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darchildre · 8 months

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Sara Reads an Infuriating Book, the Conclusion

Friends, I have finished W Scott Poole's Wasteland. Here are some notes on the last two chapters:

Chapter 4:

Like chapter 3, this mostly discussed subjects outside my bailiwick - the chapter focused mostly on the rise of fascism in Europe and America throughout the 1930s and only touched on film a little. And the films it did discuss are, to my mind, only horror films if your definition is very broad: M, and the Dr Mabuse movies.

I have one small rant here: Poole, in discussing M, talks about the movie's "fully human monster" and the fact that American and British film wouldn't "fully explore this subject for another three decades." And I thought, okay, sure - making a movie as frankly about a child killer would be pretty confronting even today, that seems fair.

But no, this is not what he means, because the films he uses as examples of British and American films exploring the subject matter are Psycho and Peeping Tom, which means we're just talking about serial killers.

Sir. Even leaving aside movies like Murders in the Zoo and Mystery of the Wax Museum (which he's going to discuss in the very next chapter), between 1927 and 1944, people in Britain and the US filmed three separate versions of The Lodger. I am absolutely not claiming that these movies are anywhere near as good as M, but you cannot argue that no one outside Germany made a serial killer movie before the 1960s.

On the up side, this chapter did remind me to rewatch M and that I've always meant to get around to the Mabuse films.

Chapter 5! This chapter was called "Universal Monsters", which of course made me excited. Unfortunately, this is the last chapter, so Poole has to cram a lot of stuff in and can't really give anything enough space for proper discussion. Especially since this chapter is as scattered as all the others: we do discuss the American horror cycle of the 1930s, but we also have to drop in on Lovecraft, T S Eliot, and Machen (as we do every chapter), as well as discuss the revival of Spiritualism, the collapse of Victorian mourning culture during WWI, and some thoughts on ghost stories as comforting when compared to, y'know, the omnipresent mutilated corpses that Poole never stops talking about.

Because there's so much, nothing gets a lot of focus. Here are some bullet points:

Poole does not discuss the 1931 Dracula at all. It gets a sentence or two marking that it has been made, but no discussion of the actual film. And sure, you can't talk about everything, but my dude! You have been yammering on about symbolic/metaphorical portrayals of shell shock for chapters now and you don't want to talk about Dwight Frye's Renfield? We're just going to move right past Lucy quoting "Stand to Your Glasses" to a literal walking dead man? I get that you talked about Nosferatu a lot but damn, that seems like a hell of an omission.

Talking about James Whale and his horror movies: "We unfortunately have really nothing from the director himself regarding how the war shaped his vision of horror." THIS IS WHAT I'M SAYING. Look, I am generally death-of-the-author as hell and I think that Poole's reading of most of these films is a legitimate and valid reading. I just object to the idea that it's the only valid reading, especially when he never presents solid evidence other than his opinions about the films.

Petty nitpicking time: friends, I just watched every damn one of the Universal Invisible Man movies and there is no suggestion in any one of them that Griffin is “a disfigured scientist who seeks invisibility to hide his mutilated face". That's just wildly inaccurate. Poole loves facial disfiguration so much that he sees it in films where it does not appear at all. (Claude Rains as Griffin is visible for all of 10 seconds in the original film, his face is entirely unmarred and, frankly but irrelevantly, really lovely.)

Even pettier nitpicking: if you are going to make a snarky comment about people mistakenly referring to Frankenstein's assistant in Frankenstein and Bride as Ygor, it's going to come off better if you remember that the character in the original film is named "Fritz" and not "Karl". Karl is in Bride.

I will admit that I only skimmed the Afterword because, frankly, I've been reading this book at work and I got to it when we were about to close up and go home. Thus, I don't have anything to say about it.

In conclusion! This is not the most infuriating book about horror I've ever read, because Poole a) doesn't hate people who like horror and b) doesn't think that all horror stories are about incest. I disagree with a lot of his conclusions, but mostly because I think he's making too strong a case on too little evidence and I don't like anything that only allows for one reading of any work of art. I also found the structure irritating and I think parts of the book would be better if the scope was narrower - wandering off to talk about Surrealist painters or T S Eliot every damn chapter got old after a while.

It's absolutely not the book I would recommend for a first entry into horror film history - that's still Skal's The Monster Show. But, if you want some context for 1920/30s horror film, with a focus on European film, it's not a bad book to argue with or make film lists from.

And now I have to go track down Shell Shock Cinema by Anton Kaes, because it's the book in the works cited that sounded the most interesting.

#i've also been reminded of how much i love the black cat #that might be due for a rewatch soon #sara reads an infuriating book

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musicblogwales · 8 months

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youtube

Richard Walters - 'Anchor' (Official Video)

Richard Walters is back with new single “Anchor”, the latest track to be cut from his upcoming solo record ‘Murmurate’ (out 17 November, via Nettwerk). Enveloped by Walters’ tender falsetto, “Anchor” is a spacious piano piece adorned with longing string arrangements to stir the soul. A song dedicated to his daughters, it finds the artist opening-up about the intense and transcendent connection we feel with our closest family. As Richard explains:

‘“Anchor” is a song about and for my daughters; I've been away a fair bit the last 12 months, which felt especially hard post lockdown, and it's a song about that familial pull and instinct to protect and support them.”

Co-written with esteemed songwriter Edd Holloway (Lewis Capaldi, Tom Grennan), who had also recently become a father around the time of writing, the resultant single is another fine example of Walters’ exceptional ability for intimate storytelling, captivating vocals, and intricate musical arrangements.

“Anchor” swiftly follows recent teaser tracks “After Midnight” and “Move On”, all of which reveal different shades of Walters’ upcoming solo album ‘Murmurate’, which is released this Autumn.

Written in 2022 as the world recalibrated to the tides of change, ‘Murmurate’ homes-in on those feelings of waking up in the post-pandemic world to the realisation that many of us had changed too. An album that ruminates on our human need for real-world relationships and the importance of meaningful connections with those closest to us, these recurring themes would also play into the palpable intimacy of ‘Murmurate’ and its recording. As Richard explains:

“When it comes to music, throughout lockdown I was desperate to be in the room with other people making things again. In my opinion, Zoom just doesn’t cut it when it comes to finding common musical ground and building things up” says Walters. “That’s where the title ‘Murmurate’ comes from - I just wanted to feel that unison again, to move in time with other songwriters and musicians, to flock and gather and soar a little bit, even if the distance from my homelife made me feel torn from time to time.”

Combining unassumingly complex arrangements and openly heart-on-sleeve songs, it’s an album that graciously shifts from nocturnal piano ballads (“All Over”), to sprightly folk/pop poetry (“Long Way Down”), darkly lilting lullabies (“Open Everything”) to longing, love-lorn duets (“Locked Up Never Fade”).

With all tracks performed and written by Richard Walters, ‘Murmurate’ was recorded, produced and mixed by Eliot James, before receiving its final mastering by Dyre Gormsen. Amongst the myriad instruments performed by the pair, listeners will also be able to detect Eliot’s 11 year old son Leland James on cello, plus guest vocalist Lydia Oliver. ‘Murmurate’ is released on the Nettwerk album on 17 November 2023.

An artist, performer and songwriter based in the UK, Richard Walters has amassed over 100 million streams across his five critically acclaimed albums and four EP's to date. Since his debut release in 2005, his music has featured on a number of TV shows including Grey’s Anatomy, CSI: Miami and Tin Star, while receiving praise from titles including The Guardian, Clash, Line Of Best Fit and other tastemaker press. Richard’s solo releases have also gained notable support from BBC 6 Music’s Lauren Laverne and Guy Garvey, plus BBC Radio 2’s Jo Whiley and Dermot O’Leary.

Sought-out by stars including Grammy-winner Joe Henry, British icon Alison Moyet and Oscar nominated actress and singer Florence Pugh, Walters has also lent his talents to influential electronic artists including Kx5, Solomun, Sonny Fodera, Sultan + Shepard and more.

A member of the group LYR (with poet laureate Simon Armitage and Patrick Pearson, who release their second album 'The Ultraviolet Age' on 30th June); Richard also released the album ‘Shapes In My Head’ under the name Sun Lo, a collaboration with ATTLAS, earlier this year. Catch Richard tour his latest work this November at these UK headline dates:

RICHARD WALTERS - LIVE DATES 2023 24 Nov - BRISTOL, The Louisiana 25 Nov - OXFORD, Jericho Tavern 29 Nov - MANCHESTER, The Castle Hotel 30 Nov - LONDON, The Grace Tickets on sale now: https://www.richardwaltersmusic.co.uk/live

#Youtube

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stonewallsposts · 10 months

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June Reading

Each month this year I'm trying to read at least one political/historical work, and one novel in Italian. Unfortunately, the political works, I'm spending a lot of time on by taking notes and recapping them so I make sure I understand the arguments. And the Italian novels are just much slower for me to read than in English. For example, Saltatempo was around 250 pages and took 11 days, whereas Moll Flanders was 425 pages and took me 5 days, roughly one quarter of the time per page. But I'm determined to maintain this. It means I'm reading less books this year, and not chugging through my list of novels as quickly. But of my massive list of books I started with, I'll probably have less than ten left by the end of the year.

Moll Flanders- Daniel Defoe (1722)

Tale of a woman, born in Newgate prison, and how her life moves from servitude to legitimacy, to various troubles and eventually to crime, until she finally is caught, undergoes repentance, and sets things right as much as possible. There are no chapter divisions in the book. The tale just moves from incident to incident, as if she were telling her story to someone she met in a bar.

Karl Marx- Early Writings (1834-35)

The early writings consist of: Critique of Hegel's Doctrine of the State, Letters from the Franco-German Yearbooks, On the Jewish Question, A Contribution to the Critique of Hegel's Philosophy of Right Introduction, Excerpts from James Mill's Elements of Political Economy, Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts, Critical Notes on the Article: The King of Prussia and Social Reform, by a Prussian.

The importance of these writings is to see the intellectual development of the foundations of Marxism.

The most difficult and dense to get through was the Critique of Hegel's Doctrine of the State. The articles I got the most from were On the Jewish Question and Excerpts from Mill's Elements of Political Economy. I had already read the Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts, so I skipped that section.

There were a few places where I had to rely on outside sources to help me understand what Marx was talking about because it wasn't clear to me at all. The first was just understanding his approach to Hegel. But I found another article that helped explain where he was coming from. The introduction by Lucio Colletti was really helpful too. Apart from those sources, I'm not sure I would have gotten what Marx was talking about.

The second article that helped immensely was an explanation of how and why Marx used abstraction in his arguments. This is an important concept in his arguments, and I was struggling to follow his thinking. Understanding how he thought about this helped unlock his thought process.

This is all part of my effort to educate myself about Marxism.

Non ti muovere- Margaret Mazzantini (2001)

Timoteo, a 50ish surgeon, has a 15 year-old daughter who is hit while riding her scooter in the rain to school. She is seriously injured. The story is a confessional Timoteo is thinking to his daughter while she is undergoing surgery. He confesses a long affair with another woman, intermixed with tidbits about how he met his wife, and their years together up to this point.

The Mill on the Floss- George Eliot (1860)

Tale of Maggie Tulliver, a young passionate girl of 8 when we first meet her, until 19. She is seen as troublesome, but intensely passionate and loving. She breaks out on occasion against her more judgmental family, who want to box her in to a more social role. Eliot acknowledges the value of these roles at times, even while portraying their judgment as unfair. Maggie is caught up in her passions, which occasionally lead her astray, but she ends up coming back to her place. It's a good story that tells us about life and the way people looked at certain situations.

