Untitled

Right now I am at that exciting part of my college career where I get to figure out a topic for an honors thesis for my art history major.  Admittedly (and probably weirdly), I’m pretty enthusiastic about this and have sacrificed all of my actual papers due this week to research topics for this, which I’m not even supposed to start for like 4 months I don’t think.  But in any case, I’ve finalized a topic with my thesis director and am prepared to throw back into the water the flopping around, almost dead fish which are my previous attempts at a topic.  So here, for your viewing pleasure, are some cool (or at least I think they are) tidbits from art history that I came upon in my search…

  1. Les Femmes Tondues – after the liberation of France from the Nazis in 1944, women accused of sleeping with German officers ceremoniously had their heads shaved in public areas like city squares, fountains, or war memorials.  Some interesting writing has been done by the historian Richard D.E. Burton about the French love of and delight in gruesome spectacle; my intent would have been to view les Femmes Tondues as a performance of indirect feminine castration, also in consideration to visuality as identity.
  1. Victor Hugo’s graphic work – most people don’t realize that apart from being a writer, Victor Hugo did do some kind of weird art.  Most of it is things you would expect, like dark Romantic castles or stormy landscapes, but then there are also his drawing titled “Justitia,” of a guillotined head being thrust into the sky by the force of the decapitation.  It is probably good I didn’t pursue this topic further because I have no idea what to make of that.
  1. Pornographic prints of Marie-Antoinette – there are a million valid reasons as to why this topic was a problem from the start. Number one being that it would be a thesis on porn.  Regardless, there are a lot of very interesting prints of the queen, mostly because of the way they single her out and scapegoat her solely because of her gender.  There are also some great ones of her as mythic animals, which is always fun.
Hugos Justitia
Hugo's "Justitia"

New and Exciting

I spend a lot of time on this blog geeking out about new plays and their development.  This is partially because I find something so incredibly out of this world exciting about new works.  This is also because I feel like new works are often overlooked by the general public, and I hope that I can make one person out there reading this blog see a poster for a new play and be willing to take a chance on it.  Passion and advocacy, that is where I stand.

There are generally three stages of new works.  I’ve touched on this in previous posts, so I’ll just give a quick review.  Remember, no two plays are alike in their developmental processes.  These three steps can come in many different shapes, sizes, and colors.

The reading: This can happen many different ways, usually either within a close group of friends or collaborators, door closed, or on a stage with actors sitting the whole time with a small audience.  This is usually the first time the playwright has heard his work read aloud.  He has another critical eye or two in the room (director, dramaturg, possible producer, etc) to help him use the reading to the best of his ability.  In this setting, the actors have the script in hand.  There is no blocking- they are usually at music stands or sitting, depending on the setting.  For audiences who are not text-oriented or used to really focusing on the writing, this type of production can feel a bit mundane or confusing because they cannot see the full picture.  This is mostly for the writer, although sometimes it can help potential investors or collaborators decide if they want to work on the production.  From this stage, the playwright usually makes tons of revisions to get to…

The staged reading/developmental production: Again, this stage can take two different forms.  The staged reading is similar to the initial reading in that actors still have scripts in hand, but it is closer to a full production.  There is blocking, which means there is also a director attached to the production.  Sometimes there are a couple furniture pieces, minimal lighting, and the suggestions of costumes as well.  There is a small audience for this production.  This gives everyone an idea of what the piece looks like on its feet, how it moves theatrically.  The other way this stage can work is called a developmental production.  If done as a developmental production, the piece generally looks the same– the blocking and design elements aren’t too complex– but the  actors are off-book and can give themselves over to the material more fully because of this.  In this stage, the playwright usually has more rehearsal time with the cast and is revising throughout the process.  That is why things are kept simple– they could change at any moment.  Of course, the hope is that this will lead to the end goal…

Full production: This is what most people are used to seeing in a theatre.  Impressive lighting, sets, costumes, actors running all of the stage, impeccable direction, a show (usually) that will look exactly the same from night to night.  For the first full production, the playwright might be involved, but after that (unless you’re Edward Albee) the playwright is out of the picture, entrusting his work to the capable hands of theatre professionals worldwide.

This weekend, we have the opportunity to see a play that has traversed all three of these steps at this very university.  This is an opportunity that only happens once every few years, so I would suggest that we all take advantage of it.  Manic Pixie Dream Girl by Emma Jeszke, a senior in the theatre school, will be presented in Studio 1 at the Walgreen Drama Center Thursday-Sunday.  Information can be found here: http://www.music.umich.edu/departments/theatre/index.php#  This production is a part of a re-emerging initiative called Plays-in-Process, in which SMTD faculty will take student work and give it a full production.

