Wired Mesh

Just Want You in My Caddie

This one's for Scott: the marketing firm Lucien James has released a report on the use of brandnames in Top 40 music, particularly hip-hop. Titled "American Brandstand," the summary is filled with striking tidbits -- Of the 111 songs in the Billboard Top 20, 43 had brands in the lyrics -- and some perceptive analysis of the economic and social purposes such name-dropping serves in American culture. Plus it contains the following insight, the academic tone of which is just endlessly amusing: "Similarly, when 50 Cent talks about taking a woman he has just met back to the Ramada Inn, it's fairly clear that the focus of their evening is going to be different from the evening he would have evoked if he'd taken her to, say, the Four Seasons." Ah, yes indeed.

Who Shot J.R.R.?

My freelance gig with the Pulse has afforded me the opportunity to review a handfull of films over the last month: "The Missing" and "Something's Gotta Give," both of which I generally hated, and "Mona Lisa Smile," which I enjoyed even though I tried very hard not to. I wrote about 700 words on each of these movies; you can examine my opinions for yourself, along with many other articles from talented individuals, by seizing a free copy of Pulse at your local hipster coffee shop.

I have not, however, written anything on Peter Jackson's "Return of the King." There have been so many reviews of the movies, so many angry arguments over them, and so many people who understand the source material more comprehensively than I do, that I decided there was nothing else to be said.

Turns out I was wrong. There was something more to be said, and, as is often the case, Anthony Lane has said it. Notice, Josiah and Steele, how he notes the ways that Jackson fails to grasp Tolkien's vision, and then in the very next sentence brushes aside these concerns as perepheral to the task of cinematic vision.

"Tolkien has a tremendous late chapter entitled 'The Scouring of the Shire,' in which the hobbits return to their land and find it snarled in petty feuds, a hangover of Sauron’s influence, which they consider it their business to erase. It always makes me think of post-Vichy France, riven with bitter charges of German collaboration, and not a jot of it remains onscreen. Instead, the movie closes in limp bucolic mood; Sam, the staunchest figure in the saga, goes home to a bosomy hobbitess, as he does in the novel, but Jackson, the man who can marshal warriors by the thousand, finds it hard to catch the rusticity—brisk, unsentimental, cider-sharp—of the original.

"Perhaps that is as it should be. As I watched this film, an eager victim of its boundless will to astound, I found my loyal memories of the book beginning to fade. It may be time to halt the endless comparisons between page and screen, and to confess that the two are very different beasts."

What Lane has done here -- and done so effortlessly it makes me sick -- is to resolve the tension between Tolkien purists and Jackson fans, by conceding that the films miss the books' original spirit, then arguing that the movies have crafted an entirely new spirit, one more in the tradition of Douglas Fairbanks than J. R. R. Tolkien. This is criticism at its finest: simultaneously unsparing and uplifting, and making me want to dash away from my desk and go to the movies.

Bloomenbergansteinthal

Just in time for Hanukkah, an important Salon piece from Baz Dreisinger on "the new Super Jews": twentysomething Jewish hipsters who mock their own neuroses, insecurities and stereotypes. Dreisinger isn't thrilled:

"Today's Jewish tastemakers lust not after inclusion but the edginess that comes from exclusion... What's new about "new" Jewish comedy like "The Hebrew Hammer," then, isn't its jokes or the black-Jew buddy fantasy it indulges, but the way it has recast these things: Jewishness -- otherness -- as a trendy accessory that can be taken on and off at will. This sort of identity-making is in line with today's "big fat [insert ethnicity] wedding" trend, in which ethnicity is both particular and universal at the same time. It's also of a piece with the triumph of the nerd, whose pop-culture poster children include director Spike Jonze and N.E.R.D. über-producer Pharrell Williams. Otherness is cool, as long as it's as kooky, funky and freely styled as the latest trend in Brooklyn's hot Williamsburg neighborhood (the hipster, not Hasidic, section)."

