ejp626

I don't know where I got this idea about Briefing for a Descent into Hell, but it was completely wrong. Aside from the parallels Leeway mentioned (DeQuincey and Burgess), I have to wonder if Barth's The Last Voyage of Somebody the Sailor drew on the earlier sections of Briefing. I knew pretty early on that this wasn't what I was looking for, and I bailed within a day. I doubt I'll ever come back around (to finish it) but you never know. I'm finally reading Herzen's My Past and Thoughts, in conjunction with Isaiah Berlin's Russian Thinkers, which will then be capped off with Tom Stoppard's The Coast of Utopia, which as Stoppard freely admitted, was entirely inspired by these two sources. I was fortunate enough to see the whole cycle of plays earlier in the year, and they were really something else. Perhaps the most intelligent theatre I've seen in a long time.

The quality should be fine, but if Criterion recently remastered a film then the Art House will still be the older version. That doesn't apply to too many titles, I would think.

Wrapped up the Death of Ivan Ilych, which has some memorable sections, particularly when Ivan finally thinks over his whole life and realizes that he wasted it after all. Kind of the anti-Christmas Carol, as it were, as it is far too late to do anything about it. (And Tolstoy is honest enough to make it clear that had he recovered, he would have gone right back to the same correct but empty life of before.) I didn't care for The Devil at all, so, for me, Tolstoy is only a 2 out of 5 for his short novels, which is a low success rate for sure. I just started Lessing's Briefing for a Descent into Hell. I certainly am aware that quite a bit of literature from the late 60s and early 70s shares this interest in madness and, along with Laing's Knots, questions whether normal people are "sane." I think this approach has really fallen out of favor, perhaps in part due to the emptying out of mental hospitals with many mental patients ending up as the homeless. It is much easier to tell yourself that "No, I'm not crazy" when the reference case shifts so dramatically. I also wonder if literature is generally returning (even more) to its function as an escape valve as the economy gets increasingly pinched for the middle class. They don't have time to ponder whether they are crazy (or if the whole rat race is a rigged game and they are frauds for participating, see Ivan Ilytch) and when they do read it is more for pleasure. I haven't really made up my mind about Descent yet, but I'm pretty sure it isn't going to be a "keeper," simply because my shelves are so over-crowded now.

Fair question. Lack of interest in life? In others? In musical possibility? In the things that any educated person knows about music? Like if you never read a book by a person who had been alive during your lifetime and didn't think anyone else should either? Could be anything, I don't know. A possibly unfair idea that most contemporary classical music is pretty lousy. Or not wanting composers to hang around and bug you for not doing it exactly the way they have it in their heads. Or finding out that you recorded some sonata that has to be scrapped because three notes of the melody came from some other living composer who plans to sue -- or that the composer was a child molester. There are a lot of reasons to favour dead composers.

If it's anything like the Criterion/Eclipse distinction (aside from the fact they don't put the same films on each label), Art House probably doesn't come with any bonus material, and maybe not even any commentary tracks.

What a shame. I wasn't a regular listener, but my dad was and when I was visiting, we'd usually hear these guys on the radio. RIP

So far no US release date (not in the Amazon.com system). Given shipping prices it might actually be cheaper to get it up here in Canada from the UK site than the US! Anyway, this looks like one that I will be springing for. Thanks for the update.

Tolstoy's The Cossacks. I'm generally not enjoying Tolstoy's shorter novels/novellas. I find this one very boring and will start skimming it pretty soon. I remembered at the last minute that I had planned to read Zelazny's A Night in the Lonesome October (his last proper novel) in October. So I started on the 30th and finished up a bit after midnight. It has been reissued by Chicago Review Press: http://www.amazon.com/Night-Lonesome-October-Rediscovered-Classics/dp/1556525605/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1414770472&sr=1-1&keywords=zelazny+October This edition has illustrations by Gahan Wilson. It's certainly not a major novel, but almost a kind of fan fiction where he combined the Lovecraft universe with Dr. Frankenstein, the Wolf Man, Jack the Ripper and Sherlock Holmes. Oh and Dracula. The whole novel is told by the familiars, i.e. animal companions, of the humans who are playing a Game to determine whether the Elder Gods are released or not. I think if you like whimsy, it is worth reading. If you want a more serious fantasy novel, it is one to avoid. On the whole I enjoyed it.

Raining and getting colder. It might even snow a bit over night! Looks like a disappointing night for the kids, but we'll go out for a little while anyway.

I would question the need for a baseball player unless this is a US list only. I'm not sure it has the global reach and recognition beyond the playing countries. That's why I suggested Ali as he was recognised probably anywhere that mass media reached at the time - I'm not too sure many other sports people have had that reach since. Michael Jordan. Quite possibly even more recognized worldwide than Ali, even at the height of his fame, I think the list really has to be broken into 1900-1950 and 1950-2000. For someone in my generation, you might arguably still count Sinatra but not remotely Bing Crosby. He's just not even on the radar. Conversely for an older generation you might possibly concede Michael Jackson was huge but not even know who Madonna was (back to the original list).

Congratulations. I am not familiar with the book Chuck was referring to, but there are a handful of novels about real-life individuals where it is clear it is a work of fiction, i.e. somewhat metafiction. I've just started Leonid Tsypkin's Summer in Baden Baden which is a recreation of Dostoevsky's time in Germany (still in the thrall of his gambling addiction) and his last days, combined with Tsypkin's own visit to the Dostoevsky Museum. I'm sure it's not exactly the effect you were going for, but there might be parallels. Hopefully, someday I will be able to read both and compare the two.

I like it, but I haven't listened to it in a while. It is included on Mosaic's set: The Complete Mercury Art Farmer/Benny Golson/Jazztet Sessions.

