summer, in the form of a short list:
true blood
iced coffee
reading, reading, reading
slow mornings
france
orange laughter
Wednesday, June 6, 2012
moonrise kingdom
article source: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2012/05/24/PKM61OLCDP.DTL
This article gave some details about the new Wes Anderson movie, Moonrise Kingdom that was just released in select theaters this past weekend (after being shown at the Cannes Film Festival previously). Anderson commented that he has been heavily influenced by French New Wave (specifically Truffaut) and despite the fact that many consider his films to be heavily dependent on his specific style, Anderson would rather not be known for repetition. The article touches on common themes in Anderson's films - peculiar characters, familiar cast members (the cast for Moonrise Kingdom including Bruce Willis, Edward Norton, Frances McDormand,Bill Murray and Jason Schwartzman) and specific scriptwriting. The plot of the Moonrise includes young adolescent love, stealing library books, and Khaki Scouts, but the rest of the story remains fairly mysterious.
I picked this article because 1) I love Wes Anderson! 2) I am planning to see Moonrise Kingdom eventually 3) I've already watched the trailer a few too many times
The article was informative, and I learned that Roman Coppola helped write the script as well as helping to write the script for Sophia Coppola's Somewhere (which I also love).
This article gave some details about the new Wes Anderson movie, Moonrise Kingdom that was just released in select theaters this past weekend (after being shown at the Cannes Film Festival previously). Anderson commented that he has been heavily influenced by French New Wave (specifically Truffaut) and despite the fact that many consider his films to be heavily dependent on his specific style, Anderson would rather not be known for repetition. The article touches on common themes in Anderson's films - peculiar characters, familiar cast members (the cast for Moonrise Kingdom including Bruce Willis, Edward Norton, Frances McDormand,Bill Murray and Jason Schwartzman) and specific scriptwriting. The plot of the Moonrise includes young adolescent love, stealing library books, and Khaki Scouts, but the rest of the story remains fairly mysterious.
I picked this article because 1) I love Wes Anderson! 2) I am planning to see Moonrise Kingdom eventually 3) I've already watched the trailer a few too many times
The article was informative, and I learned that Roman Coppola helped write the script as well as helping to write the script for Sophia Coppola's Somewhere (which I also love).
Tuesday, June 5, 2012
Escape from camp 14
article source: http://theweek.com/article/index/228631/inside-north-koreas-gulag
7 years ago, at the age of 23, Shin In Geun escaped from a North Korean political prison. That statement alone is enough to merit astonishment, as previously no one born in a camp had been known to escape. While the article itself does not provide detail of his escape, it hints at the perseverance of the escape in reciting time limits: a month found him in China, two years found him in South Korea, and 4 years found him in Southern California. More astonishing, however, is the bit of life from inside the camp that Shin In Geun reveals. It is a life that reflects a horrifying lack of basic family ties and mutual respect for human life. Shin grew up as a slave, under the pressure of survival that led to his betrayal of his mother and brother in their plan to escape the camp. Once he relayed this information, however, Shin was tortured for information anyways and eventually witnessed the hanging of his own mother and brother. What Shin wished to relay to the outside world, however, was not the terror of his own personal experience but the level of deasement within the camps, and the truth that the abuse within them came not only from the guards, but between the prisoners themselves.
I found this article in the back of the magazine The Week, which I get at home. I chose the article because of the subtitle:
7 years ago, at the age of 23, Shin In Geun escaped from a North Korean political prison. That statement alone is enough to merit astonishment, as previously no one born in a camp had been known to escape. While the article itself does not provide detail of his escape, it hints at the perseverance of the escape in reciting time limits: a month found him in China, two years found him in South Korea, and 4 years found him in Southern California. More astonishing, however, is the bit of life from inside the camp that Shin In Geun reveals. It is a life that reflects a horrifying lack of basic family ties and mutual respect for human life. Shin grew up as a slave, under the pressure of survival that led to his betrayal of his mother and brother in their plan to escape the camp. Once he relayed this information, however, Shin was tortured for information anyways and eventually witnessed the hanging of his own mother and brother. What Shin wished to relay to the outside world, however, was not the terror of his own personal experience but the level of deasement within the camps, and the truth that the abuse within them came not only from the guards, but between the prisoners themselves.
