It happened a few months ago. I was walking across a parking lot in the middle of the day. My path took me near a youth, maybe eighteen, not very imposing. As I drew near, he muttered something. I looked around, thinking he might be talking to someone behind me. No one. So I turned back to the kid and said, "What?"
"G'meadolla."
It took me a moment to translate. "You want me to give you a dollar?"
"Yeh. Gi' me a dolla."
I looked around again, to make absolutely sure he was talking to me, and to see if any friends of his might be showing up. Still nobody.
Furrowed brow. "Why should I give you a dollar?"
This was his cue to produce a weapon, or a threat—in which case he would have gotten his dollar—but he did nothing.
I detoured slightly to get around him and went about my business.
So the kid got his feet wet. This may have been his first attempt at thuggery, and while he didn't get his dollar, the experience was relatively painless. Next time he'll be ready to back up his request. Maybe he'll elaborate: "Heh, I need a dolla to get a taco." Maybe he'll start carrying a knife. Maybe he'll bring friends.
But I'll be better prepared too. Of course, the main option will be to fork over the dollar (or whatever amount he requests). But I've got another idea that may work:
"G'meadolla."
"Kid, where do you live? I need to talk to your mama about you asking strangers for money."
Yeah, that might throw him.
Tuesday, June 28, 2011
Wednesday, June 22, 2011
Coincidence #6
The last three films I've watched are Catherine Breillat's 2009 retelling of Bluebeard; Looking for Comedy in the Muslim World, a mostly unsuccessful comedy from 2006 that has Albert Brooks traveling (via Air India) to India and Pakistan to find out what makes Muslims laugh; and the 1962 French thriller Le combat dans l'île.
The thriller included a shot of an Air India jet and a mention of Bluebeard. Which is mildly cool.
The thriller included a shot of an Air India jet and a mention of Bluebeard. Which is mildly cool.
Sunday, May 8, 2011
The Great Recession
Periodically, Andrew Sullivan's blog, The Dish, links to a chart comparing unemployment rates for all the recessions since World War Two. The latest update is here. (Unemployment rates are compared in the second chart.) Have a look. Can there be any doubt that the name, "The Great Recession," is well-deserved?
Book Report
So what does one read after The Fountainhead, which is both an earnest self-help manual as well as a fount of misantropy; which manages to raise a paean to the human spirit, and pee on it at the same time?
I'm glad I asked.
When I decided to blog The Fountainhead, I had chosen another book to read, just for my own pleasure; but I hadn't started it. Now was the time to return to Nathaniel West's 1934 novel, A Cool Million. Boy, talk about a palate cleanser! This short novel (or long parable) tells the story of an innocent from the countryside who ventures out into the world and ... is torn to shreds. This is one dark and bloody satire. (It even touches on the political arguments of the time, such as the war between collectivism and libertarianism. Hmm, where have we heard that discussion?) In some ways the story resembles Candide—the protagonist has a Cunégonde-like admirer who is made to suffer greatly. But in West's world, anyone attempting to cultivate their garden would be trampled by common thieves and grasping capitalists. The book is an acid bath, a universal solvent of cynicism.
Now I am halfway through Henry James's 1899 novel, The Awkward Age. At a rented estate in the English countryside, the Duchess has just laid her cards on the table for Mr. Longdon, which revelation promises to drive the action of the remainder of the book. After reading Rand and West, it takes a while to adjust to James's overstuffed prose. It's a shock to the digestion, like suddenly reverting to certain recipes of the 1950's, when everything was prepared with lots of cream and butter.
Seriously, I find I have to put my mind into four-wheel drive to take in such passages.
But the pleasure of reading James is his characters. These are people with good and bad tendencies, but their motivations are well worked out; no one is evil purely because the story needs a villain at some point. The conflicts are real (i.e., between real people), not expressions of ideology or cynicism. I'm rooting for Vanderbank and Nanda to get together, but if circumstances take the story elsewhere, it won't be because someone starts behaving out of character or someone else shows up from nowhere to intervene by magic. A true, sensible universe is comforting, and sometimes the reader needs comfort.
I'm glad I asked.
