No More Santa and Other Stories

I can't actually recall believing in Santa, though I may have at one point.  I was a pretty skeptical kid from about 3rd grade on.  Our son was basically willing to go along with the story after he found out (around age 8) for the sake of his sister.  My daughter started questioning seriously a few weeks ago.  It started with the tooth fairy -- why is her handwriting just like yours?  Then she found a tooth in a drawer.  I guess there was still some lingering faith, but she decided the tooth fairy wasn't real after a week.  Then she started questioning Santa.  Right around her 8th birthday, she put us on the spot.  And while we said we were just helpers and such, eventually when your children ask you point blank about something, you really shouldn't lie.

As in all things, there is now a cottage industry in psychologists who will either support the Santa story as an innocent white lie that allows children to learn things on their own and distinguish truth from fiction, as well as those who see the world more black and white and feel one should never mislead children.  My daughter is a bit angry that we tricked her and says she won't tell her children there is a Santa Claus.  I said that is her right, but she might feel differently when she is older.  I doubt there has been any permanent damage, but we'll see.  My wife wishes there had been one more Christmas with Santa.  I think it's good she figured it out, though I wish she wasn't upset about it.

Anyway, I have pretty much all the gifts for my son, but only one thing for my daughter (though I have stocking stuffers for each).  I am not really looking forward to dealing with holiday shopping, so I had better figure out what to get her and do it in the next two weeks.

Generally, I feel out of sorts.  I have more or less caught up with work, and it was kind of strange not feeling quite so obligated to be up all hours of the day.  Of course, there is work that I could have or should have done, and I am extremely tempted to just take one day this week or next and sleep in.  But I don't think that will be today.  I spent quite a bit of time getting caught up on reading.  I should be 75% through my list of Russian authors by the end of the week, though then I will take a one-book detour into Canadian lit.  There's a pretty good chance that I will wrap up this Russian trek by mid-January.  While it has been quite rewarding, I am a bit exhausted.  It really did feel like graduate level work, though no final exam.  I suspect I am ready for my next project, which will be a couple of academic papers (on car sharing services though not Uber, which is basically just an unregulated taxi service, which is different) and the creative writing.  I think I do need to carve out an hour each evening to write or nothing will get done.  I've already used Leechblock on a couple of other websites, and possibly I need to apply it to my own blog...

Edit: So there have already been some spin-off consequences.  We were at a holiday breakfast at a local community centre (extremely empty compared to the ones in Vancouver, almost depressingly so), and my daughter didn't want to bother sitting on Santa's lap. 

The loneliest Santa?

I suppose there is not much point in trying to track down the Santa train on the TTC.  Now if we were in Chicago, I think we'd still go look for the CTA Santa train as riding it is such a cool experience -- it is clean and smells nice and elves ride inside and hand out candy canes and they even play holiday jingles inside the cars.  I don't think the TTC goes to such lengths, but I could be wrong.  Anyway, maybe in another year or two, she will "forgive us," and we can return to the simple joys of seeking out Santa during the holidays.

Recent ups and downs

I have been really out of sorts since Thurs.*  Maybe part of that was having to work far harder and longer than I expected on Wed. (and not having U.S. Thanksgiving off!) but still only slightly chipping away at the mountain of work I have before me.  (Indeed, I'll see if I can be briefer than usual, as I have a few work obligations to get to tonight.) Given that I have a very pronounced tendency to emphasize the negative, I'll also add some counter-balance at various points as I go into the last four or five days.

It started off fairly badly on Thurs.  I left work early to go find the bus terminal for Greyhound/Megabus to pick up my father-in-law.  It turns out that the station still has lockers, which kind of floored me.  I have bus lockers play a small role in a short play I wrote, but I didn't imagine I would see them still in use.  (Even here, you couldn't just stick something in them for months on end -- only overnight.  I think ultimately I had to switch this over to a bank deposit box, though I can't recall at the moment.)

Since so few people stick around after the bus pulls in, they closed down the arrivals area 4 years ago.**  But Greyhound has no way to track the actual arrival time, and the drivers don't even check in, so they couldn't even tell me for certain whether the bus from Detroit had arrived!  I find that simply incredible.  I didn't ask about Megabus, but I suspect they have a bit more data on their buses and drivers.  I think Greyhound does in the States as well, so I am just absolutely baffled by this.  Anyway, after 2 or 3 periodic passes through the departure area, I went outside to wait for the bus.  As you might imagine, it was cold.  And I was not very happy about all this.  In fact, it was so cold, I only could bear to do a bit of reading (the departure lounge was just too far from the arrivals area, given that there was no good information on buses actually arriving, so I had to wait outside).  Ultimately, the bus pulled in about 90 minutes late, mostly due to very inefficient border crossing inspections (a hand-search of all luggage of every passenger!) and getting slowed down by a Thanksgiving Day parade in Detroit!

