January 2010
39 posts
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I would unfriend Ovid too
I was already pretty jazzed about The Point, but this excerpt from Jonny Thakkar’s, “The Withering of Narcissus” seals it:
Ovid confesses he only wrote to become famous. That is why exile was a “living death” for the poet, since “writing a poem you can read to no one is like dancing in the dark. An audience stimulates brilliance, to praise a talent swells...
“In the late 1990’s, after reading David Foster Wallace’s essay...”
– ESSAY; You Can’t Get a Man With a Pen - New York Times
Frighteningly relateable.
“You go to a dance where a new pop song is playing, and for the rest of your life...”
– Louis Menand on The Catcher in the Rye for The New Yorker. (via meaghano) (via irredenta)
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Michael Brod dot Com →
“I spend a lot of time just doing that [thinking]. I think a lot of people spend a lot of time thinking but they feel guilty about it, because we’re this sort of work-driven culture that if you’re not in some state of mind where you’re actually producing […] producing thoughts does not seem to have the same value as producing widgets.”
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What a bitch!
I asked myself, should I try to act like a lady? I can do it. It’s hard, it takes a lot out of me, I can do it for a few hours. But then I thought, Naw. These people, both my friends and my enemies who are here, aren’t coming to see me act like a lady. So I thought I’d just be myself—which is, you know, abrasive, strident, and obnoxious. So then you can all go outside...
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Dissent, Winter 2010
The current issue of Dissent asks eight prominent intellectuals to write briefly about intellectualism, American politics, pop culture, and the academy. The editors frame the inquiry as the descendant of an earlier symposium:
In 1952, Partisan Review, then near the apex of its influence, held a similar symposium, entitled “Our Country and Our Culture.” Its purpose, wrote the...
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“Jumping off from that statement, the conversationalists — Sehgal refers to them...”
– “Making Art Out of an Encounter” about the Conceptual artist Tino Seghal’s works. In the New York Times Magazine, Sunday, January 17th. Read the full article here. (via gallery221)
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WatchAn interesting project to be aware of: Coming & Crying. Coming & Crying is an effort by Melissa Gira Grant and Meaghan O’Connell to publish a new book of honest, original sex writing. Grant and O’Connell describe the kind of writing they want to publish thus: “Compelling writing that doesn’t skip over the interesting parts, writing that is willing to go there, to be...
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Curation vs. Creation on Tumblr
Day of the Dreamweavers: culled:
Curation Culture
breannetrammell:viafrank:
Jon-Kyle Mohr posted a really thoughtful critique of the online curation culture called A Complimentary Rant on the State of Convenience. (Is curation culture a term? Can I coin that?) Anyway, Jon-Kyle’s central question: Why is it that with the ease of publishing available today people so often choose to re-post content...
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"It's not Jay or Conan. It's Us." by David Carr....
TO: NYT
FROM: mike
RE: newspapers and late-night TV didn’t change, we did as the times prepares to try yet again to cowboy its readers back in the fee-for-service corral, has sulzberger, jr. taken time to read david carr’s (excellent) column in his own newspaper? i reluctantly, stupidly paid for the times’ last foray down this trail. at that time, it lost and stopped trying...
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This Week in Reading
Welcome to a new weekly feature of TNI, in which we recap this week’s links at TNI | Syllabus, our daily links roundup.
This week on TNI | Syllabus (1/11/10 - 1/17/10):
Between unnecessary background information and rambling quotes from nobodies, newspaper articles these days are way longer than they need be. Snooty intellectual parties and hilarious bovine murder: Woody Allen has still...
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“I really don’t care that much about “Beauties.” What I really like are Talkers....”
– from The Philosophy of Andy Warhol, page 62. (via mebbee)
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Moves in Contemporary Poetry
As a poet and reader of poetry, I found most things on list pretty accurate, and the remainder justifiable at least. I, personally, am guilty of verbing non-verbs. But go see where you fit for yourself:
http://htmlgiant.com/craft-notes/moves-in-contemporary-poetry/#more-23642
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Join us on Facebook:
The New Inquiry
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Both Ready and Able
Indie band Grizzly Bear recently commissioned artist Allison Schulnik to animate their music video. Ready, Able is now on view at Western Exhibitions, as part of a show titled The Power of Selection Pt. 1, curated by Ryan Travis Christian. Enjoy!
More of Schulnik’s monsters here.
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James Baldwin on Regret
Though I have not read Kazan’s, The Arrangement; I can’t imagine this novel packs the punch it has inspired in Baldwin’s gorgeous review:
Memory, especially as one grows older, can do strange and disquieting things. Though we would like to live without regrets, and sometimes proudly insist that we have none, this is not really possible, if only because we are mortal. When...
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Worthy Institutions: NYC's Brecht Forum →
“The BRECHT FORUM is a place for people who are working for social justice, equality and a new culture that puts human needs first. Through its programs and events, the Brecht Forum brings people together across social and cultural boundaries and artistic and academic disciplines to promote critical analysis, creative thinking, collaborative projects and networking in an independent...
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The Books of the Century →
Check out this fascinating resource comparing the 20th century’s bestsellers with “critically acclaimed and historically significant” books year-by-year.
Good lord. We really went out in style:
1999 Fiction Bestsellers
1. John Grisham, The Testament
2. Thomas Harris, Hannibal
3. Jerry B. Jenkins and Tim LaHaye, Assassins
4. Terry Brooks, Star Wars: Episode 1, The Phantom...
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Highlights from Noam Chomsky's "The Responsibility...
The Responsibility of Intellectuals
Noam Chomsky
The New York Review of Books, February 23, 1967
Here’s why you should READ IT: The real highlights are products of long threads of reasoning, which do not submit to the doctrine of pith imposed by “quotability.”
Let this nevertheless entice you:
Intellectuals are in a position to expose the lies of governments, to analyze...
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WatchStunning and exciting video from Röyksopp, with vocals from Karin Andersson, one of the most cutting edge musicians of recent years.
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WatchAs a compliment to their Jane Austen exhibit, The Morgan Library has put together this short film, “Reflections on Austen.”
The film consists of interviews with scholars, philosophers, and authors (including Cornel West, Fran Lebowitz, Harriet Walter) and quotes on Austen from great writers in history, spliced together in the service of what is essentially a promotional tactic from...
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“In her forties, Rand began an affair with Nathaniel Branden, a disciple half her...”
– Scott McLemee on the continuing appeal of Ayn Rand
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What spontaneity sounds like →
bobulate:
In the ’50s and ’60s, celebrated photographer W. Eugene Smith recorded the sights and sounds of hundreds of people in and around a loft building in Manhattan where major jazz musicians and others flocked to play music. It marks a kind of cultural heritage of that time unlike others.
That work remained in archives until The Jazz Loft Project:
From 1957 to 1965 legendary photographer W....
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Impressions on a Young Artist Pt. 1
German War (1914-15), Oil on Canvas, 171.5 x 156 cm
Exhibition: Permanent Collection and Pavel Filonov: Seer of the Invisible Institution: Russian Museum (Russky Muzei), St. Petersburg, Russia Date Exhibited: July 17th - November 7th 2006 Date Viewed: July 2006
I traveled to St. Petersburg for a second time in the summer following my first year as an art student. That year, I went the...
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Here Comes Success, Hooray Success
Tao Lin, author of works such as Shoplifting at American Apparel, Bed, and Eeeee Eee Eeee, takes a jab at the direction of renown a published fiction writer’s career may take in the US. Some of Lin’s summations of published writers working today include:
“Blog will be published as a hardcover in 2270 on Mars.”
“Receives up to three e-mails a day from a mix of MFA...
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