As a cultural Jew far from the homeland (New York City), I quickly identify with the attraction of this "new Jewishness" -- and with Dreisinger's concerns. When I chat with my (half) Jewish quasi-hipster friends in Chattanooga about our ethnicity, it's usually in a joking fashion. And I have often teasingly embraced the ways that my background does make me a bit of an outsider. Depending on the day, I like and loathe that outsider status. But when I'm trying to make and establish connections with other, gentile people (say, most of my closest friends), I'm quick to ignore any differences my background may have created between us. In that sense, my Jewishness does feel like an "accessory that can be taken on and off at will." And we haven't even started talking about what it means to be Jewish and love Jesus.

I realize that these thoughts are hopelessly jumbled. Perhaps they can be sorted out in the comments section.

I Want to Kiss You

Not to toot my own horn (which is, if nothing else, a disturbing image), but I've had quite the two weeks here. I finished my last two classes at Covenant (including a test, a cumulative final, and two papers), wrote eight stories for Pulse, moved one roommate out of my apartment and another in, celebrated my sister's birthday, drove my friend Morris Yaegashi to Atlanta, and pulled my first all-nighter since I was editor of the Bagpipe -- all while working my usual shift at the office. I still have a hard time remembering most of last Thursday, after staying up all night; I remember finishing my final, swerving down Lookout Mountain to my office, holding a short phone conversation with my mother ("I can't feel my legs right now," I remember mentioning), grabbing a 20-minute nap and driving to Northgate Mall, where I spent three hours with Andy Montgomery, reporting for Pulse on the life of a mall Santa Claus. Then I got up the next morning at 6 a.m., drove the Japanese Jukebox to the Atlanta airport, and hosted a Hanukkah party for about 40 people that night at my tiny apartment.

I knew I was exhausted (and maybe a bit drunk on Jack and Coke), when I had the following conversation with Rye-Baby concerning a Covenant student wrecking her automobile.

"Man, I drove by her today, and like 15 minutes later she pushed her tree into a car."

"No," said Ryan gently, "I don't think that's exactly what happened."

"I'm sorry," I said, correcting myself, "she crashed her tree into a car."

This, silly as it was, was not the most embarrasing conversational display in the country this weekend. That honor goes to Joe Namath. (You see how I just transitioned from a personal story to a pointless link? They don't teach this kind of thing. It's a gift.) He wins the exciting prize of never being interviewed again on live television for the rest of his life. I really wish I had seen this.

By the way, look for the Santa Claus story in Pulse this Wednesday. It features some fine photos by Mr. Andrew Mongtomery of small, cowering children hiding from that wretched old elf.

We Have Visions of Sugarplums

It is very easy to write like Ernest Hemingway. It is not hard to do. Not hard at all. The hardness is not in writing like Hemingway. No. But writing a Christmas poem like Hemingway, that is hard. Very hard. Too hard for me, I think. But not too hard for James Thurber. He was very skilled, James Thurber. A real talent. Tough as a big marlin. A pity he died.

Narcissism 101

OK, kids, today's class topic is Narcissism and the Fragmentation of 21st Century Society. I assume all of you have done your assigned reading: David Brooks' essay "Superiority Complex," on the democratization of snobbery. Can someone summarize this piece for us? Yes, Ryan?

Well said. You're right, Brooks does argue that "everybody can be a snob, because everybody can look down from the heights of his mountaintop at those millions of poor saps who are less accomplished in the field of, say, skateboard jumping, or who are total poseurs when it comes to financial instruments, or who are sadly backward when it comes to social awareness or the salvation of their own souls." He says that the success of American society has allowed thousands of little interest-based communities to emerge, each with its own high potentate, who feels very good about himself.

Sit down, Josiah. No, you can't go to the bathroom right now.

Now class, today we have two guest speakers who will illustrate how this trend has practical effects on our own lives. First we have Village Voice music critic Robert Christgau, who will argue that for years now, indie rockers and their Pitchfork breathren have inflated their own importance in the musical canon, effectively erasing the last 50 years of pop history. He says that "what was once alternative rock is now an alternate universe—a universe where no one listens to Mozart or Miles and any aesthete who dabbles in song form challenges Lennon-McCartney. Poised for takeover? What's to take over? Indie stars are already masters of all they survey." Please give a warm welcome to Mr. Christgau.

