I won't lie, I knew you'd belong here

[sovay]

Rabbit, rabbit!

To see out January, spatch and I attended a double feature of Peter Bogdanovich's What's Up, Doc (1972) and Paper Moon (1973), both starring Ryan O'Neal but more importantly both edited by Verna Fields: they were screened as part of the Brattle's series on female editors. I had seen What's Up, Doc once in high school, after which I went around quoting pieces of it for twenty-odd years ("There's not much to see, actually; we're inside a Chinese dragon"); this time I could appreciate Barbra Streisand, since I was no longer immediately bitter about Hello, Dolly! (1969), and notice that Kenneth Mars was doing his best Hans Conried as a snooty semi-Croatian musicologist, flouncing hair-toss and all. Rob had never seen it. I'd never seen Paper Moon, like a black-and-white forerunner of O Brother, Where Art Thou? (2000), not a pastiche of the pre-Code movies it resembles. It was a Madeline Kahn double feature, too. After a relatively rotten day, we had a good evening.

Have a bunch of links.

1. Courtesy of brigdh: maps of the Roman Empire divided by stereotype. I am particularly fond of the progression from "Drunks" to "Huge, terrifying, really angry drunks" and the one with the Senate.

2. Courtesy of newredshoes: the backfire of "vice signaling," or why the New York Times keeps looking so pro-Nazi.

3. I've seen this article's argument made before and perhaps more rigorously, but it is always worth noting the ways in which the conspiracy theory aspects of anti-Semitism slide it under many people's recognition of racism: "Anti-Semitism differs from most forms of racism in that it purports to 'punch up' against a secret society of oppressors, which has the side effect of making it easy to disguise as a politics of emancipation. If Jews have power, then punching up at Jews is a form of speaking truth to power." See also Eric Ward's invaluable and quite rigorous "Skin in the Game: How Antisemitism Animates White Nationalism."

4. Maria Dahvana Headley revisits The Crucible in light of Arthur Miller's personal life and comes to some distressing, though fascinating conclusions: "Him Too? How Arthur Miller Smeared Marilyn Monroe and Invented the Myth of the Male Witch Hunt." The title is clickbaity, but the article itself is not.

5. I love this story by Yoon Ha Lee very much: "The Starship and the Temple Cat." It has the best ghost cat.

Comments

[asakiyume]

The maps are brilliant! Sharing with my family. And that story by Yoon Ha Lee is on my read-today list :-)

[sovay]

The maps are brilliant! Sharing with my family.

"Crowded urban hell. Boring small towns. Empty wasteland."

And that story by Yoon Ha Lee is on my read-today list

The ending reliably makes my throat catch. Autolycus joined me for the re-read, which I thought was kind of him.

[asakiyume]

Crowded urban hell. Boring small towns. Empty wasteland. --some attitudes never change!

Re: Yoon Ha Lee's story (now that I've read it): It was a very affecting. I like that the language of the dead is also the language of bells.

[sovay]

I like that the language of the dead is also the language of bells.

Yes. It makes sense. Echoes and reverberations, a ringing long after the touch is gone.

[muccamukk]

That header's more eyebrow raising than the title, for the Miller piece. I'm not sure we needed Munroe on a burning cross.

[sovay]

That header's more eyebrow raising than the title, for the Miller piece. I'm not sure we needed Munroe on a burning cross.

It's certainly not an image I ever expected to see.

[drwex]

I also enjoyed the maps, thank you.

I remember going from liking The Crucible when I read it first as a school-age child to being unable to watch the film because I thought it was horrid. I've no firm idea what changed my view of the story. In between I did develop a minor obsession with Marilyn Monroe - she and I share a birth date, which started me reading about her. I formed the opinion that Miller was beastly, but not with the sort of rigorous analysis that Headley has.

[sovay]

I also enjoyed the maps, thank you.

You're welcome! They made me happy.

I remember going from liking The Crucible when I read it first as a school-age child to being unable to watch the film because I thought it was horrid. I've no firm idea what changed my view of the story.

I've never seen the film of The Crucible and am now unlikely to, despite its ridiculously good cast. I read the play in high school, when it was taught strictly as an allegory for McCarthyism. I knew the divergences from the historical record, but no one at that time taught me what they might mean.

[coraline]

"What's up doc" was one of my formative movies, one about which I have no chill or perspective. I'm glad you enjoyed it :)

[sovay]

"What's up doc" was one of my formative movies, one about which I have no chill or perspective. I'm glad you enjoyed it

It totally holds up.

"Dr. Bannister, I have a message for you from the staff of the hotel."
"What is it?"
"Goodbye."

[sartorias]

Thank you for the link to Yoon's story. I might have missed it, being somewhat backed up in my catching up with online magazines.

[sovay]

Thank you for the link to Yoon's story. I might have missed it, being somewhat backed up in my catching up with online magazines.

You're welcome! It's one of my favorites of his recent work.

[sartorias]

Mine, too!

[osprey_archer]

Thanks for the link to the article about The Crucible. I never liked the way that the play heaped all the blame on Abigail, not least because I'd read other books about the witch trials & I knew the real Abigail was much younger than in the play - which I guess didn't give Miller any pause when he came up with the little story that became the germ of The Crucible. But this article lays it all out much more clearly than I could have.

[moon_custafer]

There’s been a production of The Crucible running at the local university— I’m sure it was in rehearsal before #metoo, but I have been a bit ill at ease seeing acquaintances approvingly quoting the line about “little crazy children jangling the keys of the kingdom.”

[sovay]

but I have been a bit ill at ease seeing acquaintances approvingly quoting the line about “little crazy children jangling the keys of the kingdom.”

I can see that.

Women lose both ways, in The Crucible: their efforts to take power are both underhanded and unsuccessful. I don't feel that was necessary in order to tell the story of a community turning on itself, but then I never understood before that John Proctor was Arthur Miller's self-insert.

[sovay]

Thanks for the link to the article about The Crucible.

You're welcome!

I never liked the way that the play heaped all the blame on Abigail, not least because I'd read other books about the witch trials & I knew the real Abigail was much younger than in the play - which I guess didn't give Miller any pause when he came up with the little story that became the germ of The Crucible. But this article lays it all out much more clearly than I could have.

And the thing is, The Crucible is a central piece of the American theater canon and it works powerfully as an indictment of McCarthyism and I still wish I could have seen Arthur Kennedy as John Proctor in the original 1953 Broadway production and I am fascinated that Sartre scripted his own version of Miller's play which was then filmed in 1957 in French: and there's this whole axis along which Miller slanted the history, which I have not seen anyone before Headley point out so keenly. (It's possible someone has. I don't read as much about mid-century theater as I read about mid-century film.) And that's there and that's real. I hope it will be taught.

[strange_complex]

Haha, I absolutely love those maps! The senate one in particular, because I literally show my students that exact same division in my Augustus lectures (except labelled in slightly more formalistic terms). I think they might grasp the reality a bit better if I showed them this version. :-)

[sovay]

I think they might grasp the reality a bit better if I showed them this version.

Do it!

[choco_frosh]

Heh. I was just looking at "Eight Ways to Divide Finland"...

[sovay]

I was just looking at "Eight Ways to Divide Finland"...

Link?

[choco_frosh]

I found it while scrolling through Very Finnish Problems, but:
https://imgur.com/gallery/Q6alA

(Needless to say, this sort of thing has been done for various other countries, but the finnish one is particularly good...)