#50

2010 was a crappy year and I'm not sorry to see it go. Neuropath was a fitting novel to finish it off.

Imagine the Saw movies with Dr. Ben Carson or Vilayanur Ramachandran cast as the serial killer. Think what fun a brain surgeon could have messing with your innards! And how pseudo-philosophical an author could wax while writing an unparalleled piece of schlock. I want to punch this book in the face.

#49

Magnus, whose destiny has been tied up with those of Dunstan Ramsey and Boy Staunton since before his birth, is playing the role of an 18th century magician in a biopick for the BBC directed by the Robertson Davies equivalent of Ingmar Bergman. There's even a Sven Nyquist character. Magnus of course has to provide "subtext" for his performance by confessing (or at least revealing) his past. Along the way he gets revenge on one of the BBC cats and perhaps we at last come to understand who killed Boy Staunton. The exploration of themes like masks, personae, deceipt, guilt, sin, revenge continues.

Though I enjoyed its final third, I had a tough time with this installment. The endless reminiscence about vaudeville glazed my eyes several times, which is why it took two weeks to read it. But overall the Deptford Trilogy is magnifique.

Once you go black...

First, read Casey's review, which is better than anything my lazy blogging ass is likely to cobble together. I agree with his post point-for-point, except for the brief mention of The Wrestler, which I've not seen yet.

The film positively reeks of Cronenberg and Polanski as Casey notes--the main character's descent into madness is very reminiscent of Polanski's Repulsion. It has Cronenberg's fascination with flesh and wounds and mutations; Polanski's oddball humor is apparent throughout. I laughed uncomfortably several times during Black Swan.

I think Aronofsky has also watched Adrian Lyne's Jacob's Ladder about a billion times. There are many visual and audio clues which I shan't discuss lest I ruin the surprise. And though the movie is indeed "psychological horror," it's also a dark fable along the lines of Pan's Labyrinth.

Black Swan was a dizzying entertainment. It's the best ballet film since The Red Shoes, and the best film of its type since Dead Ringers. The dance sequences are magical and monstrous. The performances are universally good. Barbara Hershey scared the shit out of me. I'm tempted now to re-read Conrad's "The Secret Sharer" to suss out the doppleganger theme. But in a nutshell the film is about the creative process gone terribly wrong. Artists must confront the Shadow in order to more fully express themselves. Tightly-wound, exquisite Nina loses the confrontation but her art succeeds. She could have shouted "Look ma! I'm on top of the world!" at the end.

#48

Colin Wilson has written fine and entertaining works on the occult (Mysteries and The Occult), as well as popular compilations of crime and serial killers. I found his Jung bio for a few bucks via Alibris.com, and thought: what the hell? I'd just read his protege's bio, after all.

What I get primarily from Wilson's take is that Jung wrote convoluted and punishingly dense works because: A) in his thinking he had already ruptured with Freud but did not want to publicly express that fact yet, and B) he was a mystic and a philosopher of history and a literary critic and anything but a scientist, but his persona as a scientist and doctor had to be carefully shored up in his published works. These two motivations made it difficult for him to honestly and simply express his thinking.

Lord of the Underworld is rather hostile to Jung. Wilson, whose keen psychological insight is that people are robots 90% of the time and that we hand over control of ourselves to a secondary personality which goes through the motions far too often, claims that Jung's system is unnecessarily complex. But Wilson approves of play therapy, and to a degree he likes archetypes, and he thinks active imagination is just peachy.

While I don't disagree that Jung can be overly complex, I think Wilson's idea is underly so. But I admire many of his books nonetheless, including this slim volume.

Day #63

A crazy day of full solstice moon/lunar eclipse-inspired bad luck:

Got up, drove to work, arrived at work after 20 minute commute, cell phone rings: "Where's my car key?" the wife asks. It's in my coat pocket. I drive back home, takes almost 30 minutes, and then back to work again.

Eating a hard pretzel at lunch, I broke a crown. Salt crystals jammed down into the cracked fake tooth. Ouch.

A child I let play Yugio cards in my room during his recess flipped out and broke a nice comfy chair on a new table, smashing the one and gouging the other.

All the report cards I wrote into templates got fucked up when people I emailed them to opened them. Something about me having Vista and them having XP, or perhaps the printer--who knows? All I know is I reprinted and reformatted my fucking report cards a half-dozen times today, and had to drive back to school after I was almost home because of this issue, which resulted in yet another in a sequence of more-than-twelve-hour days. SO TIRED.

No More Kings

Day #64

We had our Culminating Event Friday. At an expeditionary learning school we throw open the doors and parents, relatives, local residents and a variety of dignitaries and big wigs tour around looking at what the students learned. There are snazzy displays of artwork in the halls and the rooms become galleries and there are dance, drum, and choral performances. Even though I busted my ass this week getting everything ready I still felt renewed and happy afterward. This is what the charter school experience is all about.

I wish I could post video here of the amazing performances--if you are my Facebook friend you'll be able to see some short vids over there. The 5th graders did a live version of Schoolhouse Rock's "No More Kings" which was amazing.

And one of my favorite 6th grade kids--a true brainiac--announced that after months of auditions and call-backs he has been chosen to take the role of Symba in the Lion King ON FREAKING BROADWAY. I will miss him, but what an amazing opportunity! I've already had a student in The Wire, now I'll have one on stage. Pretty awesome. We'll have to finally break down and get tickets to the show.

Now I'm broken and weary. The wife and I are both sick with the latest hacking nasty cold. I think I'm going to skip the staff holiday party this eve to recuperate for one last week of school in 2010.

Day #62

To all those who say teachers work bankers' hours: I worked 30 hours the last two days. I will be working a long day tomorrow as well, and I will have to work another Saturday just to get my work done this week. And many teachers at my school are working more hours than I.

In other words: up yours!