I think this is an incredible thing both for student writers as well as audiences at the university.  As a new works nerd, this of course, is my cup of tea because it is both allowing students to cultivate their own passion for new works and advocating for a theatre community in which new works are valued.  We can do Shakespeare over and over, and I do think there is great value in that, but what good is Shakespeare if we don’t learn from him and write something that speaks to the current moment?  I have had the privilege to see Manic Pixie in its staged reading incarnation, last year at the University-sponsored Playfest, and I can say with absolute certainty that it speaks to the current moment in a way that students and community members alike should understand and encourage them to truly think.

J. Cole: A Live Review

For one of the shortest hours of my life I sat in the Mezzanine section of Hill Auditorium as J. Cole pranced around the stage this past Friday night, singing halves of his songs and literally walking behind the curtain for minutes at a time. His concert, brought to us by the new organization Music Matters and the fraternity Pike, was less than impressive. Much less. The concert hall was not nearly sold out, and the audience’s energy level probably matched that of the San Francisco Orchestra concert a few weeks ago. I was disappointed not because it was only a decent show, but because I had such high expectations for it. While I prepared myself for the ramifications of having a concert at Hill Auditorium, I had been to the Lupe Fiasco show and had experienced ways it could still work. These circumstances were not repeated Friday night.

A few weeks ago, I was intrigued and excited when I heard that Music Matters was having a competition for student organizations to perform as the opening act, and thrilled to hear that Encore (a favorite Hip Hop dance crew of mine) won the contest. However, at the concert all three groups that were being considered got a chance perform. This is great because it allows more students to be involved in the show, which I think is extremely valuable, but it marked the first moment my expectations were far from met. Also, the dance groups were not allowed to even stay and watch the performance without purchasing tickets. Trust me, Music Matters, there were plenty of open seats for them.

I was further surprised when J. Cole started his set at 9:30, an unprecedentedly early time for a Hip Hop show. My best guess is that this was due to restraints from either Hill Auditorium or Music Matters, and either way it reflects more upon the poor organization of the night. He only played for an hour, and because of this restriction he mostly only sang the first half his songs. This made it very difficult for the audience to coincide with the rhythm of the show. I expected his set to be primarily composed of his most recent, and debut, album “Cole World.” Again, my expectations were incorrect. While I was pleased he incorporated my three favorites (Nobody’s Perfect, Can’t Get Enough and Work Out) I would have enjoyed to hear some other tracks off the album. Full songs off “Cole World” would have been much better than partial songs off earlier mixtapes.

The only aspect of the evening I was completely unprepared for was J. Cole’s accompaniment. I was unwaveringly sure that J. Cole would not have a live band behind him, because most of his beats are predominately synthesized, but I was proved wrong when I walked into Hill and saw a drummer, guitarist and two keyboardists on stage. Far from just merely acknowledging his band, J. Cole allowed time for each member to have his own solo. Each was undeniably impressive, but he does not deserve that credit. I thought the solos interrupted the show and made it even more difficult to get excited about J Cole’s music. A good live hip hop artist will use each song to ignite and galvanize the crowd, while J. Cole took unnecessary breaks and disrupted the cohesion of his set. So while I was very impressed with the talent of his band, I was simultaneously losing respect for J. Cole. One of my favorite parts of the show was when J. Cole’s DJ spun a live remix of Big Sean’s “Dance A$$” creating an entirely new song right as we watched.

This was one of two ways J. Cole attempted to connect to his audience (Big Sean is from the D). His second was when he went backstage during one of his band member’s solos and came back out wearing a Michigan sweatshirt. Honestly, it’s always great to see Michigan pride, but it would be much more impressive if he wore it outside of our campus. Overall, the night was not nearly worth the price of admission, and the young Music Matters crew might want to reconsider the name of their organization, for it Friday night’s concert was any indication, it obviously doesn’t matter much.

Easter Tunage

Today is Easter! Hurray!

The Easter Bunny wants your soul.
The Easter Bunny wants your soul.

I’m celebrating by working all day and eating my weight in chocolate, which I have found to always be a great decision regardless of what day it is. Today, I’m listening to music that either 1.Reminds me of bunnies or 2.Reminds me of the life of Jesus Christ. As it happens, there have been a number of Christian classical composers throughout the years (Handel’s wildly popular oratorio, The Messiah, does get played. EVERY. YEAR.) and they do, in fact, write pieces about the life of Christ. And if you really think about the story, there is a lot of dramatic stuff there (man gets crucified, etc…) that a composer can really play with to make this music really quite powerful. So what I’m saying here is that this ain’t your daddy’s contemporary christian rock record. This is music that (I feel) transcends it’s purely religious connotations, to the point where everyone can enjoy it as incredible music.

