it's that time of year! reading roundup, film feelings, operatunities, cultural conclusions, judgy judgements, the usual unsubstantiated personal opinion!
books first. this year i did pretty well on reading more (43 in total), but quality was few and far between. there has to be a better way to decide when to give up on reading something that doesn't catch my attention or interest. only hindsight is useful.. which is useless.
8 memoirish - i can't seem to stop seeing this genre as easy reading, with mixed results. half of them were pretty damn good, particularly Notes on a Foreign Country (Suzy Hansen), When in French (Lauren Collins) and in my prize for most unexpectedly nuanced, Jill Soloway's She Wants It. The Lonely City (Olivia Laing) was a very interesting beast, musings on psychology, lived experience intercut with art history and biography.
15 non-fiction focused on special areas of interest. most alarming - Why We Sleep. largest and most edifying yet depressing, Thomas Piketty's Capital in the 21st Century. most inspiring - The Evolution of Beauty and The Wonder of Birds. in another life i might become an ornithologist. i fulfilled my goal from a year ago of starting to learn and understand chinese history. i particularly liked Mary Gaitskill's collected review/criticism (Somebody with a Little Hammer), i'll read anything that she writes.
12 traditional fiction - my harshest judgement is reserved for this category, where i increasingly can't stand navel-gazing contemporary literature about the minutiae of the titular life (The Idiot, Elif Batuman [who wrote a fascinating longform article on the japanese rent-a-relative industry]), this whole genre of autofiction. i write my own in my journal every night and it's more entertaining! nor do I enjoy historical fiction (Pachinko, Min Jin Lee) anymore, sorry not sorry, everyone raved about that one. everything is always telegraphed in advance, character stereotypes abound, i find myself skim-reading just to confirm my plot predictions. this is not to say that a traditional love story (Normal People, Sally Rooney) or myth transposition (Everything Under, Daisy Johnson) can't be written well in new lyrical ways, but sometimes it's more fun to blow shit up and blur the boundaries between waking and sleeping as in My Year of Rest and Relaxation (Otessa Moshfegh), which was particularly disorienting to read in bed while falling asleep. i was disappointed by Philip Pullman's plotless canoe adventure La Belle Sauvage and also, typically for the booker prize, the first graphic novel included on the shortlist (Sabrina, Nick Drnaso), where just because something is a commentary on its time and media (social and populist) doesn't mean it's interesting or make up for the fact that the characters are barely distinguishable and everything looks like it happens inside a cardboard box. "if you don't have anything nice to say, don't say it at all" - clearly i don't hew to this view, on the mostly anonymous internet, but i don't like to only write positive things because that just contributes to publication bias. scientific method and all that.
conclusions: i'll take provocative writing with brilliant turns of phrase for now, thanks. i'm looking forward to the next books by Otessa Moshfegh, Nell Zink, when oh when is Alison Bechdel going to release hers?
films:
my worst movie experience of the year - i love a good documentary and also i love public libraries. Ex Libris: the New York Public Library went for over 3 hours (we walked out at the 2:45 mark) and lacked any sort of narrative structure or aesthetic interest, with way too many administrative meetings and american self-congratulations. i liked where they showed the automated processing of returned items, and that was about it.
i saw a lot of blockbusters this year and they were pretty much mostly forgettable. Isle of Dogs was good, i do like wes anderson. rewatching the royal tenenbaums though - it was not as good as i recalled from 14 or so years ago.
Phantom Thread was pretty great, all interiors and crunching and eating and jockeying.
hands down the best film i saw was also the most recent, The Favourite. it was in the smallest theatre in the most multiplexy of black concrete-walled lightning bolt-carpeted cinemas, and it was great. i haven't seen something where what felt like a small like-minded community of audience members laughed so much at genuinely wicked/funny/black dramedy without ruining it. throw in deadpan barbed verbal jousting, excellent shooting outfits, hefty emotional undercurrents and associated nuanced acting, unpinnable/flexible sexualities, baroque organ/harpsichord soundtrack, i haven't even gotten to the strong female characters yet. absurdist period drama, i'm here for it.
