smug in their campaign, the living emblems of cheap politics; and no one really wants to vote for McGuinty and the Liberals, except perhaps a bit out of pity, and because they're the only viable option left. As I said before on this blog, this was Eves' election to lose, especially after the surprising burst of support he received after the blackout. But now, he's (er) evened out, and thrust himself into the shadows.

I know this: the heads of many campaign organizers will roll after all is said and done, enough that it may look like the bloodless Ontario version of the revolutionary Reign of Terror. Click here for a report on the apparently deadly decline of the Tories. Note to campaign organizers and politicians: give us something to vote for, not just to vote against. Unless you're Howard Hampton, in which case you're just plain fucked.

The Sheep In Dick Wolf's Clothing

Also from today's NYTimes, there's an interesting article on the continued success of the Law and Order franchise, which is pretty much on the verge of being monolithic in its proportions. There are some quite canny assessments in the article (despite some misstatements-- e.g., that no one dies on L&O, conveniently forgetting George Dzundza's shooting way, way back and Jill Hennesy's car crash; that we know next to nothing of the characters, forgetting the famous 'first execution' episode, or the death of Adam Schiff's wife some time ago). There's an extent to which Law and Order is like a pseudo-intellectual's ratty old pair of slippers, comfortable enough but not especially provocative. It's not a challenging show by any means-- it ties itself so closely to conventions of its own now well-known design (how many times will the child turn out to be the killer, after all?), that we always know we're safely inside Dick Wolf's very familiar New York.

I think, though, that the main show is wearing thin (and has been for some time), and I've found little of particular interest in the newer variations which always ring too familiar for my eyes. The flagship L&O, though, hasn't been the same for me since Steven Hill (Adam Schiff) left the show: he could provide either necessary gravity or necessary lightness, and his occasional political flipness always seemed a mask for an idealism that somehow had to persist in an environment prone to destroying that idealism.

L&O, the main show, is beginning its 14th season. It has only one primetime contemporary in terms of such extensive duration, another show that too seems to have no end in sight, The Simpsons. I wonder if that says something... *hmmmm* Food for thought.

Law & Order & Law & Order & Law & Order & Law & Order ...

Love, Like Self-Parody, Takes Time

Ah, I suppose it was inevitable: not only has Mariah Carey become a caricature of herself, but now she's decided to acknowledge her own role as self-caricaturist. The review in this link, of Ms. Carey's self-styled musical revue, is often hilarious, with a few lines that indicate how consciously she's embracing her own status as potential drag-queen diva subject. "Queer Eye for the Straight Girl," indeed.

Are You Ready For A Shakov Session?

Found this on the 'net today, and thought it quite interesting, if only in a 'hmm, I wonder how they'll do that' sort of way.

---

Star of British WHOSE LINE IS IT ANYWAY ? to direct Impro Theatre's SHAKOV FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: 08/21/03 Michael McShane, star of the British version of WHOSE LINE IS IT ANYWAY?, directs Impro Theatre's production of SHAKOV, premiering at EdgeFest 2003. The company will improvise in the style of Shakespeare and Chekov creating two completely different pieces in one evening. McShane will also serve as narrator and improvisor.

McShane starred in WHOSE LINE IS IT ANYWAY? in England from 1988-1994 and was one of the most popular stars of that show. He has performed professionally with Annette Bening, Emily Watson, and Sir John Gielgud. What interested McShane in this project was "using Chekov as well as Shakespeare as a platform on which to build; the wide range of prose and poetry, the rise and fall of kings and courts; and with Chekov; the desperate and the deluded classes stumbling across the Russian countryside, funny and sad and strange. Both writers create worlds which continue to evoke much of what is felt and thought in the human mind and heart."

Impro Theatre, formerly Los Angeles Theatresports, has been in existence close to 16 years. In that time they have explored "long form" pieces or improvised plays, as well as continuing to perform improv games. One very successful "long form" show was SHAKESPEARE UNSCRIPTED. "We do not think of ourselves as an improv comedy group, although our performances are always comical. We are an improvisational theatre ensemble and pride ourselves in being completely unsuitable for television, as we do not focus our work on getting laughs, but creating satisfying narratives with well defined characters, finding honest moments of comedy within the stories.", says Artistic Director Floyd Van Buskirk. The name change to Impro Theatre came about since the company did not want to be thought of exclusively as a troupe that played short form formats of improv games.

Cast members include Lisa Fredrickson, Dan O'Connor, Edi Patterson, Kelly Holden, Jim Sabo, Mike McCafferty, Doreen Remo, Brian Lohmann, Mike McShane, Michele Spears, Floyd Van Buskirk, Steven Loeb, Alison Inconstanti, and Tracy Burns.

---

Shakespeare and Chekov, eh? Now that's a weird blend. What else can come down the pike? Shakespeare and Ibsen? Shakespeare and Samuel Beckett? But I'd love to watch the audiences react to the combination of Shakespeare and David Mamet. The actors would have a field day, that's for sure...

And Two If By

Here is a cool image, courtesy Mr. Ublansky.

Brief Note

Not bothering to post much today, except this: Happy Anniversary, Parentals. Thirty-two years. Congratulations.

Addendum To The Beat Goes On

In rereading my post, I realize that I didn't quite say all of what I meant, and that I probably didn't say it was well I should have, even if there's nothing ultimately I would retract per se. Do I think that a lot of the forms of music in the past several years have been 'tinning' our ears? Yes, I do-- though the same can be said of commercials, of the world of the news-byte, of the general assaults against poetry in the past ninety years (partially the result of changing aesthetics, partially the result of the Modernist tendency to make poetry 'difficult' and perhaps unapproachable, partially the result of a series of misconceptions about poetry and its literary and social functions). There are lots of factors.

I wanted to make clear that I wasn't really blaming the kids for not knowing accenting and such, but in rereading it, I do see how that intention may not have been crystallized. The fact is this: kids these days very often aren't taught at all the minutiae of poetic process and poetic reading. Goodness knows, most teachers in high schools avoid these things like the plague, and so the kids never learn it, or are never made aware of it; but one needn't handle such matters specifically in terms of trochees and spondees and dactyls, as my kids learned yesterday. A lot of the time it's just about doing the reading out loud and listening and figuring things out -- and more often than not, such things are instinctive in the final analysis. This stuff, though, used to be drilled into you in elementary and high school, and probably still is in the early (e.g., kindergarten) stages-- in the days of "Hickory Dickory Dock" and "The Cat In The Hat," the rhythms and music of I think every English speaking child understands.

