sovay | I know I could take the bait, but oh, I know I'd never surface

Current Music: Swamp Wife, "I'm a Liar"

I know I could take the bait, but oh, I know I'd never surface

I remain tired to an unreal and maddening degree, but yesterday I managed to visit

phi on flyby and this evening I finally unpacked almost the last of our fragile things into the glass-fronted cabinet. Certain others seem to have remained in storage, such as the fossil fish, my slot machine token,

spatch's collection of bottles. We will track them down. Have some links.

1. A.S. Byatt has died. For years I felt like the one person in my entire circle of friends who had failed to love Possession (1990); in fact I bounced off most of her novels, most badly The Children's Book (2009), but I loved her short fiction, especially the paired novellas of Angels & Insects (1992), the first half of Elementals (1998), and the frame story and Loki of Ragnarok (2011). I was just watching Bonnie Wright's Medusa's Ankles (2018), a short film based on Byatt's 1990 short story of the same name; it feels in some ways like a deliberate dodge of its source material and in others like an abundant homage to its rich, visual, tactile text and bittersweetness. Her stories were sharp jewel boxes.

2. I love that the Blaschka glass invertebrates have traveled from the Harvard Museum of Comparative Zoology to Mystic Seaport for an exhibition of their own, Spineless: A Glass Menagerie of Blaschka Marine Invertebrates. I am undeservedly charmed that this article headlines one of my favorites, Stiliger ornatus, with its gold-banded, algae-tinted cerata, which I have coveted on every visit since 2014.

3. I had such a surprised reaction to a statement by Roger Ebert quoted in Richard Brody's "Siskel, Ebert, and the Secret of Criticism"—

"When you disagree on a movie," Ebert said, "you're not disagreeing on the movie. You're disagreeing on who you are. If I don't like a movie and he does, then I'm not saying that the movie is flawed, I'm saying that he's flawed."

—that I am trying to source further context on it, since it is not clear, either, from the biography which Brody is reviewing, whether Ebert meant strictly the dynamic of his arguments with Gene Siskel or criticism in general and whether he thought it was a feature or a bug or merely a fact of human interaction, because the attitude described is one of the least helpful I can encounter in either professional criticism or casual conversation. Nothing deep-sixes a discussion of art faster than the conflation of quality with taste, never mind mixing in personal rejection. That way lies fan wank unto the fourth generation. [edit: further context sourced by

kore in comments.]

4. For example, David Ehrenstein's "Desert Fury, Mon Amour" (1988) depends on defining the movie in question as "quintessentially mediocre," for which he makes a cogent, technical case with which I cannot bring myself to agree independent of my instant affection for the picture—it's too weird to be the middle of the road as opposed to all over it—but it is a masterful piece of film writing all the same. Its extra-textual analysis is especially valuable. I have no idea why I haven't read his Open Secret: Gay Hollywood 1928–1998 (1998).

5. I meant to share this poem some time back, but events overtook me: Matthew Hollis, "The Diomedes."

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I think Stiliger ornatus would fit very nicely in that case among your pretty things.

Heavens, I didn't know there was a film of Medusa's Ankles! I mourn Byatt's passing: I've been reading her since The Virgin in the Garden (1978). What I love is her passion for haecceity, for the thisness of the world. I love the way she minutely worldbuilds times and places as if now</> were historical fiction, were fantasy.

Nine

I think Stiliger ornatus would fit very nicely in that case among your pretty things.

Thank you. I wish I had a glassblower to commission one from.

Heavens, I didn't know there was a film of Medusa's Ankles!

I found it on Vimeo! If it had not altered, slightly but crucially, one key line, I wouldn't have any argument with it at all. So far the director seems to work only in short films and music videos; her debut had nice parts for David Thewlis and Dungeness. Medusa's Ankles gets you Kerry Fox, Jason Isaacs, and the Matisse.

I mourn Byatt's passing: I've been reading her since The Virgin in the Garden (1978). What I love is her passion for haecceity, for the thisness of the world. I love the way she minutely worldbuilds times and places as if now were historical fiction, were fantasy.

I discovered her whenever she started turning up in the Year's Best Fantasy and Horror and then really started to follow her in college, after "Cold" (1998). I agree with you about the worldbuilding. Even her stories I didn't like never felt thin.