The Twelve Caesars- Suetonius (121AD)

I won't bother to give a recap of each of the twelve Caesars. But I will note the pattern the book reveals. Rome went from being a Republic to a monarchy. How did it happen? Why did it happen? What are the things that we should look for that cause a people as prosperous as the Romans to give up self-governance and submit to a single ruler? Most of those lessons aren't found in this book. But the fact is: Rome got Julius Caesar as the first emperor. He was a relatively competent ruler and maybe the people felt that this single hand could accomplish more than the by then relatively useless Senate. But once a "king", or princeps, as they called him, was established, it was only 3 generations before that concentration of power went off the rails. What followed Caesar Augustus was the maleficence of Tiberius, Caligula, Gaius, and Nero, each murdered by people who hated them and their deaths rejoiced over by the populace. The point being that once power is concentrated in the hands of one man, you're not going back, and it's going to attract the worst, most power-hungry men.

What this book shows is the malfeasance of men entrusted with too much power. There were, on occasions, emperors who showed themselves to be genuinely interested in governing well. They understood the trust that had been put in their hands and sought to rule wisely. But of the twelve Caesars, there were only 4 that fit that. And maybe we should throw out the first two since they were coming into the role from the viewpoint of a republic, not a monarchy.

That was another thing to note. The republic didn't die at once. The Senate continued to exist, in a somewhat toothless form, well into the imperial age. The settings of the republic didn't disappear, they just lost their power over time until they were institutions in name only.

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writerthreads · 3 years

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The top 10 classic fears in literature

By Prof. Marianna Torgovnik on TedBlog

Fear #1: Death, death, death—did I mention death?

An almost universal fear, death recurs in literature more than any other fear, all the way from canonical works through fantasies like J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings. I list the fear of death three times since it occurs in many forms: fear of our own deaths, fear of family members or close friends dying, fear of children preceding parents, the death of an entire culture.

Some examples: Shakespeare’s Sonnets (“Like as the waves make towards the pebbled shore”; Hamlet (“To be or not to be”); John Keats (“When I have fears”); Virginia Woolf, The Waves; Pat Barker, The Ghost Road. This list could go on and on, because the fear does.

Fear #2: Avoiding death for the wrong reasons.

Literature loves paradox and so, paradoxically, the second greatest fear is avoiding death for the wrong reasons: when death will inevitably follow a noble or moral act or out of cowardice, especially in war. For understandable reasons, this fear is less common than more general fear of death, but it is out there and memorable nonetheless.

Some examples: Sophocles, Antigone (to bury her dead brother, Antigone famously courts death); Shakespeare several times — Hamlet again (“There is a providence in the fall of a sparrow”) and Antony and Cleopatra (to avoid capture by Octavius); Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities (“It is a far, far better thing that I do than I have ever done”); Harry Potter in his pursuit of Voldemort.

Fear #3: Hunger or other severe physical deprivation.

Survival tends to trump the finer emotions when it comes to fear. Sometimes time specific, the fear of hunger nonetheless reminds us of basic things. In romantic novels or poems, it can be and often is a symbol for more abstract needs, like love. In Holocaust literature, it portrays humanity strained to the core.

Some examples: Dante, The Divine Comedy (Count Ugolino and his children); Samuel Taylor Coleridge, “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner” (“Water, water, every where, nor any drop to drink”); Charlotte Bronte’s Jane Eyre; Elie Wiesel, Night; Susanne Collins’ The Hunger Games.

Fear #4: Killing or causing the death of someone you love.

Whether by murder, negligence or a set of circumstances beyond our control, the fear of causing the death of someone we love is a big one. It’s a stock feature of numerous spy and crime dramas, where we tend to brush it off since the hero (think James Bond) or (more rarely) heroine’s beloved is almost always a goner. Numerous operas by Verdi, including Rigoletto and Un Ballo in Maschera use this theme, sometimes more than once; in fact, opera thrives on this fear, as in Bizet’s Carmen. It usually takes serious and even majestic forms in literature.

Some examples: Patroclus dying for Achilles in Homer’s The Iliad; Othello killing Desdemona in Shakespeare’s Othello; Thomas Hardy, Jude the Obscure (“Done because we are too menny”); D.H. Lawrence’s Women in Love (Gerald choosing to die rather than kill Gudrun); Gillian Flynn’s Gone Girl.

Fear #5: Being rejected and/or being loved by the wrong person.

At last we come to a fear that can have a lighter side and, sometimes — though not always — a happy ending. In literature, characters fear being rejected, being loved, and being loved by the wrong person in almost equal proportions. Once again, the examples span the ancient classics all the way up to the present.

Some examples: Woman loves step-son madly in three versions of the same story, none with a happy ending (Euripides, Hippolytus; Racine, Phaedra; Mary Renault, The Bull from the Sea); mixed up couples set right in Shakespeare’s As You Like It; love triumphs by the end in Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice; two different kinds of love lead to tragedy in Hardy, Tess of the D’Urbervilles; mixed results in Jeffrey Eugenides, The Marriage Plot.

Fear #6: Illness, disease and aging.

Closely allied to the fear of death — but not identical to it — the fear of illness is another constant though, as we’d expect, the disease most feared changes over time. The bubonic plague used to be the leading contender; TB enjoyed a long dominance until cures were found. Nowadays, cancer and, more often, dementia are far greater fears. There is at least one stunning example in this category of embracing the fear being absolutely the right thing to do: Flaubert’s St Julien, L’Hospitalier, in which the saint embraces a leper and achieves transcendence.

Some examples: Giovanni Boccacio’s Decameron; Daniel Defoe’s Journal of the Plague Year; Oscar Wilde, The Portrait of Dorian Gray; Albert Camus, La Peste (The Plague); Ian McEwan, Atonement; Jonathan Franzen, The Corrections.

Fear #7: Lost reputation, divorce or scandal.

People used to fear this one more than they do today, when our motto seems to be that no publicity is really bad publicity and unseemly revelations are the order of the day. Still, this is a significant fear, and one that even recent books revisit in original ways.

Some examples: Sophocles, Oedipus Rex; Leo Tolstoy, Anna Karenina; D.H. Lawrence, Lady Chatterley’s Lover; Thomas Wolfe, The Bonfire of the Vanities; Phillip Roth, The Human Stain.

Fear #8: War, shipwrecks and other disasters.

The fear of shipwrecks can seem archaic — but they were the airplane crashes of yesteryear. Shipwrecks can be mere episodes or the core of the plot; in early literature, they are closely allied with war, a more global disaster. While other disasters arouse fear — earthquakes, volcanos — war and shipwrecks lead the field. Both change characters’ lives, with variable results.

Some examples: Homer, The Odyssey; Defoe, Robinson Crusoe; Jonathan Swift, Gulliver’s Travels; Tolstoy, War and Peace; Yann Martel, Life of Pi.

Fear #9: The law and, more specifically, lawyers.

Fear of the law is a surprisingly classic fear, weighing in at number nine. But what’s meant by the law changes over time. While fear of God’s judgment remains plausible in literature, it is far less common today than fear of society’s laws — and specifically the rapacity of lawyers and the law’s ability, in Dickens’ words, “to make business for itself.” In some modern books, the law becomes a metaphor for the meaning of life.

Some examples: The Bible; Aeschylus, The Oresteia; Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Scarlet Letter; Dickens, Bleak House; Franz Kafka, The Trial; Arundhati Roy, The God of Small Things

Fear #10: That real life won’t resemble literature.

While this might seem the most trivial of fears, in fact it drives a lot of great literature. Some characters want life to be elevated, inflated, like epic or romantic literature. Deprived of that illusion, they die or take their own lives—looping us back to fear #1. Other characters favor codes of renunciation that have been called by literary critics “the Great Tradition,” fearing that they will gain something by immoral or amoral actions; a variation on this fear is the fear, as George Eliot’s Dorothea puts it, “I try not to have desires merely for myself.” Not at all light for avid readers, this fear usefully reminds us that life is not really like a Henry James novel.

Some examples: Miguel de Cervantes, Don Quixote; Gustave Flaubert, Madame Bovary; George Eliot, Middlemarch; Henry James, The Ambassadors; Julian Barnes, The Sense of an Ending.

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itsevidentvery · 3 years

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Tagged by the fabulous @pianodoesterror Thank you so much!

1) how many works do you have on ao3?

49. They’ve crept up on me!

2) what is your total ao3 word count?

340,321. It’ll take a while before I hit the half-million mark but I’m working on it!

3) how many fandoms have you written for, and what are they?

4: Silicon Valley, Good Omens (TV), The Terror and Hannibal (honestly Hannibal barely counts because I wrote one ficlet and got it out of my system).

4) what are your top 5 fics by Kudos.

Most of my top-kudosed fics are my Good Omens ones, and I don’t know if anyone follows me for those anymore. My top-kudosed in my current fandom (The Terror) are:

Two Houses, Alike in Indignity – aka my BritPol AU.

Da mi basia mille, deinde centum – kissing. Just… a lot of kissing.

A wounded deer leaps highest – an extended riff on the theme of Francis Crozier Submits to the Mortifying Ordeal of Being Known. And also Being the Little Spoon.

Worthier than he knows – Mirror sex! Francis Crozier wriggling furiously under the weight of admiration and thirst! My apologies to TS Eliot, also.

An embarrassment of Jameses – Identity kink, James Fitzjames’s teetering pile of insecurities, and Francis Crozier’s altogether too many Jameses.

5) do you respond to comments?

I do! Not… well, or sensibly, because I love comments and they make me absolutely twitterpated, but I do respond.

6)what's the fic you've written with the angstiest ending?

Carnevale ends with unresolved heartbreak, insecurity and misdirected feeling. And this one’s not angsty, so much as grubby: a very nasty imagined interstitial between James Fitzjames and Francis Crozier after Cornelius Hickey’s flogging. And at least one of the possible endings of this Choose-your-own-Ending Fitzier is, er. Less than pleasant.

7) What’s the fic you’ve written with the happiest ending?

I’m an unashamed wuss, so I tend to write fics with happy endings, or at least happy-for-now endings. I’d say it’s a tossup between two fics. The first is my Good Omens human AU where Crowley is a determined bookstore customer, because Aziraphale and Crowley get together AND Crowley gets to have the book AND Aziraphale gets to not sell it. The second is my Terror BritPol AU, where Francis Crozier and James Fitzjames get to U-Haul AND Brexit is averted. Okay, that might actually be my happiest ending.

8) do you write crossovers? If so what is the craziest one you've ever written?

I don’t write crossovers per se, but I have written a Silicon Valley Regency AU which riffed on both the Twelve Dancing Princesses and has vibes of Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell. And I’ve written another Silicon Valley AU which loosely spins off Henry II and Thomas Becket, and my Terror BritPol AU takes a lot of its beats from the National Theatre’s This House.

9) have you ever received hate on a fic?

Lord, no, never written anything popular enough, I don’t think.

10)Do you write smut? What kind?

I do indeed! The … messy … kind, typically. As in ‘Just throw away those sheets, they’re beyond saving’.

11)have you ever had a fic stolen?

I don’t think so.

12) have you ever had a fic translated?

I haven’t! Open invitation, lads.