But people tend to lose these things, just as they tend to lose languages (as my French, for example, has so badly dwindled) for lack of attention and practice. And they're horrible things to lose, in part because we lose something about verbal intuition, but also because we lose a lot in the way of the 'joy' of language. We lose, in the end, the child's love of making sounds with words, and making what we mean link up to the sonic and musical qualities that will best 'drive home' what we mean.

For too many reasons, many of which become justifications, we supplant that child-like impulse with supposedly 'more adult' notion of 'understanding' and 'getting the point' and 'reading in between the lines.' Yes, these things are important, but *just* as important is knowing how sound changes everything.

Great writers very often indicate the 'sound' of things they write, their verbal 'intentions,' so to speak. The reader has to be patient and attentive, has to figure out how the words should sound in order for their meaning to be clear-- the reader has to figure this out by attending to issues of context and source and speech patterns and so forth. Actors know this very well. They have to.

I guess in the end, I lament that most people today tend not to think of these things, and that even most literature students manage to get through a great deal of their career without learning some of the key 'nuts and bolts' lessons that will so aid them in their studies. The stuff about rhythm and meter used to get burned into our heads, and now it seems it's almost as rarely taught as Latin.

I don't blame the kids for not knowing this stuff, though I won't exonerate them for not knowing it; so much of it we do know because we enact it so often and so instinctively in our own speech from the time we are children. Deep down, we know there are countless ways of saying the word 'fuck,' depending on how we mean it-- and we know how to apply that knowledge when we need to. But the same kind of instinctual understanding has to be applied to reading the words of poets and novelists and so forth.

Unfortunately, we've become used to the flat-toned sounds of sound-bytes and so forth, and we tend to convince ourselves that if we figure something about a text that we then 'get it,' and can thus move on.

And, most of the time, yes you can move on, and it won't 'hurt' you if you do. But you're likely missing something, or simplifying it or reducing it to suit your own purposes, rather than seeing what's really there. And, as Mr Eliot puts it, we can have the experience but miss the meaning.

It'd be nice if I could spend all the time necessary to flesh out these things for my kids-- to show them how thoroughly, for example, rhythms and stresses are things most of us know innately, and that, by such standards, The Waste Land isn't as far removed from Green Eggs and Ham as we may initially think.

It's the old truism: the things we most often overlook are the most obvious, the things we take for granted-- but if we do overlook such things, we can misunderstand things entirely.

Northrop Frye was right, I think: all literary theory that cannot be taught at the kindergarten level is probably useless. And, after all, the child's eyes and ears are so much more attentive than ours tend to be.

To think that a hundred years ago in Ontario, (some of, anyway)Shakespeare's sonnets were taught in grade three. Grade THREE. Go figure...

The Beat Goes On

Yesterday's teaching experience was a tad disappointing. I should qualify this: the kids, generally, were energetic and active enough, but it was more than a bit frustrating that so few of the kids these days have 'good ears' for poetry. We spent the class talking --at great length-- about sound: about the implications of sound, stresses and unstresses, inflections and tonalities, and so on and so forth; really, basic scansion and poetic reading. Unfortunately, in a course where the kids are having beats and such emphasized so strongly, most of them have only vaguest ideas on where to put accents and where not to put them, and on and on. The sound lesson entirely eclipsed the material that we were supposed to do on Shakespeare's sonnets. I'm relatively sure in the end that the class was useful for the kids, and that they've now given at least some thought to the rudiments of sound to sense, but I felt in many ways like I was conducting a vaudeville show. At one point, I even forced three of my poor minions to say the words "I love you" to the class in as convincing a manner as possible; yes, this was a desperate attempt to get them to understand the difficulties of inflection and rhythm cadence, but it was desperate. Oy... Suffice it to say that I may have laid some important groundwork for the term, but it does not bode well for the rest of the course. If such elementary things have to be dealt with so exhaustively, I wonder how well we really progress with the pace of doing a play a week.

This leads me to a larger musing: the extent to which kids today read everything as if it were prose. Our culture has become so removed from the cadences of speech and poetic effect that there's an endemia of 'tin ear syndrome.' I don't really blame the kids. I have to give them credit: they were eager in approaching the subject, and they seemed to have some fun (and some intellectual profit) from the whole exercise. The class, though, lived up to the title I'd given it, but in entirely the opposite way than I'd expected. I had planned to use the Frostian notion of the line that 'scans itself' (that directs readers how to read it) in relation to a few sample lines-- from Dryden, Eliot, Frost, Leigh Hunt, and even (no kidding) Bart Simpson. The consideration of these lines, though, wound up consuming the class time; we never really did get much to Shakespeare. It's appropriate then that I called the class "Doing A Few Lines," which really did feel like a kind of drug-inflected experience. Oy vey.

But, people of the world: please, for the sake of English teachers if for nothing else civilizing or cultured, prick up your ears, both inner and outer! Remember the things you used to know about sound and rhythm and cadence, all the stuff you learned from jumping rope and bouncing children on your knees and singing nursery rhymes. I sometimes think the broad popularity of things like rap and hip-hop and so forth have so untuned our ears that we don't hear the music implicit in the way we speak and we way we read. The metrical monotonality of such forms of music seem to me have helped to dampen our alertness to such matters. Take back your ears, people! Take back the sound!

Now Dr J will step down from his soap-box and sulk about the end of civilization as we know it. ;-)

What a Drag...

Some people are just plain whiners. Nah, I'll be slightly more sympathetic than that-- but what did people expect? High quality stuff from the government??? *shakes head*

Busy News Day

Looks like there's a lot going on today...

It seems General Wesley Clark is entering the race for the Democratic nomination for President. Clark is an interesting figure, loathed and loved in various quarters, and he's probably most famous to Joe-Schmoe as the primary talking head on CNN during the American wars on Iraq and Afghanistan. Clark has one thing none of the other Democratic contenders has: military credibility. As former Supreme Commander of NATO, he stands as the only real 'foreign policy' candidate in the Democratic crowd, and as such his entry could cause huge problems for other Democratic candidates: he is a high-profile runner who can gather attention in ways that the others have not been able, not even the Howard Dean and his internet machine. And his credentials are pretty impressive: a Rhodes Scholar, graduated first in his class at West Point, leader of the Kosovo assignment, and so on and so forth. It's of course too early to tell is Clark will win the nomination, but if he does, a lot of the Republican defense will die with it: they will not be able to attack Clark on foreign policy or on his lack of military experience or on his supposed 'softness' on terrorism or the like; which means that if Clark becomes the nominee, the nature of the 2004 election will change significantly. I don't know if Clark is the best man to be President, but suddenly things are getting very interesting indeed. It should be interesting, too, because Clark is a much better public speaker than any of the Democratic nominees, and this could bring something long missing from Presidential debates: articulateness.