When I decided to blog The Fountainhead, I had chosen another book to read, just for my own pleasure; but I hadn't started it. Now was the time to return to Nathaniel West's 1934 novel, A Cool Million. Boy, talk about a palate cleanser! This short novel (or long parable) tells the story of an innocent from the countryside who ventures out into the world and ... is torn to shreds. This is one dark and bloody satire. (It even touches on the political arguments of the time, such as the war between collectivism and libertarianism. Hmm, where have we heard that discussion?) In some ways the story resembles Candide—the protagonist has a Cunégonde-like admirer who is made to suffer greatly. But in West's world, anyone attempting to cultivate their garden would be trampled by common thieves and grasping capitalists. The book is an acid bath, a universal solvent of cynicism.
Now I am halfway through Henry James's 1899 novel, The Awkward Age. At a rented estate in the English countryside, the Duchess has just laid her cards on the table for Mr. Longdon, which revelation promises to drive the action of the remainder of the book. After reading Rand and West, it takes a while to adjust to James's overstuffed prose. It's a shock to the digestion, like suddenly reverting to certain recipes of the 1950's, when everything was prepared with lots of cream and butter.
"Would you," the Duchess said to him the next day, "be for five minutes awfully kind to my poor little niece?" The words were spoken in charming entreaty as he issued from the house late on the Sunday afternoon—the second evening of his stay, which the next morning was to bring to an end—and on his meeting the speaker at one of the extremities of the wide cool terrace. There was at this point a subsidiary flight of steps by which she had just mounted from the grounds, one of her purposes being apparently to testify afresh to that anxious supervision of little Aggie from which she had momentarily suffered herself to be diverted. This young lady, established in the pleasant shade of a sofa of light construction designed for the open air, offered the image of a patience of which it was a questionable kindness to break the spell. It was that beautiful hour when, toward the close of the happiest days of summer, such places as the great terrace at Mertle present to the fancy a recall of the banquet-hall deserted—deserted by the company lately gathered at tea and now dispersed, according to affinities and combinations promptly felt and perhaps quite as promptly criticised, either in quieter chambers where intimacy might deepen or in gardens and under trees where the stillness knew the click of balls and the good-humour of games....OK, if you say so.
Seriously, I find I have to put my mind into four-wheel drive to take in such passages.
But the pleasure of reading James is his characters. These are people with good and bad tendencies, but their motivations are well worked out; no one is evil purely because the story needs a villain at some point. The conflicts are real (i.e., between real people), not expressions of ideology or cynicism. I'm rooting for Vanderbank and Nanda to get together, but if circumstances take the story elsewhere, it won't be because someone starts behaving out of character or someone else shows up from nowhere to intervene by magic. A true, sensible universe is comforting, and sometimes the reader needs comfort.
Saturday, April 23, 2011
The Fountainhead: The Movie
There is a wonderful bit of dialogue in the film version of The Fountainhead that wasn't in the book.
In the book, Dominique Francon has a brief moment of passion with a worker in a granite quarry. By "moment of passion," I mean that she flirts with the man, and later on he shows up at her home and forces himself on her. Much later, her husband Gail Wynand brings home the architect Howard Roark for dinner. When she sees Roark, she recognizes him as the quarryman.
In the film, the rape takes place more or less as in the book. But the subsequent meeting takes place in a public place, a celebration of the opening of Enright House. Dominique had written a column about Roark's work, and at their meeting she mentions her column. Roark (leering): I remember every line of it. Dominique: I wish I had never seen ... your building.
"Column" and "building": What clever ways to get around the censors!
The movie, directed by King Vidor, is a lot of fun, at least for someone who has read the book. Gary Cooper is twenty years too old to play Howard Roark; this is all but acknowledged in the opening scenes of the film, which zip through the novel's early years and only show Roark in darkened silhouette. But Coop is the right "type" for the role—upright and taciturn. Patricia Neal is brilliant as Dominique. She brings TEH CRAZEE, as they say, depicting a very disturbed and very beautiful woman. Raymond Massey is more than adequate as Gail Wynand. In Ayn Rand's screenplay, the figures of Keating and Toohey are much reduced from the book—a wise choice. Max Steiner's score is just the sort of stirring romantic music the film needs.