First stop—Messiaen’s La Transfiguration de Notre Seigneur Jésus-Christ,or as translated by wikipedia: “The Transfiguration of Our Lord Jesus Christ.” The story that Messiaen is trying to depict isn’t so important—basically Christ goes up on a mountain, is confirmed as the son of God, and the light of heaven shines on him. Very exciting things. But just the way Messiaen sets this! It’s this huge orchestra and chorus, with enough power to bulldoze ten houses. And the whole piece (which is really quite long) ends with this radiant, powerful, and beautiful chorale-

The other piece I’m looking at today is a piece by Arvo Part, one of the so called “holy minimalists” for his deep christian faith. The piece, Passio, is a setting of the Passion text, and is really quite stunning. He uses repetitive structures throughout the (again, quite long) piece, but this youtube video gives you a nice idea of what it is like. It’s super powerful. Scary at some points, strikingly beautiful at others, but on the whole-a haunting and incredible easter tune. Turn it up and rock out!

So that’s what’s on my playlist for today. Oh yeah. Also this bunny song, for good measure…

May y’all enjoy the weekend and make it through this next week and a half. ALMOST DONE!

Bear Parade (3): “Something Other Than School or Sleep” (Tao Lin)

Bear Parade round three.

From the short-story collection by Tao Lin titled:

“Richie” is the first story of the collection. It begins thus:

“Thursday night they kidnap me, my mom, and my dad. They put garbage bags over our heads and push us outside. Inside the garbage bag I think about my American History teacher. I think about what he said to me. He said, Richie, you better speak up, you better talk in class, be more confident. I think about what I do every day. How I slept the entire Summer vacation. I think about how much more I will sleep in my life. I think how I don’t like anything. How I don’t have anything. I think that something might be happening finally. Something other than school or sleep.”

The line “Something other than school or sleep” strikes me.

As a twenty-odd-years-old college student, my life pretty much = school and sleep. A little part-time employment, too. But mostly school and sleep. That is what my existence is. I wish for the feeling “Something might be happening finally.” But for a very long time not much has happened.

Like the eponymous character Richie, in school I’ve been told, “You better speak up, you better talk in class, be more confident.” ‘Participation grades’ are the bane of my GPA. Like Richie, “I don’t like anything.” For a long time I couldn’t pick a major because the way to pick a major is you first ask yourself “What do I like? What are my interests?’ and if you can’t answer those questions because you don’t like anything then you have nothing on which to base your decision.

I mean obviously I like some things. Hyperbole.

Tao Lin has been described as “the Kafka of the iPhone generation.” Maybe it’s a glib description.

But there is something very Kafkaesque about his prose.

I don’t know how to describe “Kafkaesque” exactly. It’s something like ‘the characters experience insurmountable existential conflicts, and it’s hysterically funny’ (w/ “hysterically” meant in the ‘hysteria’ sense, not just the ‘very funny’ sense).

E.g., Richie being kidnapped by a group of high schoolers is funny. Richie not liking anything and waiting for something to finally be happening is existential-y.

Tao Lin gets a lot of buzz online, both good and bad. He’s been accused of being gimmicky for doing things like ‘selling shares’ of his second novel online and ‘whoring himself’ on the internet by posting /commenting / etc. a lot online. Regardless of his gimmickery, I think it’s undeniable that at least sometimes his writing is well-crafted. “Richie” is well-crafted. It’s up to you whether “Richie” is good / bad / enjoyable / unenjoyable, but I think it’s almost like objectively true that “Richie” is well-crafted, or something, if “well-crafted” is defined “employing a tight, logical structure and consistent style.”

I just reread that sentence and thought ‘What?’

From the very first line, “Richie” builds action. The kidnappers are there on line one. Then things keep moving. The story doesn’t pussyfoot around. It builds on itself. I think that’s what I mean by ‘well-crafted’—the story builds on itself. Like if you put a bunch of bricks and cement on an empty lot and then the bricks magically became animate and started stacking themselves and spreading cement on themselves until they were a six-story office building—reading “Richie” is like that, is like watching bricks magically stack themselves.

By paragraph two Richie, his mom, and his dad are in “some kind of underground base.” The kidnappers realize they’ve made a mistake:

“The kidnappers walk in front of us. One of them says, There’s been a mistake. He says, We meant to kidnap only two of you but we kidnapped all three of you. He says, We need to release one of you. He says, After we release one of you, that one, whoever it is, will be sent a ransom note.”