Click here to read an old but prescient article from Slate on Clark's possible candidacy. And click here to read a diatribe against Clark, which suggests the extent to which the Republicans are moreorless terrified of Clark's candidacy: the heavy-hitters from the Bush-Cheney Right that had tended to ignore the Democratic election have started bringing out the guns, invoking rhetoric that is dangerously close to slander. Note that most of the 'information' on Clark comes from noted Republican source like Bob Novak. But love or hate Clark, he scares the Republicans because he is not (like Howard Dean or Joe Lieberman) the typical 'unelectable Democrat.'

It also looks like the debate about gay unions in Canada is even more tenuous than first appeared, as the House of Commons barely defeated a motion to insist that marriage be defined specifically as the union of a female and a male. This whole case is going to get worse before it gets better, methinks.

Ah, and in the Ontario election campaign, it looks like Premier Ernie Eves is in la-la-land. I don't think he's realizing that he's losing the election: Dalton McGuinty and company aren't winning the election, but Eves is certainly losing it, especially if he really believes his ads haven't been negative. This election is just sad-- when it's not accusing the Liberal leader of being a kitten-eating alien. LOL.

The US vetoed an Arab sponsored vote at the UN Security Council to rebuke Israel for its threat to kill Arafat. Geez, the Bush Administration really is stepping in international doo-doo everywhere, isn't it?

The tributes and memorializations of Johnny Cash continue: here are two such gestures, one from The Guardian and another from the New York Times.

Apparently, ABC is going to try to persevere with 8 Simple Rules despite John Ritter's passing last week. I don't think it's going to work....

A Spanish judge has indicted Osama Bin Laden for the attacks of September 11, 2001. Yeah, we know that trial's going to happen. *rolls eyes*

Ah, but there remains, too, all the fun stuff from Ananova...

Couple arrested for sex on street corner at 8am A Chilean couple have been arrested for having sex on a street corner - at 8am. They were completely naked and made no attempt to conceal what they were doing, said witnesses. The couple were arrested in Osomo after reports from people who complained they were too loud. Police officers told Terra Noticias Populares that hundreds of people rang them to complain. The couple told police they had left a party very late and couldn't wait to get home to make love. They were released after a few hours but will go on trial for indecent exposure. Evidence during the case may include CCTV footage. A police spokesperson said: "They literally couldn't wait to make love, and they were not sorry. They said it was great!" Dr J is rolling over laughing...

MP suspended for bringing out dildo in parliament A Colombian MP has been suspended for bringing out a rubber dildo during a parliamentary debate. Luis Eduardo Diaz used the dildo to illustrate his demand for poor people to be sterilised in Bogota to control birth rates. After realising that he had offended other MPs, Diaz lost his temper and left the dildo on the desk of the Health Ministry. MP Fernando Lopez Gutierrez told Terra Noticias Populares: "Mr Diaz was suspended for five sessions. "His behaviour was disrespectful to the whole town. A rubber penis is not something that should be brought to parliament." There were no complaints about the human rights implications of Mr Diaz's proposals. A parliamentary spokesperson later said: "I guess we got so focused on the rubber penis we didn't even pay attention to what he was saying. But of course his proposal would never be accepted." Dr J wonders if this would ever happen in Canada... Or imagine Dick Cheney chairing the Senate with a dildo... *Snicker, snicker*

More news here:

VIAGRA, OK. -- It's just two letters, but it makes for a dramatic name change.

Yes, the town of Agra is now "Viagra" Oklahoma.

You got it, the same name as the prescription drug used to treat impotency.

So what do residents think about their new hometown?

It all started as a challenge from a country radio station. The Twister offered the town free concert tickets if it would rename Agra to Viagra. On Friday it did.

City leaders erected the sign early Friday morning.

"Hopefully, it will have a positive effect on the town," said Mayor Ray Troxtell, who added it wasn't a hard decision to make.

The city council voted unanimously for the name change.

Longtime resident David Watkins said it's an appropriate change: "Yes, people are horny here, they really are," he said laughing.

John Dugger, a bread truck driver, says his delivery is finished rising but, coincidence or not, he's noticed a change in Viagra residents.

"There is a lot more energy," he said. "People are bopping around having a good time."

But like the pill, the name change will not last long.

The Viagra police will be the Agra police again on Saturday.

Because the town lived up to the challenge, all of Viagra's 370 residents are getting a ticket to Saturday's country music concert in Tulsa. They are handing the tickets out Friday night at the Viagra mini-mart.

The mayor hopes the publicity will help boost attendance to the town's 100-year celebration next spring.

Oh my lord.... *Shakes head profusely*

And ladies, if this doesn't scare you, nothing will...

Woman to have forceps removed from abdomen

A woman in Thailand is to have a pair of forceps removed from her uterus six years after they were left there by surgeons.

Lamphan Yinsuth, 46, has had stomach pains since her hysterectomy at Chanthaburi province's Prapoklao Hospital in November 1997.

X-rays had revealed the pains were caused by the 2.4 in by 11.4 in forceps lodged in her abdomen.

After complaining to the country's Medical Council, the hospital agreed to pay Yinsuth 400,000 baht (about £6,100) for the operation.

It has also agreed to perform surgery to remove the instrument.

*Shudder* SIX YEARS!!! Oh my....

And for everyone in danger of Hurricane Isabel, check out Dave Barry's advice. Hee Hee. Monkeys everywhere!

Enough for now... Oy vey.

Misery...

Okay, it's official: the world is coming to an end.

Bits About The 'Net

Here is an article that udderly, er, utterly, baffles the mind.

Now, I'm willing to believe in the redemptive power of love, but this strikes me as just plain spooky. It's amazing what people will believe.

Dave Barry's column today is on the Democratic primaries... and it is fair and balanced. LOL.

Oh, dear Lord, it seems poor Jennufleck may be finished. *covers mouth in shock* Or maybe not. Or maybe it's just another desperate attempt for attention. I refuse to link to any of the garbage on the net today about this piffle. WHO CARES? Apparently Ben got 'cold feet,' which I think is Hollywoodese for 'the bugger realized he's just saving money on the divorce that would happen a year from now anyway.'

I cannot believe the monumental stupidity of the Israeli goverment that has mused publically about assassinating Yasser Arafat. Don't get me wrong, I'm not defending Arafat-- but to say such things is just throwing kerosene on the already out-of-control fire. Protests to the Israeli statements have reached as far as Indonesia. *shakes head in disbelief*

Whenever I think about the weighty decisions our politicians have to make, I am so glad that I am not in the political world. It's nice to know that Manitoba has truly forward-looking legislators.