After I got my father-in-law home and settled and we had dinner, I tried to watch Nebraska (for the second time!).  This time I got about 1/3 of the way through and just felt like I was slumming it, and I stopped.  I'll have more to say on this later.  But it was a bit of a minor disappointment.  As far as I can tell, some of the stuff that was supposed to "couriered" over here didn't make it for some reason, and my daughter hates the swim cap that did make it over.  So that was more than a little frustrating.

Friday was another long day at work and I got home quite late.  I had mostly finished up the Johnston translation of Pushkin's Eugene Onegin, which is ok, though from my brief perusal, I like Falen's better.  The truth is, it is such a common plot, that most of the artistry comes from the poetry, which of course is impossible to translate correctly.  I'll have a bit to say about the duel that is so central to the plot in another post (though I am trying to finish up reading Chekhov's The Duel first).  On the other hand, I've been quite taken by Turgenev's A Sportsman's Sketches, and I am nearly done reading through those.  So I guess that has been a positive development.  (While Herzen's My Past and Thoughts was interesting, I think it was way oversold by Isaiah Berlin and my expectations were just too high, whereas Turgenev is meeting and occasionally surpassing my expectations.  What has been paying off to some degree is having a much better grounding in the whole milieu that Turgenev was writing from, and I am sure this will deepen my reading of Fathers and Sons considerably.)  Another positive is that the landlord finally came by and installed the railing to the basement.

Sat. we had a look at a 3 bedroom house just north of Pape Elementary School.  It really wasn't as nice as I hoped and I thought the asking price was on the high side.  Then I found out that this was a seller who was trying to start a bidding war and definitely expected to sell over asking (this is a technique that I despise that fortunately only seems to have taken root (in the U.S.) in New York and San Francisco).  While I have known intellectually that it is going to be tough to find a place to buy in this neighbourhood, or ideally a bit further north in Riverdale proper, it's now starting to sink in.  Of course, I have more resources than many, so we'll probably find something eventually, but it will be more than I want to pay, for certain.  That (and a general lack of sleep) are probably the main sources of my discontent this weekend.

Well, there was another major issue and that is Bell went out around noon on Sat. and remained out until 5 pm Sunday.  Some box outside the house blew out.  This meant no phone, tv or internet for two days, and of course my work requires far more contact than that.  I went back to the library on Sat. in order to use their wireless.  As I was heading home, a bus was pulling up and I decided I might as well go downtown to work, so I did that for 3 or so hours.  I ended up staying so close to 7 that I decided to swing by the City Hall to see them light the tree.  I hadn't expected so many people.  It was quite unpleasant actually, and then I was sort of trapped on the upper level.  They took forever to light the tree -- 7:30, when 7:15 would have been far more reasonable.  Then it was a huge problem getting out and when the police turned up for crowd control they actually made it considerably worse.  It literally took another 30 minutes to get down the stairs and across the street to catch the streetcar.  I was not at all impressed with the way the city handles crowd control, and I will avoid that place in the future for anything involving a concert or fireworks.  I'm sure that it was made worse by them still not being done with the construction at Nathan Phillips Square.  I was pretty starved by the time I finally made it home. 

In general, I stayed up too late on Sat., which lead to the other disappointment of the weekend. I had planned to leave close to 8 am on Sunday to get to Young People's Theatre to see about the discounted tickets for James and the Giant Peach.  Ultimately, I left at 8:40 or so, and didn't arrive until 9:15.  There was a long line that moved extremely slowly.  I guess there were 10-15 people ahead of me when they said all the tickets were gone.  I was majorly bummed.  It felt like such a scene from a Charlie Brown movie, and had I left on time I would have had those tickets.  Fortunately, I had told my kids that they were only going if I could get the tickets (and they were just as happy to spend more time with their granddad).  I can look into getting the discount tickets later in the month, though there are certainly no guarantees there will be any available.  That actually reminds me that I have to look into getting my daughter into swimming classes.  I think registration starts Dec. 6, so I have just a bit more time.

I went to Eaton Centre and was kind of disappointed in the various sales.  I even thought the sleds at Canadian Tire were not very good quality, so I might as well just get something just as cheap from Walmart where I don't have to haul it so far home.  (I guess one positive is that I am basically done shopping for b-day stuff for my daughter and Xmas presents for my son.)  The clothes shopping did not go well at all, however. I was just astounded that 70% or so of the dress shirts at Hudson Bay Company were fitted or slim cut, when I hardly see young men wearing dress shirts at all.  I found one shirt in my size.  In general, shopping for clothes is extremely dispiriting for me, and then I start getting frustrating that my current job/lifestyle is not supportive of getting in shape at all...

I went home and took a nap (in frustration) after finding that the cable and internet were still out.  Around 3 I woke up and thought I would try Sears over on Coxwell.  Well, it turns out that it was just a mail drop place -- in other words you could have stuff sent there from Sears.ca but there was no store at all.  This was just too much.  I went home and found that the cable and internet was back on, and tried to get caught up.  As frustrating as the whole outage has been, I will admit that it was much, much worse trying to get service restored in the UK and even in Vancouver, where Shaw was pretty useless.  I have to admit that when I see it all written out, it strikes me that it was a pretty lousy weekend with far more downs than ups.  I probably should cut this off here.  The next posts will be far more focused on Turgenev and other Russians, and that should be a bit more uplifting.