This thread is like a rash. I know I shouldn't keep peeking in, but I can't seem to help myself. I guess that is the way with most things on the internet.

Larry: I seem to change ISPs every 2 or 3 years, which does help to keep a lot of unwanted spam away, though probably I've lost contact with some former email buddies. At any rate, I've had very good success with MailStore Home (which is freeware). It doesn't take too long to sync up with your existing accounts and download all your mail. I don't know about then relinking to a new account, but at least you would have the old email in a searchable archive. (I wish I had this for the two moves previous to my last move...) I guess I should say I don't know for sure it would work with AOL, but probably. They've probably had other people want to transfer their email over. Eric

Sounds fairly interesting, though I can guarantee I don't have time to read 44 novels! Maybe I'd have time for the best 5 or 6 read in conjunction with Barbara Pym, who mines a very similar vein. Holiday seems to be accepted as his best, so choose this one. The Barbara Pym connection didn't occur to me, but yes I see it, though my wife says she dislikes Middleton's masculine standpoint, which you certainly couldn't say of Pym I was thinking of going over the same territory in multiple novels, though I guess her characters are middle to upper middle class. Many are cultured. I think I'll try Holiday and perhaps Harris's Requiem, which also had pretty good reviews. That should tell me how much more time I'd want to invest.

Sounds fairly interesting, though I can guarantee I don't have time to read 44 novels! Maybe I'd have time for the best 5 or 6 read in conjunction with Barbara Pym, who mines a very similar vein.

I didn't mean that as a shot at you, just sick of the constant claims of plagiarism out there. If I am reading that passage correctly, Ligotti is criticising Tolstoy for not following through on a bleak worldview. I think Kreutzer Sonata doesn't wimp out to the same extent as A Confession. I guess the main difference is Ligotti gives attribution to Tolstoy and Pizzolatto did not.

What's funny is that if someone reports them, their listings will be pulled. When you sell on eBay, you can't refuse to accept PayPal. eBay put this rule in place years ago, shortly after they bought Paypal. Maybe they accept payment in cash only, small bills, plain envelope. Sounds like a good deal all the way around...

So I went to the site and looked through the examples and I saw a lot of loose paraphrasing, which to me does not rise to the level of plagiarism, given how transformative the rest of the work is, i.e. it is only one character who shares Ligotti's world view and it is embedded in a totally different context. But like everything, I guess it will be up to the courts to decide if Ligotti or more likely his publishers decide to sue. As I've already made clear I am in deep disagreement with the drift of today's courts which now use copyright to restrict creative endeavors (claiming that three notes or a trill and the like need to be licensed). I probably should read Neil Netanel's Copyright's Paradox, but it would just further enrage me. Very little of value from 19th Century or Modernist literature would exist under today's copyright rules, and that to me screams out that something is wrong. For instance, when I went and read the original excerpts from Ligotti's book, I said to myself -- Hmm, a lot of this just sounds rehashed from The Kreutzer Sonata. Maybe I should go through and see if Ligotti plagiarized Tolstoy, finding specific phrases that sound remarkably similar to the other work. It shouldn't be that hard. But I don't do such things, since I don't support today's copyright rules and because I don't believe in gotcha journalism. But mostly because I have a life...

Reading some of Tolstoy's short novels. Family Happiness wasn't bad. I really didn't like The Kruetzer Sonata at all. SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS It's a lot like reading American Psycho with all the oxygen in the novel taken up by this crazed, misogynistic man who got away with murder because of the backwards state of the law (it was quite legitimate to kill an unfaithful wife at the time). I'm pretty sure this is the first time I've read this, as I would have had an even stronger reaction 10-15 years ago and probably abandoned the tale in disgust. I should get around to The Cossacks and The Death of Ivan Ilyich a bit later in the week.

A much more self-contained exhibit at the McMichael Collection (in Kleinburg, just north of Toronto). It is called J.W. Morrice and John Lyman in the Company of Matisse, and it runs through Jan. 4. The focus really is heavily on Morrice and Lyman. There are perhaps 5 Matisse oil paintings and another 3 or 4 works in pencil. I wouldn't really consider either Morrice or Lyman particularly important artists, but they had a few nice pieces here and there. I was hoping to see a bit more Matisse honestly. One painting towards the end of the exhibit stood out (Rainy Day Paris - I believe this was by Morrice), but I just couldn't justify spending $40 on the catalog. The McMichael is always worth a visit if you like the Group of Seven, and this is a decent but hardly life-changing exhibit.

I'm thinking more along the lines of a KOB/John Cage 4'33" mash-up where you release an album with the exact same timings as KOB (the corrected version) but the only think you hear are some random rustlings in the studio -- and the members of MOPDTK trying not to giggle.

They have the "right" to do it, but it seems totally pointless (only slightly less so than the silly remake of Psycho) any why any record company would think it merits release (rather than just being a live affair) is beyond me. What I wouldn't have a problem with is if they remade it in a free-jazz way or changed the meter or anything that showed any originality at all.

75 tracks on 5 CDs. No real info (other than Cassandra Wilson and Norah Jones are on Disc 4) This is the puffery: Each of the five discs covers a specific era, from boogie to hard bop, soul jazz to the roots revival of the 90's, and the 21st century trailblazers like Robert Glasper and Gregory Porter. Not interested in this or the Monk. I'm so done with buying the same material over and over.

Well, one can ask the same question about many of the recordings of the jazz repertory movement of the past 25 years, in my opinion. Why should one ever listen to recreations of old music done not quite as well as the originals, by today's musicians? We can certainly ask that. I consider it a waste of time to go to something like that. This project strikes me as navel gazing of the absolute worst kind.