I'm glad Harvard let the invertebrates out. :) If I don't have to work next month maybe I'll go visit them, as I haven't seen them in decades.

I wonder if Ebert was trying to describe the situation that leads to the fanwank rather than trying to endorse it. Because yeah, if he's saying that is how it actually is rather than how people perceive it to be (and they could change their minds and be less wanky), my reaction is the same as yours but less eloquent.

I think I read Possession around the same time as I read Always Coming Home. I liked the partially epistolary structure of both, but I think I preferred ACH because I am a sucker for worldbuilding and NOT for the Victorians.

I wonder if Ebert was trying to describe the situation that leads to the fanwank rather than trying to endorse it.

This is my thought too. Like he's describing a common way people react to things.

This is my thought too. Like he's describing a common way people react to things.

You see why I want the rest of the interview! It felt so out of character with the way he wrote about movies, but I never watched Siskel & Ebert.

I hope that's what Ebert was getting at, because it's hard to imagine otherwise (and I watched Siskel & Ebert for years).

I hope that's what Ebert was getting at, because it's hard to imagine otherwise (and I watched Siskel & Ebert for years).

Data point much appreciated. I had a real record scratch moment with it.

[edit]

kore sourced the original context on ABC's 20/20 in 1988, below!

Edited (only be sure always to call it please "research") 2023-11-20 06:52 (UTC)

If I don't have to work next month maybe I'll go visit them, as I haven't seen them in decades.

I think you should! The surrounding context of sailors' journals and citizen science sounds great, too.

I wonder if Ebert was trying to describe the situation that leads to the fanwank rather than trying to endorse it.

That's what I would prefer. Brody contextualizes it didactically, but I never got the sense from any of Ebert's reviews that he was writing as a gatekeeper, which is part of the reason the comment startled me. I have read other critics *cough*Harlan Ellison*cough* who are a lot more ad hominem about their assertions.

I think I read Possession around the same time as I read Always Coming Home. I liked the partially epistolary structure of both, but I think I preferred ACH because I am a sucker for worldbuilding and NOT for the Victorians.

Besides, Always Coming Home has music.

(The Victorians are not a dealbreaker for me, but I was left cold by the novel—which should have been in my sweet spot of the reconstruction and gaps of history—while surrounded by people who thought it was the most incredible thing. I still don't know quite why, but I tried it again as recently as ten years ago and it still didn't do anything for me beyond the prose.)

Oh, that's sad about A.S. Byatt, some of her poetry had a great deal of meaning to me.

Oh, that's sad about A.S. Byatt, some of her poetry had a great deal of meaning to me.

I am sorry. I don't think I ever read any of her poetry, only her prose.

I liked "The Djinn In The Nightingale's Eye", but her novels were uninteresting. I read "Possession" when everyone did, and felt no interest in re-reading, which is my measure of engagement with a work of fiction.

I liked "The Djinn In The Nightingale's Eye", but her novels were uninteresting.

I also liked "The Djinn in the Nightingale's Eye." It may have been the first collection of hers I bought, on grounds of it being the first one I encountered in used book stores. I kept waiting for Three Thousand Years of Longing (2022) to come to a streaming service accessible to me and should probably just take it out of the library, old-fashioned-style.

Starring Kerry Fox, Jason Isaacs, Chanel Cresswell and Anna Shaffer

OMG THAT IS BURYING THE LEDE Jason Isaacs! <333 I would watch that man read the tax code.

I really like her short stories too -- I was thinking I should reread them, since it's been ages since I have read some of her collections, or I may just reread Ragnarok, just having seen the finale of Loki S2.

OMG THAT IS BURYING THE LEDE Jason Isaacs! <333 I would watch that man read the tax code.

Enjoy! He's very good in it.

I really like her short stories too -- I was thinking I should reread them, since it's been ages since I have read some of her collections, or I may just reread Ragnarok, just having seen the finale of Loki S2.

I want to unpack and re-read Ragnarok. "Ungraspable Loki flamed amazement and pleased himself."

OK, I looked at that footnote, and apparently it's from a 20/20 video in 1988:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qIqUH6nxOIs

I can't look at it all now bc we're about to eat dinner (late) but it will be interesting to see that quote in context!