Which is hilarious. And it adds conflict / movement to the story. The story is not pussyfooting around. It keeps building.

“My mom says, Richie, what’s happening, what’s wrong?”

A week passes. They’re moved to another location. A “cage” w/ a bathroom and kitchen. This setting is funny. Paying attention to setting, w/ little details like the kitchen, is good craft. A lot of writers would just say “cage”; they wouldn’t include the kitchen.

‘Tao Lin includes the kitchen’ is a good way to describe him.

The dad calculates how much money he is worth a day–“$7,000”–and decides he should be freed. He feels he’s worth more than Richie and the mom. His reasoning is absurd. Instead of deciding he should be free because of some humanistic reason, he decides he should be free because he’s worth money. That’s Kafkaesque: facing an insurmountable problem—like proving your ‘worth’—by appealing to some sort of hysterical mathematical overrationalization.

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The dad punches the high-schooler kidnappers and escapes. The story keeps moving.

The story keeps moving in a way you might be taught in a college creative writing class. Step by step. One thing leading into another leading into another leading into. Like one day your creative writing teacher would talk about ‘craft’ a lot, and you would glean that ‘craft’ has something to do with a tight structure and consistent style and ‘building things on themselves.’

(What I want to say / argue in general w/ this blog post, I just decided, is: Regardless of whether you like Tao Lin, he almost unarguably has ‘style’ and has the ability to produce a ‘well-crafted, builds-on-itself story.’ And that in itself is impressive. Because a lot of contemporary writers aren’t as detailed.

Why I’m trying to say this is: Tao Lin has A LOT of ‘haters,’ [e.g. see http://htmlgiant.com/craft-notes/tao-lin-on-the-future-of-the-novel/ the first two comments of which say “tao lin is a jackass” and “his work is a barnacle on the whale of literature”] and I don’t think the haters understand why they hate Tao Lin. Their hate, I opine, has nothing to do with Tao Lin’s being a ‘bad writer.’ It has more to do with his style being decidedly different. Meaning their hate is simply a matter of taste. But what people don’t seem to realize is his ability to develop a style so strong that it induces such serious responses—even if that style is something most people dislike and their responses are mostly antipathetic—is impressive itself [“impressive” literally means, like, to just affect someone deeply, and it doesn’t have to have positive connotations necessarily maybe—think of, like, impressing upon a memory-foam mattress] and shows some sort of…talent (?)…or something.

I 100% realize that telling people the ‘real reason’ they dislike something is presumptuous as hell.

I stand by what I’m saying.

Because I feel like it has some sort of larger and more important implications. Like, attempting to understand why you really are for or against {some piece of art} without appealing to shitty circular ‘X is bad because it’s bad’ arguments seems important, in general. Like, my argument for Tao Lin is he’s good because he’s a stylist and exhibits craft, and that eo ipso impresses me, as it shows he sorta ‘knows what he’s doing’ when he writes.

I just reread all that and stared at my computer’s monitor for like 5 seconds and then thought ‘What?’ and ‘Seems like all I’m saying is taste in art is subjective. But with more words.’)

The dad is gone. Richie and his mom are still in the cage:

Two weeks pass. The kidnappers begin to let me and my mom out for up to five hours a day. My mom is not so angry anymore. But sometimes she is angry. She sits there and her face gets very tense. Her brows angle. When she is sleeping her face gets like she’s fighting a war. But sometimes she hugs me. She smiles. She asks how my life is. I say, Good. I say, Fine. But now she asks me again. She says, Richie, tell me about yourself. I look at her. I say, I don’t know. I say, I’m okay. She comes to me. She hugs me. She says, Richie, please, tell me how you really are, what your life is like. I stare at the ground.”

What’s wrong here exactly?

The inability to discern what’s wrong exactly is Kafkaesque.

Or maybe existential-y. Like, ‘being’ itself is what’s wrong. Or something. What?

Anyway, it’s something I’ve felt pretty much my entire school-and-sleep-filled life: That ‘never-quite-right’-ness of everything. That yearning for “something other than school or sleep / other than {thing(s) occupying the majority of your life}.” And I know I’m not the only one.

“I say, I don’t know what is wrong with me. I say, It gets worse every day. My neck shakes a little. I say, I don’t know. My face twitches. She unhugs me and looks at me. I look at the ground. She hugs me. She says, Richie. She cries. I think, I shouldn’t have said anything. I think, What can she do about this? Sorry, I think.”

The kidnappers decide to release Richie and his mom. They make a “contract” for them to sign. The contract stipulates that they won’t call the police. The story is almost over. When your reading it on bearparade.com, you can see that bottom of the webpage is approaching—your scrollbar is running low on space. The whole story has been building up to this moment. I’ve always been a fan of endings. I think they make or break stories. What are Richie and his mom going to do? Sign the contract? Will they call the police?

