Ok, so today I've handed in my final pieces of coursework, and don't have my exams for a month and 12 days (I'm not counting down, honest), which means I have some spare time to write some more bollocks on here. So here goes, annoyance no.1:
Liverpool Fans:
Just to clarify, I don't have a problem with people who are from Liverpool, who support Liverpool (ok, maybe a small problem, but not huge); rather it is the 'plastic scousers' that really get under my skin. It is these fans that make talking about football in public unbearable. They're only too keen to spout their absolute cock: "You'll never walk alone" or "it's all about history."
My point is that these plastic scousers demonstrate everything that is wrong with modern football (I sound like such an old man, spouting off the Daily Mail). These plastic scousers who are now in their late twenties or thirties, who have no relation from Liverpool are now getting away from being what is essentially a glory-hunter, because they have failed to win a league title in years; it's these same fans who are only too keen to denounce Manchester United or Chelsea fans for being glory hunters, and it annoys me, because they did exactly the same during the 80s. And if any of them give the line: "I've followed Liverpool through the good and bad times," by law, we should be able to actually slap them! I'd like Liverpool fans to point out the "bad times." It is this rash choosing of football teams because of their success that chairmen of football clubs are made social pariah's of. Roman Abramovich has been trashed in the press for his rash sacking of Jose Mourinho, Scolari, or even Avram Grant because he is only interested in one thing: instant success. If people stay loyal to their local team - or manager - success will - more often that not - arise. We only need to look at Wigan or Hull for an example of this. I don't know whether Swindon will ever return to the Premiership, but I won't sell out my team for a period of instant success though, which is what 99% of football fans would like their chairmen to do.
The Complete Degradation of the English Language:
Usually, when I see the press' reaction to the addition of certain words into the dictionary, I usually sigh in dismay for their conservatism. Although, my recent university work has convinced me that this conservatism is in fact founded - although not for the anti-popular culture stance that the media takes. Modernist and Postmodernist writers bemoans the gulf between subject (the self) and object (what's being described) that is increasingly becoming the norm in our society. I've recently done an essay on D.H. Lawrence's 'Lady Chatterley's Lover' where one of his points was that language has become so fragmented, and can only refer to the object through other objects - which means that it doesn't even refer to the object itself. The example he uses is in the inclusion of the 'C' word (C U Next Tuesday) in the novel, with the argument being that because it is taboo, the signifier (the word) hasn't become detached from the signified (the Vagina); culture hasn't allowed for the distortion of meaning. It is for this reason that I'll lose faith in modern society when 'words' like 'PMSL' will be added into the dictionary, because it only refers to a by-product - a very rare by-product - of laughing hysterically, when in fact, you're probably just amused. I really hate this horrible abstraction of language.
Right I'm going to end now because I probably sound really pretentious.
Currently Listening To: Flight of the Conchords - Self Titled
Currently Playing: Football Manager Live
Currently Reading: Just about to go back to George Eliot's 'Middlemarch'
Currently Watching: The Sopranos Season 5
Going to Manchester on Thursday to watch Manchester City vs Hamburg: and before I'm accused for being a glory hunter, I'm going for a friend at work, at tickets were only £5!
Tuesday, 14 April 2009
Monday, 6 April 2009
George Oppen
"I'm reminding myself that I do want to be here, that I would not lack the courage to cut my throat if I wanted to do so. I don't do so. In fact I enjoy life very, very much. I wrote that in a poem in case there was any misinterpretation of that." 1969
Recently
No posts really recently because I've been quite busy, and will continue to be this busy for this week. Currently writing an essay on the relation of George Oppen and Paul Auster to popular culture, and still have an essay to write on Virginia Woolf and D.H Lawrence. This is just a quick currently doing post:
Currently Reading: George Oppen 'Collected Poems'; Paul Auster 'Music of Chance'
Currently Watching: Flight of the Conchords Season One
Currently (Still) Playing: Football Manager Live
Currently Listening to: Bob Dylan 'Dylan'; Flight of the Conchords 'Self Titled'; I Killed The Prom Queen 'Music for the Recently Deceased'
It would be really nice if someone bought me some form of external hard-drive.