OK, I looked at that footnote, and apparently it's from a 20/20 video in 1988

Thank you for running that down! I saw the citation of 20/20 in Singer, but I didn't see a footnote in either Brody's article or the version of Opposable Thumbs visible to me on Google Books. Have a nice dinner!

[edit] The segment is framed in terms of their antagonism, such that Siskel is introduced saying of Ebert, "It's been my mission, since I was twenty-three years old, to beat him. That's eighteen years ago. He is the one person in Chicago that I must destroy in print," and Lynn Sherr describes the cross-talk of their show as "unscripted, unrehearsed, unmitigated war." The context is as follows, having shown a clip of Siskel and Ebert full bore disagreeing about Full Metal Jacket:

Sherr: "It felt to me as if you were putting him down, in a very real way. That wasn't acting. You were really putting him down."

Ebert: "We have real arguments. When you disagree on a movie, you're not disagreeing on the movie. You're disagreeing on who you are. You see, if I don't like a movie and he does, then I'm not saying, you know, that the movie is flawed or that the movie isn't flawed, I'm saying that he's flawed. He—there's a flaw in his character that makes him like that movie. And so basically it's a very personal thing . . . There is sometimes hostility. We are sometimes extremely angry with each other. And this is based upon the fact that we are completely incompatible in terms of our personalities."

Siskel: "Roger has this style about him that drives me crazy. He—I have described him as a party unto himself."

Ebert: "I mean, to him competition is absolutely the beginning and the end of the day, and I occasionally take a few hours off. I like to tell jokes or something."

Siskel: "I know all of his jokes. I could do all of his jokes. And then the laughter that he supplies in case anyone else doesn't laugh."

So it sounds more like depiction than endorsement, but depiction of a particularly prickly case in which both critics have a lot of ego tied up in the disagreement, although the show makes sure to collect evidence of both of them saying nice things about the other before fading out on another highly colored argument. The closing music is "Let's Call the Whole Thing Off."

Edited (only be sure always to call it please "research") 2023-11-20 06:36 (UTC)

OK, that makes more sense of the quote, which I otherwise had a visceral "No!" reaction to, but/and it's definitely That Specific Case, and makes me sad on their behalf.

OK, that makes more sense of the quote, which I otherwise had a visceral "No!" reaction to, but/and it's definitely That Specific Case, and makes me sad on their behalf.

It reminded me how much I do not enjoy debates about books, movies etc. which contain that aggressive element of who gets to be Right, as opposed to the kind of compare-and-contrast of what worked for one person and what didn't for another which I can do basically forever because it is fundamentally more interesting to me. And sometimes you can explain what you love about a piece of art to someone such that they understand exactly the depth and rationale of your feelings about it and it still bores them, annoys them, or leaves them cold! But that's how art works. You can't take it personally even when it's yours, otherwise you'd never survive an audition or a submission or a show.

Aw, the cabinet looks great! I'm sorry about continued unreality, though. ♥

And that is a weird quote, yes. *squints at it*

Aw, the cabinet looks great! I'm sorry about continued unreality, though.

Thank you on both counts! We still have a lot of art we need to put up, even after a year, although I am reminding myself that I spent most of said year sick to the point of disability.

And that is a weird quote, yes.

It seems from context to have been more of a description of his dynamic with Siskel than a philosophy of criticism on the whole, but I'm glad it was not a part of his written reviews.

The thing that's very weird is that arguing about who you are on that level is completely unnecessary, because you are different people. Being different people is a given? You already knew that? I didn't have to wait to hear that you only like Byatt's short stories and not her novels whereas I like both to find out that you and I are not, in fact, the same person. Did Mr. Ebert have to wait to find that out? What a very strange approach.

I didn't have to wait to hear that you only like Byatt's short stories and not her novels whereas I like both to find out that you and I are not, in fact, the same person. Did Mr. Ebert have to wait to find that out? What a very strange approach.

Assuming that the 20/20 segment was not cherry-picking its clips, the irreconcilable differences of Siskel and Ebert seem to have been the driving force of their reviewing partnership, but it is definitely not a mode in which I would want to coexist week after week because I do not find it fun either to feel attacked for my artistic tastes or to make other people feel attacked for theirs in turn. And I am comfortable writing about movies which I think are actually bad! Or even sometimes just not very good in ways from which I cannot extract entertainment! I can make value judgments! But if someone pops up in my comments to explain that they don't care about the political-intellectual incoherence of The Woman on Pier 13, they love its paranoid atmosphere so much, more power to them for the salvage work. It probably helps that I also don't care very much about the formation of canons and have never kept a ranked list of anything in my life unless required to do so for purposes of an exam or something.