Thank you, Mr. Christgau. Good to see you giving the hipsters what for. Please take a seat over by the fish tank. Now, we also have with us today Romanian poet Andrei Codrescu, an NPR commentator who would like to talk to us about blogs. Good to have you with us, Mr. Codrescu. We look forward to hearing what you have to say.

What's that now? Are you suggesting that blogging communities are focused on the ego gratification of the blogmaster? That we have no more perspective than the indie rock critics who think Grandaddy is the new Coltrane? That we are also searching for people to affirm our significance? That our work is an impermanant as a spider's web, and as small? Well, I don't think my class likes that, Mr. Codrescu. And we think your accent is funny, don't we, class? You can go home now, sir. Don't let the door hit you on the way out.

Well. I've think we've all learned an important lesson today. This cultural criticism thing is lots of fun, until some spoilsport comes in and starts criticizing you. That person is no fun at all. Don't any of you be that nasty person. That's all for today.

Yes, Josiah, you can have a hall pass now.

Pretend Percy?

Downstairs in the lobby of the Medical Mall, there's some kind of Christmas Open Housepital, with lots of eggnog and people in wheelchairs. I just rode the elevator back up to my eighth-floor office with my plate piled full of little Swedish meatballs covered in what tastes like barbecue sauce. Ah, the South.

Speaking of which, there's a fascinating article in the New Republic critiquing the critical cliche that Bruce Springsteen is the spokesman for everyday American workers. David Hajdu argues that Springsteen may speak for what many Americans want to be (tought, tender, irrepressible), but that he rarely if ever speaks for himself, which makes him an odd figure to embrace for his authenticity.

But what's really incendiary is Hadju's thinly veiled accusation that Harvard professor Robert Coles fabricated many of the quotes in his book about Springsteen, including pages of quotes supposedly from the aging Walker Percy. As a Percy and Springsteen fan, I knew that the southern novelist had sent the Jersey rock star a rather intellectual fan letter in the late 1980s, and that Springsteen had spoken well of Percy in interviews. But I knew nothing of the Percy quotes -- if they are that -- in Coles' book.

I have no idea whether Coles cooked up the quotes or not. But they certainly don't sound like Percy: "This guy is his own boss--he's earned the title every inch of the way: he sings of us while singing to us, and what you hear (the one you're hearing) is a plain, ordinary guy soaring way above himself and everyone around him through his voice, and through the songs he's written."

This is rambling claptrap, nothing like Percy's usual withdrawn, sadonic quality in oral interviews. High praise from Percy usually was limited to the suggestion that the person in question wasn't a complete rat-bastard. It's always possible that my favorite writer accidentally slipped into cheerful charity (maybe he hadn't had his whiskey yet), but I certainly hope not. Now I'm annoyed, and not even the little chicken wings from downstairs are helping.

The Festive Fifty

I was listening to WUTC, Chattanooga's painfully solid National Public Radio station, last night in my kitchen as I mixed up a plate of spaghetti, Prego, and ground beef, one of the few meals I can concoct with anything resembling success. Nothing is so comforting as a cup of instant coffee, a bubbling stove, and the DJ stylings of the unimpeachable hipster Joshua Daniels. If only he would lighten up on the Rickie Lee Jones, whose accompanists sound like they're sacrificing a cow with their violins in a corner of the studio.

Anyway, I was reminded by Daniels that WUTC is taking votes for the Festive Fifty of 2003, a list of the year's best albums played on public radio. You can vote online, and you'll be elligable for a nice Stone Cup gift basket, which I'm sure you would enjoy, you being into coffee and all, you reader you. It's quite the list, so take your time and consider your choices carefully. I selected Gillian Welch, Johnny Cash and Fountains of Wayne, but you go with what you like. Although if you select Jack Johnson I will have to hunt you down and yell at you for hours on end.

Friends and Ice Weasels

This morning, after engaging in a pleasant anti-Patriot Act discussion with a mustachioed man at my local Golden Gallon, I arrived at my office to discover that both my mother and my sister had e-mailed me inspirational quotes. Thinking them both quite nice, I have decided to share them here.

