Proust again

On reading:

In the sort of screen dappled with different states of mind which my consciousness would simultaneously unfold while I read, and which ranged from the aspirations hidden deepest within me to the completely exterior view of the horizon which I had, at the bottom of the garden, before my eyes, what was first in me, innermost, the constantly moving handle that controlled the rest, was my belief in the philosophical richness and the beauty of the book I was reading, and my desire to appropriate them for myself, whatever that book might be. For, even if I had bought it in Combray, having seen it in front of Borange's grocery, which was too far away from the house for Françoise to be able to do her shopping there as she did at Camus's, but which was better stocked as stationer and bookshop, held in place by some strings in the mosaic of pamphlets and monthly serials that covered the two panels of its door, which was itself more mysterious, more sown with ideas than the door of a cathedral, the fact was that I had recognized it as having been mentioned to me as a remarkable work by the teacher or friend who appeared to me at that period to hold the secret of the truth and beauty half sensed, half incomprehensible, the knowledge of which was the goal, vague but permanent, of my thoughts.

From Swann's Way, translated by Lydia Davis (New York: Viking, 2002), 85-86

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Dance Festival

From this morning's New York Times:

No one is quite sure when New York City children began celebrating spring by dancing in schoolyards, their teachers leading them, often awkwardly, through the steps, their proud parents gathered round, snapping pictures and clapping along. It is a peculiar urban rite — called Dance Festival in most of the city, and May Fete on Staten Island — that has been around, it seems, for as long as the public school system itself.

My most vivid Dance Festival memories (P.S. 131, Boro Park, Brooklyn): crepe-paper sashes and armbands and a song called "Wind the Bobbin":

Wind, wind, wind the bobbin,
Wind, wind, wind the bobbin,
Pull, and pull,
And clap, clap, clap.

Or was it "Tap, tap, tap"?

Oh to be a city-kid again.

Link » When School Turns Into the Land of 1,000 Dances
(New York Times, registration required)

From Proust

Marcel Proust on "'seeing a person we know'":

But even with respect to the most insignificant things in life, none of us constitutes a material whole, identical for everyone, which a person has only to go look up as though we were a book of specifications or a last testament; our social personality is a creation of the minds of others. Even the very simple act that we call "seeing a person we know" is in part an intellectual one. We fill the physical appearance of the individual we see with all the notions we have about him, and of the total picture that we form for ourselves, these notions certainly occupy the greater part. In the end they swell his cheeks so perfectly, follow the line of his nose in an adherence so exact, they do so well at nuancing the sonority of his voice as though the latter were only a transparent envelope that each time we see this face and hear this voice, it is these notions that we encounter again, that we hear.

From Swann's Way, translated by Lydia Davis (New York: Viking, 2002)

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The dowdy world goes to a party

That's an early Father's Day present, Parties for All Occasions, by Jane Werner (Racine, WI: Whitman Publishing Company, 1941). Here are Miss Werner's suggestions for one such party. Mind you, this party's for grown-ups:

SLEIGH OR HAY RIDE

Invitations: By telephone if you like, but this is a perfect opportunity for original invitations. These should be very simple. For a hay ride they could be of brown wrapping paper, for a sleigh ride a circle of white to represent a snow ball. Color is almost an essential; even if you are not artistic you can manage funny stick figures in colored pencil to decorate the invitations. And a rhyme is worth the effort; perhaps it may be something like:

      With a hi! and a ho! it's a hay (sleigh) ride!
      Climb aboard at half past eight!
      We'll be starting from our door
      Promptly then — but not before —
      So we urge you not to come too late!

Hour: Any time during the evening.

Decorations: A basement game room is ideal for after-the-ride refreshment and games. If you do not have one, try to carry out the informal spirit of the party in the rooms you do use. A scarecrow might greet the guests after a hay ride. If cornstalks are not in season, jars full of grasses would be decorative. Shiny Christmas tree icicles and evergreen boughs covered with artificial snow would help suggest winter for a sleigh ride.

The table for a hay ride should be covered with a bright cloth, and your brightest pottery should be used. A centerpiece of fresh vegetables might be used.

A typical winter table might have a mirror centerpiece surrounded by cotton batting snow, with paper or pipe-cleaner figures skating, skiing, and enjoying other winter sports. They can be dressed up easily in bits of colored paper or cloth, with green paper trees in the background.

Refreshments: One hot dish, such as chili or oyster stew. Something hearty and fairly substantial is essential for crisp winter weather, followed by hot chocolate and cookies.

Of course warm weather would demand lighter refreshments. Perhaps cold meats, vegetable salad, rolls, a cold drink (or coffee) and cookies would be the solution. Or you might serve individual picnic lunches packed in boxes covered with colored paper.

These tips are followed by descriptions of several games that might follow the refreshments: On the Ski Trail, Walk to the Duck Pond, Livestock, Snowflake Tennis, Wit-Tickler.

While waiting for cornstalks and snowflakes to be in season, you can read more about "the dowdy world" via the links.

Link » The dowdy world on film
Link » The dowdy world on radio

Hail, kale

Eating vegan has the paradoxical effect of opening up one's food choices in all sorts of unexpected ways. Tonight, there was kale, which I'd never eaten before. Sauteed with olive oil and garlic, it's a hearty, satisfying vegetable.

O kin to broccoli and Brussels sprout,
Thy bounty gaineth favor at our board!

Hail to thee, blithe kale.

