MeyerBros

How the hell can you argue with this list of courses and course textbooks for my fall semester? You can’t, so don’t try. It kicks ass.

Narrative Theology - Keith Graber Miller

Theologies of Whiteness - Dean Johnson

Love and Justice - Malinda E. Berry

Can you really argue with that? I’m lovin’ it…

2 out of 5 stars
someone airbrushed my fugard

I have to admit - I saw it coming when I saw the airbrushed cover art. And I was right. Within the first five minutes this movie had deviated so far from the book (and the book’s intention) that there was no way back. The complexity of Athol Fugard’s characters is reduced to simplistic stereotyping and meaningless redemption. Fugard’s story is gritty and complex, where this movie has an air-brushed and pristine gilding with nothing underneath. The movie changes everything from Tsotsi’s past (where the political context of apartheid is removed and replaced by a drunk father), to the present story (where a complex story of personal growth is replaced by a crime thriller), and even his implied future (where an honest story of redemption is replaced by, well, fluff). There is no way to call this the same story. Please read the book (and the rest of Athol Fugard’s work) before you watch this movie.

my reviews of “snakes on a plane”, “a man without a country” by kurt vonnegut jr., and a South Bend Tribune review of “Danny and the Deep Blue Sea” as performed at New World Arts.
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this is an expiriment in reviewing a book in the style of the book itself. don’t trust it. in fact, i wouldn’t bother reading it. it goes bad by the end of the first paragraph, and paragraph three is entirely innapropriate. some of the comments might be interesting though. you could just skip to them.

this isn’t right.

this is right. it’s the only way to do this, get it all over with at once. it’ll be great. self referential and everything, just like A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius, except more so because it’s a review written in the style of the book. maybe even from the perspective of the author. no. yes. or as me writing as the author or the other way around. a self aware review mixed with vacation memoire about a memoir book. it’ll be the best thing i’ve ever written. it is the best thing i’ve ever written. you’re going to love it. you do love it. you hate it. i can tell you hate it. you’re never going to talk to me again. i’ll become depressed and and start drinking too much - random sex without condoms - AIDS - and then you’ll feel sorry. why don’t you like me anymore?

i really wasn’t that impressed with several things. AHWOSG, for one, and the eiffel tour for two. also versailles and AHWOSG again. the book just wasn’t all it was cracked up to be. i wasn’t sure it went anywhere. the eiffel tour and versailles certainly did not go anywhere. they were big.

i should probably also mention that i haven’t had much sex in a while (with or without condoms) and even masturbation has been lacking. and while i know i will be judged by all of you for saying that, it doesn’t really matter because i could be lying. i am lying. maybe i’m lying. if i am i apologise, but still think you deserve it.

the point is, the book didn’t do much for me. neither did the french revolution. french cheese on the other hand… and oh the fondue… etc.

orgasmic, you might say.

is this pornography? how will we know? can we define the destinction between art and porn? can dave eggers define it? bobby meyer-lee? who’s definition would we go by?

how about mental illness? who defines that? who has it? what should we do about it?

racism?

this is an apology for this post. i’m very sorry. i’m not sorry. blame dave.

So we saw Jane Eyre tonight at Trafalgar Studios on the West End. Great directing, great acting, great set, great lighting–great show! The company is Shared Experience, and Polly Teale is co-Artistic Director. No wonder they’ve performed After Mrs. Rochester a lot, and now also Jane Eyre and another one she wrote called Bronte. Helen Edmundson, who wrote Mill On the Floss used to be a member of the company as well. But yeah, it was definitely worth the amazing 4th row center 17.50 pound seats (man I love London’s student concessions).

Tomorrow morning we’re up early to catch a 5:30 am cab to Heathrow airport, and then on to Bulgaria!

Breakfast on Pluto is a great new movie with Cillian Murphy as an Irish transvestite in the 70’s. I watched tonight and was blown away. Another great story from writer/director Neil Jordan who also wrote and directed The Crying Game. Both are entirely worth your time - though this one is distinctly more positive (in its own little way) than the earlier. And Patrick ‘Kitten’ Braden rivals any of my uninterested heroes - defining a new, more intriguing, niche in the genre (The Dude (Big Lebowski) and Cool Hand Luke being other favorites).

Speaking of The Dude: Last night’s film was The Hudsucker Proxy, another Coen Brothers favorite of mine (co-written with Sam Raimi (who caught that the name ‘Hudsucker’ was stolen from an earlier Coen/Raimi collaboration (starring who else)? come on, people, try to keep up). Tim Robbins is great, I love Paul Newman, and I expected Bruce Campbell (I already linked to him) but suddenly I was seeing Steve Buscemi in a bit part and John Mahoney (who I loved on stage at the Steppenwolf in Chicago “I Never Sang for my Father”) as the newspaper editor. oh - the connections. i love (pseudo)indi-film.

Today I also ordered several books:

• Stone Cold Dead Serious by Adam Rapp
• Fat Pig by Neil Labute
• Indian Killer Sherman Alexie
• The Saint Plays Erik Ehn
• Passion Play: A Cycle by Sarah Ruhl

I’m most excited by those last two, with Sherman Alexi close behind (though this doesn’t look like his most interesting book (i’m not the thriller sort)).

just finnished “love” by Toni Morrison. i think it wasn’t what i expected, but who can remember exactly what they expected when they started reading a book? it kept me intrigued and kept me reading, so i’d recomend it.

then i got “metamagical themas” by Douglas R. Hofstadter out again. i may also start something like “kite runner” if Michelle has her way. sounds good to me.

Wow. I feel totally honored to join y’all here as an official contributor. Hopefully you won’t downgrade my privileges anytime soon. Here’s my first post:

What I’ve Been Reading
(and would like to share with you)

1) “Holy Skirts” by Rene Steinke, a novel about the Baroness Elsa van Freytag-Lorenghoven. Subtitled “A novel of a flamboyant woman who risked all for art.”

This woman was courageous, outrageous, and true to herself even when it hurt. She didn’t just make art, she lived it. A close friend and would-be lover of Marcel Duchamp. She wore taillights, bird cages (avec bird), and postage stamps, among other things, and a Time writer wrote of her: “She was New York’s first punk persona 60 years before their time.” Everyone thought she was crazy by the end of her life, perhaps from syphillis, but perhaps, as Ezra Pound wrote of her in a poem:

“Well, of course, there was a certain strain
On the gal in them days in Manhattan
the principle of non-acquiescence
laid a burden.”

I think I want to write a play about her.
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I just finished Athol Fugard’s one and only novel - recently recovered from his archives and edited for publication despite his claims that it wasn’t worthwhile. Very good except for the ‘now a major motion picture’ cover art with a heavily airbrushed clean/faux-gritty photo of a South African youth. I hope the movie isn’t in that style (I hate the super-clean look that tries to be gritty but has all the blemishes and specs removed. Disgusting. Like Crash - but now I’m way off topic). The book is very good and you should read it.
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