Jun 19th, 2009 at 9:13 am
Normblog Profile
Regular readers of this blog probably know a lot about me already, but in case you want to know more I’m the subject of this week’s Normblog profile which is full of scintillating facts.
29 Responses to “Normblog Profile”
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June 19th, 2009 at 9:37 am
I thought you’d say Iraq.
June 19th, 2009 at 9:55 am
It is interesting that Stevens (and Dickinson of course) is becoming the default middle-brow American poet. For most of the 20th he was considered radical in content and style.
June 19th, 2009 at 9:58 am
Your choice of “best novel” is 100% correct.
June 19th, 2009 at 10:00 am
But your choice of “favorite movie” is suspect. Blade Runner is an excellent movie, but better choices are numerous.
June 19th, 2009 at 10:04 am
What would be your main blogging advice to a novice blogger? > Specialize! I’m a generalist, but that’d be hard to pull off in the more mature blogosphere of 2009. Focus on something, and be great at it.
That’s a sound advice.
June 19th, 2009 at 10:07 am
If you could choose anyone, from any walk of life, to be President, who would you choose? > I think Obama’s the right man for the job.
Heh. Is CAP OK with that audacious answer?
June 19th, 2009 at 10:09 am
My question is, does Matt prefer the original theatrical release of Blade Runner or the director’s cut? I’ve seen both and the latter just seems wrong without Harrison Ford’s voice-overs.
June 19th, 2009 at 10:13 am
Gregory Clark is a loon.
June 19th, 2009 at 10:13 am
” I’ve seen both and the latter just seems wrong without Harrison Ford’s voice-overs.”
You, sir, are a victim of nostalgia. Your preferences are seemingly dictated by which version you originally viewed, not which version plays better.
June 19th, 2009 at 10:43 am
I like film noir.
I like science fiction.
I like Harrison Ford.
I seem to like movies known for their cult following.
I hated Blade Runner.
June 19th, 2009 at 10:43 am
Portland? Really? You do know that it rains a lot there and their road system is really confusing. They do have a pretty cool science museum though and the Oregon coast is nearby and really great.
June 19th, 2009 at 10:44 am
The only thing I gathered from A Farewell to Alms is that Clark doesn’t know one damned thing about genetics.
June 19th, 2009 at 10:46 am
Wally Stevens is a fine choice. As is “The Snow Man” (”The Idea of Order at Key West would be my pick, tho).
Re: Bob McManus: I’m not sure how he’s become “the default middle-brow American poet.” Is that because middlebrow people like to drop his name? Because they sure as hell haven’t read him.
Forget Dostoevsky and move on to Tolstoy. Dostoevsky is the matzoh brei of novelists– too heavy and indigestible.
June 19th, 2009 at 10:53 am
Jeff J:
Yeah Clark played his hand pretty weakly. He thoroughly demolished a lot of other theories for industrial revolution and emphasized time and again that they didn’t explain why then, and then proceeded to say, er, cultural or, possibly, dare I say it, genetic, traits of thrift and hard work passed down over the centuries, which explains the timing how exactly? And to be clear including the genetic link was weak since he didn’t even make the argument i.e. peruse the scientific literature to see if such traits are even thought to be handed down genetically. Still, he makes the Malthusian case well and that probably provoked some thoughts for Matt. Plus, Matt probably hasn’t read much about economic history/development and Clark is a good writer. Too bad he didn’t choose some better books.
June 19th, 2009 at 11:34 am
It is interesting and perhaps revealing to juxtapose the following statements:
1. What philosophical thesis do you think it most important to combat? > That selfishness is more rational than benevolence.
2. How, if at all, would you change your life were you suddenly to win or inherit an enormously large sum of money? > I’d travel more and buy some more expensive stuff.
This is not meant to be a “gotcha.” Just something to think about.
Best regards
June 19th, 2009 at 12:04 pm
My question is, does Matt prefer the original theatrical release of Blade Runner or the director’s cut? I’ve seen both and the latter just seems wrong without Harrison Ford’s voice-overs.
Director’s cut! Is this even a serious question?
June 19th, 2009 at 12:12 pm
Is that because middlebrow people like to drop his name? Because they sure as hell haven’t read him.
I don’t know how many people have read Harmonium, but many of the poems like “13 Blackbirds” and “Emperor of Ice Cream” have become common currency. Blue Guitars are everywhere. I presume college kids are given the Collection, or a selection. The later stuff isn’t read. I sure had trouble with the last books.
Just looks like he has replaced Frost and Eliot and that the times have grown into Steven’s attitudes of existential hedonism(?) and concerns, perception and consciousness.