Link » Kale (from Wikipedia)
Link » Kale (from The World's Healthiest Foods)
Link » Kale and collard greens (from molliekatzen.com)

Movie recommendation: The Honeymoon Killers

François Truffaut called The Honeymoon Killers (1970) his favorite American film. It was written and directed by Leonard Kastle and is based on the true-crime story of Raymond Fernandez and Martha Beck, the "Lonely Hearts Killers," who teamed up to con gullible spinsters and widows of their savings and lives. Kastle, an opera composer, had never made a film before; his friend Warren Steibel (producer of William F. Buckley's television show Firing Line) suggested that the Fernandez-Beck story would make a good film.

Ray (played by Tony Lo Bianco) is a cheap approximation of elegance; Martha (played by Shirley Stoler) is a sour, haughty, contentious woman whose every attempt at conversation seems to turn into an argument. (Stoler's work is almost certainly a major influence on Divine in John Waters' films.) Ray and Martha's mutual passion takes us into operatic territory as they move from murder to murder to their own destruction, accompanied by excerpts from Mahler's Sixth Symphony.

The Honeymoon Killers is no gore-fest, but it is strong stuff: the brief on-screen violence is terrifying in its matter-of-factness. "Hit her again," says Ray. "Finish her," says Martha. What happens off-screen, toward the film's end, is even more terrifying. The film's greatest distinction lies in its hilariously deadpan dialogue, spoken by characters who are wholly without irony. Here are Ray and Martha bickering in the house they've just bought, in Valley Stream, Long Island:

Ray: Don't eat candy at ten o'clock in the morning.

Martha: It's because you're making me nervous!

Ray: You're nervous! How do you think I feel, sitting around here day after day? Now I've even taken to reading these stupid magazines of yours! . . . They call this place Valley Stream. Hmm, hmm. What a joke. One little jail after another with ten feet of grass between them. Valley Stream. I hate it here.

Shooting with a very modest budget ($150,000), Leonard Kastle made a masterpiece. I'd liken The Honeymoon Killers to Herk Harvey's Carnival of Souls (1962), another great American film made with maximal imagination and minimal resources. Both films are available from The Criterion Collection, in beautiful digital transfers, with all sorts of wonderful extras.

Link » The Honeymoon Killers (The Criterion Collection)
Link » Carnival of Souls (The Criterion Collection)

Revenant

From Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day:

revenant   \REV-uh-nahng (the final "ng" is not pronounced, but the vowel is nasalized)\ noun: one that returns after death or a long absence

Example sentence: The play is about a family of revenants who come back to their ancestral home after years of political exile.

Did you know? Frightening or friendly, the classic revenant was a ghost — a specter returned from the dead. Even in figurative uses, death played its hand. When Sir Walter Scott, in his 1828 novel The Fair Maid of Perth, used "revenant" in one of the earliest uses of the word in English, he was referring to a criminal who had survived the gallows, who "was cut down and given to his friends before life was extinct, and . . . recovered." Eventually, though, we appended a more earthly meaning: a revenant can be a flesh-and-blood returnee when we use it simply to mean a person who shows up after a long absence. We borrowed "revenant" from the French, who created it from their verb "revenir," which means simply "to return," as does its Latin ancestor, "revenire."

"Revenant" has two associations for me. The word turns up in the lyrics of the first song of Sufjan Stevens' Illinois, "Concerning the UFO Sighting near Highland, Illinois":

When the revenant came down
We couldn't imagine what it was

And it furnishes the name of a great record label, Revenant Records, devoted mainly to reissues of neglected American music. Revenant is the label responsible for Screamin' and Hollerin' the Blues: The Worlds of Charley Patton, the best boxed set I've ever seen.

What did she mean by that?

The title of a book my wife Elaine bought for me yesterday:

The Complete Idiot's Guide to Vegan Living

Words, mere words

From Mark Edmundson, Why Read? (Bloomsbury, 2004):

Many humanities teachers feel that they are fighting for a lost cause. They believe that the proliferation of electronic media will eventually make them obsolete. They see the time their students spend with TV and movies and on the Internet, and feel that what they have to offer — words, mere words — must look shabby by comparison.

Not so. When human beings try to come to terms with who they are and describe who they hope to be, the most effective medium is words. Through words we represent ourselves to ourselves; we fix our awareness of who and what we are. Then we can step back and gain distance on what we've said. With perspective comes the possibility for change. People write about their lives in their journals; talk things over with friends; talk, at day's end, to themselves about what has come to pass. And then they can brood on what they've said, privately or with another. From that brooding comes the chance for new beginnings. In this process, words allow for precision and nuance that images and music generally don't permit.

Our culture changes at an astounding velocity, so we must change or pay a price for remaining the same. Accordingly, the powers of self-rendering and self-revision are centrally important. These processes occur best in language. Surely there is something to be learned from the analysis of popular culture. But we as teachers can do better. We can strike to the central issues that confront students and the public at large, rather than relegating ourselves to the edges. People who have taught themselves how to live — what to be, what to do — from reading great works will not be overly susceptible to the culture industry's latest wares. They'll be able to sample them, or turn completely away — they'll have better things on their minds.

[Edmundson is quoting Shakespeare, Troilus and Cressida, 5.3:

Pandarus: What says she there?

Troilus: Words, words, mere words.

I'm reminded too of Hamlet, 2.2:

Polonius: What do you read, my lord?

Hamlet: Words, words, words.]

A related post » Mark Edmundson tells it like it is

Child's play

The Child is father of the Man

William Wordsworth (1770-1850), "My Heart Leaps Up"

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Child — the child, Father of the man

Van Dyke Parks (b. 1943), "Child Is Father of the Man," from SMiLE (words by Van Dyke Parks, music by Brian Wilson)

*

Most of my ideas come from my childhood. I just needed the knowledge and skills to develop them.

Gerhard Trimpin (b. 1951), sound sculptor and installation artist, quoted in an article by Jean Strouse, "Perpetual Motion," in The New Yorker, May 8, 2006