Word to budding writers: nothing is more intense that a feud about a fake-book, as evidenced by this exchange. Hilarious. Also from Modern Humorist, this parody of those Penthouse letters that everyone pretends they've never, ever, ever read.

Apparently according to the quiz, Which 'Whose Line Is It, Anyway' Actor Are You?, apparently I am:


Why doesn't that suprise me? I kinda half-expected to be Paul Merton or Greg Proops-- or even Clive Anderson. Gawd, I miss the old British series. Mornings just aren't the same without waking up to my morning chuckles.

And in another relevant quiz, Know Shakespeare? Rate Yourself, apparently:



Well, I guess I damned well better be... ;-)

I Have To Laugh...

I really probably shouldn't comment on this, but I do find it interesting how many of the recent hits to this site have come from people searching for images of Kathy Greenwood (of Whose Line Is It Anyway) nude. Sorry, people, no naked images of her here-- or anywhere else, for that matter, as far as I know. And, yes, that is a shame. ;-)

Ah, Ontario Politics...

I've heard some strange stuff come out during political campaigns, but Ernie Eves is learning, methinks, not just the dangers of caffeinated staffers but that perhaps some days it just doesn't pay to wake up in the morning. Click here to read what has to be one of the weirdest stories I've ever heard. The words "smiled broadly" are to be relished.

Who says Canadian politics is dull? (Well, normally I do, but this is definitely an exception. Hilarious!)

Remember Everything: More On The Man In Black

"Stretch him out no longer." -- Kent, King Lear (5.3.316)

Johnny Cash's death yesterday has been big news, but I think it's important for people to know the breadth and depth of his career that spanned almost fifty years. Today's Times has a lengthy tribute to him that gives a fairly good overview of his truly sprawling career, and addresses (however passingly) the extents to which Cash was always influencing and being influenced by new music, to which he was always redefining himself and music in general. His American Recordings is a brilliant album, well worth the listen, as are the successors to it. And even if Johnny didn't die on stage as he said he wanted to die, at least he died at a kind of career apogee, at a point when even people of the crassest tastes were recognizing his significance and greatness. I'd also encourage people to read the tribute from New Music Express, which rightly remarks that we should observe the passing of Cash with the same kind of awe that people observed the passing of Elvis; but where Elvis became tired and self-caricaturing, Cash remained a figure of great dignity and passion. The comparison of Cash with King Lear at the end of the tribute strikes me as rather fitting. He died like Lear, after suffering and great loss, his vanity stripped away, but suddenly and finally recognized for who he truly was, a kind of titan.

"June loved flowers. I want her to have lots of flowers."

It's also worth reading the tribute from Rolling Stone, which claims that a box-set will be released of the remaining material (around a hundred songs in total) for American Recordings. Anyone not affected by Cash's words quoted near the end of the article has absolutely no soul.

(For my Canadian readers, a bit of trivia: it was in London, Ontario that Johnny proposed, on stage, to June. Cash said he always had a special affinity for Canada, in part because he toured the country so intimately, small town to small town. It's hard to imagine any major musician doing that these days.)

Johnny Cash was a legend-- a legend that never forgot he was also a man. I fear we shall not look upon his like again.

Click here to go to the official Johnny Cash website.

Addendum: Check out, too, this slideshow from the Times.

Fleming's Not Orwell's World

In today's Times, there's an interesting piece on the latest book by literary critic and theorist Tzvetan Todorov. In his book, Todorov puts forward a somewhat surprising argument, that Europe itself has to rearm. To read the article, click here. Unfortunately, the article doesn't so much engage Todorov as it reports him, but it's worth a read, anyway. Todorov's observation that we've moved from the world of Orwellian governmental conflicts to Flemingesque super-villainy has something very much to it, which we should all find very disturbing indeed, mainly because we're then firmly ensconced in the world of the cult of personality, and the world of the daisy chain of bad guys.

Milestones

Oh, it is a sad day today. John Ritter, after collapsing on the set of his television series 8 Simple Rules For Dating My Teenage Daughter, has died at 54. The notorious director Leni Riefenstahl, whose pro-Nazi films have made her a kind of pariah within the artistic community, has died at age 101.

And saddest of all, the Man In Black himself, the great Johnny Cash has died at age 71, just after being released from hospital after a two-week stomach ailment. This is just after Johnny was all the buzz (here included) about his unprecented nominations for the MTV Video Awards. It looks now, barring the discovery of any unreleased material, as if his most recent album will indeed be his last, and his cover of "Hurt" will indeed be his swan-song summa. Click here to read the BBC's obituary on the original country wanderer, and click here to see a clip from Cash's haunting video to "Hurt." You'll need RealPlayer for the video. This is very, very sad indeed. Rest in peace, Johnny.

Me Sez Nussing, Me Sez Nussing

For the sake of general anonymity, I'll leave this ambiguous, but why is it that the things people most vehemently criticize about others are the *same damned things* that they so fliply practice otherwise, or at least have practiced in the recent or not-so-recent past? At the risk of sounding sexist, I find this attribute (facing me, at least) most often in female form, as they criticize other women (and very often their sex in general) for things they do themselves, and very often do in much greater degrees. I'm aware men may be just as guilty of such hypocrisy, but I find it especially insidious in females, largely because they tend to be almost religiously oblivious to their own hypocrisy, and when it is pointed out to them, they merely become defensiveness and blame on 'feminine prerogative' or some other euphemism for 'fuck off.' (Has anyone ever heard of the arbitrary nature of 'masculine prerogative? I don't think so.) Why is it that if a man is caught in a hypocrisy, he's a jerk or a dog or some other like thing, but when a woman is caught in a hypocrisy we're supposed to let it slide? Ah, another trait that bothers me, not about women specifically, but about people generally: selective accountability.

(The further irony to this, that most women I know *will* admit they do this in one-on-one conversations, so long as they're not taken to task on it, and they don't have to do anything about it. But say the same thing in mized company and the result is very, very different. Go figure.)

Maybe I'm too idealistic, or maybe I was raised by a set of codes and ideals that these days seem old-fashioned or naive. I don't know. But accountability and honesty (to oneself and to others, and *both* at the same time) shouldn't, as I see it, be things we pick and choose. *Shrug* Or maybe I am out-dated after all.

Arsonist And Old Lace?

This is what I call desperation, from Ananova:

A man who tried to set fire to his home to avoid having sex with his wife has been jailed for two years.

Svetin Gulisija, 26, from Seget in Croatia admitted starting a fire in woods just behind his house because he was too tired for sex with his wife.

The couple had to be evacuated as firefighters tried to bring the blaze under control.

The damage was later estimated to be around £15,000.