13) have you ever co-written a fic before.

I’m a rotten collaborator. I can barely bring myself to the sticking post, I wouldn’t wish my erratic writing habits on anyone else.

14) whats your favourite ship?

Fitzier and Jared Dunn/Richard Hendricks will always have a very particular place in my heart.

15) whats a WIP that you want to finish but don't think you ever will?

*looks guiltily* I don’t think, at this point, that I’ll ever finish my Good Omens fic where I trace Aziraphale and Crowley’s relationship through the lens of the classic Seven Deadly Sins. Looking at it now, it should actually have been a series. But either way.

16) What are your writing strengths.

I think I’m good at dialogue and character observation. When I concentrate, I think I can pull off unexpected but illuminating word choices.

17) what are your writing weaknesses?

I think I should push myself more as a writer. For example, I’ve only ever written one reasonably plotty longfic – my Terror BritPol AU – and I’ve never written a puzzle-piece, or something that requires detailed worldbuilding. I also tend to default to a particular limited-perspective third-person present-tense style (with the exception of my dialogue-only Terror WIP), and I’d like to branch out more.

18) what are your thoughts on writing dialogue in other languages in fic?

I’ve only written scraps of dialogue in other languages in fic. If there were an easy way for readers to get the translation as they read, it’s something I’d love to see more. But in general I think the priority should always be the flow of the story. Writers can – and should – try to get across a change in language or idiom in a multitude of ways.

19) what was the first fandom you wrote for.

Silicon Valley! I unfortunately have a thing for Horrible Little Gremlins and Long Boys who Crave Validation.

20) what's your favourite fic you've ever written?

Ouf. This one’s hard to answer. My immediate instinct is to go with my Terror BritPol AU because it’s the first longfic I actually brought in for the landing, but I also have a soft spot for my Silicon Valley fairytale Regency AU and a Silicon Valley fic about emotional abuse told from the abuser’s perspective. The last one wasn’t an easy one to write but I think what’s on page is close to my conception of it, which is rare for me.

I suspect my Terror mutuals have already been tagged, but please do have a go if you fancy it! And I’ll tag @joycecarolnotes, @bitchardhendricks, @ladiesloveduranduran and @retrauxpunk if they fancy doing this.

#ouf writing #Pianodoesterror #fandom #the terror #good omens #silicon valley #about the author #thank you!

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dailydilettante · 3 years

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Strong Female Characters in 19th-Century Fiction

Some look back on the 1800s as a time of rampant sexism, patriarchy, male dominance, gender inequality — whatever you want to call it. And it was indeed that sort of time. But a number of 19th-century female novelists, and a few male ones, managed to directly or indirect speak against that in some of their books.

I thought of this last week while reading Lelia by George Sand (born Amandine Lucile Aurore Dupin). In that fascinating 1833 novel, the independent, intellectual, skeptical, cynical, depressed, world-weary, God-doubting title character in some ways sounds like she could be living in 2018 — if the eloquent language used in Sand’s philosophical book were more casual and not densely rich like a lot of 19th-century prose was. Lelia is not always an easy book to read, but you’ll rarely see better writing than penned by Sand (whose image accompanies this blog post).

Anne Elliot of Jane Austen’s Persuasion (1818) is another strong heroine. The capable Anne is in love with Captain Frederick Wentworth, but lives a very useful life even as the relationship between her and Wentworth is thwarted for years.

The star of Charlotte Bronte’s Jane Eyre (1847) has strong feminist leanings that come out in various ways — including her pride in being smart, her need to work, and her insistence that she be an equal in marriage.

Helen in Anne Bronte’s The Tenant of Wildfell Hall (1848) courageously leaves her abusive/alcoholic husband to save both her son and her own self-worth. It’s a novel so feminist that Anne’s not-quite-as-feminist sister Charlotte unfortunately helped prevent wider distribution of it after Anne’s death.

Of course, many of the 19th century’s male critics and readers slammed works that dared depict women as equal to men. Undoubtedly one of the reasons fewer women back then tried to write novels — and a number of those who did write them used male or gender-neutral aliases.

Another author with a George pseudonym, George Eliot (born Mary Ann Evans), created a number of strong women — including lay preacher Dinah Morris of Adam Bede (1859). And Eliot lamented the second-class citizenry of female characters in novels such as The Mill on the Floss (1860), in which Maggie Tulliver’s less-brainy brother is treated much better than her by their parents and society as a whole.

Jo March, who thirsts to be a writer, is another nonstereotypical 19th-century female — in Louisa May Alcott’s 1869 novel Little Women.

And Kate Chopin’s The Awakening (1899) depicts Edna Pontellier’s memorable rebellion against her constricted role as a wife and mother.

Can 1900 be considered the last year of the 19th century? If so, Colette’s Claudine at School belongs in this discussion with its assertive, mischievous, hilarious protagonist.

Some male novelists of the 1800s also created female protagonists who didn’t act like stereotypical women of their time. Examples include Jeanie Deans in Sir Walter Scott’s The Heart of Midlothian (1818), Judith Hutter of James Fenimore Cooper’s The Deerslayer (1841), Becky Sharp of William Thackeray’s Vanity Fair (1847), Hester Prynne of Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter (1850), Marian Halcombe of Wilkie Collins’ The Woman in White (1859), the title character in Thomas Hardy’s The Hand of Ethelberta (1876), journalist Henrietta Stackpole in Henry James’ The Portrait of a Lady (1881), and the martyred protagonist in Mark Twain’s historical novel Personal Recollections of Joan of Arc (1896).

Of course, there were also strong women in pre-1800s novels, with just two examples being the very different stars of Daniel Defoe’s Moll Flanders (1722) and Frances Burney’s Evelina (1778). Moll has a tougher exterior than Evelina, but the latter protagonist also has lots of inner strength.

With grateful that to

Dave Astor at https://daveastoronliterature.com/2018/06/03/strong-female-characters-in-19th-century-fiction/Strong Female Characters in 19th-Century Fiction

#article

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gnar-slabdash · 3 years

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Leverage 01:03 The Two Horse Job

ok so this has been sitting in my drafts bc right after i watched it i found out about the Correct Order of season one. And a lot of my notes here are just yelling about how wild it is that this stuff happened in EPISODE THREE but it turns out this was not SUPPOSED to be episode three, it was supposed to be later in the season and that makes wayyyyyy more sense. but tbh i don’t have the motivation to redo my notes so here they are in all their unedited and incorrect glory.

YEAH STERLING!

omg I very much understand why even this early on nate is like “so we get you the money, right?” this is actually the first time it hasn’t BEEN about money, he’s starting to think he’s got this DOWN already and then he gets hit with “NOPE this is emotional” and he’s like “What I am too hungover to figure out how to give you catharsis right now.” OMG look how wide his eyes get when he then gets hit with the Eliot’s Past bomb one sentence later. lmao at least then nate gets to hit eliot back with that biblical “you meant you knew the family.”

lollll alan foss is that guy from suits i love him in a weird way.

parker’s stripy outfit w leg garter card swipey thing is so cute!

“Well why doesn’t he work for me?” “Cause I work for him” when nate comes in -- weirdly similar energy to sophie’s “well i’m with HIM” gesture in the toy job

nate’s character` is cracking me up lmao a good example of jusst being enough of an asshole to egg the guy on even when the mark is a huge ass too

also heckin cute how they hand nate cards so he can win.

ohhhh we’re shaking it up TWICE -- first it’s not abt the money, then enter sterling. so we really only get one “formula” episode before we add some plot -- just to mess with nate and to make sure the audience doesn’t get too comfortable in assumign they know what’s gonna happen either

you know why nate’s the main character besides parker? because he’s the US. te honest man is the audience so every time nate goes “wait that’s not how this was supposed to work” the audience is right there with him. he’s the point of view character, our way in. oh THREE -- one ,it’s personal for eliot, two, it’s about the horses not the money, three, STERLING.

so what sterling actually THINKS at first is: Nate is there trying to prove Foss did it so that HE can prove himself to IYS and get the job back. So even here Sterling doesn’t necessarily think they’re enemies, just RIVALS When Sophie shows he just thinks shes’s another wrench in the works, he doesn’t necessarily connect her w nate yet?

I like that sterling points out nate plays “complicated little games” whereas nate was like “i just conned ppl it’s part of being an insurance investigator” like that was normal but it’s NOT normal nate’s just Like That.

My wife: There is only one man I might accept in that hat and his name is james buffett.

Hey they’re split up Parker-Hardison and Eliot-Nate again. It’s a thing! To build the relationships.

lol i forgot abt the part where it’s like WHOOPS Eliot’s a bottom. (she won’t let him kiss her but she’ll push him up against the stable and kiss him)

wait the faberge egg line is she implying she’s pretended to be a ROMANOV heir

clarify yeah nate for sure got fired.

it’s not till thirty minutes in he figures out nate’s a criminal and THEN he thinks nate’s after money.

so when eliot and nate and sophie are talking about it theyre talking like all their personal connections are a liability but then eliot goes to parker and says “I” need you to do this and that’s important and good and helps get stuff done.

Parker: “Horses are a lot less murderous than I originally thought” My wife: ” “It’s me!”

OOH eliot is PISSED cause foss didn’t even look at the horse which is of course why the whole scam works cause foss doesn’t LOOK at the horse doesn’t CARE abt the horse they all knwo that

“Glad u found a family” EPISODE FUCKING THREE

it’s not till the END of the episode that sterling is starting to get really pissy and bitter about it bc he’s figured out more or less what nate’s game is.

#leverage #leverage liveblog #the two horse job

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teabooksandsweets · 4 years

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The Cottage Library

I just thought it would be neat to have a list of book recommendations with a sort of mild cottagecore vibe or books that would fit into it, despite not specifically being about these things – this is all about the right feeling after all, not specific elements, etc.

Everyone can add to that list – that’s the point, actually – and maybe we can all find quite some good, fitting books.

The point is nice fiction and even non-fiction of any genre, can be country-life related, but doesn’t have to be, ideally of the more uplifting and cosy sort, but that doesn’t have to be either, there’s no strict rules, if you think it fits, it surely will fit, we all have our own tastes and ideas, after all.

So, I’ll make a start:

The books of Elizabeth Goudge, especially

Linnets and Valerians – an enchanting children’s novel; the most cottagecore a book could ever be

The Little White Horse – a more famous children’s novel; also very cottagecore, but in a different way

The Eliots of Damerosay Trilogy: The Bird in the Tree, The Herb of Grace, The Heart of the Family – Extremely uplifting, lovely adult novels; especially the second book, The Herb of Grace (known as Pilgrim’s Inn in the US) is marvelously warm and wholesome, and often thought to be a single novel. If you’re not interested in the entire series, you might still give this one a try!

The Rosemary Tree – also a warm and sweet and wholesome adult novel

her other books, too, I suppose, but these in particular!

James Herriot’s books

His All Creatures Great and Small series of memoirs – A less sweet or cute, but in its own way enchanting recollection of stories from his life as a country vet in the Yorkshire Dales in the 30s-50s; lovely stories of animals and even more intriguing stories of people

His children’s books – often simplified, sweet stories that also appeared in his adult novels

James Herriot’s Yorkshire – with photos by Derry Brabbs; non-fiction, a lovely photo book about Yorkshire and the Dales

I cannot stress enough how lovely to read his books are and what a lovely picture of a hard, but wonderful way of life and a great many different and complex people in paints in such a light and quick manner that one doesn’t even notices it at first. If you want to read some country-fiction that is absolutely positive, but not entirely cottagecore-sweet, read Herriot!

