In between dusting, making iced tea, and chopping vegetables for dinner, I've been thinking about old Robert Frost. To be precise, I've been thinking about his poem "Mending Wall." Did you ever study it in school? We came across it in the 5th grade, though what I gleaned from it then other than thinking the neighbor in it rather grouchy, I couldn't say.
Well, that was then. I'm now inclined to wonder what it was that set that rock-hauling neighbor's teeth on edge and made him insist on keeping the wall in good repair. You just know there's a story behind it; having had a few bad neighbors yourself, you may be more inclined than you were as a youngster to wonder about his side of the story. I know I am. The something-there-is-that-doesn't-love-a-wall narrator has apparently not lived in my building. If Frost had quoted me in that poem, I'd be saying not only "Good fences make good neighbors," but also "So does soundproofing."
As of today, I have new upstairs neighbors, it seems. I haven't seen them, but I'm going by all the noise, trudging back and forth, and voices I've heard in the hall. Last month, I heard maintenance cleaning the apartment after it was vacated by He-Who-Bangs-Around-Like-Thor (the previous tenant), and I was hoping for a quiet summer, but someone seems to have swooped in already. Over the last couple of summers, there was a two-month break between tenants when things were blissfully quiet. This year, the break has been cut short, but it was nice while it lasted.
June is not a common time for people to move in around here. Nor would I guess it to be common anywhere to start moving in at midnight on a Sunday night, but of course there's no accounting for taste. I don't know how much actual heaving of boxes and furniture took place, but I did hear a lot of footsteps up there right around then, just after I settled down peacefully with a book. Unfortunately, the previous tenant had a penchant for coming in and making a lot of noise as soon as I turned on my reading lamp at night, so last evening's unorthodox arrival already felt like deja vu.
I have several theories as to why that particular apartment has been so troublesome for the last several years, and most of them are tongue-in-cheek. Any one of them would make a great thriller or science fiction novella (and maybe I'll write it some time):
1.) A previous tenant had ill-gotten gains and hid it in the walls or floor. Word got out, but no one knows where it is; hence the use of saws, drills, and other equipment I've sometimes heard up there. Gold diggers.
2.) In that very apartment, an alien lost the wingnut needed to drive his spaceship and can't get back to Alpha Centauri without it (this is the reverse of Lost in Space; call it Trapped on Earth--Without a Paddle). The story of how this happened in the first place involves a wild party, a limbo session, and a spaceman who couldn't hold his bourbon. A succession of neighbors with humanoid features masks a desperate attempt to find the widget, which is smaller and thinner than a contact lens and can move of its own volition. Pod people.
3.) All the upstairs tenants are part of a psychology experiment to see how annoying they can be before the other neighbors within earshot move out. I agree, it would be hard to get this one past an ethics committee, so it would have to be run by a renegade psychologist untroubled by tenure considerations. At the end of the experiment, the psychologist ends up in prison, and the volunteers are forced to flee the country to avoid prosecution. Mad scientists.
4.) The tenants are part of a theft ring, which decided to establish its Bluegrass headquarters in the bucolic environs of a suburban apartment dwelling. No one would ever guess, right? All of the heavy noises and sounds of furniture moving are attempts to hide stolen -- what? Artwork? Gold bricks? Bicycles? Circus elephants? Criminals.
If this were a Douglas Adams or Neil Gaiman novel, the upstairs neighbors might actually be gods, passing mostly undetected as regular humans due to their shapeshifting abilities. The whole thing would end in a major gods-on-gods rumble or some sort of time travel cliffhanger. The trouble with that one is that none of my actual neighbors have had even a hint of mythic grandeur. I'm leaving this one off the list. So, not gods.
I think Mr. Frost's narrator dismisses his neighbor's insistence on mending the wall too naively. After all, healthy boundaries are important in life, as is consideration. The narrator seems to feel that even nature rises up against walls, toppling them in silent protest--whereas I am all in favor of them, within reason. They offer some protection against stray dogs, invasions of privacy, and accidents. A picturesque stone wall like the one in the poem seems eminently reasonable to me--it keeps modest order without being an eyesore. There's an art to stone fences, as well as personal boundaries, and I somehow doubt it's a spirit trying to break the wall in the poem. It could be moles, though.
Monday, June 16, 2014
Monday, June 9, 2014
Gone Fishing
Not really, but Wordplay is on a short break while I wrestle with revisions, labyrinths, cultural complexes, the myth of the rugged individualist, the potency of the myth of the rugged individualist, majority-minority demographic trends, the exact location of the Minotaur, Benjamin Franklin, the Knights of the Round Table, and the peer review process.
