Brain droppings

[ChoChiyo]

Cleaning out stuff, I ran across these quotes:

We write for the same reason we dream--because we cannot not dream, because it is in the nature of the human imagination to dream.

The basis of the writer's art is not his skill but his willingness to write, his desire to write, in fact, his inability not to write.

The most important thing is to write, and to write nearly every day, in sickness and in health.

all of the above by Joyce Carol Oates

The writer is a person who has hope in the world; people without hope do not dream.

Flannery O'Connor

[felonius]

Nice Cho. Thanks.

The first one by Oates brought to mind another of my favourites by James Joyce from Ulysses:

The movements which work revolutions in the world are born out of the dreams and visions in a peasant's heart on a hillside.

Although we must also take note of the Chinese proverb:

A peasant must stand a long time on a hillside with his mouth open before a roast duck flies in.

[Aunflin]

/and now me wonders if felon's mental bowels have become constipated...?

[felonius]

/and now me wonders if felon's mental bowels have become constipated...?

Just constipated with life Aunflin; celebrated my birthday last Friday and was away for the weekend (in more than one sense ), and work's been busy the last couple of days.

But here we go. Kevin Brockmeier today. The ostensible topic is song, but I think it can be applied to writing as well:

Of all the forms of voice and communion, a song is perhaps the least mediated by the intellect. It ropes its way through the tangle of our cautions, joining singer to listener like a vine between two trees. I once knew a man whose heart percussed in step with the music that he heard; he would not listen to drums played in hurried or irregular cadence; he left concerts and dances and parties, winced at passing cars, and telephoned his neighbours when they played their stereos too loudly - in the fear that with each unsteady beat he might malfunction.

Song is an exchange exactly that immediate and physiological. It attests to life of the singer through our skin and through our muscles, through the wind in our lungs and the fact of our own beating heart. The evidence of other spirits becomes that of our own body. Speech is sound shaped into meaning through words, inflection, and modulation. Music is sound shaped into meaning through melody, rhythm, and pitch. A song arises at the point where these two forces collide. But such an encounter can occur in more than one place. Where, then, is song most actual and rich - in the singer or in the audience?'

[Aunflin]

Now, I like that quote, felonius! My feet always "percuss" in time with music--whether I like the music I'm hearing or not.

Music is a very powerful and mysterious force. I find I always work better when I "play" my favorite songs in my head while I'm working. The odd thing is that I hate it when they turn on the radio at work--gets on my nerves terribly. But I think it is because it disrupts my mental music, which baffles me and causes me to get rather irritable while everyone else (all those people I term as lazy) work harder. Oddly enough, all the good workers prefer not to have the radio on--very odd, I think.

hmmm....

[laurie]

... celebrated my birthday last Friday and was away for the weekend (in more than one sense ...)

And a (belated) Happy Birthday to you, dear Felonius !

I don't need to ask if you had a good time ...

[felonius]

Thanks, m'lady. It was actually one of the best birthdays I've ever had.

/me resumes scouting the trail for more fresh droppings...

If anyone else wants to throw in, please do! Well, maybe not throw in...

[Darb]

Ah, yer just saying that because I've had real scat-fighting experience.

[felonius]

Do tell. Fresh and moist or dry and crumbly?

This is what I get for being awake at this hour...

[felonius]

Excuse my rather tasteless allusions last weekend, fine and upstanding IBDoF denizens.

Today, hot from the...er, hot off the press! Paul Auster, writing on the story of Pinocchio:

The superiority of the Collodi original [Pinocchio story] to the Disney adaptation lies in its reluctance to make the inner motivations of the story explicit. They remain intact, in a pre-conscious, dream-like form, whereas in Disney these things are expressed - which sentimentalizes them, and therefore trivializes them. In Disney, Gepetto prays for a son; in Collodi, he simply makes him. The physical act of shaping the puppet (from a piece of wood that talks, that is alive, which mirrors Michelangelo's notion of sculpture: the figure is already there in the material; the artist merely hews away at the excess matter until the true form is revealed, implying that Pinocchio's being precedes his body: his task throughout the book is to find it, in other words to find himself, which means that this is a story of becoming rather than of birth), this act of shaping the puppet is enough to convey the idea of the prayer, and surely it is more powerful for remaining silent.

Likewise with Pinocchio's efforts to attain real boyhood. In Disney, he is commanded by the Blue Fairy to be "brave, truthful, and unselfish," as though there were an easy formula for taking hold of the self. In Collodi, there are no directives. Pinocchio simply blunders about, simply lives, and little by little comes to an awareness of what he can become.

[mccormack44]

Very interesting quote.

I never liked Pinocchio — and being my age, I knew the book BEFORE there was a Disney version. But this quote makes me see something I never saw as a child. I don't LIKE the story better, but I do see what's in it better.

I don't denigrate Disney movies, the way some people do. Partly because I remember some of them fondly ( I was one of the thousands(?) of children who saw Snow White when it FIRST came out) and partly because they have produced some very good movies for parents to share with their children.