Pointless post to satisfy my self-importance; Twitter is also pointless
Currently Reading: George Oppen 'Collected Poems'; Paul Auster 'Music of Chance'
Currently Watching: Flight of the Conchords Season One
Currently (Still) Playing: Football Manager Live
Currently Listening to: Bob Dylan 'Dylan'; Flight of the Conchords 'Self Titled'; I Killed The Prom Queen 'Music for the Recently Deceased'
It would be really nice if someone bought me some form of external hard-drive.
Pointless post to satisfy my self-importance; Twitter is also pointless
Monday, 9 March 2009
Friday, 20 February 2009
The Sublime
I had one of those moments today, when I can say that the was to some extent, an elavation of my soul - to borrow the phrase from Edgar Allan Poe. During a seminar on James Schuyler and Barbara Guest, we were looking at Schuyler's poem 'An East Window on Elizabeth Street.' The concept behind Schuyler's poetry, is that it should be treated as a painting or photo. He will write about something that he can see and the poem itself is the frame around the scene. The poem were were studying for instance is Schuyler putting into words, Elizabeth Street from an eastern window. It was in the lines that are:
"But why should a metal ladder climb, straight
and sky-aspiring, five rungs above a stairway hood
up into nothing."
If we picture the scene, Schuyler is looking around as he's writing the poem and his eyes are drawn to a fire-escape thats ladder goes up five rungs higher than the stairway hood. In this moment Schuyler, unexpectingly experiences the sublime - an elavation of the soul - from surveying the ordinaryness of his scene, and not being attentive to anything in particular, and just happens upon the ladder; the idea is that one will not find the sublime if it is being sought after, rather it is found when you aren't being attentive to finding the sublime. This got me thinking and really struck a chord with me. It made me think of all the moments in which some form of culture - in the broadest sense, I don't try to pretend that it's only high culture that has this effect on me - really touches the soul. For instance listening to a piece of music, where you get a cold shiver because you find it that special; or when a poem really moves the emotion that it seeks to, etc. Essentially what I'm trying to get at is when something really connects with your mind and subsequently infuses a rush or emotion - whatever that emotion is. Last night for instance, whilst reading for the seminar Schuyler's poems, I felt a connection with 'The Payne Whitney Poems,' where a certain section called 'February 13 1975' really 'spoke to me' - for lack of a better term. I think what I like in Schuyler's poetry is that vunerablilty and fragility that is present, as a result of his mental state. A line from 'An East Window on Elizabeth Street' really touched in the seminar once I'd -we'd - unpacked its meaning: "I never thought I'd make it." The line itself is so ambiguous that it's magnificient; one can guess that Schuyler made me referring to his own anxieties about a poet - considering he didn't publish whilst his friend Frank O'Hara was alive, because he was too intimdated by O'Hara's work, or the fact he had several major nervous breakdowns.
I'm digressing slightly - massively. The main point of this was my meditation upon this idea that one can only find the sublime when they have no expectations and aren't being attentive to the search for sublimity. Having only really started to really enjoy poetry within the past year or so, it is in music that I've experienced this many times. The most vivid one that I can think of at the moment occurs in Eternal Lord - 'Get to F**k' 1 minute 20 seconds in to the song. The song slows down with palm muting and a slow beat from the drums, and suddenly the vocalist screams - I've no idea what he actually says, and lyrics websites don't tell me either, but the contrast of the breakdown and his scream gave me goosebumps the first 100 times I'd heard the song. What's sad is that now the song no longer has the effect on me because I know it's there and have experienced it many times before. This reminds me of Poe, where he says that the artist is constantly trying to reach the 'Supernal Beauty' after experiencing a taster of it: art is essentially an attempt to elavate their soul to this supernal beauty. I honestly felt that at this point in 'Get to F**k' that I reached some form of supernal beauty; what makes it slightly ironic is that I found this 'supernal beauty' in a band that have been labelled - in my opinion, incorrectly - as Death Metal!