Saturday, May 31, 2014
Capturing a Book
Last week, I read two books recommended by readers of a magazine I subscribe to. This reminded me a little of my experiment two years ago, when I read lots of books from NPR's summer reading lists. I did something like that last summer, too, but blended recommendations from several sources. On the whole, I've decided that, despite coming across a few gems in these reading lists, I usually do better on my own when it comes to picking out books. I just know what I like.
I often find good titles when I'm looking for something else. I might be looking at books by an author I already know and notice something on the same shelf that calls out to me. Part of the fun of going to the library is the serendipity and the not really knowing what I'm going to walk out with. Sometimes, I'm in the mood for something in particular and walk out with a book within five minutes; other times, I know what I want but can't seem to find it.
When I went to the library the other day, I had a title in mind, but the library didn't have it, so I started browsing. I noticed several flyers on a display that someone in reader's advisory must have put together. They had titles like "If You Like Dan Brown . . ." or "If You Like Agatha Christie . . ." In my case, you almost have to be more specific: "If You Like Jane Smiley's Historical Novels But Not A Thousand Acres"; "If You Like Literary Adventures With Exotic Settings and Mythology"; or "If You Like Romances--With Humor--That Aren't Predictable," but to get something that close to the target, I'd have to write the list myself.
However, I flipped through several of the flyers and found some book descriptions that appealed. I started hunting and located a few of the books, including The Age of Desire, a novel about Edith Wharton, and Rules of Civility, a novel about upper-class New Yorkers in the 1930s. I almost picked the Wharton book, but something in the description made me think of Henry James's The Bostonians, and though this book may be nothing like that, I decided against it just in case it was. (This would be from my flyer, "If You Like Henry James and You Like Boston, but not The Bostonians.") Likewise, I might actually enjoy Rules of Civility, which is supposed to invoke a touch of F. Scott Fitzgerald, but my reverse snobbery kicked in just then and a novel about wealthy New Yorkers didn't appeal.
I perused three of the pamphlets and looked for at least 10 of the suggested titles before deciding that maybe the lists wouldn't work for me. I then tried the library's "New Books" shelf, but nothing grabbed me there either. This was turning into one of those contrary occasions when I didn't know exactly what I wanted, but I knew what I didn't want, and I wasn't finding what I wanted, but I didn't want to leave the library without a book.
I took one last look at the list called "If You Like The Night Circus" and saw a book called The Stockholm Octavo that I had somehow overlooked before. The description summarized a tale of love, intrigue, and a Tarot-like deck of divination cards set in 18th-century Sweden. What? How did I not see that before? I found it on the fiction shelf and was drawn to it right away because of the beautiful cover, which depicts the deck of cards, and the satisfying size--over 400 pages. I also noticed a blurb from an author I like on the back of the book, and that seemed promising.
The real test of a book, though, is to read the first few sentences. Then and there, you get the flavor of what the author is up to; a book that sounds fascinating in synopsis and is highly recommended is sometimes simply not your thing once you start reading, but this one began well: "Stockholm is called the Venice of the North, and with good reason. Travelers claim that it is just as complex, just as grand, and just as mysterious as its sister to the south."
OK, that's more like it! Right away, I'm intrigued because I've never thought of Stockholm as being like Venice at all. Throw in words like "complex" and "mysterious," and you've got my attention. A novel set in a northern city with the allure of an Italian one is probably going to be worth your while for the setting alone. And there's a seer! And a deck of mystical cards!
Why I ended up with the last book I considered, I don't know, but I walked out of the library happy. I'm about a fourth of the way through it, and somehow it's just what I had in mind, even though I didn't know what I had in mind when I walked into the library. Sometimes, you just know what you want when you see it.
I often find good titles when I'm looking for something else. I might be looking at books by an author I already know and notice something on the same shelf that calls out to me. Part of the fun of going to the library is the serendipity and the not really knowing what I'm going to walk out with. Sometimes, I'm in the mood for something in particular and walk out with a book within five minutes; other times, I know what I want but can't seem to find it.
When I went to the library the other day, I had a title in mind, but the library didn't have it, so I started browsing. I noticed several flyers on a display that someone in reader's advisory must have put together. They had titles like "If You Like Dan Brown . . ." or "If You Like Agatha Christie . . ." In my case, you almost have to be more specific: "If You Like Jane Smiley's Historical Novels But Not A Thousand Acres"; "If You Like Literary Adventures With Exotic Settings and Mythology"; or "If You Like Romances--With Humor--That Aren't Predictable," but to get something that close to the target, I'd have to write the list myself.