I'm suspecting it was more than just a matter of being 'tired.' *rolls eyes*

At Play In The House Of The Lord

I read this story, and had to include it here:

Porn film shot in Italian Church

An Italian church may have to be reconsecrated after a porn film was discovered to have been filmed there.

A local man recognised the San Vincenzo church when watching the film called The Confessional Box.

He called police, who studied the film and confirmed scenes of a man dressed as a priest having sex with a bride had been filmed in the church.

The film crew had told the local priest they wanted to use the church for a wedding scene, say ABC News.

According to church law, the Bishop of Marsi, Lucio Renna, will have to rebless all services held in the church since the film was made in 1998.

A bishop will now have to issue a new decree to make all the weddings, christening and funerals which have taken place over the past five years valid.

Makes me wonder: if a church has to be consecrated after this, what has to happen in those churches that were soiled by pederastic priests? Hmmm. Notice how that doesn't get mentioned, eh?

I have to wonder, too: what is the obsession with sex in churches? Remember all the 80s mini-serials that featured priests as harbingers of sexuality, most of the time played by the recently self-outed Richard Chamberlain? Oh, it is to laugh....

The Long and the Short Of It, Your Honour...

This article has to be read to be disbelieved. Some instinct in me wondered if it was April Fool's Day today, but it is evidently not. Oh my lord. One has to love the small touch: the dog ate the leash. How appropriate.

Will You Have Some More Sauce To Your Leak?

Ah, can anyone imagine the days when a poster like this one would have been seen pretty commonplace? Oh, times have changed.

And, for the attentive (and those with really good eyesight), note the ironic name of the copyright holder of this image.

Sir John Davies

I've been rereading of late some of the works of the Elizabethan poet Sir John Davies, mainly because I was rereading an essay on him in T.S. Eliot's On Poetry and Poets. I'm inclined to agree (in part, anyway) with Eliot's estimation of him as a poet of great clarity and cohesion, a poet, to paraphrase Eliot, to muses to himself out loud and never raises his voice. Unfortunately, except in courses devoted strictly to Elizabethan verse, Davies is seldom discussed, and I'd encourage anyone out there to read him. See this piece from Yet Other Twelve Wonders of The World, from Section I, "The Courtier" (reprinted in 'Elizabethan spelling'):

LONG haue I liu'd in court, yet learned not all this while,
To sel poore sutors, smoke : nor where I hate, to smile :
Superiors to adore, Inferiors to despise,
To flye from such as fall, to follow such as rise ;
To cloake a poore desire vnder rich array,
Not to aspire by vice, though twere the quicker way.

And it's fine verse, isn't it, neither exaggerated nor understated, with a lovely sense of cadence. Also, there's a directness (not to be confused with simplicity) that's refreshing, especially considering some of the works of Davies' contemporaries.

Anyone interested in reading more of Davies should take a glance at the materials available at Lumiarium by clicking here. Well worth it.

The Star-Spangled Blather

Paul Krugman has a good piece in today's Times on the ways in which the Bush administration has exploited the events of 9/11-- and though it carries the air of blatant liberalism about it, I also can't fault the logic. The Bush administration-- which insisted it would make its process that of unification rather than partisanship-- has been one of the most truly partisan and ideocratic administrations in recent American history, comparable only really to Reagan's. I agree here with Krugman: this is only going to get worse before it gets better. Click here to read the article if you have the free Times subscription.

A Covenant Of Silence

Something tells me that I should write something about today being September 11th, that I should reflect with some sort of somberness on the events of that horrifying day two years ago, and not just put together my usual ramblings and musings and cyber-clippings of bits from the news dailies. It's not, I'm sure, just some onerous sense of 'decorum,' of feeling that I *ought* to be serious and commemorate, in one way or another, the gravity of what happened as almost three thousand people perished; it's not merely some vague sense that I should say something intelligent or profound or insightful or elegiac about what happened. I can't say I know for sure what I should say, if I should even say anything at all, but going on with everyday life on the anniversary of those attacks is too much like walking past a familiar graveyard: one tries not to think too much about what happened and how things changed, but to walk past without thinking of those things is like a kind of denial, and indeed a kind of moral irresponsibility. As much as we may not want to look too deeply into the piercing stare of history, we mustn't let ourselves avoid its gaze, either. What does one say? What does one not say?

In the two years that have passed, the callouses to the events of that day have started to form. The casual punditry is everywhere, and I have to confess I've done my own rather 'detached' commentary on it, mostly in private. Reason, logic, detachment, they eventually make their ways in to help us understand what we've seen and known, and inevitably we lose some of the sense of emotional immediacy, and harsh poignancy, most of us felt that day. We think now, in the cold distancing of time, more in terms of abstraction: of terrorism, of politics, of the idea of war. We tend not to think so much of images and sensations that seared themselves into us as things happened. Some of them, like the pervasive images of the planes hitting the towers, have been played so often that it's as if we've become inoculated against their horror; others, like "Let's Roll," the last words of one of the passengers on Flight 93, were all but anthemized, to the point that their original poignancy has become diluted, even commercialized. We try not to think of the cries of terror as emergency forces tried to tell people still trapped inside the towers what to do; we try not to think of the horrifying desperation of those who saw horror inside and thought jumping from ninety-stories up was a better alternative; we try not to think about the very few bodies that were found, that so many people were little more than ash and the odd body part; we try not to think too much about the loved ones who carried photos and names and went searching, so many in Diogenous fashion, for hope against hope. In short, we try not to think too much about the realities, the things we saw, most of us luckily at some distance, and we try not to think about the things that we know must have happened, if only scientifically. We try, too, not to think too much about our own senses of horror, as the shock of disbelief, that these things couldn't possibly be happening, gave way, moment by moment, to the stunning realization of what was indeed happening and that all of us were moreorless helpless to do anything about it.

On September 11th, I watched, as I think most of us did, as everything happened. I know I spent over twelve or thirteen hours straight, watching and waiting for news, and in my own way praying. There reached a point that evening, that I couldn't bear to watch anymore, and so went to have a pint or two and just get away from the news-- in my own way, I think, to digest and to deal with all that had happened. I remember sitting on a patio at a then-favourite haunt, and the silence was deafening. No one was talking. All along the road, a road with a dozen bars all interconnected with one another, there were maybe two dozen people out and about, all in the same boat I was in of not being able to take anymore information. Everyone looked so gaunt, so weak; even people out with guests and loved ones sat in almost complete silence, as if such silence was the only way people could deal with this, or as if any intrusion of sound would disrupt the delicacy and somberness by which we kept our emotions at the very least in check.

