Five extended thoughts
Aug. 22nd, 2005 08:39 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
tarigwaemirDeWolfe Apts., on the Memorial of the Queenship of Mary
Meant to say all this yesterday but was running short on time and felt too sleepy. So, a list of things I meant to write on LJ, whether you're interested or not:
1. Daera and I managed to get intoxicated for the first time in our lives on Saturday night. Er...Sunday morning? We opened the bottle of champagne at around 11:30 and finished it a little before 3. We learned that:
2. Murakami isn't an author about whom I can facetiously say, "Oh, I love his writing," because he happens to write the kind of book that can't be classified under liking or disliking--a different mode of emotional reaction altogether. (I feel like that about Chaim Potok's novels too, although Potok isn't really like Murakami at all.) I spent some time thinking about it last Friday, and I think the best way to describe it is that reading Murakami for me is like trying to remember my face, the way it looks from the outside. The moment, you know, when you glimpse yourself in the mirror and see yourself as a stranger, not-self, and yet the person you see is intimately familiar. I think what is also different is that normally, reading a book changes me--the causality is very unidirectional, from book to mind--but in this case, I had already changed before I read the book. Perhaps that's a little dramatic, but I do know that I've become a different person this summer, with some sort of fundamental re-patterning, and it's odd because for the first time this change cannot be traced back to a book or a person but a coincidence of events and circumstances. And such a random coincidence too! I keep wondering, if one small factor had been out of alignment, would I have perceived this summer as a time of such momentous change? I suppose to be honest, it's not so much that I have changed but rather my self-image. In any case, reading Sputnik Sweetheart was rather like a negotiating process with myself, a new map for these rearranged paths in my head. The question remains though: would the book have been less important if I had read it at any other time? I think Murakami's infected my writing as well, but that at least is typical.
3. Daera and Nan left yesterday for California; only Annie and I are left. Not feeling particularly charitable or sociable, we are both living in the apartment as if the other did not exist. Like ghosts, as Nan would say. Mother's been anxious that I wouldn't be able to handle it--in her defense, I had a terrible time living on my own last summer--and she's been pestering me for weeks to let her come up and stay with me for a few days before I finally move out this Saturday. I've been nobly attempting to assert my independence, but yesterday, I agreed to let her come after all. I'm sure that sounds quite pathetic and unbelievable, but a part of me burned out last week, and right now, I don't exactly trust myself to avoid self-neglect. Example: today I skipped lunch because I felt sick at the thought of eating yet another sandwich. It's kind of humiliating to realize that despite all the pride I take in being self-contained and emotionally independent, I'm pretty bad at taking care of myself, particularly when there's no one to witness me falling into self-neglect. Maybe that's why my parents successfully maintain their overprotective grip on me. In any case, Mother's coming up on Wednesday, and as pathetic as it all sounds, I think I'm relieved.
4. On a lighter and less introspective note, yesterday, Daera and I went to watch Red Eye starring Cilian Murphy of Scarecrow fame. I intended to watch it for the sole purpose of ogling the actor, but ended up getting sucked in by the plot which was appropriately suspenseful. After all the blockbuster films we've been seeing, it's nice to go to an unambitious movie that accomplishes everything that it wants to achieve, nothing less, nothing more. Also, the actress--I forget her name--was more compelling and charismatic than Murphy, although he too was excellent and managed to creep me out completely. (I get the feeling he's going to be typecast for these rather psychopathic criminal roles now.)
5. Reading Complete Poems of Baudelaire, and the translation is quite awful. I'm glad now that I borrowed the volume that had the original French. I mean, my French is pretty shoddy especially after two years of disuse, but nonetheless, I can tell when a translation completely mangles an image in order to maintain the rhyme scheme. Translating poetry is difficult, I know, but I think one should never, ever bother to transfer the rhyme. -_- As an example, the last stanza of the introductory poem, "Au lecteur" ("To the Reader"):
Yours &c.
Meant to say all this yesterday but was running short on time and felt too sleepy. So, a list of things I meant to write on LJ, whether you're interested or not:
1. Daera and I managed to get intoxicated for the first time in our lives on Saturday night. Er...Sunday morning? We opened the bottle of champagne at around 11:30 and finished it a little before 3. We learned that:
- I get "Asian glow". Actually, an understatement: I turn brick red not only in the face but in the arms, hands, legs and for all I know, the soles of my feet. Daera doesn't, since she generally has better tolerance than me (she ended up drinking more of the champagne).
- We are remarkably boring drunks. We both felt sleepy, and while I was probably more talkative than usual, I didn't feel any more uninhibited than I normally would at that time of the morning. (I always grow chatty when I'm sleepy. If I'm particularly exhausted, I also start indulging in outrageous metaphors and far-fetched analogies, but alcohol doesn't seem to turn on my "purple prose" switch any more than lack of sleep does.)
- The vasodilation and increased circulation to my head causes my very scalp to pulse and my temples to throb--it would figure that I would experience a hangover-worthy headache while drinking. (On the bright side, I was perfectly fine when I woke up at 7:20, after little more than four hours of sleep.) Note to self: eat while drinking alcohol.