However, I flipped through several of the flyers and found some book descriptions that appealed. I started hunting and located a few of the books, including The Age of Desire, a novel about Edith Wharton, and Rules of Civility, a novel about upper-class New Yorkers in the 1930s. I almost picked the Wharton book, but something in the description made me think of Henry James's The Bostonians, and though this book may be nothing like that, I decided against it just in case it was. (This would be from my flyer, "If You Like Henry James and You Like Boston, but not The Bostonians.") Likewise, I might actually enjoy Rules of Civility, which is supposed to invoke a touch of F. Scott Fitzgerald, but my reverse snobbery kicked in just then and a novel about wealthy New Yorkers didn't appeal.
I perused three of the pamphlets and looked for at least 10 of the suggested titles before deciding that maybe the lists wouldn't work for me. I then tried the library's "New Books" shelf, but nothing grabbed me there either. This was turning into one of those contrary occasions when I didn't know exactly what I wanted, but I knew what I didn't want, and I wasn't finding what I wanted, but I didn't want to leave the library without a book.
I took one last look at the list called "If You Like The Night Circus" and saw a book called The Stockholm Octavo that I had somehow overlooked before. The description summarized a tale of love, intrigue, and a Tarot-like deck of divination cards set in 18th-century Sweden. What? How did I not see that before? I found it on the fiction shelf and was drawn to it right away because of the beautiful cover, which depicts the deck of cards, and the satisfying size--over 400 pages. I also noticed a blurb from an author I like on the back of the book, and that seemed promising.
The real test of a book, though, is to read the first few sentences. Then and there, you get the flavor of what the author is up to; a book that sounds fascinating in synopsis and is highly recommended is sometimes simply not your thing once you start reading, but this one began well: "Stockholm is called the Venice of the North, and with good reason. Travelers claim that it is just as complex, just as grand, and just as mysterious as its sister to the south."
OK, that's more like it! Right away, I'm intrigued because I've never thought of Stockholm as being like Venice at all. Throw in words like "complex" and "mysterious," and you've got my attention. A novel set in a northern city with the allure of an Italian one is probably going to be worth your while for the setting alone. And there's a seer! And a deck of mystical cards!
Why I ended up with the last book I considered, I don't know, but I walked out of the library happy. I'm about a fourth of the way through it, and somehow it's just what I had in mind, even though I didn't know what I had in mind when I walked into the library. Sometimes, you just know what you want when you see it.
Friday, May 23, 2014
Palace of the Looking Glass
This week, we had a special treat in the re-opening celebration for a local treasure, the Kentucky Theatre. The evening featured a free showing of South Pacific, free popcorn, free leis, and an appearance by Nick and Nina Clooney, who had their first date at the Kentucky years ago for a showing of (guess what!) South Pacific. The Kentucky has been around since 1922; you can tell it's of a distinguished age by its neoclassical facade and elegant architectural details, but it embodies the phrase "aging gracefully" to the fullest. Rarely will you see a more beautiful theater, or one that is more beloved, as evidenced by its most recent renovation.
Based on my extensive moviegoing history at the Kentucky, I developed an idea some years ago about the real meaning of the experience. This was even before I entered graduate school to study myths; I'd been thinking about mythology in our culture for a long before I went to school for it. It seemed to me that going to a movie had a ritual quality that was something like the feeling you get by going into a cathedral or some other great spiritual house. The sequence of events is perhaps in a different order, but the elements of enactment are similar.
I think the same dynamics come into play in most movie theaters, but perhaps the lofty elegance of a place like the Kentucky makes it more apparent that you're entering a special place, one set apart from the everyday world. You stop at the ticket booth and make your offering, which entitles you to enter. There's a series of liminal spaces, from the entrance under the marquee (where you're still outside but in shadow, already experiencing the imaginal lure of the movies calling out from the playbills and movie posters surrounding you), to the first lobby (in the case of the Kentucky, a spacious hall of mirrors, the better to remind you that what you're about to see is yourself reflected, or possibly a different reality altogether than you've imagined before, as in Cocteau's Orphée), to the inner lobby, behind a second set of doors, where the concessions stand reigns supreme.
Popcorn, Goobers, Raisinettes, Candy Bars . . . these humble but nostalgic foods that look so enticing inside the big glass case, where they sparkle like jewels, are the ritual accompaniment to the main attraction, topped off not with communion wine but possibly a Cherry Coke. Healthy eating is not really the idea; self-indulgence is somehow innocent in a movie theater, if not actually necessary, possibly to lower your guard. You thought you were coming for an evening's diversion, when in reality . . . who knows what might happen up there on that screen and inside your head? Instead of incense, the seductive, earthy aroma of roasted popcorn envelops you, and not just today's freshly popped offering, but all those other batches of months and years past, permeating the fixtures at a molecular level, smelling of carnival and mystery, magic and darkness, as a theater lobby should.