Of course, we were all thinking more or less the same things, and we all knew that the world as we had known it had changed in a single day. We sat there, in a kind of covenant of silence. There, really, was nothing to say, because nothing anyone could say at that point would have made things better, or eased anyone's fears, or made sense of the catastrophe. It was a lesson in pity and terror that many of us would never have imagined outside of a movie; it was a lesson that the monstrous and the infernal were not just things of a past about which we'd supposedly learned better after Hiroshima and Nagasaki and Dachau and Bergen-Belsen. Nor could we turn our heads from it, as much of the world has done, say, with the conflicts in Somalia and Bosnia-Herzegovina and Rwanda and in far too many places around the world. And, for the first time in a very long time (and perhaps the first time ever, depending on how one wishes to define this), we knew a kind of global pity, as we were all watching the same tragedy, and only the most ardently radical proponents of hatred and bloodshed went untouched by it all. Our notions of being at least relatively insulated against horrendous violence were shattered. The world became both much larger and much smaller at the same time, as the unreal became real, and real became unreal.

I don't want to use this space to talk about what has happened since, nor do I want to try, at this moment, to understand, because, at least in commemoration, perhaps understanding is a luxury of the living. It becomes a kind of bandage we put on a wound so we can move on. In a way, even writing this I feel like I'm saying way too much about something that can really only be understood and felt in silence, in the quiet sadness before language imposes a kind of order and logic. Today, I don't think I'll be watching the memorial services and the copious television coverage. I do know this, though: it'll be very difficult not to think too long on the obvious today, and it'll be very difficult to avoid the clatter that will try to suggest what I should be thinking and feeling on a day such as this.

The hard part will later this evening, long after the sun's gone down, as I try not to forget the painful silence that came after seeing too much and knowing too much, after all of the thoughts and feelings of a day of madness truly started to mean something, but before they became something 'understandable.' My mind, if not my body, will be on that patio again, between knowing things and accepting them, and remembering all too well a night it seemed when everyone ached and no one knew what to say-- and no one dared to try.

Just Wait For It...

I'm not sure whether this story is horrifying, or hysterically funny-- and it sounds like it could have been a Monty Python sketch:

Man dies at his own wake

Doctors in Argentina say a 94-year-old man died at his own wake.

They say Carlos Gonzales Valencia was wrongly certified dead at a clinic in Ramos Majia.

His daughter, a nurse, noticed he still had a pulse after his 'body' was taken home for his wake.

But by the time emergency services arrived, Mr Valencia had died for real, reports Terra Noticias Populares.

An emergency doctor said: "This man died while at his own wake. He was seen by a doctor and the funeral people but no one realised he was still alive, that is really incredible."

Now the family is suing the clinic.

I guess for that family the term 'wake' will have nasty, nasty ironies attached to it for quite some time. Neither the doctor nor the funeral people noticed? It boggles the mind.

^~~Teach Your Children Well^~~

From The Associated Press, the young ladies in this story are, if absolutely nothing else, persistent:

AUSTIN, Minn. -- Two teens accused of searching for a marijuana dealer dialed the ultimate wrong number -- they called the Mower County Sheriff's cell phone.

Sheriff Terese Amazi's cell phone rang around noon on Friday. The caller said she wanted a bag of marijuana. After Amazi said she was the sheriff, the caller said, "I'm sorry," and hung up.

A few minutes later, the phone rang again. This time, Amazi let a deputy answer.

The caller again asked for a bag of marijuana, and the deputy -- who called himself "Dupe" on the phone -- arranged for a meeting at a convenience store an hour later.

"Apparently, they didn't know the meaning of 'Dupe' as in 'duped' either," Amazi said. "It's incredible."

The girls, ages 15 and 17, were arrested at the scene. Police said they found cash for the marijuana and drug paraphernalia on both girls. One was released to her parent and the other was turned over to a probation officer.

"Not only did they do something wrong, but they should have been in school," Amazi said.

*Rubs eyes in agonized disbelief.* These young ladies must NOT be allowed to procreate.

Ma and Pa Kettle?

Some people will do anything for even the slightest bit of attention. Sheesh. Caveat emptor, ladies and gents, caveat emptor.

^~~I Hope You Like Jammin' Too^~~

After Dave Barry's column on Monday that encouraged readers to call the American Teleservices Association with their thoughts, apparently the ATA was swamped by phone calls. Can we say 'poetic justice,' boys and girls? I knew you could.

Maybe Small Things Amuse Small Minds But...

... this is ridiculous, and it reminds me more than bit of The Gods Must Be Crazy.

One has to wonder, too, about the irony of the 'scientific excitement' about such a discovery's relationship to 'soft-tissues.' ;-)

Uh-Oh...

How ironic is it that I received from Mr Ublansky today a link to this quiz. Considering the cohort of little-ones, one definitely has to be very, very cautious indeed. ;-)

Shakespeare Blog

After much fussing and ado, I now have set up a blog for my students. All in all, I think it looks pretty good, although I haven't adapted much in the way of links nor have I added anything in the way of significant material. But, the preliminary work is done. *Sigh.* Now the question is, will the kids actually use it? *Shrug.* I know, I know, I'm probably being far too optimistic. Grr arrrgh.

Short, But Extremely Fatigued, Comment

Well, it looks like everything I imagined is going to come true. I truly am in Hell. The problem isn't the kids: after an initial meeting (as much as one can tell from a first meeting), the kids seem fine. But I already went through the 'bite-my-lip-till-it-bleeds' bit today, and things look like they're only going to get worse. Ugh.

On the flip side, managed to spend some time today with a few people who helped raise my spirits a bit, especially the once-Chair of the department who said some things that were indeed enlightening, and others which suggest explanations for a great deal. It remains true: sometimes, one learns more over a few casual beers than over years of 'being there.' Go figure.

It's been an unbearably long day. Why do I do this? Why do I think I must?

Things Retrograde But Perhaps Still Amusing

Crap, it's back to the days from hell. As such, I shall be moreorless incommunicado for a bit. Uggidy ugh ugh ugh. I'll no doubt have to sit through a very awkward meeting tomorrow after the lecture, and give the opening night performance of "Dr J Bites His Lip," a performance that shall be running for months. Anyone from the campus checking this blog may be able to find me around da Bull off and on between 12.30 and 4.30. "May" is the key word there. Anyone who does find me is responsible for buying the good Dr countless pints to ensure his goodwill. ;-) (Of course not. A pitcher will suffice.) Then teaching, or doing something called teaching when one's students have nothing yet to do. *Shrug*. The typical meet & greet, really. I hate meet & greets. Alas, must be done. They're so masturbatorial. But, Dostoevsky reminds me that sometimes self-flagellation may be retrograde but it can be nonetheless amusing....