A few other songs that have had a similar effect on me:
Lastly, the sentiment that came from the poem made me consider certain things in my life, and has made me think in a way that I didn't before: something that Schuyler, and the postmodernists would have been happy with.
I now really don't know whether to write an essay on James Schuyler or on John Ashbery for my New York module; the other module will definatly feature a Wallace Stevens essay, who I'm sure you can tell (I don't know who you are, though I will still refer to you as you) I love - once again unexpectingly stumbling across his work amidst some very average work on a previous module.
James Schuyler - 'The Payne Whitney Poems'
PASTIME
I pick up a loaded pen and twiddle it.
After the blizzard
cold days of shrinking snow,
At visiting hour the cars
beloew my window form up
in a traffic jam. A fast-
moving man is in charge,
herding the big machines
like cattle. Weirdly, it all
keeps moving somehow. I read
a dumb detective story. I
clip my nails: hard
as iron or glass. The clippers
keep sliding off them. Today
I'm shaky. A shave, a bath.
Chat. The morning paper.
Sitting. Staring. Thinking blankly.
TV. A desert kind of life.
"But why should a metal ladder climb, straight
and sky-aspiring, five rungs above a stairway hood
up into nothing."
If we picture the scene, Schuyler is looking around as he's writing the poem and his eyes are drawn to a fire-escape thats ladder goes up five rungs higher than the stairway hood. In this moment Schuyler, unexpectingly experiences the sublime - an elavation of the soul - from surveying the ordinaryness of his scene, and not being attentive to anything in particular, and just happens upon the ladder; the idea is that one will not find the sublime if it is being sought after, rather it is found when you aren't being attentive to finding the sublime. This got me thinking and really struck a chord with me. It made me think of all the moments in which some form of culture - in the broadest sense, I don't try to pretend that it's only high culture that has this effect on me - really touches the soul. For instance listening to a piece of music, where you get a cold shiver because you find it that special; or when a poem really moves the emotion that it seeks to, etc. Essentially what I'm trying to get at is when something really connects with your mind and subsequently infuses a rush or emotion - whatever that emotion is. Last night for instance, whilst reading for the seminar Schuyler's poems, I felt a connection with 'The Payne Whitney Poems,' where a certain section called 'February 13 1975' really 'spoke to me' - for lack of a better term. I think what I like in Schuyler's poetry is that vunerablilty and fragility that is present, as a result of his mental state. A line from 'An East Window on Elizabeth Street' really touched in the seminar once I'd -we'd - unpacked its meaning: "I never thought I'd make it." The line itself is so ambiguous that it's magnificient; one can guess that Schuyler made me referring to his own anxieties about a poet - considering he didn't publish whilst his friend Frank O'Hara was alive, because he was too intimdated by O'Hara's work, or the fact he had several major nervous breakdowns.
I'm digressing slightly - massively. The main point of this was my meditation upon this idea that one can only find the sublime when they have no expectations and aren't being attentive to the search for sublimity. Having only really started to really enjoy poetry within the past year or so, it is in music that I've experienced this many times. The most vivid one that I can think of at the moment occurs in Eternal Lord - 'Get to F**k' 1 minute 20 seconds in to the song. The song slows down with palm muting and a slow beat from the drums, and suddenly the vocalist screams - I've no idea what he actually says, and lyrics websites don't tell me either, but the contrast of the breakdown and his scream gave me goosebumps the first 100 times I'd heard the song. What's sad is that now the song no longer has the effect on me because I know it's there and have experienced it many times before. This reminds me of Poe, where he says that the artist is constantly trying to reach the 'Supernal Beauty' after experiencing a taster of it: art is essentially an attempt to elavate their soul to this supernal beauty. I honestly felt that at this point in 'Get to F**k' that I reached some form of supernal beauty; what makes it slightly ironic is that I found this 'supernal beauty' in a band that have been labelled - in my opinion, incorrectly - as Death Metal!