Edit:
There was actually a fairly innocuous comment here that turned out to be nothing but spam.  I'll try to be better about monitoring that in future.  In response to the query about other recommended reading, I wrote: Do you mean the duel in Russian literature, or something else? In addition to Eugene Onegin and Chekhov's The Duel, duels feature prominently in Dostoevsky's Demons and Turgenev's Fathers and Sons. It is also somewhat notable when a duel does not take place in Tolstoy's Anna Karenina. I should be able to post on this next week or so.

* Actually my left ear has been bothering me for over a week.  It gets a bit better, then seems to close up again.  I definitely will have to have it looked at pretty soon.  That is a major reason for my being out of sorts as well.

** This is just one of several examples of how Toronto is just a bit shabbier than I remembered.  Conditions at UT's Robarts Library are another.  I think Toronto is definitely constrained by a fierce anti-tax movement spearheaded by its outer (essentially suburban) wards.  While Toronto might not be considered such a global city had it never been amalgamated, I think on the whole it would have been better not to have been forced together, particularly since Mike Harris intentionally drew the boundaries in a perverse way to add far more suburban residents into the city than one would ever have done were it not for political payback.

Best (pop) concerts

So I am just back from the Stevie Wonder Songs in the Key of Life show in Toronto (the only Canadian stop on the tour).  Pretty amazing band -- two of almost everything -- backup keyboards, guitarists, drummers, percussionists.  6 back-up singers, including his daughter (the one to whom Isn't She Lovely is dedicated to).  On some stops, India.Arie is the opening act and then joins the show.  Here she just joined in on 5 or so songs -- 4 costume changes (off-stage).  Great concert, though I wish he had started more or less on time -- it was 45 minutes late getting started.  Thus, we had to split as he was getting ready to do an encore.  Really wanted to hear that (on some stops it has been Superstition), but it was past our bedtime (and more to the point the baby-sitter meter was ticking...).  I've seen Stevie do a more hits oriented show in Grant Park in Chicago, so I decided it was ok to get out of there and beat the crowds on the train.  It actually was a pretty smooth ride back, maybe only 30 minutes to get from Union Station to home.

I'd say that this show is now in my top 10 of pop/rock concerts.  So that got me thinking about other great shows I've seen.  Now as it happens, I have not seen all that many pop/rock concerts -- far more classical and jazz concerts, and I wouldn't even attempt to pull out a top 10, though some day I could probably list a few of the most memorable.

In terms of my top 10, I'll just list what I remember, but will probably have to fill in details later (like year/venue and so on). (Actually, I am going to shamelessly steal from Spinal Tap and make it my top 11, since 11 is just so much more awesome than 10.)

Camper Van Beethoven, New York, 2003
This was a big surprise that they reformed and even managed to get one of the original members who had moved to Australia to come back for this one show.  I think it ran close to 3 hours, and they played a large part of Tusk (which was a high-concept album where they played Fleetwood Mac's Tusk).  It really was sort of an "event" for a relatively small handful of fans.  I've enjoyed all the times I've seen Camper Van and/or Cracker (I think it's up to 4 now), but this was by far the best.

David Bowie, Sound+Vision Tour, Detroit, 1990
This was supposedly the last time he was going to play most of his hits.  That didn't turn out to be the case, but I still had a great time, even if he didn't retire his hits afterwards.  We were on the main floor in the first 3 or 4 rows.  Sweet.

Steely Dan, Chicago, Chicago Theatre, 2008
This wasn't the tour where they played entire albums; it was just a tour where they had a really tight band running through the main hits.  I hadn't really thought they would tour together, but they seem to have gotten over their differences.

David Bowie, A Reality Tour, Rosemont/Chicago, 2004
Really great show -- a heavier, louder concert than Sound+Vision, drawing heavily on Earthling, which I like quite a bit.  From my understanding, we left and missed a second encore where he played "Panic in Detroit," but that may not be accurate.

Bruce Hornsby and the Range, Detroit, 1990
Cowboy Junkies opened for them and were incredible, far more dynamic than they usually come across on their albums.  Great show.

10,000 Maniacs, Detroit, 1988
This was actually at Pine Knob, a bit north of Detroit.  Again, a bit louder and more dynamic than what is on the albums.

Stevie Wonder, Songs in the Key of Life Tour, Toronto, 2014
See above

The Who, Pontiac/Detroit, 1989
They actually played at the Pontiac Silverdome, not Detroit proper; this is was the tour where they played most of Tommy.  It was also one of the very last tours before they became total caricatures of themselves.  You'd probably have to pay me to see The Who now.  I've heard that they will finally stop touring in 2015, but I'll believe it when I see it.

Depeche Mode, The Singles Tour, Rosemont/Chicago, 1998
Pretty much what it says on the tin.  The lead singer was just back from rehab and the band sounded great, playing mostly hits and some b-sides.