- We lost some coordination and felt a bit unsteady on our feet, but then again, given my clumsiness even when sober, this development was also rather anticlimactic.
2. Murakami isn't an author about whom I can facetiously say, "Oh, I love his writing," because he happens to write the kind of book that can't be classified under liking or disliking--a different mode of emotional reaction altogether. (I feel like that about Chaim Potok's novels too, although Potok isn't really like Murakami at all.) I spent some time thinking about it last Friday, and I think the best way to describe it is that reading Murakami for me is like trying to remember my face, the way it looks from the outside. The moment, you know, when you glimpse yourself in the mirror and see yourself as a stranger, not-self, and yet the person you see is intimately familiar. I think what is also different is that normally, reading a book changes me--the causality is very unidirectional, from book to mind--but in this case, I had already changed before I read the book. Perhaps that's a little dramatic, but I do know that I've become a different person this summer, with some sort of fundamental re-patterning, and it's odd because for the first time this change cannot be traced back to a book or a person but a coincidence of events and circumstances. And such a random coincidence too! I keep wondering, if one small factor had been out of alignment, would I have perceived this summer as a time of such momentous change? I suppose to be honest, it's not so much that I have changed but rather my self-image. In any case, reading Sputnik Sweetheart was rather like a negotiating process with myself, a new map for these rearranged paths in my head. The question remains though: would the book have been less important if I had read it at any other time? I think Murakami's infected my writing as well, but that at least is typical.
3. Daera and Nan left yesterday for California; only Annie and I are left. Not feeling particularly charitable or sociable, we are both living in the apartment as if the other did not exist. Like ghosts, as Nan would say. Mother's been anxious that I wouldn't be able to handle it--in her defense, I had a terrible time living on my own last summer--and she's been pestering me for weeks to let her come up and stay with me for a few days before I finally move out this Saturday. I've been nobly attempting to assert my independence, but yesterday, I agreed to let her come after all. I'm sure that sounds quite pathetic and unbelievable, but a part of me burned out last week, and right now, I don't exactly trust myself to avoid self-neglect. Example: today I skipped lunch because I felt sick at the thought of eating yet another sandwich. It's kind of humiliating to realize that despite all the pride I take in being self-contained and emotionally independent, I'm pretty bad at taking care of myself, particularly when there's no one to witness me falling into self-neglect. Maybe that's why my parents successfully maintain their overprotective grip on me. In any case, Mother's coming up on Wednesday, and as pathetic as it all sounds, I think I'm relieved.
4. On a lighter and less introspective note, yesterday, Daera and I went to watch Red Eye starring Cilian Murphy of Scarecrow fame. I intended to watch it for the sole purpose of ogling the actor, but ended up getting sucked in by the plot which was appropriately suspenseful. After all the blockbuster films we've been seeing, it's nice to go to an unambitious movie that accomplishes everything that it wants to achieve, nothing less, nothing more. Also, the actress--I forget her name--was more compelling and charismatic than Murphy, although he too was excellent and managed to creep me out completely. (I get the feeling he's going to be typecast for these rather psychopathic criminal roles now.)
5. Reading Complete Poems of Baudelaire, and the translation is quite awful. I'm glad now that I borrowed the volume that had the original French. I mean, my French is pretty shoddy especially after two years of disuse, but nonetheless, I can tell when a translation completely mangles an image in order to maintain the rhyme scheme. Translating poetry is difficult, I know, but I think one should never, ever bother to transfer the rhyme. -_- As an example, the last stanza of the introductory poem, "Au lecteur" ("To the Reader"):
C'est l'Ennui!--l'œil chargé d'un pleur involontaire,You may recognize the last line (referenced in Eliot's The Waste Land). Anyway, the translation is:
Il rêve d'échafauds en fumant son houka.
Tu le connais, lecteur, ce monstre délicat,
--Hypocrite lecteur,--mon semblable,--mon frère!
Ennui! daydreaming of the guillotine,How does "ce monstre délicat" map to "armchair terrorist"? The image conveyed is completely different! Admittedly, I'm an awful translator myself, but surely someone who studies this poet for a living would be able to do better than that?!
Grows misty-eyed, a hookah in his fist.
Reader, you know this armchair terrorist--
Yes, you--you hypocrite--my next of kin!
Yours &c.
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(no subject)
Date: 2005-08-23 03:48 am (UTC)glad to hear about red eye...i really want to see it, primarily for the same reason as you ;)
(no subject)
Date: 2005-08-23 07:23 am (UTC)You could not pay me enough money to see Red Eye, but I'm glad you enjoyed it. I have to say, Murphy just creeps me out waaaaaaaay too much...sorry ;)
Have fun with your mother! My parents are so anxious to have me home :) I've had a blast here, but I have to say that I'm excited to go home and excited to go back to school. I think I've sort of finally figured out what I want and how to be proud of myself and my life...anyway, I shall try to explain this to you at some point. I tried to explain it to my parents yesterday and it turned out oddly...oh well *g*
(no subject)
Date: 2005-08-25 04:14 am (UTC)it was definitely the best night/day of summer