No.

“[The kidnapper] says, Hey, do you want to leave or not? He says, Richie, hey, Richie’s mom, you two want to go back to the world or not?”

And it ends just like that.

And I think it’s perfect.

(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stockholm_syndrome seems relevant to the ending.

[I’m not suggesting you medicalize the ending. Fiction is metaphor.

Imagine feeling Stockholm Syndrome not towards kidnappers but towards a ‘never-quite-right’-y world.

If you can imagine that, you can understand Kafka(esque) and “Richie” and Tao Lin and maybe me.])


@barkmuckner

It’s That Time of the Year….

Everything is creeping up on us.  We thought there was so much more time left in the semester.  Suddenly, they’re telling us classes are over in two weeks and just about everything is due between now and then.  And then for some of us, graduation is coming up right after.  Job applications must be turned in, flights must be arranged, papers must be written, goodbyes must be said.  AH!  Too much stress.

So what do we do?  I know it’s bad.  It’s not a good habit to get into, and it only prolongs our work time, but we tend to play on Facebook, go out for “one quick drink,” or…we go to YouTube.  Or even worse, we go on Facebook and see that it has happened again.  “15 of your friends posted about “Call Me Maybe.””  A video has gone viral.

I don’t think it is any coincidence that the great Rebecca Black/”Friday” explosion of 2011 and the Carly Rae Jepsen/”Call Me Maybe” viral video of 2012 reached their peaks at almost exactly the same time.  Each of these videos that started as, more or less, jokes and grew into cultural phenomena debuted in early March and gained their multi-million following in mid-March.  There is something fascinating about the mocking-turned-anthem turn that each of these tunes took.  I don’t think “Call Me Maybe” suffered quite as much derision as “Friday” did, but there is still an awareness of the quality, or lack thereof, present in each fan’s sing-a-long that makes one wonder where the line between genuine appreciation and irony lies.

After the initial, “Oh my God, this song is so bad, but it’s so funny, so I guess we’ll listen to it at every party!” experience that “Friday” endured, there was a concession by many that the song was catchy.  For all of the auto-tune in the world and the strangest lyrics, the song’s redeeming quality was its beat.  The same response seems to be following “Call Me Maybe,” although people seem more apt to like Carly than Rebecca.  They appreciate the song as a whole, until they examine the lyrics closer and begin to question what it is about the song that really grabs their attention.  Then the conclusion is reached: it’s the beat.

But is it?  There is still the question of the unique timing coincidence.  I have a theory.  Each of these songs is sung by a teenage girl about her specifically teenage experiences.  Rebecca Black basically takes us through her journey on an average Friday.  She shows herself waking up at her parents’ home, going to school, going to a party with her friends.  Carly’s song, though not through the lyrical narrative, shows us in the video that it also takes place at her parent’s home.  Each of these girls interact with a boy in a way that is strictly adolescent– innocent flirting, waiting for him to make the move, barely touching.  They each have a group of friends they joke around with during the day and a band they rock out with later.

Assuming that the hike in view counts and instant popularity is due primarily to college students, as the prominence of the songs on campus would suggest, I think the appeal is obvious.  At this time in the semester, the stress is beginning to mount and we are searching for an escape.  Our teenage years were not so long ago.  So we fall back into this celebration of adolescent play, and jump up and down to the mundane lyrics and pubescent voices as a way to recall that carefree time in our lives, when our biggest concern was which seat to take or if the boy who cut our parents’ lawn was gay.

Granted, most music videos don’t feature pop stars paying bills or studying for exams, but there is something extra relaxed and responsibility-free about a teen sensation.  They don’t even have to make their own breakfasts.  They still have their parents to take care of them.  And though none of us will ever admit it and would never give up our independence for mom’s cooking, when the stress really piles up, there is something comforting in the idea of your childhood home and high school friends.  There was something wholly unique and idealized about that time in our lives.  Perhaps in four years we will look back on college in the same way, but for the time being, high school is our Neverland.

I wouldn’t call this a regression; it is merely a 3-minute break from the over-committed, research-ridden, paper-writing mess that March and April can be.  So yes, we might laugh at the constant refrain of “Friday, Friday, gotta get down on Friday,” or question the sentiment that, “Before you came into my life, I missed you so bad,” but we revel in the simplicity.  And if we must mask it in irony or perform a close-reading of the narrative at a party to justify our enjoyment, so be it.  But for the time, I say, do what you can to have “fun fun fun fun.”