Tragically Hip, Chicago, 1995
This was at Metro, which was always standing room only.  They played slightly over half the material off of Fully Completely, plus some songs like Nautical Disaster and New Orleans is Sinking, that I wasn't very familiar with.

They Might Be Giants, Flood Tour, Vic Theatre, Chicago, 2009
They came through and played all the songs on Flood, but unlike some of these other album-centric tours, they mixed it up and played other hits as well.  I've seen them 4 times, including in their hometown of Brooklyn.  All were great shows, but I think this was best.

Runners up: Psychedelic Furs in New York; Roxy Music in New York (Rufus Wainwright opening); Sade with India.Arie opening, MSG in New York; Duran Duran in London (my wife really wanted to see the original line-up back together); Hall and Oates in Chicago; Steve Winwood in Vancouver; Sting in Grant Park, Chicago; Midnight Oil in Grant Park, Chicago; Barenaked Ladies in Grant Park, Chicago (mostly but not entirely singing children-oriented songs); Local H at a street fair in Chicago; The Waltons at a UT hang-out.

I just remembered seeing the original line-up of Everclear at Metro 1995 or so where they were playing off Sparkle and Fade.  Now that I think about it, that show is threatening to break into the top 11.  Probably would make the move "upstairs" if it had been the follow-up tour where they had some other great material from So Much for the Afterglow.  Now that Alex has reformed the band with some young pups, I'm less interested in seeing them.

I may recall some other really great concerts and shuffle the order a bit, but this is basically what I think of as the best concerts I've seen.  This actually is most of the pop/rock concerts that I have ever seen.  As I said, my focus has always been more on attending jazz or classical concerts.

Shakespeare and me: productions I've seen

As it turns out, I have seen a goodly number of Shakespeare's plays and certainly all the key ones.

The chronological grouping comes from this source.

Histories   
1590-91     Henry VI, Part II    (Bard on Beach, Vancouver, 2011)
1590-91     Henry VI, Part III   (Bard on Beach, Vancouver, 2011) 
1591-92     Henry VI, Part I     (Bard on Beach, Vancouver, 2011)
1592-93     Richard III             (Bard on Beach, Vancouver, 2011; Toronto 2016; Shakespeare Bash'd, Toronto, 2018)
1595-96     Richard II                (Stratford, 2023)
1596-97     King John    
1597-98     Henry IV, Part I     (Oak Park, IL, 2011, Driftwood, Toronto, 2022)
1597-98     Henry IV, Part II    (Oak Park, IL, 2011, Driftwood, Toronto, 2022)
1598-99     Henry V                 (Oak Park, IL, 2011, Driftwood, Toronto, 2022)
1612-13     Henry VIII             (Stratford, 2019)

I've seen all the Henries (sometimes in abridged format) now including Henry VIII (which I saw last year).  I came close to seeing King John at Stratford last summer, but that would have meant an overnight trip, so I ultimately passed.  I have not decided if I want to watch Richard II, but I did see a good production of Richard III in Vancouver and then a couple of solid productions in Toronto.

Comedies
1592-93     Comedy of Errors      (Shakespeare in the Park, NY, 1992; High Park, Toronto, 2015; Shakespeare Bash'd, Toronto, 2016; Toronto, 2026)
1593-94     Taming of the Shrew    (New Jersey, 1992; Atlanta, 2003; Stratford, 2015; Driftwood, Toronto, 2016; Toronto Fringe, 2019)
1594-95     Two Gentlemen of Verona    
1594-95     Love's Labour's Lost     (Chicago, 1996; Stratford, 2015)
1595-96     A Midsummer Night's Dream   (New York, 1992; Bard on the Beach, Vancouver, 2014; Shakespeare in the Ruff, Toronto, 2017; Driftwood, Toronto, 2019, High Park, Toronto, 2023)
1598-99     Much Ado About Nothing    (Toronto, 1994; Toronto, 2014; Toronto, 2016)
1599-1600   As You Like It    (Shakespeare in the Park, NY, 1992; High Park, Toronto, 2014; Shakespeare Bash'd, Toronto, 2017)
1599-1600   Twelfth Night    (Ann Arbor, 1990; Toronto Fringe, 2015; Shakespeare Bash'd, Toronto, 2017; High Park, Toronto, 2017; Stratford, 2024)
1600-01     The Merry Wives of Windsor  (Kalamazoo, 1986; Shakespeare Bash'd, Toronto, 2015)  
1602-03     All's Well That Ends Well    (Shakespeare in the Park, NY, 1993; High Park, Toronto, 2016)
1604-05     Measure for Measure     (Shakespeare in the Park, NY, 1993; Toronto, 2016; Toronto, 2025)

I've seen The Merry Wives of Windsor many years ago (actually while still in high school).  I thought then, as now, that it is a pretty minor work and passed up a chance a couple of years ago to see it at Bard on the Beach.  The only one that I can't find proof that I attended is Two Gentlemen of Verona, though I've probably seen that somewhere along the way.  I'll just make a note to catch it the next time it comes through. Similarly, I know I've seen Twelfth Night more recently than 1990, probably in Chicago and somewhere else.