(shoutout to the moment in its sibling film The Lobster and the pony with the beautiful hair. i'm still laughing about it.)
i watched the most TV this year that i have ever, i think. Westworld was cerebrally entertaining, at least it kept us discussing and conjecturing and wending a way through all the plot convolutions. Killing Eve and Maniac are probably my picks of the year. i also watched a lot of Parts Unknown and other food-related tv, RIP anthony bourdain and jonathan gold, sigh.
the classics:
why is lucia di lammermoor, a tragic opera, in mostly major keys? is this a bel canto thing? i tried to expand my horizons and felt like laughing the entire time. Jessica Pratt was great, though, a rare treat in sydney. i would love to see this opera with a black comedy production.
ho ho ho this year i went to glyndebourne, on a trouser role pilgrimage (frankly, i wouldn't do it for anything less). it is definitely the fanciest pants thing i have ever done, trying to not stand out too much among the black tie garden picnic crowd who thought that a bling mcmansion fluoro set for Der Rosenkavalier was just not traditional enough. i think i finally understand what it means to see operas when you already know and love them, to hope they will surpass your experiences and expectations. who will be the next mezzo Giulio Cesare after Sarah Connolly hangs up her golden chestplate? that opera is just hit after hit after hit. to see Kate Lindsey in her first outing as Octavian in those sublime stretched Strauss moments was very special, i hope she has several more to come.
a final highlight, also in london, was seeing John Eliot Gardiner with the english baroque soloists and monteverdi choir do several Bach cantatas, ewig in dulci jubilo indeed.
till next year! let us put our phones down and appreciate everything else.
Sunday, December 30, 2018
Monday, January 1, 2018
art and context, aka 2017: a year in reading and other things
much as the catholic archbishop of sydney mourned 2017 as an annus horribilis, trite as it may seem, so has my year in reading been. for different reasons, yet not unrelated. notwithstanding but acknowledging the underlying backdrop of a hairsprayed orange wreaking global havoc, we can both (and i would not put myself in the same sentence as the catholic archbishop of sydney otherwise) point to the socio-geopolitical climate: as a local example, 'progress', though not without unnecessary trauma and damage (the same sex marriage debate here in australia) can be lamented on both our parts, for myself the way in which it occurred of course. ugh!! means, ends, all that? smug gloating by 'leaders' afterwards. horrible. streams of obscenities issuing internally and in the presence of friends. furthermore, ignorance truly is bliss. a full 30% of the eligible voting population chose to actively deny equality to others on a symbolic point! (by which i mean alternative lifestyles are happening no matter what, this was just legality catching up to real life.) the flip is that 50% chose to actively support equality. which of those figures is less depressing? some things are just better left unknown, but that requires leadership and empathy for the least defended, both of which have been lacking in australian politics for a while.
i have always been slightly morose in my optimism, but new depths of cynicism have been reached - it's not just that it's a shitshow, but that it has always been thus; we are all muddling along in barely overlapping venn diagrams thinking that the system is one way or another and if only we got our act together etc etc... yeah, right. like in mean girls, *light-bulb* the system does not exist! western democracy is oligarchy, institutions/constitutions hold no power, meritocracy has been co-opted by 'communists' and communism is a dirty word. the press needs a hippocratic oath. who is the press?
with books, as always, let us begin with the middling to bad.
i have always been slightly morose in my optimism, but new depths of cynicism have been reached - it's not just that it's a shitshow, but that it has always been thus; we are all muddling along in barely overlapping venn diagrams thinking that the system is one way or another and if only we got our act together etc etc... yeah, right. like in mean girls, *light-bulb* the system does not exist! western democracy is oligarchy, institutions/constitutions hold no power, meritocracy has been co-opted by 'communists' and communism is a dirty word. the press needs a hippocratic oath. who is the press?