Other adult novels, such as

The Blandings books by P. G. Wodehouse – or any other of his books, for the light and sunny energy and great fun, though the Blandings series is more...country.

The Green Thrush and Fairacre series by Miss Read

Classic romances and comedies of manners (Jane Austen, or Georgette Heyer, for example)

Cosy mysteries and classic detectvie stories (Dorothy L. Sayers, Agatha Christie, Arthur Conan Doyle, G. K. Chesterton)

Some more gothic novels and romances as well, I suppose? Yes, I guess those do fit in there too, for dark and stormy nights and the smell of wet heather, isn’t it? And classic mystery novels as well!

A lot of what is apparantly called “the feminine middlebrow”. Some of the books I have mentioned fall in that category, it seems, and it has many good fitting picks, I suppose.

Some adult fantasy novels, such as The Last Unicorn by Peter S. Beagle, are, I think good fits as well.

Lud-in-the-Mist by Hope Mirrlees – another adult fantasy, that I nearly forgot about, and though very melancholy also very intriguing and I think it does belong in this list in some way

Phantastes by George MacDonald – I remembered alongside with Lud; ah, well, I does belong in this list too, I think. Very faerie.

A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens, and a lot of the very warm of what is called classic literature (I call it warm, and think that fits)

Other children’s literature, such as

The Chronicles of Narnia by C. S. Lewis – I cannot not include them in a list of recommendations, and they really do fit into this one, which is good

C. S. Lewis’ Letters to Children – Perhaps even lovelier for adults, but I cannot take them out of the children’s list. Lovely, sort, and inspiring.

The Dark is Rising Sequence by Susan Cooper – These enchanting books really do transport one to their settings and their seasons, whether it’s a hot summer in Cornwall, Christmas in the Thames’ Valley or autumn in Wales; very, very atmospheric and lovely

All that has lovely critters in clothes and things of that sort, whether it’s Winnie the Pooh, Wind in the Willows, the stories of Beatrix Potter, The Great Mouse Detective. You know what sort I mean.

The Happy Prince & Other Tales and The House of Pomegranates by Oscar Wilde – I was unsure whether to put them here or with the adult books, but as they started out as stories for his own children, here they are; absolutely lovely fairy tales that I cannot recommend enough

Generally classic retelltings for children

Generally fairy tales

I must admit, I am unfamiliar with the Green Knowe books, but I do think they fit in this list, from what I know about them (I need to get around to them) and from the lovely movie I saw

All Anne of Green Gables books by L. M. Montgomery

All Little Women books by Louisa May Alcott

The books of Frances Hodgson Burnett, especially The Secret Garden

Also the books of E. Nesbit

The Hobbit by J. R. R. Tolkien – I nearly forgot such an obvious one!

Speaking of Tolkien, his Father Christmas Letters

Also generally classic children’s books

I’m excited to see your additions!

#literature #adult booklr #farmcore #the cottage library

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buckybarnesbingo · 3 years

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BBB Week 38 Roundup, Part Two of Four

We’re halfway there! (Yes, I’m gonna have “Livin’ on a Prayer” stuck in my head all day.)

Go give these collaborators some love!

Title: Into the Fray (Voluntarily or Not) Collaborator: InTheShadows Link: AO3 Square Filled: K4 - phobias Ship: Bucky & Tony & Loki Rating: Gen Major Tags: Developing Friendships/Relationships, implied/referred triggers all around for the boys, but nothing too serious Summary: Bucky listens to Stark complain to himself as he settles himself down in the cave. Outside the blizzard blows on, as strong as ever. He has been complaining ever since they landed here. Jotunnhiem. Loki assured them he can get they back home, but for now they must wait for th storm to die down. And if Stark doesn't shut up it is going to be a long wait. Judging by the way Loki is snapping back at Stark, he agrees. A long wait. Word Count: 1405

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Title: Bean There, Brew That moodboard Collaborator: rebelmeg Link: Tumblr Square Filled: Y5 - AU: coffee shop Ship: none Rating: Gen Major Tags: moodboard, coffee shop AU Summary: Clint owns a coffee shop made entirely of puns, and leaves Darcy in charge when he takes a vacation. The shop gets a new regular (clearly some kind of hobo/assassin) that likes to purr at his coffee. With a pack of snarky baristas and a whole lot of sugar, Bucky finds himself living just a little bit more.

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Title: No Question is a Good Question Collaborator: InTheShadows Link: AO3 Square Filled: U4 - waiting for extraction Ship: Bucky & Ava Starr Rating: Gen Major Tags: dehumanization Summary: The Asset cleans its weapons and waits for its handler to arrive. The mission is complete. The mission had been successful - anything else is unacceptable. Beside it is its partner for this mission, also waiting. But this partner is new. Does not know the rules. It talks and it takes off its mask. Doesn't it know that neither is allowed? The Asset is a weapon. That is what Ghost needs to be. Ghost still has much to learn. Word Count: 642

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Title: Through it all, you were there Collaborator: honestmischief Link: AO3 Square Filled: B5 - Pain Ship: WinterIron Rating: Mature Major Tags: Nightmares, drowning, blood and injury, torture Summary: Five times Tony felt like he was dying + one time he did not. Word Count: 607

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Title: The Strength that Now You Show Collaborator: starjargon Link: AO3 Square Filled: Y5 - Expendable Ship: Bucky & Steve Rating: Gen Major Tags: Self-esteem issues Summary: Bucky and Steve have a conversation before Steve takes the stones back. Word Count: 663

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Title: Sent to a different dimension Collaborator: Menatiera Link: Tumblr Square Filled: B5 - Sent to a different dimension Ship: Stuckony Rating: Gen Major Tags: dimensional travel, AU, magical creatures, mer!tony, dragon!steve, alien!bucky, soulmates, moodboard Summary: Bucky has been sent far away by a magical blast. He suspects it’s a different dimension at least, because things are… different. Steve, for example, has been turned into a dragon shapeshifter by the serum, and Tony is a merman. Bucky has no idea what’s the deal with his counterpart whose body he’s currently inhabiting, but he has both of his arms, and occasionally wings too, which is cool, but was quite disturbing to find out at first. Oh, and the three of them are in a relationship here. But regardless of that, Bucky has to find out what’s going on and how to get home, because the clock is always ticking in the background, not to mention the mysterious paths appearing in the forest in the mist that calls for Bucky. However, Steve and Tony don’t want to let him go.

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Title: Relevant Experience Collaborator: 27dragons Link: AO3 Square Filled: Y1 - Missing Scene Ship: WinterIron Rating: Gen Major Tags: none Summary: The missing end-credits scene that they inexplicably left off of Endgame... Word Count: 519

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Title: What Lies They Told Us Collaborator: darter-blue Link: AO3 Square Filled: C1 - AU: Mobsters Ship: Stucky Rating: Explicit Major Tags: Enemies to Lovers, Minor Character Death, Mafia AU, Angst, Mutual Pining Summary: Steve Rogers might still see his ma every Sunday, but he isn’t the dutiful son. He gave up that life a long time ago. Bucky Barnes may be following in his fathers footsteps, but he wants to set a path to something more than where they’ll take him. Steve and Bucky’s lives have always intersected. There is something between them that exists, real and palpable. But they are opposite sides of a coin. Opposing families in a war for money and power. Blood and pain. And fate may bring them together, again and again, pulling them closer. But it always finds a way to rip them apart. What they need is a way to fight fate. To fight their families. To reach each other. To keep each other. Word Count: 4839

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Title: Occupational Hazard Collaborator: Ibelieveinturtles Link: Tumblr Square Filled: Y4 - Occupational hazard Ship: none Rating: Gen Major Tags: Harry Potter AU, Quidditch, moodboard Summary: During the first Quidditch match of the Inaugural Wizarding Olympics, Bucky is involved in an accident.

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Title: He Did it Again, Didn't He? Collaborator: TheMadHale Link: AO3 Square Filled: C2 - Sunglasses Ship: Platonic Bucky/Reader Rating: Mature Major Tags: Domestic Violence Summary: When the reader turns up to see Bucky her eyes are covered by huge sunglasses. Word Count: 329

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Title: The Masseur and the Assassin Collaborator: buckybarnesdeservestobehappy Link: AO3 Square Filled: B5 - AU: Spy, Secret Agent, Assassin, or Hitman Ship: Stucky Rating: Mature Major Tags: assassin, guilt, massage, happy ending, poor life choices Summary: Bucky Barnes needed a vacation from his job. What he found was a happy ending. Word Count: 3293

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Title: Hiding The Present Collaborator: TheMadHale Link: AO3 Square Filled: U4 - Picture Square Ship: Bucky/OFC Rating: Gen Major Tags: none Summary: When it comes to protecting his family Bucky takes it very seriously. Word Count: 289

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Title: n/a (to be decided) Collaborator: ibelieveinturtles Link: Tumblr Square Filled: C2 - Diner/Restaurant Ship: Bucky/Darcy Rating: Gen Major Tags: moodboard, holiday romance, reunion, surprise baby, unplanned pregnancy Summary: 5 years after their summer holiday romance, Bucky and Darcy meet again. It’s a huge surprise for both of them.

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Title: "Come On Alice!" Collaborator: TheMadHale Link: AO3 Square Filled: B4 - Alice in Wonderland AU Ship: Stucky Rating: Gen Major Tags: Bucky in a dress Summary: A bet between Ellie and Nat results in a shock at Tony Stark’s party Word Count:372

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Title: Bucky Barnes: Accidental Bondmate Collaborators: ABrighterDarkness & betheflame Link: AO3 Square Filled: Y3 - Alpha/Beta/Omega, ABrighterDarkness Ship: Stuckony Rating: Teen Major Tags: Reference to forced bonding Summary: He walked out to the yard to pull parts from an old car to use in a different one. He wound up back in his house with not one, but two, bondmates. Word Count:3545

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Title: The Ins and Outs of Family Collaborator: Starjargon Link: AO3 Square Filled: B1 - Labyrinth Ship: Bucky Barnes & Eliot Spencer, Bucky Barnes & Rebecca Barnes Proctor Rating: Gen Major Tags: Panic attack Summary: Bucky finds his family again. Or rather, they find him. And they're not letting him go this time. Word Count: 1394

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Title: The Midnight Fox – Chapter Two Collaborator: Minka Link: AO3 Square Filled: C3 - free space Ship: Stucky Rating: Mature Major Tags: bodyguard AU, royalty AU Summary: Amid the flashing lights, high fashion, and crystalline champagne flutes of the royal court of Estia, a deadly intrigue is brewing. There are whispers in the night; talk of a plot to assassinate the king and an uprising forged in blood and stolen art. With the bars of his gilded cage closing in, Crown Prince James Barnes faces his own struggles. Dealing with a city more enamoured with a masked vigilante than him is starting to get old fast, and his stuffy new bodyguard is as infuriating as he is potentially dangerous. As chaos threatens to rip the country apart and the list of Royal allies begins to run thin, the Prince is forced to face the demons lurking in his past. After all, no party can last indefinitely, and no secrets remain buried forever. Word Count: 15,858

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Title: Clint’s Big Secret Collaborator: pherryt Link: AO3 Square Filled: B4 - nerds Ship: WinterHawk Rating: Gen Major Tags: fluff, food Summary: Bucky can't believe that's what Clint is eating right now. What. The Fuck. How does Clint look like this when he eats like that? Word Count: 2535

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Title: The Ghosts of Me Collaborator: ibelieveinturtles Link: Tumblr Square Filled: C1 - Ghosting Ship: none Rating: Gen Major Tags: art edit Summary: Is it possible to ghost yourself?