Tragedies
1593-94     Titus Andronicus    (abridged vers. @ Red Sandcastle, Toronto, 2022)
1594-95     Romeo and Juliet     (High Park, Toronto, 1997; Stratford, 2013)
1596-97     The Merchant of Venice  (Chicago, 2011)  
1599-1600    Julius Caesar       (Stratford, 1990; High Park, Toronto, 2015; Shakespeare in the Ruff, Toronto, 2018) 
1600-01     Hamlet            (Bard on the Beach, Vancouver, 2013; Stratford, 2015; Driftwood, Toronto, 2015; Toronto, 2018; Stratford 2022; Shakespeare in High Park, 2024)
1601-02     Troilus and Cressida (Shakespeare Bash'd, Toronto, 2026)    
1604-05     Othello           (Kalamazoo, 1988; Stratford, 2013;  Driftwood, Toronto, 2017; Shakespeare Bash'd, Toronto, 2019; Stratford, 2026)
1605-06     King Lear       (Vancouver, 2012; Stratford, 2014; Toronto, 2015; Toronto, 2018, Soulpepper, Toronto, 2022, Shakespeare Bash'd, Toronto, 2023)
1605-06     Macbeth         (New Jersey, 1992; Bard on the Beach, 2012; Toronto, 2015; Stratford, 2025)
1606-07     Antony and Cleopatra    (Buddies, Toronto, 2012)
1607-08     Coriolanus    
1607-08     Timon of Athens (Tiff'ny of Athens, Shakespeare in the Ruff, Toronto 2025)

It seems like things start breaking down once I hit the tragedies.  It looks like I skipped Titus Andronicus, Troilus and Cressida, Coriolanus and Timon of Athens.*  To be honest, I generally am not that interested in pure tragedies, though I generally find Macbeth and Hamlet worth watching.  I have very grave doubts about Lear, simply because he acts so foolishly and petulantly, that I am not sure I'll see it again.  I know I'm not interested in seeing The Merchant of Venice again, though the Bollywood-infused remix Merchant on Venice was pretty good.

Romances
1608-09     Pericles    (Toronto, 1994)
1609-10     Cymbeline   (Shakespeare Bash'd, Toronto, 2020) 
1610-11     The Winter's Tale (Stratford, 2025)   
1611-12     The Tempest      (Bard on the Beach, Vancouver, 2014; Stratford 2018)
1612-13     The Two Noble Kinsmen* (Shakespeare Bash'd, Toronto, 2024)

I'm not that sure I even want to count Two Noble Kinsmen as being by Shakespeare.  I guess I'll try to see it one of these days.  I believe I actually have seen Cymbeline** and The Winter's Tale, though I don't have any surviving programs, so I may go when I have a chance if the productions get good reviews.  On the other hand, the plot of The Winter's Tale in particular is not one that I find very palatable and I passed on a chance to see Coal Mine do it.  I've definitely seen the Tempest more than once - most likely four times, but the details of the first time escape me now.

So the official tally is 29 out of  38 or 76%, though I suspect I've actually seen at least a couple more.  It's always hard to know how often to come back to these as opposed to seeing other masterworks versus spending more time on contemporary theatre.  I try to mix it up a fair bit, though time and money don't always allow for it.  I am sort of interested in the upcoming production of Hamlet at Stratford next summer, but in general, I am leaning more and more towards to just sticking with the comedies.  I just find too many loose ends with the tragedies that bug me, and the minor characters are too hard to tell apart in the history plays.

Edit: I guess I should add just a bit about a few of them, which were particularly memorable and so on.  Measure for Measure had Kevin Kline as the Duke, which did partially make up for the fact that it is such a "difficult" play.  The strangest production I remember seeing was Brian Bedford in Julius Caesar at Stratford.  The key characters were all in togas, but the soldiers wore yellow t-shirts and Army boots, if I am not mistaken.  A weak attempt at a pomo production.  The best Lear I've seen was not the one at Stratford (which was generally good, though Cordelia was weak) but the Honest Fishmongers in Vancouver in 2012.  Bard on the Beach generally does good but slightly populist renditions of Shakespeare.  However, the shows I saw in 2014 on the main stage -- Midsummer's Night's Dream and The Tempest -- were truly incredible.  It's somewhat strange that I basically can't bear watching The Merchant of Venice any longer, but I don't have nearly as much of a problem with The Taming of the Shrew, which is perhaps even more retrograde.  There's a lot about As You Like It that I do like, but the ending is so unbelievable as to spoil much of the play for me.  I generally have to pretend that the last five minutes didn't happen.

In terms of upcoming productions, I decided to pass on The Tempest at Hart House, but I'll catch a Bollywood-infused production of Much Ado About Nothing at Tarragon.  As I said, I might well see Hamlet at Stratford this summer, but I haven't really decided about Taming of the Shrew or Love's Labour's Lost.  It will depend a great deal on the concept/casting and possibly the advance reviews.  I see that Shakespeare in the (High) Park is going to be The Comedy of Errors and Julius Caesar.  It's good for me in that it has been ages since I've seen either.  I'll probably try to go to both and may take my son to Comedy of Errors.  My daughter is probably too young to really understand what's going on, but we'll see a bit closer to the time.