ahem, sorry not sorry about that political rant. but as a person interested in how the world works, it can't be ignored if i only blog once a year. all that to say that reading fiction has felt trite and superficial to me for most of the year, until i realised again that appreciating the art of fiction writing is a rewarding and balancing balm and should be applied liberally to:
a. offset the detrimental effects of current geopolitics and reading about it and history, sometimes in the form of books but mostly longform things on a phone :/
b. avoid the trap of reading nonfiction of unmemorable quality, which i did rather too much of this year.
with books, as always, let us begin with the middling to bad.
i did not learn my lesson from last year, and read too many (10) memoirs (see b. above). i learned about people butttt maybe no one that interesting. Ariel Levy's The Rules Do Not Apply did not wow me like i expected, having read its central and most moving chapter previously published online. i liked Bill Hayes' Insomniac City but definitely prefer Oliver Sacks in his professional writing rather than in memoir form. i did enjoy Cork Dork by Bianca Bosker, or rather the deep dive into an area of expertise. in that vein then, my favourite of the year is David Sedaris' Theft By Finding, if i can count slightly tidied and published diaries as memoir, because yes, he's a funny guy, has had a varied and interesting life, but really it demonstrated the honing of his craft. very close second is Myriam Gurba's Mean, as an example of the heights of such craft.
the other non-fiction i read this year fell only into two other categories: russia (2) and psychoanalysis (3). i have and will continue to read most things that Masha Gessen writes, and my dad has piqued my interest in pre-20th century chinese history. Damion Searl's The Inkblots was a fascinating look at hermann rorschach the person and psychoanalyst, the art and sensitivity/specificity of the actual rorschach test, its latter-day bastardisation and usage in popular culture, quite far from the original. the other highlight, which i need to revisit, was Janet Malcolm's Psychoanalysis: The Impossible Profession (pub. 1981). the performance of which in real life is also very inaccessible to the average person. we need to invest in mental health, well, treatment for more than just the most severe at a start, then for everyone who needs it, then prevention and health maintenance for all. see "muddling along" above.. i have only endless ellipses. not quite yet resignation.
in an effort to place more emphasis on fiction, here are most of the 11 that i read this year, somewhat in order of reading, with snarknotes as per usual:
I Love Dick, Chris Kraus - yeahhh as the first of its kind to say, women can write like this and be seen as serious writers, sure. otherwise, no. (and yet, gasp on that last page, ugh!) vacillation/would not read again
What Belongs to You, Garth Greenwell; A Greater Music, Bae Suah (trans. Deborah Smith) - i read these at opposite ends of the year, but found similarities in the internal voice of a quiet person, the role of memory in that voice and the remove of living in a different country as an adult perhaps forcing that quietness. classical music throughout the latter book, which i like to think i understood as part of an internal monologue. what do people who don't know that world think of this book? '...our hands trembled and our ears seemed to pick up the sound of our hearts breaking, not as a clean crack but as a wrenching of fibers...'
Purity, Jonathan Franzen - i liked him more before the internet, there i said it. does he have a neurosis about the internet? being known for not liking it, yet having it play such large obvious roles in his recent books, j franz do you have an inferiority complex about the internet? other than that, money, too much of a complicated yet tidy plot, typical franzen female and male characters, i don't really care for it.
Do Not Say We Have Nothing, Madeleine Thien - fictionalised 20th century china, a page-turner with a family book myth as the hook. dragged in the end. see above, pre-20th century chinese history.
Conversations with Friends, Sally Rooney - i liked this in some ways, it reminded me of emily gould's friendship, but also some parts i just didn't care about. at all. as a portrait of a contemporaneous young female person, valid, but also eye-rolling slash wish it wasn't like this.
Swing Time, Zadie Smith - this one grounded me back to the search for quality in fiction at the end of the year. pondering what it means to live and to be better in relation to oneself or others, demonstrated via a complicated yet tidy plot, not completely spelled out, modern with the impact of omnipresent screens in our lives. j franz you wish you could be zadie smith. 'She kissed her teeth.' call me inordinately biased but zadie smith has always gotten teeth right.