The clunky parts of dialogue are the sometimes lengthy discourses on Objectivism that Rand insisted on keeping in the screenplay. This was her privilege, and her philosophy is the driving force of the book; but Cooper's delivery of Roark's long courtroom speech is painfully wooden.
Still, Rand did a fine job chopping away big parts of the book to make a two-hour screenplay, and the movie came out much better than I expected.
In the book, Dominique Francon has a brief moment of passion with a worker in a granite quarry. By "moment of passion," I mean that she flirts with the man, and later on he shows up at her home and forces himself on her. Much later, her husband Gail Wynand brings home the architect Howard Roark for dinner. When she sees Roark, she recognizes him as the quarryman.
In the film, the rape takes place more or less as in the book. But the subsequent meeting takes place in a public place, a celebration of the opening of Enright House. Dominique had written a column about Roark's work, and at their meeting she mentions her column. Roark (leering): I remember every line of it. Dominique: I wish I had never seen ... your building.
"Column" and "building": What clever ways to get around the censors!
The movie, directed by King Vidor, is a lot of fun, at least for someone who has read the book. Gary Cooper is twenty years too old to play Howard Roark; this is all but acknowledged in the opening scenes of the film, which zip through the novel's early years and only show Roark in darkened silhouette. But Coop is the right "type" for the role—upright and taciturn. Patricia Neal is brilliant as Dominique. She brings TEH CRAZEE, as they say, depicting a very disturbed and very beautiful woman. Raymond Massey is more than adequate as Gail Wynand. In Ayn Rand's screenplay, the figures of Keating and Toohey are much reduced from the book—a wise choice. Max Steiner's score is just the sort of stirring romantic music the film needs.
The clunky parts of dialogue are the sometimes lengthy discourses on Objectivism that Rand insisted on keeping in the screenplay. This was her privilege, and her philosophy is the driving force of the book; but Cooper's delivery of Roark's long courtroom speech is painfully wooden.
Still, Rand did a fine job chopping away big parts of the book to make a two-hour screenplay, and the movie came out much better than I expected.
On Blogging The Fountainhead; And: Conclusions
A few years ago, David Plotz, a not-very-religious writer at slate.com, took on the task of blogging the Bible. It was a popular series of articles. Plotz learned a lot, his readers learned a lot, and he eventually got a book out of the experience. It helped that he's a good writer.
January 2011. Here I am, trying to push myself to write. And here's this book, The Fountainhead, which some denounce as trash and some revere as a religious text. So hey! If Plotz can blog a long book, so can I. If nothing else, it will be good writing practice.
And so it was. I can't vouch for the reader's experience. I'm not sure I even want to think about it. But overall, it's been a gas to write. There will not be a book, however.
The debate over Ayn Rand continues. Andrew Sullivan's blog, The Dish, has hosted an ongoing discussion of Rand's influence. A couple of interesting assertions:
Objectivism is the sort of philosophy many kids adopt and then grow out of by the time they're thirteen. I get the point. We are instructed to sneer at any grownup who looks up to Rand and her ideas. Right. Why limit ourselves to a discussion of the ideas—and from what I've seen of it, I do find Objectivism to be pretty laughable—when we can throw personal insults about. That's so adult.
Rand's novels are particularly appealing to high-achieving girls; they completely identify with the geniuses under attack by a conformist society. Interesting thought. The idea is that in school, girls are put under intense peer pressure not to stand out. Just when they want to discover their selves and cultivate their own abilities, they are told to stay with the pack. Hmm. I don't know if that's true, but it makes sense.
My far-too-brief, altogether-too-pat conclusions—
Ayn Rand was a skilled writer and a droning, ham-handed polemicist. She did a brilliant job skewering the hypocricy of the left. She could write exciting bits of plot. But it was her ambition to preach, to prove her system. Her ideal, the self-contained genius, doesn't work in the real world.
In condemning altruism, she claims that no one can reach the ideal of being a pure altruist; thus we are all condemned to fall short. Yet being a pure individualist is just as impossible for everyone but the sociopath. We are all doomed to be something less than pure egotists.
But I'm venturing into philosophy and getting rapidly out of my depth. Let's get back to the book.
Roark and Toohey bear the burden of personifying the extremes of Rand's world-view; they barely register as human. Roark is innocent genius, mostly disconnected from human interaction. (His out-of-character friendship with Wynand is the one part of the novel's depiction that works.) Toohey is a caricature, a mustache-twirling villain.