I found this article in the back of the magazine The Week, which I get at home. I chose the article because of the subtitle:
Twisted by hunger and cruelty, Shin In Geun betrayed his mother, and then watched her hang
It kind of jumps out at you. In any case, though, the article was well written and emphasized the fact that the level of deprivation inside these camps is illustrated in the way that it has turned its inhabitants against each other, and forced them into a less-than-human state of being and mentality. I found the story itself to be very interesting, if only in light of the fact that there is so little overall information about North Korea.Sunday, June 3, 2012
senior reflection TWO
Went to see Joe Pug in concert last night! He is the coolest.
With 5 (!) days left, I can't help but think about the future.
Joe has this one song called "I Do My Father's Drugs"
my favorite part goes like this:
if you see me with a rifle
don't ask me what it's for
I fight my father's war
Leaving home for the first time and everything makes you wonder about how much of you is you and how much of it is where you've grown up and the beliefs of your parents or your peers. Maybe sometimes we don't even know when we're fighting someone else's war. Are we condemned to fight the same things because of the way we're made? And yet.
With 5 (!) days left, I can't help but think about the future.
Joe has this one song called "I Do My Father's Drugs"
my favorite part goes like this:
if you see me with a rifle
don't ask me what it's for
I fight my father's war
Leaving home for the first time and everything makes you wonder about how much of you is you and how much of it is where you've grown up and the beliefs of your parents or your peers. Maybe sometimes we don't even know when we're fighting someone else's war. Are we condemned to fight the same things because of the way we're made? And yet.
You're rocking the boat
article source: http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/books/2012/05/on-censorship-salman-rushdie.html
This article was technically a lecture given by Salman Rushdie, but republished in print I think it remains interesting. "On Censorship" is an account, an analyzation, on the complex relationship bewteen art and censorship - although in truth Rushdie paints the picture as much more black and white: creation and its inherent opposite. He considers liberty, freedom, and the ability to create comparable to the air we breathe, asserting that this freedom is fragile enough to require "not only freedom but also this assumption of freedom". We must, in other words, have confidence in the longevity of our freedom as well. So, with this fragility he considers the darkness that is censorship - the change in meaning that is "censored art", the political impacts of censorship in China, the effects on individual artists when work is banned. He warns, ultimately, against shying away from those artists and their creations that seem to rock the boat. Originality, he says, is dangerous, and it's important that we defend it.
I don't really even read the New Yorker regularly, but I did try to read Salman Rushie once, and while I never finished his book I liked the bit that I did read. Rushdie has a truly amazing way with metaphor, and I agree with a great deal of what he spoke about in this lecure. At the same time though, he classifies creation and censorship as "thing" and "no-thing", asserting that censorship is the absence of presence - but censorship has to be more than just absence. The act of trying to erase something is in itself a statement, not merely the absence of it. Words that have been crossed out do not simply cease to exist. He also relies a great deal on the fragility of artists, which, while romantic, feels a bit patronizing, and denies art some due complexity.
This article was technically a lecture given by Salman Rushdie, but republished in print I think it remains interesting. "On Censorship" is an account, an analyzation, on the complex relationship bewteen art and censorship - although in truth Rushdie paints the picture as much more black and white: creation and its inherent opposite. He considers liberty, freedom, and the ability to create comparable to the air we breathe, asserting that this freedom is fragile enough to require "not only freedom but also this assumption of freedom". We must, in other words, have confidence in the longevity of our freedom as well. So, with this fragility he considers the darkness that is censorship - the change in meaning that is "censored art", the political impacts of censorship in China, the effects on individual artists when work is banned. He warns, ultimately, against shying away from those artists and their creations that seem to rock the boat. Originality, he says, is dangerous, and it's important that we defend it.