Lincoln in the Bardo, George Saunders - mmm i wanted to like this and i did, though not intensely, but felt somewhat muppet's christmas carol about it all. concept, execution, man booker prize: fine, typical. personally i prefer fewer and deeper characters. 'Two puffs of smoke became mutually fond.' !!!
Autumn, Ali Smith - i love the way ali smith plays with words and speech patterns, swirling between internal monologue and in this book, dream sequences, which sounds faffy and vague, but no, great. How To Be Both is in my opinion the best example of her work thus far in the culmination of style, flow, concept and intensity of meaning. i can't believe i haven't mentioned it previously on these end of year lists, but apparently i missed summarising the year i read it (2014).
The Ballad of the Sad Cafe, Carson McCullers - oh man! one of the best of those southern gothic tales, where months pass in sentences, everyone slightly repulsive, devastating nonetheless. i am a sucker for an unusual woman.
all in all, not quite so terrible a year, given the circumstances, but i aim in future not to have to read so frantically in december in order to have anything at all to write about.
documentaries i watched of note and interest:
the 13th - ava duvernay, so good
the putin interviews - not objective. enlightening nonetheless
icarus - started as an attempt to see the effect of doping on one person's cycling performance, and devolved into an exposé of systematic doping in sport. the system does not exist.
the vietnam war by Ken Burns and Lynn Novick - i have been glued to the tv for 2 hours every weekend. rigorously objective and global context provided. hugely educational.
notable concerts of the year:
finally, some Monteverdi in and around the place! i loved hearing the 1610 Vespers in st mary's cathedral, by the Song Company and choirs. can't say the same for the madrigals done by Les Arts Florissants, which suffered irrevocably from intonation issues after the first 15 minutes. madrigals ARE intonation; i wanted to clutch my ears and applauded only at the end out of courtesy, that's how bad it was. a significant dearth of press reviews followed, considering the high international profile of the group. publication bias, i know you, i see you.
my first Poppea, thanks to Pinchgut Opera. do i love a countertenor eminem-alike Nerone? no, give me sarah connolly any day. but the production was fine, and i get it, finally, having considered L'Orfeo more accessible previously; sometimes only listening to records doesn't make sense.
SSO concert stagings of Pelleas et Melisande, and Bluebeard's Castle, courtesy of opera theatre renovations. resulted in similar sinus clearings of my understanding and man, that high C climax of bluebeard with a full symphony orchestra, extra brass on the landings and the opera house organ, was just about transcendental, as intended.
and with that, happy new year folks! may we appreciate what we have and think of others. and keep appreciating and critiquing art. in the words of cameron esposito, 'art dismantles power or else it's propaganda'.
the other non-fiction i read this year fell only into two other categories: russia (2) and psychoanalysis (3). i have and will continue to read most things that Masha Gessen writes, and my dad has piqued my interest in pre-20th century chinese history. Damion Searl's The Inkblots was a fascinating look at hermann rorschach the person and psychoanalyst, the art and sensitivity/specificity of the actual rorschach test, its latter-day bastardisation and usage in popular culture, quite far from the original. the other highlight, which i need to revisit, was Janet Malcolm's Psychoanalysis: The Impossible Profession (pub. 1981). the performance of which in real life is also very inaccessible to the average person. we need to invest in mental health, well, treatment for more than just the most severe at a start, then for everyone who needs it, then prevention and health maintenance for all. see "muddling along" above.. i have only endless ellipses. not quite yet resignation.
in an effort to place more emphasis on fiction, here are most of the 11 that i read this year, somewhat in order of reading, with snarknotes as per usual:
I Love Dick, Chris Kraus - yeahhh as the first of its kind to say, women can write like this and be seen as serious writers, sure. otherwise, no. (and yet, gasp on that last page, ugh!) vacillation/would not read again
What Belongs to You, Garth Greenwell; A Greater Music, Bae Suah (trans. Deborah Smith) - i read these at opposite ends of the year, but found similarities in the internal voice of a quiet person, the role of memory in that voice and the remove of living in a different country as an adult perhaps forcing that quietness. classical music throughout the latter book, which i like to think i understood as part of an internal monologue. what do people who don't know that world think of this book? '...our hands trembled and our ears seemed to pick up the sound of our hearts breaking, not as a clean crack but as a wrenching of fibers...'