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Title: Barton-Barnes Family - Chapter 1: The Barnes/Barton Baby Collaborator: TheMadHale Link: AO3 Square Filled: C3 - Free Space Ship: WinterHawk Rating: Gen Major Tags: Bucky softness Summary: Bucky finds a baby in his room Word Count: 917

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Title: Recovery Collaborator: ibelieveinturtles Link: Tumblr Square Filled: U3 - Soft Ship: none Rating: Gen Major Tags: another moodboard for the Harry Potter AU Summary: When Bucky wakes up after his quidditch accident the first thing he’s aware of is the soft murmur of his team’s worried voices, followed rapidly by the heavy, comforting weight of the blanket draped over his body.

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Title: Restoring the Shield - Chapter 1 Collaborator: Politzania Link: AO3 Square Filled: U5 - AU: A/B/O Ship: Stony, past Stucky, endgame Stuckony Rating: Mature Major Tags: a/b/o dynamics, semi-canon compliant, recovering!Bucky Summary: The man who was once the Winter Soldier (and before that, Bucky Barnes) is brought before the Avengers to face justice... just not the kind he had expected. Word Count: 1101

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Title: Approach With Care Collaborator: ibelieveinturtles Link: AO3 Squares Filled: Chapter 1, C3 - Free space Chapter 2, U1 - What doesn’t kill me makes me mad Chapter 3, K4 - Sensory overload Chapter 4, Y1 - Accidental feelings Chapter 5, C5 - pining Chapter 6, Y5 - Bed sharing Chapter 7, B3 - Enemies to lovers Ship: Bucky/Darcy Rating: Teen Major Tags: bad first meeting, violence towards innocent cars, sensory overload, accidental feelings, pining, bedsharing, enemies to lovers, description of a panic attack Summary: Bucky’s out for a quiet walk when he gets hit by a car. The car does not win. Darcy isn’t impressed. Word Count: 2233

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Title: The Asset Hates the Cold Collaborator: buckybarnesdeservestobehappy Link: AO3 Square Filled: Y2 - Survival in the Wild Ship: Steve & Bucky Rating: mature Major Tags: assassin, wilderness survival, missions, memory loss, canon compliant Summary: The Asset is forced to survive in the wilderness. He’s cold and alone, but he wasn’t always that way. There were once people who loved him. Word Count: 480

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Title: Brooklyn Barton-Barnes Collaborator: TheMadHale Link: AO3 Square Filled: U1 - Parenthood Ship: Father!Bucky Barnes and Child!OC Rating: Teen Major Tags: Non-Binary Character, Homophobia, Asshole character Summary: When Bucky gets a call from Brooklyn’s school his anger is directed the opposite way than the principal hoped. Word Count: 522

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Title: Pull the Guinness Collaborator: buckybarnesdeservestobehappy Link: Tumblr Square Filled: U1 - Dungeons & Dragons Ship: Stucky Rating: Teen Major Tags: bartender Bucky Barnes, nightclub, attraction, protective Steve Rogers, bouncer Bucky Barnes Summary: Bucky’s irritated he has to work on his night off, but there’s one patron who makes it worth it. Word Count: 1071

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Title: Check Collaborator: 27dragons Link: Tumblr Square Filled: C4 - Board Games Ship: none Rating: Gen Major Tags: drabble Summary: What kind of weird alternate dimension is this, anyway? Bucky’s not sure he really wants to know. Word Count: 100

#buckybarnesbingo2020 #bbb2020 #bingo fill #bbb weekly roundup #bbb week 38 #week 38 part 2/4

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trevorbarre · 3 years

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The Fall: 'Excavate!'. On a Coffee Table Near You. Part One.

If you had told me, back in 1979, that The Fall would eventually be the dedicatee of a 'coffee table book', I'd have been tempted to administer a gentle zen-blow to your head with a Metal Box. "An oversized, usually hard-covered book, whose purpose is for display on a table intended for use in an area in which one entertains guests and for which it can serve to inspire conversation or pass the time" (Wiki). Great for an anarcho-punk/hippie squat maybe, and I'm currently staring at Excavate!': the Weird and Frightening World of The Fall, a 350-page "hard-covered" tome, nestling on our own Barre family version of a coffee table, right next to Necronomicon: the Best Weird Tales of H.P. Lovecraft. I've been ploughing through the latter over the past few weeks, and this has led me inexorably (given M.E. Smith's reading preferences) on to Excavate!, even though I thought I'd read enough books about The Fall for one lifetime.

Edited by Bob Stanley and Tessa Norton, it's a handsome volume of pictorial memorabilia, album covers and short articles from the band's near-forty year career, interspersed with longer essays by various writers. Already 'hip priests' by 1982, they later became the critical darlings of such 'heavyweight' critics as Michael Bracewell, Ian Penman and Mark Fisher, who all seemed particularly taken with Smith's fascination with the literature of the weird and the uncanny, such as works by M.R. James, Arthur Machen and Lovecraft. Comparisons with James Joyce and T.S. Eliot were made. (I kid you not.)

All Fall fanatics have their favourite 'periods': I, for example, can break these down in my mind to: 1977-1979 (Step Forward), 1980-1983 (Rough Trade), 1984-1988 (Brix), 1990-1994 (Cog Sinister), 1995 onward (the long period of relative decline and curate's egg albums?). The true obsessive can obviously parse these even further. For the record, I think that the band's absolute peak was reached with the resolutely 'no-filler' The Weird and Frightening Word of The Fall (1984) and This Nation's Saving Grace (1985), with the gradual, yet objective, diminishment starting to take place from Middle Class Revolt (1995). Just like the much shorter career of The Pogues, this decline is measurable by increasingly terrible and incomprehensible vocals, with the unique properties of the group replaced by a more generic 'rock band' sound. (This was further reflected in increasingly terrible design and art on their album covers.Just compare Hex Enduction Hour! to Re-Mit, for example.)

So, yet another book about The Fall, who are now joining the premier league of the darlings of music literature, which includes The Beatles (natch), Dylan, Miles and Joy Division/Factory Records. I myself now have EIGHT of 'em, from Brian Edge's (in itself a great name) Paintwork from 1989 (which also has a rather 'coffee table' look, slick and 'professional' at the end of the 'Brix period', and the very opposite of the early Rough Trade graphics). Add to the written word(s), the plethora of live albums, bootlegs and compilations, and you have a quite remarkable body of work and criticism for what started out in 1977 as just another 'punk' band, who few thought would last even to the 80s (hence the title of the very first album, Live at the Witch Trials).

To be continued...

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cinemaocd · 4 years

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The Mirror and the Light raises more questions than it answers

Going into The Mirror and the Light, the third and necessarily final book in Hilary Mantel’s Thomas Cromwell trilogy, the basic plot wasn’t much in doubt. Thomas Cromwell would rise. Thomas Cromwell would fall. In the summer of 1540 he would be executed. Along the way his son would get married, while he remained single, despite wide-spread speculation that he was angling after the King’s daughter Mary Tudor. Those who Cromwell promoted would be raised as well and some would remain loyal while others would betray him. Cromwell’s fall would come some time after Henry VIII’s unsuccessful marriage to Anne of Cleves, and his role in promoting that marriage would play some part in his downfall. Cromwell’s past interactions with his two most powerful enemies, Stephen Gardiner and the Duke of Norfolk, would also have some bearing on his downfall, since they were the main figures behind his arrest.

These are the undisputed big historical facts that Mantel had to work with, or in many cases, work around. There were many other smaller facts that she had to play with as well, some of which appear in the book as delightful asides like Cromwell putting a neighbor’s house on rollers in order to settle a boundary dispute, or Cromwell importing beavers to control the streams and rivers of England. There was also some evidence that Cromwell had an illegitimate daughter, born sometime after his wife’s death. Mantel massages the timeline to make this fit into her backstory of original characters from the first two books, and cleverly ties the daughter to the seemingly random charge in his arrest that he “sheltered Anabaptists.”

Of course Mantel created a whole plot, a series of original characters, and interpretations of historical figures and events for the first two books. They were fiction, after all. Like any good writer (and Mantel is an excellent writer, always in control of her material), she left questions unanswered to hook readers into the third book. If you were expecting these plots to be tidily resolved, you will be disappointed in The Mirror and the Light. The book fails to resolve many questions, creates more plot threads and then leaves those loose as well. Does that mean the book isn’t successful? I would argue that it is precisely because she fails to resolve these puzzles and questions, that Mantel manages to walk the knife edge between genre fiction and literature with a big “L.” She is certainly aware that these characters have all been the main actors in romance novels and murder mysteries as well as history plays. Indeed that is the subtext of almost every movement of plot within the novels.

While Wolf Hall seemed to be a conversation with playwright Robert Bolt about the veracity of A Man for All Seasons, which made Thomas More the hero and Cromwell the villain; this last installment seems to be deeply concerned with T.S. Eliot’s Murder in the Cathedral, about the murder of Thomas Becket at the hands of Henry II. Cromwell digs up Becket’s bones at their resting place in Canterbury, tears down statues of Becket and even keeps the supposed remains of the martyr in his house, in case the king changes his mind. He considers commissioning a play that shows what a terrible person Becket was for disobeying his king and bowing to Rome. Henry II was excommunicated, and Mantel dwells on the possibility that if the current Henry suffers the same fate, the whole nation could be lost to invaders given free reign by the pope to do their worst to the heretics. This is one of the reasons Cromwell is so eager to align England with Lutheran princes via the marriage with Cleves. But of course, Cromwell, as always, has half a dozen reasons for everything he does.

Eliot celebrates Becket as a champion of the separation of powers of church and state, a founding principal of modern democracies and one which was much threatened during the time Eliot wrote the play, 1935, with fascism on the rise in Europe. Of course it does not take a rocket scientist or even a political scientist to put two and two together with our own times. Cromwell would be anti-Brexit, pro NHS and anti austerity. Yet, he would also be the kind of neo-liberal who would be quietly feathering his own nest, profiting from selling off National Trust properties all the while making speeches about the enduring greatness of the British monarchy. For every eerily prescient passage about the plague and it’s random destructive path through society, there is a reminder of just how foreign a country the past is: Cromwell--a becon of rationality and enlightenment--believes the source of his fever is a snake he held in Italy. For every kindly head of an English department who is inspired by Cromwell’s leadership, there is a despicable grotesque like Steve Bannon who admires Cromwell’s ability to seize both religious and political power who sees himself, like “self made” white men everywhere, the victim of the elitism that Cromwell faced.

But these are questions for people who get their essays in front of more eyeballs than I ever will. What do I, the Cromwell fanatic think of the new book?

I think die hard fans of the first two books will be generally pleased with this installment. We get so much more Cromwell than ever before. We are moving more slowly through his life and we are, with exception of a few enlightening flashbacks, solidly in the company of the mature, sardonic, earthy man that we we got to know in Bring Up the Bodies. In short, Cromwell at fifty is a pure joy. Mantel as with the previous installments surrounds him with a crew of lively and memorable companions. From his son who has come into his own as Sassmaster of Austin Friars, to the irrepressible Christophe, who stays with Cromwell through his confinement and walks with him to his execution, cursing the king as Cromwell could not, I love everyone in this English Reformation. Even the bad guys like Norfolk and Gardiner remain fresh. Mantel uses them thriftily, lest we tire of their antics, so that when Cromwell is blindsided by an Easter dinner with Gardiner and Norfolk it is one of the highlights of the book.