Dominique is wildly inconsistent, and not in the way actual human beings can be inconsistent. She simply becomes a different person to suit the story, from devouring femme fatale to icily cordial wife to swooning lover to footnote.
Keating is all flaws and no nobility. He is the bedraggled cat captured by the author and released with a string of cans tied to its tail.
Wynand is the character most fully fleshed-out. He is a man of great genius and drive, but circumstances put him on the path of accumulating power, which eventually gains him nothing. His collapse is a bit abrupt, but he breathes real air from time to time.
Rand's universe is a twisted place. The heroes are all rough beasts, unsociable and instinctively disliked by others. Kindliness is the sign of a villain. The people of the world are full of latent hostility, like iron filings rising up in the presence of a magnet. Originality and genius are frightful things to be beaten down as soon as they appear. To Rand, the primary emotion of man is jealousy. The book seems to have been written from a defensive crouch.
I will be paying one more visit to the world of The Fountainhead, and then I will put it behind me. Stay tuned.
January 2011. Here I am, trying to push myself to write. And here's this book, The Fountainhead, which some denounce as trash and some revere as a religious text. So hey! If Plotz can blog a long book, so can I. If nothing else, it will be good writing practice.
And so it was. I can't vouch for the reader's experience. I'm not sure I even want to think about it. But overall, it's been a gas to write. There will not be a book, however.
The debate over Ayn Rand continues. Andrew Sullivan's blog, The Dish, has hosted an ongoing discussion of Rand's influence. A couple of interesting assertions:
Objectivism is the sort of philosophy many kids adopt and then grow out of by the time they're thirteen. I get the point. We are instructed to sneer at any grownup who looks up to Rand and her ideas. Right. Why limit ourselves to a discussion of the ideas—and from what I've seen of it, I do find Objectivism to be pretty laughable—when we can throw personal insults about. That's so adult.
Rand's novels are particularly appealing to high-achieving girls; they completely identify with the geniuses under attack by a conformist society. Interesting thought. The idea is that in school, girls are put under intense peer pressure not to stand out. Just when they want to discover their selves and cultivate their own abilities, they are told to stay with the pack. Hmm. I don't know if that's true, but it makes sense.
My far-too-brief, altogether-too-pat conclusions—
Ayn Rand was a skilled writer and a droning, ham-handed polemicist. She did a brilliant job skewering the hypocricy of the left. She could write exciting bits of plot. But it was her ambition to preach, to prove her system. Her ideal, the self-contained genius, doesn't work in the real world.
In condemning altruism, she claims that no one can reach the ideal of being a pure altruist; thus we are all condemned to fall short. Yet being a pure individualist is just as impossible for everyone but the sociopath. We are all doomed to be something less than pure egotists.
But I'm venturing into philosophy and getting rapidly out of my depth. Let's get back to the book.
Roark and Toohey bear the burden of personifying the extremes of Rand's world-view; they barely register as human. Roark is innocent genius, mostly disconnected from human interaction. (His out-of-character friendship with Wynand is the one part of the novel's depiction that works.) Toohey is a caricature, a mustache-twirling villain.
Dominique is wildly inconsistent, and not in the way actual human beings can be inconsistent. She simply becomes a different person to suit the story, from devouring femme fatale to icily cordial wife to swooning lover to footnote.
Keating is all flaws and no nobility. He is the bedraggled cat captured by the author and released with a string of cans tied to its tail.
Wynand is the character most fully fleshed-out. He is a man of great genius and drive, but circumstances put him on the path of accumulating power, which eventually gains him nothing. His collapse is a bit abrupt, but he breathes real air from time to time.
Rand's universe is a twisted place. The heroes are all rough beasts, unsociable and instinctively disliked by others. Kindliness is the sign of a villain. The people of the world are full of latent hostility, like iron filings rising up in the presence of a magnet. Originality and genius are frightful things to be beaten down as soon as they appear. To Rand, the primary emotion of man is jealousy. The book seems to have been written from a defensive crouch.
I will be paying one more visit to the world of The Fountainhead, and then I will put it behind me. Stay tuned.