A few other songs that have had a similar effect on me:
- Blink 182 - 'First Date' interlude
- Taking Back Sunday - 'Timberwolves at New Jersey' - the first song that I ever appreciated the 'growl' type singing - although I realise that it's barely even that
- Four Year Strong - Maniac (R.O.D) - The guitaring at the outro
- Four Year Strong - Bada Bing! Wit A Pipe! - Many things with this song. When he sings "Roll with the punches..." at the beginning, followed by the introduction of the synth and then some of the most meaningful - in my subjective opinion - lyrics: "Sing it back to me, this is your life story." The mixture of these at the start of this song has given me many a goosebump
- Fall Out Boy - 'Dead On Arrival' when I realised how special this band were, and subsequently have become since the realise of 'From Under the Cork Tree.'
- Fall Out Boy - "Tell That Mick He Just Made My List Of Things To Do Today" With lyrics that at a certain spot in time, I could really relate to
- The Academy Is... - 'About A Girl' for helping me through one of the hardest times in my life :-)
- Gym Class Heroes - 'Faces In The Hall' for being one of the only songs that can evoke such a strong emotion by the end of the song
- Pendulum - 'Mutiny' I remember driving from Canterbury to Swindon, during a previously bad part of my life, and driving down the M25, around Caterham, with this song on really loud and loving all the different part, techniques, genres all fused into one song, and feeling immeadiatly uplifted.
Lastly, the sentiment that came from the poem made me consider certain things in my life, and has made me think in a way that I didn't before: something that Schuyler, and the postmodernists would have been happy with.
I now really don't know whether to write an essay on James Schuyler or on John Ashbery for my New York module; the other module will definatly feature a Wallace Stevens essay, who I'm sure you can tell (I don't know who you are, though I will still refer to you as you) I love - once again unexpectingly stumbling across his work amidst some very average work on a previous module.
James Schuyler - 'The Payne Whitney Poems'
PASTIME
I pick up a loaded pen and twiddle it.
After the blizzard
cold days of shrinking snow,
At visiting hour the cars
beloew my window form up
in a traffic jam. A fast-
moving man is in charge,
herding the big machines
like cattle. Weirdly, it all
keeps moving somehow. I read
a dumb detective story. I
clip my nails: hard
as iron or glass. The clippers
keep sliding off them. Today
I'm shaky. A shave, a bath.
Chat. The morning paper.
Sitting. Staring. Thinking blankly.
TV. A desert kind of life.
Thursday, 12 February 2009
P.S
treat this as a post-script to my previous post. Just an after thought: Wii Fit is not a form of exercise. This could be one of those bullet-points on a facebook group that's named: 'You Know You're Really Fat When..'
This rant was brought to you by Facebook's status updates.
FUCK NINTENDO for it's horrible PR for the Wii
- Wii Fit is my main form of exercise
This rant was brought to you by Facebook's status updates.
FUCK NINTENDO for it's horrible PR for the Wii
Next Week
Blogging involves also talking about your actual life doesn't it?! Hmm, next week is going to be amazing. Sunday (it's the start of the week in Argos, and therefore the start of the week in the 'real world') involves work (boo), followed by the arrival of James and Grant. Not sure what to do in the evening as everything shuts down; I'm thinking possibly going out for some food to somewhere: I know that people from Swindon are sheltered from the Nando's experience, and maybe I'll enlighten them in the same way I was enlightened a few weeks ago.
Monday sees us 3 travel to London to go see Alkaline Trio at Koko in Camden Town; I've been lucky enough to see most of my favourite bands live, but never had the oppurtunity to go see Alkaline Trio, so I am so excited, it's ridiculous. Not sure what to do during the day, possibly just head up to London early and do my usual: Canary Wharf for a Starbucks - I wonder if they have a Costa though?! Hm.
Tuesday could possibly be the end of my week! It starts with me dragging James and Grant to a lovely Modernism lecture - I have been told Grant isn't too keen on this, but the lecture is on the king of the world - not Martin Elbrow, but Wallace Stevens. Lunch will then follow the lecture in one of the campus bars, followed by my lecture on some New York postmodern literature thing (I haven't actually checked who it is yet). The evening is the part that my abrubtly end my life: Millwall vs Swindon Town. Eep. One thing is for sure, I'm not wearing my Swindon shirt.