Brief note to someone: Don't necessarily knock Ph.D. candidates directing third-year courses. Some of us would do brilliant jobs, and some even have the confidence of even the most experienced tenured faculty-- and, once upon a time anyway, even your confidence. *Ejects tongue cheekily.* So there. :-)

Yes, I *Am* An Idiot

For reasons totally beyond me, instead of preparing to meet my new batch of kids tomorrow, and instead of doing something genuinely productive, I spent much of today redesigning the visualization of this blog, including the color schematics. Blah blah blah. Yes, I'm a tinkerer: it's the way I deal with things that bug me to no human end. And yes, I am an idiot, wasting my time on such trivial matters when I could, should be doing something much more profitable. Alas, I diddle away the time, and avoid the emails that are gathering elsewhere. I have to admit that I am developing something of a liking for playing around with HTML, something that is still relatively new to me; perhaps that's a bit of the kid left in me, the kid that had to figure out how everything worked and what he could do with it. *Shrug* Who knows. Onward ho!

The Value Of A Snark

Also from the NY Times, Clive James has an interesting article, "The Good of a Bad Review." There's a fair bit of truth in what James says, but-- and I'm not sure whether this says something about my possession of a soft spot or not-- I'm not sure James' distinctions are as clear cut as he pretends. The personal attack is too often a gun rather than an axe, a device too recklessly used by people who think they're entitled to it.

Que Sadilla!

Is that a burrito in there, or... Nothing like a little ridiculous reality.

Man charged in skimpy swimsuit case      from the Associated Press

CADDO VALLEY, Ark. - A man's skimpy swimsuit was too much - or too little - for Taco Bell workers.

Employees at Taco Bell called police Sunday when the man walked into the restaurant wearing only a tiny black Speedo swimsuit and a cut-off T-shirt during the Labor Day weekend.

Caddo Valley Police Chief Hiram Latin said his attire, or lack thereof, was a little too revealing.

"He was inappropriately dressed for a restaurant," said Latin. He said the man had left his clothes at a lake.

The man faces a $750 fine and possible jail time if convicted of indecent exposure.

According to Arkansas law, a person can be charged with indecent exposure if "he knows his conduct is likely to cause affront or alarm."

Police ticketed the man and took photos of him in the Speedo, for use in court.

I'd like to interpose one key point: who the Hell ever said that Taco Bell was 'a restaurant'?

Shock and Awww

Dave Barry's column today is absolutely hilarious, on being the father of the flower girl. I especially like the clause, "then you are either a crack addict or a wedding photographer." Beautiful. And utterly, utterly true. This is exactly why men approach the minutiae of weddings with all the enthusiasm of a lamb being led to slaughter.

You Know You've Been Around Too Long When...

Not only am I to be teaching for a former TA of mine this year, one of my colleagues this year was also a TA of mine nine years ago... FOR THE VERY SAME COURSE I AM TEACHING (and have been teaching for four of the previous five years). Pretty soon, I'll have cut myself open and count thr rings to know how old I really am. Sheesh.

^~~How bizarre, how bizarre...^~~

^~~And All I've Said Was Just Instead...^~~

It requires the free New York Times susbscription to read it, but Anne, especially, might find this of interest, on the woman F. Scott saw everywhere-- and it wasn't Zelda.

I know this story very well, all too well.

I want to add one thing here: I do really like Scott's response, "Which bitch do you think you are?" For some reason, there's a tendency among the involvements, past or present, of writers (and other artists) to see themselves in everything the writer does. *Shakes head*

"Doesn't it make you sigh with relief to be settled and think of all the men you escaped marrying?" is a devastatingly ironic statement.

Oh Really?

Today's "Doonesbury" has caused some controversy in the States and has been shelved by a number of newspapers because of its 'subject matter.' Click here to read one editor's justification for not publishing it, and to see the offending strip. Personally, I'm inclined to agree with Garry Trudeau on this one: the kids today are used to much worse not just on TV, but on the playground. As someone who lives just a block away from an elementary school, I can attest with some confidence that the kids today are savvier than many expect, and indeed probably savvier than we may want them to be.

Wha????

This just makes no sense. Kewpie dolls for anyone that can do it for me.

R.I.P.

Unfortunately, I guess now he will sleep. What a shame. Click here to read the (very thin) obituary from the New York Times. I'd like to add one thing here: Zevon went out as he should, with a final album, The Wind, a kind of fitting final testament. There's a poignant article on it here. As his own song says, 'keep him in your heart.'    Shadows are falling    and I'm running out of breath,    keep me in your heart for awhile.    If I leave you it doesn't mean    I love you any less,    keep me in your heart for awhile.

The Return To Hell

Great. Tuesday I have to return to the university to face another year of bull-shite. However positive a spin I try to put on things, the long and the short of it is this: I am returning to Hell. Beyond teaching in a course that looks like it will be a misery on its own, I have to deal with a frustrating department and and I have to do so with the support of my old local haunt, which has sadly been shut down in favour of some sort of lounge/study area. I guess I'll have to settle back into da Bull, or some equally uncomfortable place I've avoided over the years. Worse, I have to do it without some of my oldest compatriots to whom to bitch and otherwise vent my frustrations, including RK who's luckily on sabbatical. Grumble, grumble, grumble. Once you think you're out, they pull you back in.

Maybe this year I'll live up to (or down to?) some of my more mis-gotten monikers. Ensconce myself, as RK has put it, in a field of young houris. ;-) Natch, my reputation is tarnished enough as it is. I must behave this year, I must behave this year, I must behave this year. And if I tell myself this enough times, maybe it'll happen. *Shrug* We shall see.

Also Archived: Leavis on Studying English

From F. R. Leavis, which sums up very nicely much of my own thinking about the academic/educative process, and what it should be about:

Well then, I know that the demand I make of English, the role I think properly assigned to it in the modern university, is such to provoke a good deal of scepticism. And when I proceed to the considerations that bring out the cogency of the assignment, I shall invite, I know, some more scepticism. But I ask the sceptics to contemplate-- to look well in the face-- what their scepticism implies. When, then, I try to suggest the ways in which the role I have defined as that of the university English School could be justified, one of my assumptions is that no one will be reading English who hasn't a bent for literary study and isn't positively intelligent. To put it another way, no one should be reading English who can't benefit by 'teaching' addressed to the top level. I see the word 'teaching' in inverted commas; I don't like it, because of the suggestion it carries of telling-- authoritative telling. The peculiar nature of the study of English worth pursuing at university level entails its being in the the most essential regards, though a special study, not what 'specialist' suggests. A genuine teacher doesn't find himself holding back his subtlest insight and his most adventurous thought because they are not suitable for communication to first- or second-year men. He tests and develops in 'teaching' his perceptions, his understanding and his thought, and with good men may do so very fruitfully. For what we call teaching is, if genuine, a matter of enlisting and fostering collaboration; the teacher in English has, in what I have pointed to with the distinction between 'special' and 'specialst', a peculiar advantage-- a given kind of advantage in a peculiarly reward form. The qualifications of a teacher are given in these observations. He is one who has the kinds of interest in literature that go with finding pleasure and profit in discussing it with intelligent young students.