As we move closer to his doom, Cromwell has flashes of his fate, but the history fan, or even just the person who has made a close reading of Cromwell’s wikipedia entry, can see it collapsing all around him. Yet, miraculously he never wears out his welcome as other iterations of the character do. As much as I enjoyed James Frain’s Cromwell early in The Tudors his characterization gets more shrill as the story moves forward to the point where his execution is almost a relief. Cromwell is a convenient villain because so many of the facts of his life actually support that conclusion. Mantel used every trick in the book from making him the victim of child abuse, to giving Cromwell a love of animals and children to humanize him in the first two books. In the third she sharpens all of these tools, even as she readies Cromwell to make that last journey from the tower.

In the first two books, there are a number of tropes that are quite worn and flimsy. For example, the idea that it was Cromwell selected the group of petty noblemen executed with Anne Boleyn because they once participated in a masquerade mocking his former master, Cardinal Wolsey. The men were guilty of something to be sure: a kind of greedy, entitled, elitist malice, but not the crimes for which they were executed. It is a weak premise really, but Mantel made it work because of the way she showed the working of Cromwell’s mind, and the way in which she brought the reader so thoroughly into his schemes. By the time you realize that you have been spending time with a mass murderer you are so under his spell that you begin to question the entire premise of narrative fiction. Can any narrator be relied upon? Is there any such thing as a villain or a hero? Are there not elements of both in every person? Can’t the guilt for all of this blood really be laid at the feet of the often childish monarch in whose name all of this happened? Where does personal responsibility begin and end in the midst of atrocity?

All of these larger questions are floating around in the background of The Mirror and the Light and as Cromwell focuses in on the grim task of disemboweling England’s religious houses for personal and political gain, you wonder what price all of this is going to have on his soul. In Wolf Hall, Cromwell fell into a fever, (probably malaria--which had a basis in historical fact) after he managed More’s execution. Though More’s death should be seen as political triumph for him, he views it as a personal failure. Cromwell does not like saints who don’t behave like rational men. He likes men like Geoffrey Pole, who he interrogates in The Mirror and the Light. Pole gives in easily to intimidation, talks a blue streak and is pardoned and released. Cromwell suffers another bout of the fever--which he believes will ultimately take his life-- after bringing down the last and largest religious house in England, the nunnery at Shaftesbury. Now it is true that Cardinal Wolsey had an illegitimate daughter who was housed there, but Mantel takes that fact and weaves into the fabric of her story. Again it is a flimsy premise and again it works because it is surrounded by unassailable bulwark that is Cromwell’s character. Cromwell arrives at Shaftesbury with the vague plan of trying to do something for the Cardinal’s daughter before he turns her out of her home. He winds up disastrously proposing marriage to her in an almost comical scene, a proposal which she rejects with such venom that he weeps for only the second time in three books. This is a man who has lost his entire family, suffered deeply all through his childhood and adolescence and yet this is only the second time he weeps? It’s not quite logical, and like the masquerade plot, it feels all a bit creaky, yet we believe it because Cromwell.

Wolsey’s daughter also accuses Cromwell of poisoning Wolsey, a rumor which has touched Cromwell’s ears earlier in the book, from the dying lips of another bastard child, this time The Duke of Richmond, the illegitimate son of Henry VIII. The injustice of the accusation drives Cromwell’s grief more than the girl’s rejection and he becomes haunted by the idea of who is spreading this rumor. While it could be any of Cromwell’s numerous enemies, it is never fully resolved. On second or third read of this or the other books, we might find the clues that Mantel hid in the story. Similarly multiple readings of the first two books reveal clues as to who terrorized Anne Boleyn by leaving her hate mail, setting her bed on fire and murdering her dog. Mantel has not exactly solved that mystery but she puts the probable solution into the mouth of one of her least trustworthy characters, Lady Jane Rochford, the wife of the late George Boleyn. If Cromwell believes her, he doesn’t say. We are left to decide for ourselves.

In the end, Cromwell’s bout of grief-driven malaria does contribute to his downfall, as he misses a crucial session of parliament, in which Stephen Gardiner forced through a series of laws meant to reverse the Reformation. Cromwell has to stand by and watch friends and fellows in the struggle to create a bible in English, burned at the stake. In Wolf Hall, Mantel says that a “blacksmith creates his own tools,” meaning that Cromwell created the very laws which he used to take down Katherine of Aragon and Anne Boleyn. The blacksmith imagery pays off in the final chapter of the last book, when we are reminded of Cromwell’s childhood nickname “put an edge on it” when he spies the dull instrument with which is to be executed. In The Mirror and the Light, the blacksmith is left at the mercy of his own tools. Unable to find proof of Cromwell’s heresy as a religious dissenter, Gardiner uses the law that Cromwell created to prevent any of Henry’s heirs marrying without the king’s permission. He takes idle gossip started by Cromwell’s oldest frenemy Eustace Chapuys, that Cromwell is planning to marry the Lady Mary Tudor, and uses it to fabricate the evidence used in Cromwell’s arrest. He uses the exact methods that Cromwell used to bring down Anne Boleyn: spin a rumor into fact while using the king’s momentary dissatisfaction as the window of opportunity to make ordinary ambition look treasonous.

The scenes with Mary are both heartbreaking and hilarious, as are many of the scenes with other possible, past marriage candidates such as Bess and Jane Seymour. Just as Cromwell’s relationship with frequent correspondents Stephen Vaughn flavored the earlier books, Cromwell’s relationship with Thomas Wyatt is the closest thing to a romance that Cromwell has in The Mirror and the Light. Cromwell’s seemingly irrational loyalty to Wyatt is explained away by a deathbed promise to Wyatt’s father (there is also a convenient deathbed promise to Katherine of Aragon retconned into this book to explain the lengths he goes to to save Mary Tudor from father’s wrath). Another flimsy trope that works because of the strength of Mantel’s characterization.

In prose that is frequently breathtaking and always interesting, Mantel saves some of her best stuff for describing the relationship between Cromwell and the king. If his friendship with the poet Wyatt is like that of a lover, his strange entanglement with Henry is like that of a spouse. In one scene Cromwell and Henry fall asleep together on a sofa. The intimacy is heartbreaking, partly because we know how it will end. When Cromwell is in his most pitched delirium of fever he realizes that Henry will use him up and spit him out. When he recovers himself, he writes The Book of Henry --treasonous advice to some imagined future privy councilor. Even if he does not consciously acknowledge that Henry will kill him, as he has his other spouses, his fever self, his true self, seems to realize it.

#Have this 2500 word brain dump #The Mirror and the Light #Hilary Mantel #Thomas Cromwell #This really only scratches the surface of my feelings #but I will probably need fic to go further

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indiasreviews · 3 years

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T.S. Eliot: The Man, The Myth, The Misogynist...

Reading time: 2 mins

Welcome to T.S. Eliot. A world full of patriarchy and inequality.

Where to start? Well, just putting it out there that I am yet to find a poem by T.S. Eliot that doesn’t contain sexism in one form or another.

First things first, let’s talk about ‘Portrait of a Lady’. Published in 1915, it perhaps comes as no surprise that it has a misogynistic tone.

Amy Hagan says that Eliot’s ‘juxtaposing terms’ to describe the woman in his poem is telling of his prejudice towards women. You only need to look at the shift from referring to her as ‘Lady’ to ‘wench’. Sexism alert. In my opinion, this archaic slur screams misogyny. Wench meaning a prostitute. Just so you know, offense was taken by the way Mr. Eliot.

In his essay, James Warwood details that Eliot’s poems are riddled with a ‘misogynistic treatment’ of women (More than anything, I’m glad that it’s not just me that thinks this). For example, the speaker repeatedly refers to the woman as ‘it’. Fyi: this is very problematic. By referring to this woman as an ‘it’ the speaker is ‘denying [she is] a real person’ and instead, treating her as though she is an ‘inanimate object’.

Ah, the objectification of women – classic 20th Century. In other words, implying that because she is a woman, she is inferior to the male speaker. Hagan also notices this in Portrait of a Lady as she concludes that the Lady is ‘reduced to an object’.

His ‘patriarchal and sexist ideas’ on femininity are also clear in ‘The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock’ (1915). Eliot’s opinion on women is made even more obvious in this poem. Especially when the speaker rattles on about the mermaids and how he has ‘heard [them] singing’. Wijangco makes a point of saying that mermaids are thought to ‘prey on men by luring them to the sea using their voices’.

Note to self: don’t confuse mermaids with sirens.

To put it simply, in ‘Portrait of a Lady’ the women are prostitutes and in ‘The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock’ women are femme fatales. In both poems, women are portrayed in a negative way. Are you surprised? As I said above, these poems were written in the 20th Century. In fact, Louis Menand decided that Eliot’s work is based on a ‘horror of female sexuality’.

It is implied that Eliot’s poem ‘Preludes’ is about a woman. Particularly in the 3rd section where the speaker says that they ‘curled the papers from your hair’ – an action typically done by women.

So, if ‘Preludes’ (1917) is about a woman, what sort of woman does Eliot present to us?

Well, in the same section, the speaker mentions that the woman has a ‘thousand sordid images’ which is thought to confirm the woman to be a prostitute. These unsavoury images can be seen to represent how the work of a prostitute was considered to be ‘sinful’ as Francesca Cavaliere explains. After all, ‘there is nothing impure in sex – except in the mental attitude to it’.

But why does Eliot present the women in his poems as objects and prostitutes you may be asking? I think that it could have a lot to do with the expected roles for women in society (submissive and dependent on men).

Especially as in her Feminist Manifesto, Mina Loy details that women have a ‘choice between Parasitism’ or ‘Prostitution’… In other words, women in the 20th Century were either wives (a parasite) who needs a host (a man) in order to survive and grow, or alternatively, a prostitute: either way both types of women are reliant on men for financial stability.

All in all, his poems do, to a degree, reflect the misogynistic climate of the 20th Century, they also present his sexist and gendered prejudice views.

#tseliot #womeninliterature #preludes #portraitofalady #lovesongs #misogyny #patriarchy #twentiethcenturyliterature

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mariocki · 4 years

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Before the madness I made it, once again, to my nearest Oxfam Bookshop - a pilgrimage I make infrequently, which is sad because it is the only place I know of in N. Wales that has a decent poetry and drama section, and good, because I lack self control.

Last time I was thrilled to pick up a collected works of William McGonagall, whose peculiarly stilted verse is a never-ending source of joy. This time I picked up my usual gross of plays and a few volumes of poetry, when something quite different caught my eye: Second Thoughts by Nicolas Bentley.

Bentley was an English author and illustrator, probably best known as a cartoonist and for illustrating the second, fully illustrated edition of T. S. Eliot's Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats. Bentley's father was Edmund Clerihew Bentley, inventor of the clerihew - a comic, biographical poem of four lines, in which the first line is simply the name of the subject. One of my favourites, by the elder Bentley:

John Stuart Mill,

By a mighty effort of will,

Overcame his natural bonhomie

And wrote Principles of Political Economy.