* Someone recently put on Titus Andronicus, but it really doesn't interest me that much, and I passed.  In 2017, Stratford is going to be doing Coriolanus directed by Robert LePage, and I'll probably see that, even though they are doing gender-flipping, at least for the main character, and I find this all so pointless (at this point in theatre history).

** Having just seen Shakespeare Bash'd doing Cymbeline, I realize that was the first time I had seen it.  It's an interesting mash-up of certain elements of Othello and The Winter's Tale, though overall less tragic than the former and slightly less contrived than the latter.  I came fairly close to checking out The Winter's Tale last year (2019), but learned (just in time) that the director inserted some completely ridiculous extra speech that inverted the meaning of large sections of the play.  I just can't get behind that.  In general, that company, Shakespeare in the Ruff, is going in a ridiculous woke direction that I can't stand.  They basically want to trade on Shakespeare's name but decolonize him or to invert the meaning of his plays, which I simply find dishonest.  If Shakespeare offends you so much, then rename your company.

Edit (04/2025!): I was supposed to see Timon of Athens last year and didn't go, and of course now regret it a bit, even though this is not one of the better plays.  And while I don't like Merchant of Venice at any level, I have only seen it once, and I wanted to see how Shakespeare Bash'd pulled it off.  But that performance was cancelled by a February Toronto blizzard, and then the make-up performance didn't work for me and Theatre Centre was not at all accommodating in trying to find something that would work for the rest of the week.  (If it wasn't so far out of my way, I probably would have just dropped by to see if I could have gotten on the wait list.)  I did decide to go see The Winter's Tale at Stratford this summer (even though I have serious reservations about the ending), so that will be one more I can cross off.

8th Canadian Challenge - 9th review - Failure to Thrive

I'll just open with a short observation drawn from Alexander Herzen's My Past and Thoughts.  There seems to be a bit of a contradiction in how he and his coterie would argue so seriously about philosophical ideals, but then he has a general aside how he dislikes the serious young men of Germany but the Americans are even worse.  (I think he tries to square this by describing some of the high-jinks that his Russian friends got up to.)  While I probably would have gotten on reasonably well with Herzen as an adult, I was extremely serious in high school (this old before your time is exactly what Herzen dislikes).  (Actually, I am trying to recall some of that moral fervour in The Study Group -- how successfully is still to be determined.)  Generally, Herzen tried to be open minded and understand where people are coming from and why they act the way they do.  As he aged, he definitely became more empathetic, though he seemed to take an instant dislike to overly bureaucratic types, whom he kept running up against.

At any rate, I should try to find a way to dampen down my general antipathy to Millennials, given what a bad hand they have been dealt in terms of a bad economy and far fewer of the benefits that the Boomers got (Gen X falls somewhere in between), and if the worst environmental scenarios play themselves out, then they will definitely be forced to deal with this at a time when they should be looking forward to retirement.  I see from some general surveys that they actually do take an interest in the environment and that they generally are less materialistic with respect to the big-ticket items like cars (and they may never have their own homes).  However, the ones that I encounter seem to never take their eyes off these tiny little screens, and consequently, they seem to be extremely shallow and interested in the most trivial of things, aside from their more general problem of over-sharing (that will certainly come to haunt them later).

Despite these proclaimed intentions, I often fall short. I will have to say that Suzannah Showler's Failure to Thrive did little to change my perception of Millenials as trivial and unserious.  So this review starts from a fairly negative place, and I will understand if you decide to bail at this point.

There was one serious misconception on my part and that was I read "Whale Fall" as "Whale Fail," i.e. when Twitter goes down.  However, a whale fall is a real phenomenon that would be somewhat familiar to someone living in Newfoundland for instance.  I liked the lines from the last stanza: "Because this is one way the earth ends; / abyssal, superlative with all-dark, / an absence too thorough / to be imagined in a living body."

However, it is unclear whether Showler spent much if any time on the coast(s) to really feel whales in her bones, as she is from Ottawa and did her creative writing program in Toronto.  It seems she has actually decamped to Columbus, Ohio.  I guess none of this matters, but she isn't a place-based poet in the sense that some of the eastern poets are.  She tends to focus more on little ironies with her fairly-cerebral poems and draws on cyberspace as her "place." (In fact, Showler says that "Whale Fall" was inspired by a Radiolab program, apparently this podcast in fact.)

I think my favourite from the collection is probably "Pretty Good Time at the Olfactory Factory," which tries to generate strong smells in the mind of the reader:

• Coconut-sweet wind laced with salt / bending around the near-albino mesa / of potash burped out of the prairie.
• Bike lock in winter coaxed open / with a crème brûlée torch.
• A Scratch 'n Sniff sticker / with all the good stuff / scratched out of it.