--- F. R. Leavis, "The Present and the Past: Eliot's Demonstration," English Literature In Our Time and the University (1969)

Poems Archived from Dr. J's Round Table II

Eating Poetry

Ink runs from the corner of my mouth.
There is no happiness like mine.
I have been eating poetry.

The librarian does not believe what she sees.
Here eyes are sad
and she walks with her hands in her dress.

The poems are gone.
The light is dim.
The dogs are on the basement stairs and coming up.

Their eyeballs roll,
their blond legs burn like brush.
The poor librarian begins to stamp her feet and weep.

She does not understand.
When I get on my knees and lick her hand,
she screams.

I am a new man.
I snarl at her and bark.
I romp with joy in the bookish dark.

--- Mark Strand (1968) from Reasons for Moving

Poems Archived from Dr. J's Round Table I

Bishop's Finger
for E.B., 1911-1979


My waitress approaches and asks
If I'd like anything from the bar.
Yes, please, I tell her, I'd like

A word, a good imported word
To start with-- maybe one of those
Frilly French words with too much

Head, or something German perhaps.
We don't serve words here, she says;
We haven't served those spirits here

Since 1969.  I ask her to rhyme off
What they do have. She answers:
Harp, Bass, Swan, Flowers, Fullers,

Brick Bock, and Bishop's Finger's back.
Suddenly, I'm excited as a child.
Bring me a Bishop's, I reply.

She pours the beer into a glass,
Lays it in front of me, and watches
As I reach into my pocket and fumble

For the scrabble pieces I carry around
For just such occasions.  I pick out
The I's from the others and drop them

Into the glass like Alka Seltzer
Tablets.  The waitress is convinced
That I'm strange, that something

Fishy is going on.  She's right,
Of course.  There's something
Iridescent about getting drunk

On a word, whether anyone knows it
Or not.  And it's a great word,
One of those sturdy American ones.

--- Jeremy Sharp (1998); from The Antigonish Review

Bits and Pieces

The funniest thing about this article is that the Kansas City Star labels it "Breaking News." 'The little dog would laugh to see such sport,' I'm sure-- especially on asphalt.

Why does this article remind me of the Mel Brooks movie High Anxiety? "Here's your paper! Here's your paper! Here's your paper!" *Shudder*

^~~"Okay, I don't make films / But if I did they'd have a samurai."^~~ Where is Toshiro Mifune when you need him?

Just reading this article makes me want to gag. The worst part, perhaps, is that he topped it off with a few pints of Guinness. I imagine poor little Kathy Greenwood would be shrinking in terror at the prospect.

"You wanna come back to my place and see my nightstick?" This gives new meaning to the phrase 'pressing charges.'

There is a horrible punster at The National Post. While the article is of no interest per se, the headline is worth the loading of the page.

Hit Me, Baby, One More Time: I don't quite know what to say about this. 'Suffer the little children' does, indeed, seem to be an ironic rallying cry from an industry obsessed with teeny-boppers in undergarments.

Here is a mildly interesting article on the late rock critic Lester Bangs. Bangs was an interesting writer when he wanted to be (his piece on Van Morrison's Astral Weeks is excellent), but --typically-- the author of the Slate article is more interested in Bangs' life than in his criticism. *Sigh* There's a more interesting article on why to write rock criticism here.

I really should stop surfing the net and do something productive. I am *so* procrastinating...

It's Official

Yes, it is: this blog is quite content with itself, for the first time since its genesis some months ago. When I first decided on giving this blog a go, I wanted it (eventually) to be a kind of usable notebook-slash-scrapbook of things: musings, observations, rantings and ravings, 'newspaper' clippings, poems, prose pieces, whatever happened to strike me as 'worth recording' or worth sharing with others. Now that I've set up the archive page as I have, it now has a greater sense of functionality: thanks to the archives page, it's now easier for me to find things that I compiled earlier without having to search, what often seemed endlessly, through weekly archives-- and considering that I very often have trouble remembering what happened yesterday or the day before, remembering weeks back was more than a tad frustrating. The archive page now seems, at least from its compositor's perspective, something like a personal anthology of materials that I at least found of interest, and now finding that poem that I was looking at a few weeks ago is just a mouse-click away. Yeah! :-) And, pardon me if this sounds unnecessarily self-congratulatory, I'm pleased with how the blog looks-- and those of you who know me well know that I do not say such things easily. The design is clear and legibile and direct-- and considering it uses no frames and involved nothing more than having the patience to learn how to code HTML and to sort through my own junk-heap of material, it may not be the best looking page on the internet, but it's also not the worst looking, either. **grin.**

So, yeah, all considered, this blog is at long last something like what I first conceived of it being: personally useful, and not just a personal staging ground. By the way, I've now modified things so it shouldn't be so obvious that the blog is composed on an 800X600 display resolution: those of you working with higher resolutions should now see things in a much more organized fashion, that is, without the vast blank spaces on the right hand side of your screen. Let me know, anyone, if there are any display problems.

All in all, this blog is finally about where I want it to be, and now, with infrastructure in place, maintaining it should be much easier and much more doable. I've always wanted this blog to be something different than most blogs, most of which seem to me little more than exercises in ritual exhibitionism, desperate attempts at personal validation, and elaborate versions of answering-machine messages ("Hey, everyone, sorry I can't talk to you right now, but read this about me instead, and leave a comment at the beep"). Yes, I confess, it's taken me a bit to get past those stages, mainly while I gathered materials and learned how the hell to deal with HTML (Grrr aaargh), but I can say pretty confidently that I'm now past them. *crosses fingers* This bloody thing now looks and acts something like a journal, albeit a public one, that for me at last serves a tangible purpose, at least for me: it no longer feels like I'm typing into an abyss. Ahhh, utility-- such a novel concept. :-)

It's nice to feel I've actually got thinking starting to work as I wanted them to work. It's a feeling I've not had in quite a while. So, my apologies if this entry seems vomitously self-laudatory, but I'm indulging myself. To paraphrase Sir Alec Guinness upon receiving an Honorary Academy Award for his lifetime contributions to film acting, I may not deserve this moment of self-satisfaction, but I'm going to take it while the getting is good.

Dr J issues a cheeky grin and darts off, stage right. A loud thud is no doubt heard shortly after.