With refreshments in hand, you pass yet another threshold, the door to the inner sanctum, the auditorium itself. In the Kentucky, the large open space above your head, the stained glass, and the ornate architectural flourishes draw your eye up, as if toward heaven. You feel a little bit like Dante before he starts ascending. For many people, there is a distinct difference between a spiritual and a secular setting, but I think in this case, considering the imaginal and transformational potential of moviegoing, the distinction is somewhat blurred. You sit in the dark, suspend your disbelief as a series of images plays out on the screen like a dream, and are sometimes profoundly changed by what you see, shaken, inspired, exhilarated, saddened, enlarged. You have probably been entertained, but sometimes you've gotten a glimpse of something you weren't expecting, and it makes a difference.
When the movie's over and the lights come up and you retrace your steps to the outside world, it often takes a few seconds to adjust to being in the ordinary everyday once again. I remember attending a showing of A Touch of Evil one rainy summer night at the Kentucky and walking to my car afterwards through a town that seemed different from the one I had left a few hours earlier. I had somehow carried the noir mood out with me, and the familiar streets now looked like a scene from Orson Welles, as if God had somehow assumed the persona of the great director.
I lost the feeling by the time I got home, but it's worth remembering. Was it possibly an opening to realizing that the shadow world and the surface world are not as far apart as they seem? Don't good films often reveal that in one way or another? Isn't a movie theater a portal to the unknown, what the Celts called a thin place, but with good seats and popcorn? I think the answer to all of these questions is yes.
Based on my extensive moviegoing history at the Kentucky, I developed an idea some years ago about the real meaning of the experience. This was even before I entered graduate school to study myths; I'd been thinking about mythology in our culture for a long before I went to school for it. It seemed to me that going to a movie had a ritual quality that was something like the feeling you get by going into a cathedral or some other great spiritual house. The sequence of events is perhaps in a different order, but the elements of enactment are similar.
I think the same dynamics come into play in most movie theaters, but perhaps the lofty elegance of a place like the Kentucky makes it more apparent that you're entering a special place, one set apart from the everyday world. You stop at the ticket booth and make your offering, which entitles you to enter. There's a series of liminal spaces, from the entrance under the marquee (where you're still outside but in shadow, already experiencing the imaginal lure of the movies calling out from the playbills and movie posters surrounding you), to the first lobby (in the case of the Kentucky, a spacious hall of mirrors, the better to remind you that what you're about to see is yourself reflected, or possibly a different reality altogether than you've imagined before, as in Cocteau's Orphée), to the inner lobby, behind a second set of doors, where the concessions stand reigns supreme.
Popcorn, Goobers, Raisinettes, Candy Bars . . . these humble but nostalgic foods that look so enticing inside the big glass case, where they sparkle like jewels, are the ritual accompaniment to the main attraction, topped off not with communion wine but possibly a Cherry Coke. Healthy eating is not really the idea; self-indulgence is somehow innocent in a movie theater, if not actually necessary, possibly to lower your guard. You thought you were coming for an evening's diversion, when in reality . . . who knows what might happen up there on that screen and inside your head? Instead of incense, the seductive, earthy aroma of roasted popcorn envelops you, and not just today's freshly popped offering, but all those other batches of months and years past, permeating the fixtures at a molecular level, smelling of carnival and mystery, magic and darkness, as a theater lobby should.
With refreshments in hand, you pass yet another threshold, the door to the inner sanctum, the auditorium itself. In the Kentucky, the large open space above your head, the stained glass, and the ornate architectural flourishes draw your eye up, as if toward heaven. You feel a little bit like Dante before he starts ascending. For many people, there is a distinct difference between a spiritual and a secular setting, but I think in this case, considering the imaginal and transformational potential of moviegoing, the distinction is somewhat blurred. You sit in the dark, suspend your disbelief as a series of images plays out on the screen like a dream, and are sometimes profoundly changed by what you see, shaken, inspired, exhilarated, saddened, enlarged. You have probably been entertained, but sometimes you've gotten a glimpse of something you weren't expecting, and it makes a difference.
When the movie's over and the lights come up and you retrace your steps to the outside world, it often takes a few seconds to adjust to being in the ordinary everyday once again. I remember attending a showing of A Touch of Evil one rainy summer night at the Kentucky and walking to my car afterwards through a town that seemed different from the one I had left a few hours earlier. I had somehow carried the noir mood out with me, and the familiar streets now looked like a scene from Orson Welles, as if God had somehow assumed the persona of the great director.
I lost the feeling by the time I got home, but it's worth remembering. Was it possibly an opening to realizing that the shadow world and the surface world are not as far apart as they seem? Don't good films often reveal that in one way or another? Isn't a movie theater a portal to the unknown, what the Celts called a thin place, but with good seats and popcorn? I think the answer to all of these questions is yes.
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