But I do feel that they tend to sweeten stories unnecessarily, and to go for "cutesy" when it is not necessary to do so. Alice in Wonderland and Winnie the Pooh, come to mind in this category. (But that's partly because I don't forgive them for redrawing the characters.)

Sue

[Kahrey]

The odd thing is that I hate it when they turn on the radio at work--gets on my nerves terribly.....

Yes, same here, except we don't have a radio, we have a TV in the crew room (more like the crew "cell"). I'm usually the only cracker up there, and they will turn it on BET and cut it up really loud. Usually, I can't hear it really well unless I'm in back booth, but it's terribly irritating. I mean, I don't listen to hip-hop and rap.

[Echus Cthulhu Mythos]

There are two radio stations at my work. The one in the Stockroom (where I spend most of my time) which plays National Radio which is like old peoples radio. It has some interesting stuff, and the musical quality is much better than what is played out in the shop which is one of the standard pop radio-stations.

[felonius]

AUNFLIN: I don't always like music when I'm working either (although sometimes the music is my work. ) I like it a lot of the time, but not all. Depends on what I'm doing. Sometimes when I'm writing I prefer quiet.

SUE: my gripe with Disney from a teaching perspective is basically its insidiousness, and how it shapes perception in young people. A recent example: I showed a group of my younger ones, grade fives, a picture of the Taj Mahal for a social studies lesson and their first reaction was "Aladdin!" This kind of perception isn't necessarily a bad thing, but it is limiting, IMHO. I've talked about that kind of thing in other threads and maybe I shouldn't mount the Soapbox again here.

KAHREY: That's rough. I'd go nuts with loud hip-hop and rap as well, I think. But it could be worse - it could be Muzak. Hang in there - or bring some of your own CDs one day and show them what a tough cracker you are.

ECM: Good that you have some musical variety in your workplace. Maybe you have an old soul.

David Sosa today. A little long, and might be more appropriate for Life Sciences and Bio-Tech than TQ&F, but I still think it's a fine dropping:

[quote]In a way, in our contemporary worldview, it’s easy to think that science has come to take the place of God. But some philosophical problems remain as troubling as ever. Take the problem of free will. This problem’s been around for a long time, since before Aristotle in 350 B.C. Saint Augustine, Saint Thomas Aquinas - these guys all worried about how we can be free if God already knows in advance everything you’re going to do.

Nowadays, we know that the world operates according to some fundamental physical laws, and these laws govern the behaviour of every object in the world. Now these laws, because they’re so trustworthy – they enable incredible technological achievements. But look at yourself. We’re just physical systems too – just complex arrangements of carbon molecules. We’re mostly water – and our behaviour isn’t going to be an exception to these basic physical laws. It starts to look like whether it’s God setting things up in advance, and knowing everything you’re going to do, or whether it’s these basic physical laws governing everything - that there’s not a lot of room left for freedom.

So now you might be tempted to just ignore the question, ignore the mystery of free will, say: “Oh well, it’s just a historical anecdote, it’s sophomoric, it’s a question with no answer, just forget about it.â€

[Darb]

Do tell. Fresh and moist or dry and crumbly?

This is what I get for being awake at this hour...

Both. The earliest occasion(s) date back to when my older sister owned a horse, and I often accompanied her to help with the stable chores. Picture the usual sibling rivalry/in-fighting, occasionally escalating from mere epithets to flying horse poo.

Dried & semi-dried scat is better for medium range use (15-30 ft), whereas fresh is better for short range fire (under 15 ft), dead-falls (perched atop ajar stall doors) and other dirty tricks, and hand-to-hand combat.

Hey, I do the same kinda stuff when I housepaint with people ... if they're up on a ladder, I'll sneak on by and paint the tips of their shoes.

We now return to our regularly scheduled discussion.

[felonius]

I'm picturing a scatalogical commando remake of Black Beauty...

[mccormack44]

Gee, Felonious, your quote raises tough questions.

I firmly believe we have individual choices (but remember that beliefs are right brained), but I have no left-brained reasons for this. I just "know" that the world is poorer if we don't make individual "good" choices and if we don't take responsibility for those choices.

Sue

N.B. ALL of the above comes from the right brain.

[Kahrey]

Believe me, if we had a CD player, I'd probably take control of it. We have to consider the customers too though.

[Aunflin]

A very interesting quote, felonius.

Perhaps the Universe is an organized system on the basic level that leads to random events that eventually occur repeatedly until a pattern forms that causes the human mind to think everything was planned out from the get-go. Or the Universe is nothing but random elements banging constantly into each other until a sort of pattern occurs. Or maybe it was all planned after all... Or maybe its all just an illusion fabricated by the minds of men because we can't seem to accept things as they are--its far too boring to think like that. And it would be really neat to have some great, pre-ordained destiny--or would it?

And now, it has occured to me, if free will does not exist, why would God or the Universe at large, make people drug addicts, alcoholics, murderers, thieves, liars, slaves...? And vice versa: why should people be temperate, sane, do-gooders, religious, and etc...?