Wednesday will be either spent in A&E, or with my doing a presentation on the King of the World: Wallace Stevens. Venue in the evening too with the Swindonians, plus a medley of the Canterbury lot (basically whoever I can get out).
Thursday and Friday, and Saturday don't matter, because Sunday-Wednesday is going to be immense; I don't think I've been this excited in such a long time.
Currently Listening To: Alkaline Trio - 'Good Mourning'
Currently Reading: John Ashbery's poetry
Currently Watching: 24 Season 6
Currently Playing: Football Manager Live and Geometry Wars 2
That's the culture part done. Football Manager Live, culture, lol. Gonna end again with a poem; I think it's only fitting to put a John Ashbery one because I absolutely love his poetry and have spent all evening reading it:
John Ashbery - 'These Lacustrine Cities'
These lacustrine cities grew out of loathing
Into something forgetful, although angry with history.
They are the product of an idea: that man is horrible, for instance,
Though this is only an example.
They emerged until a tower
Controlled the sky, and with artiface dipped back
Into the past for swans and tapering branches,
Burning, until all that hate was transformed into useless love.
Then you are left with an idea of yourself
And the feeling of ascending emptiness of the afternoon
Which must be charged to the embarrassment of others
Who fly by you like beacons.
[...]
The worst is not over, yet I know
You will be happy here. Because of the logic
Of your situation, which is something no climate can outsmart.
Tender and insouciant by turns, you see
You have a mountain of something,
Thoughtfully pouring all of your energy into this single monument,
Whose wind is desire starching a petal,
Whose disappointment broke into a rainbow of tears.
Monday sees us 3 travel to London to go see Alkaline Trio at Koko in Camden Town; I've been lucky enough to see most of my favourite bands live, but never had the oppurtunity to go see Alkaline Trio, so I am so excited, it's ridiculous. Not sure what to do during the day, possibly just head up to London early and do my usual: Canary Wharf for a Starbucks - I wonder if they have a Costa though?! Hm.
Tuesday could possibly be the end of my week! It starts with me dragging James and Grant to a lovely Modernism lecture - I have been told Grant isn't too keen on this, but the lecture is on the king of the world - not Martin Elbrow, but Wallace Stevens. Lunch will then follow the lecture in one of the campus bars, followed by my lecture on some New York postmodern literature thing (I haven't actually checked who it is yet). The evening is the part that my abrubtly end my life: Millwall vs Swindon Town. Eep. One thing is for sure, I'm not wearing my Swindon shirt.
Wednesday will be either spent in A&E, or with my doing a presentation on the King of the World: Wallace Stevens. Venue in the evening too with the Swindonians, plus a medley of the Canterbury lot (basically whoever I can get out).
Thursday and Friday, and Saturday don't matter, because Sunday-Wednesday is going to be immense; I don't think I've been this excited in such a long time.
Currently Listening To: Alkaline Trio - 'Good Mourning'
Currently Reading: John Ashbery's poetry
Currently Watching: 24 Season 6
Currently Playing: Football Manager Live and Geometry Wars 2
That's the culture part done. Football Manager Live, culture, lol. Gonna end again with a poem; I think it's only fitting to put a John Ashbery one because I absolutely love his poetry and have spent all evening reading it:
John Ashbery - 'These Lacustrine Cities'
These lacustrine cities grew out of loathing
Into something forgetful, although angry with history.
They are the product of an idea: that man is horrible, for instance,
Though this is only an example.
They emerged until a tower
Controlled the sky, and with artiface dipped back
Into the past for swans and tapering branches,
Burning, until all that hate was transformed into useless love.
Then you are left with an idea of yourself
And the feeling of ascending emptiness of the afternoon
Which must be charged to the embarrassment of others
Who fly by you like beacons.
[...]
The worst is not over, yet I know
You will be happy here. Because of the logic
Of your situation, which is something no climate can outsmart.
Tender and insouciant by turns, you see
You have a mountain of something,
Thoughtfully pouring all of your energy into this single monument,
Whose wind is desire starching a petal,
Whose disappointment broke into a rainbow of tears.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
