There are many writers in many films. In Body Double, a book of eight chapters, with acknowledgements, afterword, notes, filmography, bibliography, and index, University of Pittsburgh English and Film Studies professor Lucy Fischer gathers together for examination a great bunch of films in which writers appear—Naked Lunch, Smoke, Deconstructing Harry, Paris When It Sizzles, Barton Fink, Adaptation, How Is Your Fish Today?, Swimming Pool, The Singing Detective, and Providence, among others.
A review of It Came! by Dan Boultwood
Dan Boultwood’s endearing homage to British science fiction films of the 1950s and ‘60s (perhaps above all to The Day of the Triffids) is a wonderfully entertaining read. Jokes aplenty lie on every page, many arising from the xenophobic, sexist attitudes of our hero, a smug scientist and period cad named Dr. Boy Brett.
The Importance of Transcendence: Tenor/Countertenor Darryl Taylor’s Fields of Wonder and How Sweet the Sound
Much of classical music has been founded on the sound of the human voice, in imitation of it, or with the voice at music’s center. Darryl Taylor’s album Fields of Wonder is a return to that elemental beauty. The tenor voice—soaring in a high range in its maturity—is the voice with which others seek to harmonize, and it is usually a lyric tenor or dramatic tenor (and, past and present, black male tenors include Lawrence Brownlee, Vinson Cole, Kenneth Gayle, Roland Hayes, Kenn Hicks, George Shirley, Noah Stewart, and Kenneth Tarver).
A review of Fighting Chess with Hikaru Nakamura A Chess Career in the Footsteps of Bobby Fischer by Karsten Müller and Raymund Stolze
Nakamura’s prowess in the endgame, his opening repertoire and in particular his penchant for the King’s Indian Defence, the risk taking and fighting spirit that’s so characteristic of his style, and of course his enthusiasm for bullet and blitz: these are some of the topics under discussion. A wide-ranging interview takes up the bulk of chapter 6.
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The winner will be drawn on the first of April 2014 from subscribers who enter via the newsletter. Good luck!
Art and Environment: Manufacturing Landscapes, featuring photographer Edward Burtynsky
John James Audubon may have been a naturalist and a painter, but it does seem all that often that one gets to contemplate both art and environmental issues, as with Manufacturing Landscapes, a film that presents the work of Canadian photographer Edward Burtynsky, who focuses on nature and how it has been transformed by industrial use, producing a different landscape, often one of devastation, yet one in which an unexpected beauty can be found.
On Gertrude Stein, and Tragedy and Transcendence in Stein: Writings 1903-1932
In reading some of the description of Gertrude Stein’s life, and how she came to be an art patron—a friend to artists, an owner of their work, a facilitator of relationships—I was impressed by how intimate and simple were the lives of now famous artists, how vivid the memory. One artist spreads news of the work of another artist, Pissarro talking with others about Cezanne; or one gallerist, Vollard, introducing Cezanne, Daumier, Manet, Renoirs, and Gauguin to those who might appreciate them.
A review of Fast Fiction: A Guide to Outlining and Writing a First-Draft Novel in Thirty Days by Denise Jaden
The book is designed to be used in a kinaesthetic way – through practical exercises that take the writer from the brainstorming of story ideas through to a three-act plot, writing a workable synopsis, creating characters, working up dialogue, themes, setting, building conflict, using symbols, setting scenes, and working up a cohesive story plan (call it an outline if you want). All of these are elements of good fiction, and Jaden covers them in a surprising amount of detail and in a way which is not facile at all.
A review of Rare Breeds by Terry Bridge
All in all the book is well written, provides a wealth of information regarding many agricultural animals, is filled with many photos of animals often not seen any more. Humans have long bred critters to improve productivity, the few breeds used today mean many of the rarer, interesting breeds are being ignored. Realizing the importance of maintaining gene pool capability enables enthusiasts who are setting up small breeding programs to conserve for the future farm animals for future generations to know and enjoy.
A review of American Sycamore by Karen Fielding
American Sycamore is as intimate as a chat with a friend or a reminiscence on a summer evening in a big comfortable armchair on the front porch. While reading, you physically sense the smell of the river, and the insects. You feel the place. You want to hold this book, carry it around to accidentally open, and read new stories.