It seems to me that Reality at its basic level must be something like a nice, boring piece of firewood--it's all right to look at but far from exciting. However, when you light it on fire, it gets a bit more interesting to observe. Perhaps we are the fire and the Universe is the wood: a combination of destiny and free will...?

[felonius]

Pass me that packet of matches, willya Aunflin?

In an effort to reduce the scope of discussion here back to writing, today's brain dropping from Hans Koning, a Dutch writer who went to the U.S. in 1951, on "serious" novels:

What I believe [a serious novel] needs is evidence that its writer has gone through an awareness of the human condition, its comedy and melodramas, its mystery and tragedy. Isn't it that awareness that can give the crucial dimension to the most banal occurrences we may want to describe? It is not an awareness tied to a specific political ideology, and there is nothing specifically European about it, unless it be that so many American critics have expounded the thesis that "true art is above politics," which is to say - although they won't say it that way - that it is committed to the status quo.

No writer can float in a void above the battle; there are always links. There is a link between the potato famine and James Joyce's Ulysses. There is a link between the heroes and heroines of Henry James and the basics of their society; if they had to run off to nine-to-five jobs, they would have lost most of their literary interest. There is even a link between the portraits of Rembrandt and the plundering of the Indies by the Dutch East India Company. To be above politics (politics in the widest sense) doesn't seem meritorious to me. I believe one can only be that way through total indifference to our world, or appalling incomprehension.

When I used the term serious writing, I was not making a value judgement. I realize authors of nonserious novels achieve what they set out to achieve, and often with unsurpassed professionalism. Serious writing is not better; it has a different origin. It is writing that you have to write, what you hear in your mind.

As for me, I keep aiming toward that novel that is just that, a true novel, but a novel for our time, dealing with an essential theme and an essential message in a subterranean, carefully hidden way, a message like a snake in the grass, as Trollope put it. There'll be no boy meets tractor, nor even a professor meets sophomore.

A reader (and a reviewer) should find just as much in it as he or she is prepared to accept. Until one night, perhaps, when such a reader, for instance of my Kleber Flight, cannot get to sleep, and then suddenly the snake would raise its head, and he or she would start wondering if there was, after all, sense to what its hero (or antihero) was about on his destructive flight in that little Piper Tomahawk airplane. Or so I hope.

[mccormack44]

Another interesting quote.

I doubt if the author would consider SF and Fantasy "serious" works, but many of them do have that snake in the grass. I'm thinking of some of the early Heinlein's like Double Star, as well as Tolkien's and the novels of C. S. Lewis, for examples.

Sue

[Aunflin]

Yes, quite interesting.

But why must one form of fiction be considered better than another? It's all a matter of taste. Some folks like swords and sorcery, others enjoy a good horror novel, Science Fiction, Contemporary Fiction, a good Classic, a cheesy (or not so cheesy) romance, a historical novel, action/adventure, something utterly ridiculous...list could go on and on. And there are the people who don't read fiction at all... Everyone thinks their favorite genre(s) (BTW I've never liked the word genre...) are the best, though not necessarily serious. Sometimes one could substitute the word "serious" with severe--some of those "serious novels" can be downright depressing. Life's depressing enough at times. Who really wants to pay good money to be tortured--unless they're into that sorta thing...

Another question: if serious fiction is so important and necessary, why are all the great [fictional] classics that survive from the Ancient past (the Epic of Gilgamesh, the Iliad, the Odyssey, the Aeniad, and etc.) rather unrealistic and full of fantastical things: gods and etc. But then that could be attributed to the evolution of literature--though many of those ancient tales would be considered that atrocious thing known as fantasy today. However, I've always found it interesting that the definitions of fantasy and fiction basically mean the same thing...

Oh...

/Aunflin passes the packet of matches to felonius with a wink and a grin...

[mccormack44]

When I was a young, single mother of three children, I had some very serious issues with my mother. At that time I found that many of the so-called "Gothic novels" (I call them "coming-of-age" stories) did a lot to help me come to terms with her. So, although these are considered to be light novels, and I read them for relaxation and "escape," to strengthen me for tomorrow on the dual jobs, I also gained some growth and insight from them. I suspect that Mary Stewart, Phyllis Whitney, and Barbara Mertz (Elizabeth Peters AND Barbara Michaels), among others, should be given a lot of credit for providing entertainment which helped the reader grow.

And I've been an SF reader and active fan for most of my life. Many, many people think of SF (and Fantasy) as escapism, but the best works give the reader a lot to think about, and point the way to personal growth.

But I read fiction for entertainment; it's just that mindless fiction doesn't entertain me. I do like Romances and Romance novels, but only if there is characterization, if the characters grow, and so on.

Sue

[Aunflin]

Amen! Sue!

[ChoChiyo]

And from the alleluia corner, comes the Cho voice, "Preach it, sister!"

Yes, many great works of fantasy or SF can be read at two levels.

I think my love of fantasy and SF kept me SANE in my growing up years...