Anyway. Bentley Jnr was a poet himself, and contributed many biographical ditties to newspapers and magazines of the time, satirising public figures and generally committing character assassination with a wry smile and a cheeky wink. All of this I have newly learnt - although I was dimly aware of the clerihew and its inventor I knew nothing of his son - but I suddenly have another beloved creator of comic verse.

Second Thoughts is a truly fascinating collection. Published in 1939, it collects a smattering of Bentley's unflattering portraits of pre-WW2 figures, both of London society and international flavour. An example, titled simply Stalin;

Who could ever find a pal in

Any man who looks like Stalin?

You may think that I'm snobbish,

Though I'm nothing of the sort.

But the trouble with the chap

Is that awful chauffeur's cap:

Apart from that I'm sure

That he's a jolly decent sport.

Other political targets are closer to home; Charles Vane-Tempest-Stewart, 7th Marquess of Londonderry and Nazi sympathiser, is on the receiving end of a drily suggestive verse about his political views -

You can tell by the angle

Of Lord Londonderry's hat

That he is not a member

Of the proletariat.

And in case this may escape you,

A reminder of it shows

Also very clearly

In the angle of his nose.

Perhaps the sharpest and most waspish of Bentley's rhymes is saved for a figure who goes unnamed in both the title and body of his poem:

Impropaganda:

Rather than bombast, shrieks and groans,

And vile abuse in viler tones,

You'd think a deprecating cough

Would suit so mild a looking dwarf.

But just incase, in 1939, we might have any doubt to whom he is referring, he provides an illustration -

However, my favourites are generally the attacks on Nicolas' fellow artists, which are altogether more venemous and more delightful for it. On the author J. B. Priestley, the wonderfully titled 'Angel Pavement Guard Thy Bed';

I always think it sensible to keep

Some Priestley by your bed to make you sleep.

Be careful, though - an overdose may cause

The children to be woken by your snores.

An intricately composed - and typically mean-spirited - take on a popular novelist:

God one afternoon created Man,

Little thinking what he then began in

All good faith would, in the lengthy span

Of years, achieve what we call Ethel Mannin.

There are many more too of course, really anyone who was anybody in polite (or impolite as it may be) society in 1939 seems to have caught Bentley's attention; Oswald Mosley, Cecil B. DeMille, James Joyce, Duff Cooper, Ivor Novello - all of them come under the scrutiny of his acid tipped pen. But this was 1939 after all, and that society was about to be blown apart in a way that few could imagine. Bentley spent the War years as a fireman in a heavily bombed London. He still worked, and as far as I can tell would continue to write for the rest of his life, but his real success was in illustration. He went on to work producing cartoons for the Daily Mail, and in his later life was part of the staff of Private Eye.

I'll finish with one of my favourites from the book, another novelist. Although less remembered today than many of his contemporaries, Charles Morgan was a massively successful writer in the first half of the 20th century, known for his long, rather morose novels about love and death (including 1936's Sparkenbroke) and for his reputation as a humourless bore:

Lunching one day with Morgan

I was weary and ill at ease,

For he started quoting Sparkenbroke

Before we had reached the cheese;

He knew not what he was saying,

And as I was past caring then,

I struck him on the schnozzle

With the Corton, 1910.

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pigballoon · 4 years

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Cats

(Tom Hooper, 2019)

I feel like the widespread critical mauling that this film has received may ultimately help its case for anyone that now dares venture out to see it. I can certainly only speak for myself when I say that for me Tom Hooper's latest was nowhere near as unbearable an experience as I had been expecting, and frankly in comparison with his previous pair of disasters I found the thing an amusing enough way to spend a couple of hours.

Granted, I say this as someone who was familiar both with Cats basically plotless nature, and more importantly someone who loves a number of the songs, so maybe it was easier for me to digest than someone going in completely blind, but damn, I even thought there were aspects here and there worthy of commending.

To be clear, I'm not suggesting that is is a great film by any means, but to compare it for example to Hooper's last big screen musical attempt in 2012's strangely accepted but frankly heinous adaptation (decimation, more like) of Les Miserables, this fares better in so many of the same areas. For one, while that movies reproduction of the famed barricade in the streets of Paris felt cheap and fake and made the whole epic enterprise feel so small, the similarly recreated streets of London here feel no less stagy and not of this earth, but the fact that this is a movie about a bunch of singing, dancing humanoid cats makes that fact somewhat easier to stomach, and thus it seems that quality of fakery lends proceedings a sort of otherwordly dream (nightmare more like) quality that adds to it.

The much talked of effects didn't bother me much either, in fact I thought the activity of each cats ears and tails gave the the entire thing something of a level of slight cinematic detail impossible to produce if the makeup and costumes of the stage production had been utilized, and certainly lends a degree of feeling to the thing clearly impossible to recreate if you go the singing CGI animals route taken by Disney in their recent Lion King re-imagining. Now granted the CGI enhanced leaps and dance moves were a massive negative and one of a number of approaches Hooper takes to the material that negate his performers occasionally good work. Indeed, in addition to those jerky, ropy leaps the film also goes the Rob Marshall's Chicago route of chopping the musical numbers to ribbons making one of the principle pleasures of this show (performers ceaselessly performing) and indeed theatre in general, much harder to appreciate. Not here the adherence to long takes so famously afforded Anne Hathaway in Les Miserables, allowing her to wail her way to an Oscar.

Still, another improvement over that previous movie musical of Hooper’s is the much less offensive use of live singing. I'm not sure why he's so attached to the process, as if all the movie musicals in cinema's long history that managed to do without it were not effective enough done the way that they were, but in Cats the approach is far less movie destroying, distracting and uncomfortable to listen to than it was in Les Mis, and for a film in which 95% of dialogue is sung, that definitely helps. For even if you can’t accept the effects work, the general bizarre, nightmare quality of the entire production brought on by reasons probably both intentional and otherwise, you can still revel in the words and the music of two of the better to ever step into their respective arenas without those by now much beloved songs being ruined by bad singing and sound work.

The performances are generally nice too, with Ian McKellen (going all in, perfect for the part), Taylor Swift (in her element, but conveying so much character through her physicality and facials, and impressing singing in a distinct British accent), Judi Dench, James Corden, and Laurie Davidson proving probably best. Idris Elba doesn't bring anywhere near enough danger or gravitas to his part, skirting around the margins, and at the heart of it all, in audience surrogate mode, newcomer Francesca Hayward is clearly dancer first and actress second, but even she is afforded hardly any chance to do what she does best in any coherent way.

Anyway, it was not quite the stuff of nightmares that I had been expecting, pitched I think as a childrens movie it basically works as such, maybe my expectations had been lowered enough by Tom Hooper's recent work and the reviews so roundly reviling it, but to me the only real major disappointment here is that on account of the reaction T.S Eliot isn't going to bag himself that long overdue Oscar.

#cats #tom hooper #andrew lloyd webber #t.s. eliot #francesca hayward #ian mckellen #judi dench #taylor swift #james corden #laurie davidson #idris elba #2019 #reviews #film #films #movie #movies #musical #musicals

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claritalunaluna76 · 5 years

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When Bob Donnelly entered the music business as a lawyer in 1976, payola, or pay-for-play, was standard in the radio industry.

“When I first started, it was hookers and blow [to help get songs on the air],” Donnelly says. “Then that disappeared and it became sports tickets, trips, sneakers and the like. It changed over time so that it became much more sophisticated. At the end of the day, the labels still wanted hit records and the radio stations wanted cash.

While some radio promoters today liken those days to the Wild West — a distant past — conversations with more than 30 people in the music industry familiar with the modern radio business indicate that payments to influence airplay are still a significant feature of the radio landscape. “It never went away,” says Paul Porter, a veteran of “urban” radio who discusses his experiences with payola in his 2017 book, Blackout: My 40 Years in the Record Business. “The old days of coming in [to a radio station] with a 12-inch [record] full of money [and offering] trips and cocaine are all gone. Now everything goes to LLCs and cash apps.”

“Everyone knows it’s there,” adds Allen Kovac, CEO of the rock-focused Eleven Seven Label Group. “It’s a game that should’ve gone away a long time ago. [But] it’s prevalent enough that you’re not gonna get into the Top 15 without playing that game.”

Pay-for-play is at least as old as rock itself. The first congressional hearings on payola in the radio industry were held in 1960, resulting in the prohibition of undisclosed pay-for-play. But pay-for-play did not end. Donnelly heard so many stories from fed-up artist clients about payments to DJs and radio stations that he decided to alert Eliot Spitzer, then New York’s attorney general, to the state of the industry in 2004.

Spitzer’s investigations revealed that payola was rampant in radio. To influence airplay, money and other “valuable considerations” moved among labels or middlemen known as “indie promoters” and radio stations. “It was the early stage of people using email, so [labels and radio programmers] were pretty straightforward in terms of what the deals were and the transactions that were being cut,” Spitzer tells Rolling Stone. In 2003, for example, one program director asked Columbia Records, “Do you need help on Jessica [Simpson] this week? $1,250? If you don’t need help, I certainly don’t need to play it.”

As a result of the New York investigation, each of the major labels agreed to pay multimillion-dollar settlements. Radio chains like CBS and Entercom also paid financial penalties. In addition, the major labels committed to significant “business reforms” in the ensuing deal with the New York attorney general’s office. The most important of these was a promise to “not use … [contests or giveaways, commercial transactions, advertising, artist appearances and performances] in an explicit or implicit exchange, agreement or understanding to obtain airplay or increase airplay.”

Despite these agreements, pay-for-play transactions persist in the industry. One manager, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, recently spent approximately $10,000 through a third party directly paying radio DJs in the “urban” and rhythmic formats to play a single. The payments were strategically employed to boost the singer’s spins. When a label signed the artist, the manager was able to earn his money back.

That was a relatively cheap investment. Another music-industry veteran who requested anonymity claims that he spent five times as much to try to break a record in the rhythmic format. “I bought all my spins at the right places,” he says. “We spent about $50,000.” He got around 800 plays, mostly in mix shows.

Four radio insiders say there are small-market stations in the Top 40 and “urban” formats that appear so susceptible to influence that their playlists cannot be trusted when trying to gauge the success of a single. (Program directors often consult their colleagues’ playlists when making decisions about whether or not to play a song; few want to step out on a record without seeing it working elsewhere first.)

Stations like this exist “in every format,” says “Tom,” a label promoter with cross-genre experience whose name has been changed to protect his anonymity. “Say a song is Number 20 on the Top 40 chart [ranked by spins], but it’s Number 40 in audience [reached],” Tom continues. “You’ll probably see stations pop up with a high concentration of the spins overnight [when barely anyone is listening]. They’re getting something in return. They’re not doing it every single time just to help somebody out.”

“Take a look at the Mediabase chart and look at how many people got one, two, or three spins [a week],” adds the veteran who spent $50,000 buying spins. Songs become radio hits only if they get played in bulk; a couple of spins a week is not enough for a track to become familiar to casual listeners. “How do you break a record spinning it once a week?” the veteran asks. “For $300.” A rep for Mediabase declined to comment for this article.

In addition to direct payments to people in programming positions, industry veterans say that money passing from record labels or artists to radio stations for the purpose of influencing playlists often takes a subtler, more circuitous route. Payments are fuzzily described as promotional, and funneled through independent promoters who are frequently compared to “consultants” or “lobbyists” for hire.