Incidentally, the cover of the collection has an image of a Scratch 'n Sniff sticker, which presumably relates back to this poem.

I also was amused by the idea that her idea of a disaster was being dragged by an invisible force back to Ottawa.  This is a poem from the section Sucks To Be You and Other True Taunts (which is perhaps appropriate the part of the book where she sounds the most like a Millennial).  The poem is "Why Don't You Go Home and Cry About It?"

I have a feeling about a very slow 
apocalypse where we are all drawn 
back to our hometowns by something
like a magnet that attracts whatever
inside us is most mediocre and true.
...
... I'll need something
to think about when I am caught,
post-apocalpytically, in Ottawa,
Ontario, the capital of Canada,
where my parents still live.

I found there were a few decent poems, which is not bad for a first collection, but on the whole Showler's voice and preoccupations are not of great interest to me, and that is at least in part due to generational differences.  I even found myself out of sympathy with the Radiolab folks who take some really interesting material, but cut it oddly and add a bit too much attitude and snark to it.  I can tell it's going to be a long, painful time for me as the Millennials come to the fore (while still living in their parents' basements) as I am so out of step with them.

Books as an Inheritance

I think for those of us with large libraries, it can be really hard to decide what to do about the books that are still in the collection after we are gone.  It used to be that there would be booksellers that would come and buy up interesting libraries, but those days are quickly passing.  Even CDs and LPs have pretty minimal resale value, with some exceptions.  I think if I passed in the next 5 years, my wife could still turn to some music shops to get a halfway decent price on some of the jazz CDs, but probably not on the classical and certainly not on the pop CDs.  Those would just be destined for the landfill.  But 20 years from now (and I think I have at least that long!), I doubt they will have much value at all.  And probably there will be almost no resale value to the books, especially since I don't collect first editions.  I think it really will be down to the kids wanting some or all of the books and CDs, so I will have to find out closer to the time what they think about that.  They may well be totally digital, growing up in this era.  (If that is the case, I should do them a favour and start de-accessioning in about 15 years.)

Despite Anthony Powell's dictum that "books do furnish a room" (though it is far better if this is a working library and not just for display) and Erasmus's wise words: "When I have a little money, I buy books; and if I have any left, I buy food and clothes," there is no guarantee that someone else will really want your books, precisely because they reflected your interests and intellectual history, or indeed, any books at all.  Some of my books are held onto purely for sentimental reasons, and do I really want to inflict this on my children (hanging onto a few dozen books just because they were mine)?

I am thinking about this because I have finally gotten around to reading one of the books that I took from my mom's collection, close to 20 years after her death.  I can't recall exactly how many books I ultimately took from her collection at the time, but I think it is down to 2 or 3 left after all these years of carting books from place to place.  I have to admit I didn't care for this book very much, and I'm a bit nervous that if I don't like the next one, I may have no books left to hang onto.*  Most of her books went to a nearby community center, where I am sure they are still being appreciated.  If we lived just a bit closer, I would probably take this one back to donate as well.

One of the few books I remember her having was a hardcover set of F. Scott Fitzgerald novels, but I honestly can no longer remember if they were in her house when she died or if they ended up with my father.  I might well have discarded them by now (since it is even harder to move hardcovers than paperbacks), but I do wish I had those books.  (Of course by now I have a fairly mismatched set of most of Fitzgerald's novels and stories, and I'm sure it would just be easier to get the missing ones.  Still I suppose if the set did fall into my hands, then I would make space for it.)

In general, there is not much of a tangible legacy left, other than a few artsy photos she took and some jewelry.  I would have liked to have a few more books as well, since an appreciation for art and literature was certainly her main legacy to me.  I think I actually loaned her an art book (Janson's History of Art, which she wanted since it reminded her of her college days) but never got it back, so I eventually replaced it.  On the flip side, I just recalled that I do have her copy of a Georgia O'Keeffe catalog, and I will certainly hang onto that until the end, so I guess we're even after all.  Anyway, I might as well cut this short, as it is getting a bit too morbid and maudlin (quite the combo!).

* In the same way, I have a bit of a mental block against finishing Gloria Naylor's Mama Day, as I started reading this to my mother in the hospital, as a way of passing the time (since it was unlikely she truly heard me by that point).  I had kind of expected to get through the entire book (over the course of a week perhaps), but I had to run back to Chicago to take care of some things, and she took a real turn for the worse while I was gone.  I haven't really had the heart to return to it, but maybe late next year I'll read Naylor's Bailey's Cafe, and if that goes well, I will tackle Mama Day the following year.  I think it is time to close out this book.