I don't really even read the New Yorker regularly, but I did try to read Salman Rushie once, and while I never finished his book I liked the bit that I did read. Rushdie has a truly amazing way with metaphor, and I agree with a great deal of what he spoke about in this lecure. At the same time though, he classifies creation and censorship as "thing" and "no-thing", asserting that censorship is the absence of presence - but censorship has to be more than just absence. The act of trying to erase something is in itself a statement, not merely the absence of it. Words that have been crossed out do not simply cease to exist. He also relies a great deal on the fragility of artists, which, while romantic, feels a bit patronizing, and denies art some due complexity.
Tuesday, May 29, 2012
senior reflection ONE
Two weeks left!
I keep thinking about this song by Grizzly Bear called Two Weeks. The beginning goes like this:
save up all the days
a routine malaise
just like yesterday
I told you I would stay
It's quite nice, although I will admit I had to look up the word malaise for a quick second there.
In case you were wondering, this is the definition:
noun
I keep thinking about this song by Grizzly Bear called Two Weeks. The beginning goes like this:
save up all the days
a routine malaise
just like yesterday
I told you I would stay
It's quite nice, although I will admit I had to look up the word malaise for a quick second there.
In case you were wondering, this is the definition:
noun
1. a condition of general bodily weakness or discomfort, often marking the onset of a disease.
2. a vague or unfocused feeling of mental uneasiness, lethargy, or discomfort.
Going to school and working on nothing feels a lot like definition number 2.
how bad is it?
article source: http://thenewinquiry.com/essays/how-bad-is-it/
George Scialabra's essay is a review of a novel titled "Why America Failed", by Morris Berman, part of a trilogy by Berman that outlines and predicts the decline of an American empire. Scialabra outlines some of Berman's main arguments, including parallels drawn to the fall of the Roman empire: economic inequality, imperial military commitments, debasement of popular culture, etc. He points out that Berman has found common ground with idealists throughout American history, including Charles Beard, Perry Miller, and William Appleman Williams. Overall, though, Scialabra ackowledges Berman's radicalism, yet commends him for it, saying that it is refreshing to read an author not out to make a profit or, as he puts it, "hustle culture".
This article caught my eye mainly because the first paragraph is full of facts detailing America's lack of historical and geographic knowledge in general: in a poll, "forty percent did not know whom the U.S. fought in World War II. Forty percent could not locate Japan on a world map. Fifteen percent could not locate the United States on a world map. Among high-school seniors surveyed in the late 1990s, 50 percent had not heard of the Cold War."
I'm all.....Wait, really? But in truth, I suppose, it's easy to get caught up in the area in which we live, conveniently forgetting that much of the United States is hardly a reflection of Northern Virginia. I found the article to be very well written (if a bit dense) and interesting despite its radicalism. Perhaps we don't spend enough time thinking about the downfall of America.
George Scialabra's essay is a review of a novel titled "Why America Failed", by Morris Berman, part of a trilogy by Berman that outlines and predicts the decline of an American empire. Scialabra outlines some of Berman's main arguments, including parallels drawn to the fall of the Roman empire: economic inequality, imperial military commitments, debasement of popular culture, etc. He points out that Berman has found common ground with idealists throughout American history, including Charles Beard, Perry Miller, and William Appleman Williams. Overall, though, Scialabra ackowledges Berman's radicalism, yet commends him for it, saying that it is refreshing to read an author not out to make a profit or, as he puts it, "hustle culture".
This article caught my eye mainly because the first paragraph is full of facts detailing America's lack of historical and geographic knowledge in general: in a poll, "forty percent did not know whom the U.S. fought in World War II. Forty percent could not locate Japan on a world map. Fifteen percent could not locate the United States on a world map. Among high-school seniors surveyed in the late 1990s, 50 percent had not heard of the Cold War."
I'm all.....Wait, really? But in truth, I suppose, it's easy to get caught up in the area in which we live, conveniently forgetting that much of the United States is hardly a reflection of Northern Virginia. I found the article to be very well written (if a bit dense) and interesting despite its radicalism. Perhaps we don't spend enough time thinking about the downfall of America.
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