In radio, this form of lobbying is reminiscent of behavior that was explicitly prohibited in the Spitzer settlements. In 2006, the New York attorney general’s office wrote that “in an effort to dodge the payola laws, record labels and radio stations have also enlisted the services of so-called independent promoters … middlemen who act as conduits for delivery of the labels’ ‘promotional support’ to the stations and help perpetuate the fiction that this support is not actually being delivered by the labels in exchange for airplay and therefore does not violate payola statutes. Many independent promoters receive compensation from the labels for each ‘add’ they obtain.”

Today, some indie promoters establish special rapport with specific stations. Then, thanks to their exclusive relationships, these promoters develop a certain amount of clout — they serve as gatekeepers to the stations in their flock. In the Top 40 space, two promoters are known for allegedly having a number of stations under their influence.

“Jane,” a former major-label promotions executive whose name has been changed, explains that “some independent promoters claim to record labels, ‘You won’t get access to certain radio programmers because there are too few hours in the day and they’re not going to take calls from every single label out there. If you pay me to promote your record, yours can be one of the eight tracks that I’m working. These programmers return my phone calls.‘”

To promote a single in the Top 40 format, “you’re probably gonna hire 10 different indies on every record,” Tom says. “There could be one guy who has one station you want, another guy who has 12 stations that you want. I don’t think there’s any way somebody could have a hit at radio without having to do that.”

In the case of one prominent radio network that allegedly has an exclusive relationship with a single promoter, “he gets the adds, and then you pay him 3,500 bucks,” says “James” (not his real name), a second promotions executive with extensive major-label experience. “We call it the toll — everybody has to pay it.”

Unlike the old days, when a programmer might take home $1,250 for spinning Jessica Simpson, “the toll” doesn’t always go into the programmer’s pocket today. Instead, “what [the stations] need the money for is to go toward marketing, quote-unquote,” James says. That might include buying advertising time on the airwaves or billboards in the market, or putting money toward products like T-shirts and bumper stickers that publicize both the radio station and the record label.

Again, this behavior was uncovered — and prohibited — in the New York attorney general’s investigation more than a decade ago. “In addition to employing the traditional device of delivering bribes to radio programmers … record labels endeavor to gain airplay for their songs by providing such inducements to the radio stations as ‘promotional support,’ ” the attorney general’s office wrote.

To the extent that program directors even acknowledge the existence of seamy promotional behavior — which they rarely do — they hasten to say it’s concentrated in formats that are not their own. Multiple people working in the pop space pointed fingers at “urban” or Latin radio. Another program director who spoke on the condition of anonymity singled out country music for “get[ting] away with fricking murder.” “Everyone thinks they’re sweet boys because they got missed on the big sweep that happened with Spitzer,” the program director adds. “All the pop stations got their hands slapped, and everyone looked at us like we were a bunch of pigs. Country just skated right on by.”

Insiders claim there are notable differences between radio’s behavior today and the disguised payments that were uncovered in the Spitzer investigation.

Two people working in promotion point out that major radio chains like iHeartMedia and Cumulus have tried to distance themselves from pay-for-play, mostly by refusing to work with indie promoters. Since those two chains control many of the stations that make up the radio charts, this distancing limits the impact of any payola-type activity. A spokesperson for Cumulus said that the company has “a strict ‘no independent record promoters’ policy dating back to the 2005 Eliot Spitzer investigations”; iHeart noted that “we don’t typically work with indie promoters because we have so many other opportunities to work directly with labels and independent artists.”

Promoters also note that there are times when spending money on “promotional support” can be entirely above-board, especially if a singer in the station’s rotation is planning an upcoming show in the area. “One legitimate reason for a record label to advertise on a radio station is if they’re doing tour support,” says Jane, the former major-label promoter.

In addition, several radio and label officials argue that most promoters’ influence is indirect or advisory. “There really are people who just call people and have good relationships and can cite good facts [about songs they are hired to advance],” Tom says. “There are people where there is no quid pro quo.”

“There is still a way to structure this so it works,” adds a lawyer in the communications industry. “What the indie is obtaining from a station is the right to meet with the music director every so often and tell them about the latest records he’s promoting. One other right he’s allowed to have: When they do add one of his songs, [the station] tells him first. For these agreements to be legal, that’s all the [rights the] indie has. In return, he can give promo items to the station because he’s only getting the right to meet with them.”

Multiple people note that promoters with exclusive relationships work carefully with attorneys to make sure they are “buttoned up” — secure in the eyes of the FCC. “My sense is it’s extremely common for there to be some kind of financial transaction taking place between the station and the label,” says one FCC source. “But they just package it in a way that passes muster under our rules. The way they do it is basically exploiting loopholes in the law.” That makes radio “a very tricky area to take enforcement in.”

“On the surface, it looks sleazy and cheesy, and at times it is,” sums up James, the promotions veteran. “But it’s also on the up-and-up.” Recently, however, he says he refused to pay “the toll” to a station that had a relationship with one of the prominent independent promoters working in pop. As a result, James claims the station refused to put his song into rotation until it already went Number One.

The last line of defense against improper radio promotion behavior is major-label compliance departments, which were set up after the Spitzer lawsuits to “monitor promotion practices and develop and implement an internal accounting system designed to detect future abuses.”

Many of the people who spoke for this story pointed to the paperwork they have to sign — forms that declare that no money was exchanged for airplay — and the compliance training sessions they attend, suggesting these measures serve to curb any inappropriate behavior.

Representatives from two major-label compliance departments said the indie promoters are required to certify that they adhere to the rules laid out in the settlements with the New York Attorney General’s office every year. But “we don’t get involved in whatever relationship the promoter has with the station,” one major-label compliance officer says. “There’s nothing in the agreement that prevents us from working with independent promoters who have exclusive relationships.”

That suggests that majors may not have enough information to ensure that the indie promoters are acting in the correct manner: How can a compliance officer determine if an indie is using improper methods to influence a station without knowing the relationship between the two parties?

And even if compliance officers do have the correct information, they don’t seem able to do much about it. “The tools we have are the certifications from the independent promoters, educating them about their obligations and any information I get [about improper behavior],” says one major-label compliance officer. The annual compliance certification for one major label, reviewed by Rolling Stone, is relatively toothless: If an indie promoter violates his or her agreement with that label, it “could lead to disciplinary action up to and including termination of employment.”

“Clark,” a second former major-label promotions executive whose name has been changed, described the compliance agreements as “some bullshit, but you keep it moving.”

“Who’s regulating this, and who’s going to enforce it?” he asks.

The labels aren’t going to police themselves?

“Fuck, no,” Clark responds. “Why would we do that?”

It’s hard to find anyone in the radio ecosystem with good things to say about any of the variants of payola. “Labels don’t generally want to pay money for airplay; they’d rather get their airplay strictly on the basis of merit,” Jane says. “To the extent that payola has been a recurring form of corruption, it has been a cost of doing business competitively that most labels would prefer not to have to pay.”

Kovac, the indie label head, throws the blame back on the major labels for perpetuating “an old system that shouldn’t even be around anymore.” “If you’re a promo guy, and you’re bonused on charts, what’s the problem with incentives?” he continues. “They work. If you’re [Universal Music Group CEO] Lucian Grainge and you said to all the presidents of all your labels, ‘Tell your head of promotion from now on they only get paid on consumption [rather than spin-based charts],’ all of a sudden you’ve changed the incentive.”

Many in radio claim not to be fond of the current system either. “We hate it on our end,” James says. “But again, they sign documentation saying that there’s no money being exchanged for airplay. I guess there is money being exchanged for airplay, because you have to pay it. [Radio stations] have a choice of so many different records that they can play [instead of yours]. You’re either in or you’re out.”

Promoters and programmers say radio stations with exclusive promotion arrangements do stand to benefit from them. Phil Becker, EVP of programming for Alpha Media, says these exclusive relationships help streamline a hectic process for overworked program directors. And someone who worked at a group of radio stations notes that exclusive arrangements also drive revenue and promotional benefits for stations — especially valuable in smaller markets.

“In effect, radio stations are selling airplay to record labels,” says Gabriel Rossman, an associate professor of sociology at UCLA and the author of Climbing the Charts: What Radio Airplay Tells Us About the Diffusion of Innovation. “A lot of it is for promotional support: If the 10th caller gets concert tickets, that sort of thing. It’s a transfer from the labels and the artists to the stations.”

Artists can benefit from this transfer, since power is hyperconcentrated in the music industry. Say an artist doesn’t have a major-label deal, and his team does not have a longstanding relationship with Spotify and Apple Music’s small number of very-hard-to-reach playlist “curators.” In that case, lobbying radio might still allow this artist to get his music in front of a wide audience. That was the case for the industry players who directed strategic payments to DJs.

But even if radio serves to bring attention to unknown artists, it’s a tough game to get involved in without deep pockets — or, more likely, major-label support. To have real success promoting a song to “urban” radio, experts say you have to be able to put up at least $100,000 to $125,000. Pop radio has many more stations, so promotion there is more expensive.

One interpretation of the modern radio system suggests that the high price for airplay is the whole point: It creates a barrier to entry that favors major labels. In 1990’s Hit Men: Power Brokers and Fast Money Inside the Music Business, Fredric Dannen’s detailed history of radio promotion at its most corrupt, the author wrote that “the large record companies understood on some level that if radio airplay were not free, it would mean a major competitive edge.”

Rossman sees it differently. In 1960, he says, “the pre-rock labels were convinced that the only reason rock was played was the indie labels bribed all the DJs. By the 1980s, the dominant narrative was that the major labels compete unfairly through payola. I think it’s just [that] this is how labels compete. There’s a valuable resource, and they bid up the price.”

This is a game primarily for the rich, but playing it still has risks. For one thing, it’s streaming, not radio play, that drives monetization today, so labels largely don’t expect a direct return on their investment. Instead, they hope that the radio exposure they are shelling out for at high prices will boost clicks on Spotify or Apple Music.

But the math might not work that way. A song that is played heavily at radio but not consumed otherwise is known as a “turntable hit.” If an artist has to pay $3,500 for an add in one market, radio play needs to create roughly a million streams in that market to break even. “You’re spending a lot of money in tertiary markets that are playing songs in overnights,” Kovac says. At the same time, “the revenue that would come out of broadcast radio airplay has been reduced by three-quarters, two-thirds, due to the evaporation of CD sales and ever-declining digital sales,” according to a third promoter who spoke on the condition of anonymity. “You’re not seeing the same revenue return from radio airplay because the amount of streams you have to get to make back your investment in radio promotion spending is greater than the short-term return.”

Payola may also complicate marketing strategies. If radio play causes streams to jump, it isn’t easy to determine why they increased. “Is it for the right reasons [e.g. people like the song] or the wrong reasons [e.g. anything else]?” Jane wonders. Plotting the correct next step — the follow-up single, the tour routing — depends on understanding the initial source of success. Pay-for-play practices obscure that.

“It’s not a good thing for the artist,” says one longtime East Coast DJ. “It’s not a good thing for the labels. It’s not a good thing for the integrity of our radio stations.”

But the fate of pay-for-pay-like practices may ultimately be tied to the health of radio itself. “As long as [radio] maintains that hold on breaking new artists [and] new music, there’s always going to be a competition for those limited number of spots on their airplay list,” says Donnelly.

“People are just going to do whatever they have to do to get a play.”

Source (August 7, 2019)

#rolling stone magazine #radio programming #payola #pay-for-play #music industry

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