I get 25.9 million search hits for Frost, 13.7 for Eliut, and 8.6 for Stevens. Shrug
June 19th, 2009 at 12:20 pm
Favorite movie does not mean best movie so there’s nothing suspect about Matt’s choice unless Petey has reason to believe Matt has a certain interest in it. How about it Mathew? Are you in Ridley Scott’s pocket? Did Dad make a contribution to the screenplay? Maybe you have a thing for electonic sheep?
June 19th, 2009 at 12:31 pm
I used to claim Elliot as my fave poet but now he strikes me at cold and clammy. Read Prufrock at the right time and it hits you between the eyes but now it seems to lack music. An ex-girlfriend always held that Dylan Thomas was way better and, upon reflection, Dylan Thomas was way better. That might explain why Bob Dylan is the troubadour of my time and Bob Elliot was a comedian. It might also explain why she is an ex-girlfriend.
June 19th, 2009 at 1:44 pm
Re: Blade Runner, I figured I’d be in the minority. However, it was a serious question.
Nostalgia probably plays a part in my preference, but it’s also true that with the narration in the original release, you had a much easier time knowing what was going on in the film. This is important if you first saw it at a young age, and hadn’t read the story behind it.
The director’s cut plays as distant and impersonal to me, but maybe that’s more true to the source material.
June 19th, 2009 at 2:02 pm
You can learn to draw if you work at it; there’s nothing mysterious about it. There’s a book called Drawing On The Right Side of the Brain that explains very clearly how to go about it.
It’s possible (though tedious) to argue about what the “best” movie is, but telling someone he’s wrong about what his favorite movie is is both incoherent and obnoxious. Oh wait, that was Petey, wasn’t it.
June 19th, 2009 at 2:11 pm
Re: Bob McManus: I’m not sure how he’s become “the default middle-brow American poet.” Is that because middlebrow people like to drop his name? Because they sure as hell haven’t read him.
I don’t know. Stevens shares a lot of the same faults as Shelley — you can’t bring to mind his images easily and he wrote about complicated ideas with crippling facility — and yet Shelley was a favorite of the 19th century. “The Snow Man” is probably Stevens’s most accessible lyric and it’s also gnomic enough to leave the reader confident that he never quite gets it. I
That said, if 1 reader in 10,000 relaxes with a little Stevens (or Shelley) 1 evening a year I’d be surprised. Who besides present company and academics even reads poetry anymore?
If we’re going to tout a Stevens’s poem, I’d go for his parody of “Love’s Labours Lost” in “The Comedian as the Letter C”.
June 19th, 2009 at 4:23 pm
If we’re going to tout a Stevens’s poem, I’d go for his parody of “Love’s Labours Lost” in “The Comedian as the Letter C”.
There’s a lot to like in Stevens — “Blue Guitar,” “Blackbird,” “Emperor of Ice Cream,” etc. But I actually find myself thinking about seeing “nothing that is not there / and the nothing that is” as I go about my real life.
June 19th, 2009 at 4:36 pm
Magritte, eh? Ceci n’est pas un blog post?
June 19th, 2009 at 6:08 pm
“Favorite movie does not mean best movie so there’s nothing suspect about Matt’s choice “
Meh.
Merely invoking de gustibus non est disputandum isn’t a universal get out of jail free card.
If i say that my favorite book is Franny and Zooey, I’m guilty of either overvaluing the worth of that book or of a preciousness of taste.
In short, claiming a favorite that can’t be a best is problematic.
(Weakly tangentially related question: why can’t I stop listening to the Lady Gaga album?)
June 19th, 2009 at 6:40 pm
Petey – I’ll concede the point since you used a fancy Latin term I don’t know what means. But answer me this, Mr. Smartypants, what is your favorite movie?
June 20th, 2009 at 9:18 am
“Petey – I’ll concede the point since you used a fancy Latin term I don’t know what means.”
Wikipedia is your friend.
“But answer me this, Mr. Smartypants, what is your favorite movie?”
My standard answer for “best movie” is Vertigo.
June 20th, 2009 at 10:03 am
Petey’s wrong, of course. Art exists to give aesthetic pleasure: there isn’t a continuum of art from wretched to greatest. The process of art involves both a particular object and a unique observer. You can’t finesse away that unique observer. Hamlet isn’t for everyone. It’s just words, words, words to the vast majority of the people who’ve ever existed.
June 20th, 2009 at 12:16 pm
“there isn’t a continuum of art from wretched to greatest.”
Agreed. But it’s still useful to have a canon, and it’s best to choose the canon wisely.
“Hamlet isn’t for everyone.”
Disagree.