Ah Yes! Nice to know there is at least one young person reading this stuff; and might I add, at least one relative, relatively speaking.
Just FYI, current readings, and mostly recommended readings:
I just finished" The Missing" by Tim Gautreaux which is an excellent piece of Southern fiction. I also just finished watching, "The Plague," a movie with which I am sure Denis is well acquainted and brings up the same issues found in Gautreaux.
I also continue to read the short stories of Nikolai Gogol, and am currently reading, "The Terrible Vengeance," and most of these stories include a close look at folk religion which of course still dominates the world of religion.
I am also reading, "First Things," which in many ways is the anti-TNY because it makes exactly the opposite assumption about reality that one generally expects in New York even though both magazines originate from that Great Gothamite City. There are several good articles, one of which is about what I would call, "folk atheism" which has gone both commercial and evangelistic and is now a religious commodity, in contrast to the writings of Nietzsche, a prophet who actually understood what he was getting into. Leave it to scientists to not know what they're getting into, eh? Tunnel vision is actually a requirement to do bench science, after all. Our Shell gas station locally has a "word of the week" which is "Focus." Focus groups anyone?
Excuse me Kat I need to get up.
Here said Kat protests, sotto voce.
The name of the article is, "Believe It or Not" by David Hart on page 35 probably accessible at the First Things website already. Also a good piece about Eleanor Roosevelt, not critical but complimentary.
I would also recommend a good summary article just published in the last # of TNY,of the struggle between the founding fathers of Time magazine and The New Yorker. The founder of the latter pretty well summed up the difference between his magazine and Time by saying, "I believe in malice." It's pretty hard not to believe in malice these days; or in any days previous, as noted in my previous blog. The question is, is this a modus operandi? Which goes back to the writings of Albert Camus. More on this later, I hope.
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I am familiar with Camus' novel but have never seen the movie. I checked out Netflix and they don't offer it but I did see on IMDB's site that there was one made back in 1992 staring William Hurt as Dr. Rieux. Is that the one you are watching? If it is the reviews are very mixed. It either was given rave reviews or people hated it for not being true to the novel.
ReplyDeleteSpeaking of Malice I just added a movie of the same name to my Netflix queue about a Dr. who compares himself with God.
Dr.Rieux is played by Raul Julia
ReplyDeleteRobert Duvall plays, cum malice, Cottard.
Wm. Hurt plays Grand-not-a-piano-Grand, the civil servant Grand. In place of Tarrou there is a female whose name I did did not catch but it might also be "Jean," (As in "The Wife"--should I stop referring to this, by the way?)
The problem with making a movie about the two novels of Camus with which I am somewhat familiar from college days, is that Camus sticks to what he knows. Unlike most of fools-for-authors, he does not try to tell a woman's story--I think he felt unqualified. Would that more of us had the wisdom to shut up and let the women write their own books--like Simone Beauvoir, whom I am also keen to read even though I doubt I will really understand it. As my sister is always quick to aver. We try. (but "trying is lying" as an good AA member can tell us) Tried in the fire, more like. Thanks for reading this--I have the vcr version until July if you want to borrow it, It'd be nice to see you with a cup of coffee sometime...