From my mother came these words from St. Augustine:

"All kinds of things rejoiced my soul in the company of my friends -- to talk and laugh and to do each other kindnesses; read pleasant books together, pass from lightest jesting to talk of the deepest things and back again; differ without rancour, as a man might differ with himself, and when most rarely dissension arose, find our normal agreement all the sweeter for it; teach each other or learn from each other; be impatient for the return of the absent, and welcome them with joy and their homecoming; these and such like things, proceeding from our hearts as we gave affection and received it back, and shown by face, by voice, by the eyes, and a thousand other pleasing ways, kindled a flame which infused our very souls and of many made us one. This is what men value in friends."

I found this a cheering sentiment. Made me look forward to my small group meeting tonight. Then I proceded to the quote from my sister, attributed to Matt Groening:

"Love is a snowmobile racing across the tundra that suddenly flips over, pinning you underneath. At night, the ice weasels come."

My sister is not nearly so optimistic a person as my mother.

Colymbosathon Ecplecticos

I was driving back home from Erlanger this afternoon through a dark drizzle, when a story on NPR caught my attention. Scientists have discovered an ancient sand flea that they claim is the oldest fossil that can be identified as a male. How, you query laciviously? “It has the world’s oldest penis. If there is another one, I don’t know it,” researcher David Siveter explains.

Well.

But what caught my full attention (and made me laugh into the dusk) was the name scientists have chosen for the old fellow. He is to be called Colymbosathon ecplecticos, which is Greek for "amazing swimmer with a large penis." Coincidentally, this was also my nickname in high school.

I'm sorry I find this so funny. I can't wait to see who Googles this site now.

Sheep & Shire

If you by chance own a sheep farm, and a large, hairy man asks to use it to shoot a few scenes for his fantasy movie, you should read this article and carefully consider the ramifications of your choice. The Alexander brothers of New Zealand allowed their farm to be used as the Shire for the "Lord of the Rings" films, and now thousands of Japanese tourists are wandering through the pastures and peering into the remains of hobbit holes. So the Alexanders are making the best of it; they charge $50 a head to visit Hobbiton. No word on how this has affected the sheep.

(And yes, I realize that this is the second Tolkien-related article I have linked to in the same number of days, even though my sole attempt to finish the books was a massive failure and I'm pretty apathetic about the movies. But I keep being told I resemble Peter Jackson after the Atkins diet, so I have at least some connection to this material.)

Christ Among the Coalbiters

So, did you have a nice November? Mine was good.

I've been feeling a lot of internal pressure to make this blog into my own little home publishing station, and the strain of creating essays for arbitrary deadlines has caused me to shut it down entirely for a time. (I hope you really liked the Veith critique, since you got to read it for a month.) But in the last few weeks, a variety of larger writing opportunities have opened up -- for one thing, I'm penning for Pulse, Chattanooga's newest, best culture alt-zine, which you can find on newstands today at hipster hangouts like Lupi's, Greyfriars and Mojo Burrito. Other literary projects are still in the works, but I'll keep you updated on where you can find the most "serious" Mesh scribblings. Meanwhile, I plan to use this blog as something of a writer's desk: working through preliminary thoughts about essays I'm publishing, posting links to other writers I've enjoyed, and engaging in the occassional life story that interests only me.

So to reiterate: For my most structured, lengthy writing, go brave the pot smoke waifting from the Taco Mac kitchen and get a copy of Pulse. This space is going casual Friday for the forseeable future. I hope it's still entertaining.

That said, here's a tight little piece from Salon on the origins of the Inklings, that fine society of British writers led by C. S. Lewis and J. R. R. Tolkien. (A DayPass will be required to read it. Takes two minutes to get. No big deal.) The essay talks about how the men started out as the Coalbiters, a group of mythology afficinados who gathered at a pub every week to read epics in the original Old Norse, (Good times!) and how Tolkien helped bring Lewis to Christ. Most of the information here will be familiar to Lewis and Tolkien fans, but there are some lovely tidbits, such as the unimpressed reaction of some Inklings to "The Lord of the Rings": "Henry Victor Dyson, for one, was known to snarl, 'Oh fuck, not another elf!' as Tolkien read another section of the epic in his usual rapid-fire mumble."