The Fountainhead: Howard Roark: 18-20
In the Roark trial, the prosecution accuses Roark of being something "monstrous and inconceivable"—an egotist. The arresting officer, the night watchman, and other witnesses testify. Keating affirms that it was Roark who designed Cortlandt Homes. The contract is brandished. The prosecution rests. Roark rises to give his statement. It runs 7½ pages.
The man who discovered how to make fire, Roark says, was probably burned at the stake. The inventor of the wheel was probably torn on the rack.
(What? The same guy invented the wheel and the rack?)
Let's face it. There are a few creators; everyone else is apoopyhead second-hander. Creators are not out to help anyone else; they are merely seekers of truth. Second-handers glom off creators' creations. They are parasites.
The creator operates out of his own self, his ego. The ego is the truthiest thing.
There is no collective mind. There are only individuals. Agreements, committee decisions—these are secondary things.
Altruists depend on others for validation. Depending on others is slavery. Slavery—physical bondage—is bad. Altruism—mental bondage—is bad squared.
Second-handers agree with others; they swim with the current. Creators disagree. The creator's virtue is his ability to stand by himself.
Independence is good. Interdependence is evil.
I created Cortlandt Homes. Second-handers perverted it. As its creator, I had the right to destroy it.
This is a great country, built by creators, not second-handers. If I am sentenced to ten years in prison, I will serve my term in memory of what a great country this used to be.
Roark says all these things, and more besides. The prosecution sums up its case. The jury spends a few seconds in the jury room before returning with a verdict of not guilty.
Roger Enright buys the Cortlandt site and has Roark rebuild the project in his own pure vision.
Wynand gets his divorce.
Toohey brings a wrongful termination case before the labor board. He wins. Wynand tells him to report to work the evening of the ruling. Toohey reports, sits at his old desk, and listens to the presses running; Wynand stand nearby. Then the presses stop. Wynand: Hope you enjoyed your job. It's over. I have shut down the Banner.
Toohey finds another job.
Wynand invites Roark to his office and formally invites him to design and construct the Wynand building. It will be the world's tallest skyscraper. Roark accepts and they sign the contract. Wynand specifies that this is the last contact the two of them will have.
Eighteen months later, Dominique comes to the Wynand building construction site. A hoist carries her up, up into the sky. Waiting for her at the top of the universe is Howard Roark.
THE END
I'll have some closing comments anon.
The man who discovered how to make fire, Roark says, was probably burned at the stake. The inventor of the wheel was probably torn on the rack.
(What? The same guy invented the wheel and the rack?)
Let's face it. There are a few creators; everyone else is a
The creator operates out of his own self, his ego. The ego is the truthiest thing.
There is no collective mind. There are only individuals. Agreements, committee decisions—these are secondary things.
Altruists depend on others for validation. Depending on others is slavery. Slavery—physical bondage—is bad. Altruism—mental bondage—is bad squared.
Second-handers agree with others; they swim with the current. Creators disagree. The creator's virtue is his ability to stand by himself.
Independence is good. Interdependence is evil.
I created Cortlandt Homes. Second-handers perverted it. As its creator, I had the right to destroy it.
This is a great country, built by creators, not second-handers. If I am sentenced to ten years in prison, I will serve my term in memory of what a great country this used to be.
Roark says all these things, and more besides. The prosecution sums up its case. The jury spends a few seconds in the jury room before returning with a verdict of not guilty.
Roger Enright buys the Cortlandt site and has Roark rebuild the project in his own pure vision.
Wynand gets his divorce.
Toohey brings a wrongful termination case before the labor board. He wins. Wynand tells him to report to work the evening of the ruling. Toohey reports, sits at his old desk, and listens to the presses running; Wynand stand nearby. Then the presses stop. Wynand: Hope you enjoyed your job. It's over. I have shut down the Banner.
Toohey finds another job.
Wynand invites Roark to his office and formally invites him to design and construct the Wynand building. It will be the world's tallest skyscraper. Roark accepts and they sign the contract. Wynand specifies that this is the last contact the two of them will have.
Eighteen months later, Dominique comes to the Wynand building construction site. A hoist carries her up, up into the sky. Waiting for her at the top of the universe is Howard Roark.
THE END
I'll have some closing comments anon.
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