The Emperor's New Film (Godard)

While I wasn't particularly surprised I didn't like Godard's Adieu au langage (Goodbye to Language), I am really disappointed in the fact that it split the jury prize at Cannes (winning with Xavier Dolan's Mommy) and maybe even more so the positive reviews of this so-called film.  I really have to wonder how many are rewarding Godard for a magnificent career in film and are not really facing up to what a stinky mess of celluloid Adieu au langage is.  A couple of reviewers preface their reviews by saying that Godard remains a provocateur, and that the film needs to be seen in that light, i.e. it is a statement and/or an intellectual exercise and not really a film to be enjoyed.  But a couple seem to have really downed the Koolaid and talk about the magnificent colors of the film or how moving it was.  Bull.  These are reviewers who are afraid to be looked down on by their peers by admitting that this was a pretentious and intentionally amateurish film.  There are similar trends in the jazz world, where for a small number of listeners but a larger group of reviewers, free jazz is the gold standard, despite the fact that many (certainly including myself) find it so sterile and frankly unpleasant.  It just seems willfully obscurant and designed to chase away the general public.  Given how jazz used to be so rooted in popular culture, and film hardly makes sense cut loose from its pop culture beginnings, it seems an odd choice to go down these (to me) fruitless, arid and anti-populist avenues.  I can understand why some artists would get bored and turn inward, but I think it is a huge mistake for the larger community (particularly including critics) to be so indulgent towards them.

But I suppose it is a matter of degree; there are certainly lousy pop culture offerings that I turn my nose up at as well.  The bottom line is I really like plays or the occasional movie that makes you think.  In that sense, I found that Adieu au langage had so little to offer, other than rubbing our noses into the fact that film is an artifice and that it is a weakness or lack of character for people to expect meaningful dialogue or plots that seem to "go somewhere," i.e. build to some climax and then resolve themselves.  We are essentially dupes for wanting this, Godard is saying, and will only give us tiny snippets that repeat themselves and go nowhere.  There is no reveal as to whether the woman (or the man) committed suicide in the tub.  There is no follow through to know if the man shot died or who apparently ran over another character.  There is no plot at all in this film.  But he's been doing this for some time now (really since 1998's Histoire(s) du cinema), and not surprisingly, I find it pretty boring by now and certainly not well done in this instance.  While there is at least some truth to the general view that the French (and even British) have of Americans that we are all absurdly sentimental (as well as quasi-barbaric war-mongers), it seems just as true that the French fall for the most absurd pseudo-philosophizing and deem it profound.

But truly my loathing comes down to just how unpleasant it was to sit through this, so the craft as well as the ideas were bad.  I thought it was silly to have the soundtrack snippets cut in and out, then later repeat themselves.  I know the point is to call attention to the manipulative nature of movie soundtracks, but we get the joke, and this was not nice to sit through.  There were issues (again almost certainly intentional) that made the subtitles hard to read.  The film, despite some reviewers claiming otherwise, was deliberately amateurishly shot.  Given that it was in 3-D, turning the camera sideways or upside down or switching over to low-resolution images or moving out of focus and even allowing the two images to slide in and out (rather than forming an image in stereo) was very jarring and frankly unfair to the audience.  I had a headache from watching it that lasted almost 2 hours.  I came very close to walking out, which I never do, and only the fact that I knew it was short (70 minutes) and that I wanted to watch the whole thing if I was going to call it out, compelled me to stay.

Ultimately, this was a hot mess of a film and not even an entertaining hot mess.  I'm struggling to think of a film I dislike more, and I can't actually think of one off the top of my head (other than torture porn films which I've never actually viewed, knowing how morally bankrupt they are).  I look at the similarly empty and sterile films he's made since 2000 (particularly Notre musique and Film Socialisme), and it just drives home how unfair life in general is.  Godard gets lauded for these frankly terrible "films" (or rather art school projects) while Tati was completely shut out in his later years and could not complete some projects that would almost certainly would have been profound films in that very French sense.  Tati had some curious ideas (with which I am not really in sympathy) about elevating the common man and relegating the "stars" of the film to the margins, but he was certainly never contemptuous of popular culture or, more importantly, the audience, which is clearly the place Godard operates from now. 

I wouldn't say I am actually a fan of Chris Marker whose films are sort of in the same vein as late Godard (heavy on collage and cut-up techniques and light on plot), but I still find him easier to take.  In addition to Jonathan Rosenbaum of the Chicago Reader, who has long been in love with late Godard, I find Richard Brody of the New Yorker to be similarly unbalanced.  In this piece, where he is trying to explain just how great Godard's King Lear is (seriously, he considers it his top film of all time -- and most of his other picks are similarly inexplicable) and go into detail over the genius of Godard, Godard just comes across as a total prick and I had less respect for him than I did before I read it.  I really don't understand why some artists are given a pass to act badly and critics lap up everything they do, while others (particularly those who still show dedication to craft rather than avant garde ideas) are scorned.  By this point, I am well aware that I am in complete disagreement with Jonathan Rosenbaum on almost all films and I know that if he enjoyed a film, I will not and vice versa (aside from Tati, whom he reveres).  It seems the same is true of Richard Brody (even down to his appreciation for Tati).  Sometimes knowing which critics not to read is just as important as which ones that you do want to read.  However, the truth is that I rarely read film reviews anyway, and I certainly don't seek them out, the way I did with Roger Ebert's reviews.  I still haven't found anyone who made me interested in film (or at least film reviews) the way he did.