Edited (HTML) 2023-11-20 23:00 (UTC)

For years I felt like the one person in my entire circle of friends who had failed to love Possession (1990)

*Ahem* I didn't like it either, probably because I'm not into most Victorian poetry(1), and it was full of Victorian-style poetry-- I could appreciate the accuracy, but I didn't enjoy it. Sounds like I should give her short fiction a try, though.

(1) Except for some of Robert Browning's stuff

I didn't like it either, probably because I'm not into most Victorian poetry(1), and it was full of Victorian-style poetry-- I could appreciate the accuracy, but I didn't enjoy it. Sounds like I should give her short fiction a try, though.

She always wrote like herself, but across a wide range of tones and subjects, so it is definitely worth trying a couple of collections to see if anything clicks. They were not all full of Victorian poetry, although one of my favorites, "The Conjugial Angel" (1992), does have Tennyson on the periphery. (But also some wonderful séances and a terrifying angel.) Data point noted and appreciated.

For years I felt like the one person in my entire circle of friends who had failed to love Possession (1990)

I am another one who didn't like it. IIRC, there seemed to be an underlying critique of literary criticism/scholarship embedded in it that, for me, got in the way of the much more interesting the stuff about filling in the gaps, reclaiming women's stories, etc.

I am another one who didn't like it.

Thank you for letting me know!

IIRC, there seemed to be an underlying critique of literary criticism/scholarship embedded in it that, for me, got in the way of the much more interesting the stuff about filling in the gaps, reclaiming women's stories, etc.

That makes sense of some of what I remember feeling about the weightlessness of the novel, that the contemporary characters were satirical, but the historical ones were pastiche, and neither felt real enough for me to be compelled by them rather than content to watch their movements, so all I was left with was the structure which springs its secret at the last moment and the language, which was beautiful, but had more substance for me in her other work. Perhaps I would have enjoyed it more if I hadn't expected to care about the characters as people? Other people I knew didn't seem so disengaged.

I remain tired to an unreal and maddening degree

I'm so sorry. It's the worst and I hope you'll feel better soon. <3

Your cabinet of fragile treasures looks so wonderful!

Nothing deep-sixes a discussion of art faster than the conflation of quality with taste, never mind mixing in personal rejection. That way lies fan wank unto the fourth generation.

I want this on a T-shirt or something, it's so true!

Thank you for sharing that piece about "Desert Fury"--I also disagree with calling it "quintessentially mediocre", but I still found it really interesting and informative!

Also, thank you for the poem about the Diomedes islands, I loved it! (By the way, have you read Atlas of remote islands, by Judith Schalansky? If not, it sounds like it could be your kind of thing. I like its drawings and small, melancholic prose poems.)

I'm so sorry. It's the worst and I hope you'll feel better soon.

Thank you. I'm just very tired of how little it takes to burn me out at the moment.

Your cabinet of fragile treasures looks so wonderful!

It's the accumulation of beaches, museums, occasions, doodles, gifts. It's more crowded than it was even a year and a half ago when we had to pack it up!

I want this on a T-shirt or something, it's so true!

At least on a coffee mug! (I do not drink coffee, but I admire the art form.)

Thank you for sharing that piece about "Desert Fury"--I also disagree with calling it "quintessentially mediocre", but I still found it really interesting and informative!

You're welcome! I was fascinated by the discussion of the film in terms of market forces, narratively and extra-diegetically, which I had not thought about/to which I do not necessarily have access when I just sit down and put a disc in the player.

Also, thank you for the poem about the Diomedes islands, I loved it!

You're also welcome! It succeeded in making me want to read the collection it came from.

(By the way, have you read Atlas of remote islands, by Judith Schalansky? If not, it sounds like it could be your kind of thing. I like its drawings and small, melancholic prose poems.)

I have not, but the title is instinctively appealing and it looks like a fascinating project. I will keep an eye out for it.

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I know I could take the bait, but oh, I know I'd never surface

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