Purity, Jonathan Franzen - i liked him more before the internet, there i said it. does he have a neurosis about the internet? being known for not liking it, yet having it play such large obvious roles in his recent books, j franz do you have an inferiority complex about the internet? other than that, money, too much of a complicated yet tidy plot, typical franzen female and male characters, i don't really care for it.
Do Not Say We Have Nothing, Madeleine Thien - fictionalised 20th century china, a page-turner with a family book myth as the hook. dragged in the end. see above, pre-20th century chinese history.
Conversations with Friends, Sally Rooney - i liked this in some ways, it reminded me of emily gould's friendship, but also some parts i just didn't care about. at all. as a portrait of a contemporaneous young female person, valid, but also eye-rolling slash wish it wasn't like this.
Swing Time, Zadie Smith - this one grounded me back to the search for quality in fiction at the end of the year. pondering what it means to live and to be better in relation to oneself or others, demonstrated via a complicated yet tidy plot, not completely spelled out, modern with the impact of omnipresent screens in our lives. j franz you wish you could be zadie smith. 'She kissed her teeth.' call me inordinately biased but zadie smith has always gotten teeth right.
Lincoln in the Bardo, George Saunders - mmm i wanted to like this and i did, though not intensely, but felt somewhat muppet's christmas carol about it all. concept, execution, man booker prize: fine, typical. personally i prefer fewer and deeper characters. 'Two puffs of smoke became mutually fond.' !!!
Autumn, Ali Smith - i love the way ali smith plays with words and speech patterns, swirling between internal monologue and in this book, dream sequences, which sounds faffy and vague, but no, great. How To Be Both is in my opinion the best example of her work thus far in the culmination of style, flow, concept and intensity of meaning. i can't believe i haven't mentioned it previously on these end of year lists, but apparently i missed summarising the year i read it (2014).
The Ballad of the Sad Cafe, Carson McCullers - oh man! one of the best of those southern gothic tales, where months pass in sentences, everyone slightly repulsive, devastating nonetheless. i am a sucker for an unusual woman.
all in all, not quite so terrible a year, given the circumstances, but i aim in future not to have to read so frantically in december in order to have anything at all to write about.
documentaries i watched of note and interest:
the 13th - ava duvernay, so good
the putin interviews - not objective. enlightening nonetheless
icarus - started as an attempt to see the effect of doping on one person's cycling performance, and devolved into an exposé of systematic doping in sport. the system does not exist.
the vietnam war by Ken Burns and Lynn Novick - i have been glued to the tv for 2 hours every weekend. rigorously objective and global context provided. hugely educational.
notable concerts of the year:
finally, some Monteverdi in and around the place! i loved hearing the 1610 Vespers in st mary's cathedral, by the Song Company and choirs. can't say the same for the madrigals done by Les Arts Florissants, which suffered irrevocably from intonation issues after the first 15 minutes. madrigals ARE intonation; i wanted to clutch my ears and applauded only at the end out of courtesy, that's how bad it was. a significant dearth of press reviews followed, considering the high international profile of the group. publication bias, i know you, i see you.
my first Poppea, thanks to Pinchgut Opera. do i love a countertenor eminem-alike Nerone? no, give me sarah connolly any day. but the production was fine, and i get it, finally, having considered L'Orfeo more accessible previously; sometimes only listening to records doesn't make sense.
SSO concert stagings of Pelleas et Melisande, and Bluebeard's Castle, courtesy of opera theatre renovations. resulted in similar sinus clearings of my understanding and man, that high C climax of bluebeard with a full symphony orchestra, extra brass on the landings and the opera house organ, was just about transcendental, as intended.
and with that, happy new year folks! may we appreciate what we have and think of others. and keep appreciating and critiquing art. in the words of cameron esposito, 'art dismantles power or else it's propaganda'.
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