It is a rare event to find something laugh-out-loud funny in the business section. In fact, we could suggest it is near never-happens rare.
But, the NYT business section last week had a story about the battle between Jay Leno, a funny man with a late night talk show, and David Letterman, also allegedly funny and with a late night talk show.
There is a writers' strike in the US right now that is threatening the very fabric of the country, meaning that very soon there will be nothing new to watch on TV. Whether anyone actually notices is another issue but it is certainly riling up some people, mostly the writers themselves.
These writers have made a deal with Letterman such that they can for some Byzantine reason write for him despite this strike; not so Leno who decided what the hell, I used to be a funny guy, I'll just do it myself.
He did, and people laughed their heads off; his ratings soared. Letterman, despite the phalanx of writers, was not so funny. Ratings there soured.
What a quandry!! The writers' guilds then went into swift action, saying that Leno MUST NOT BE FUNNY until the end of the strike. He must not write his own stuff, he must sit still and wait for them to figure this problem out. And it is a big problem. If he's funny without them, what do THEY do for a living? My god, is it possible that Leno can DO HIS JOB?? Are writers obsolete? Is Letterman just plain boring? So many questions! So few answers!
So the writers are flipping out. Leno says too bad, seems I'm pretty good at this and I'm going to keep on keepin' on.
Now, here is the metaphysical issue that the writers could do some thinking upon in their newly-acquired strike-permitted spare time: is it the WRITING that is the problem? So, if Leno just stood up and said stuff off the top of his head would that be okay? Is there a difference between what he thinks up and what he writes down? There cannot be...so where is their guild's jurisdiction?
Not to put a damper on a good story. I cannot wait for the next episode.
Monday, January 7, 2008
Saturday, December 29, 2007
Fifteen Days
My friend Blatch, as the author is known, has written an adventure book. Fifteen Days refers to key dates in the Canadian battle to save Afghanistan, mostly from itself. The book is meant to illuminate the new Canadian military for those of us who thought Canada didn't have one.
In many ways there could be no better assignment for Christie Blatchford. She is one of those rare women who truly loves men, especially those who do brave things with uniforms on -- cops, hockey players, soldiers for example. She loves those who do their duty. Who feel they have one in the first place. There is an early scene in this book where (and I am going to get ALL the terminology wrong) a platoon was doing a route reconnaissance and spotted Taliban. Official procedure is to note this information in the official way, exactly the same each time, which is to announce "contact, reference X, 600 metres left" or somesuch. Instead what the eyes of the platoon barked to the others was "Jim, they're on the right! Fuck 'em up!" That boy, whoever he was, just won himself a spot in Blatch's heart forever. She loves that kind of get-it-done.
Now that I think about it, who WOULDN'T love that man? That was bloody sexy, what he did.
As I say, Blatch loves manly men, not for what they can do for her status or bank account or how they can worship her wonderfulness but rather in a pure and admiring way -- she simply loves that mysterious club they all belong to where they innately know how to do things like "fuck 'em up" and are willing to go there and do it, whatever It is. Those of us who live in big cities with all their urban glossy-haired fat-free-yogurt-eating metrosexuals, could easily have thought this breed of man extinct.
The men described in this book are heroic. Solid, true, decent, and that rare thing, brave.
I am not far into this book, which reads like a Boys' Own adventure novel, fast-paced and exciting, not unlike great hockey coverage actually, and what is starting to really hurt is knowing as I read about this man or another, he is going to die. I'm going to lose him. I know he (or she) is one of those killed in battle and I can hardly bear it. Imagine the high price Canadian families to whom this man is son, lover, dad, pay for this effort, and they pay it willingly.
I would tell you more but I have to get back to my book.
In many ways there could be no better assignment for Christie Blatchford. She is one of those rare women who truly loves men, especially those who do brave things with uniforms on -- cops, hockey players, soldiers for example. She loves those who do their duty. Who feel they have one in the first place. There is an early scene in this book where (and I am going to get ALL the terminology wrong) a platoon was doing a route reconnaissance and spotted Taliban. Official procedure is to note this information in the official way, exactly the same each time, which is to announce "contact, reference X, 600 metres left" or somesuch. Instead what the eyes of the platoon barked to the others was "Jim, they're on the right! Fuck 'em up!" That boy, whoever he was, just won himself a spot in Blatch's heart forever. She loves that kind of get-it-done.
Now that I think about it, who WOULDN'T love that man? That was bloody sexy, what he did.
As I say, Blatch loves manly men, not for what they can do for her status or bank account or how they can worship her wonderfulness but rather in a pure and admiring way -- she simply loves that mysterious club they all belong to where they innately know how to do things like "fuck 'em up" and are willing to go there and do it, whatever It is. Those of us who live in big cities with all their urban glossy-haired fat-free-yogurt-eating metrosexuals, could easily have thought this breed of man extinct.
The men described in this book are heroic. Solid, true, decent, and that rare thing, brave.
I am not far into this book, which reads like a Boys' Own adventure novel, fast-paced and exciting, not unlike great hockey coverage actually, and what is starting to really hurt is knowing as I read about this man or another, he is going to die. I'm going to lose him. I know he (or she) is one of those killed in battle and I can hardly bear it. Imagine the high price Canadian families to whom this man is son, lover, dad, pay for this effort, and they pay it willingly.
I would tell you more but I have to get back to my book.
Thursday, December 27, 2007
The Uncommonn Reader
What a charmer, what a delight, what a fantastically wonderful and clever little story this is! The Uncommon Reader is of course the Queen and she becomes ADDICTED to the written word to the chagrin of all around her. But that is just the barest outline, what is so compelling is the wit with which this fable is written.
Imagine if you will the equerries fixing the crowd so we can be through by lunch, pre-populating the crowd with the answers to the usual dopey questions so they don't have a fit of "omigod it's the QUEEN", teaching small talk on the fly. But then the Queen stops asking where they're from and how long was the drive and asks -- egads -- what they are READING!! Stunned, flummoxed, caught for words they croak uh ma'am, I'm from Brighton.
Well, something like that.
There is a lovely scene where the Queen decides to honour these authors she has come to admire so much and learns the lesson we all do. But for a meagre handful, when it comes to authors it is all in the book. A more dull or self-ref-and-reverential crowd you are unlikely to meet. Back when I was in book retail we used to want to seduce our customers by holding "Author Events" which were readings at their worst (seriously, unless you are in your jammies and about to go to bed do you want someone to read aloud? their own stuff?) or brief (sweet brevity) chats about the inspiration behind the book. The one exception was Martin Amis and if you ever have the chance to hear him speak about anything, go. Another exception was the youngest daughter of Charles Lindbergh whose name escapes me, who wrote some kind of memoir. Could have been interesting, given that the most famous Lindbergh child and the only one anyone can readily bring to mind is a dead baby. She told the story of taking her own son to see a Lindbergh museum, where the Spirit of St. Louis was housed. The museum keepers had a cherry picker there so that she and her son could rise from the ground and see the famous airplane up close. She reached her hand and touched the cockpit and said to her boy, "Isn't this amazing?" and he said "Yeah!!! For sure!!! I've never been in a cherry picker before!!!!" The book bombed but the event was nice.
The Queen's author event was not this successful.
The Uncomon Reader is, sadly, a short book but please, please, read it. It will make your day.
Imagine if you will the equerries fixing the crowd so we can be through by lunch, pre-populating the crowd with the answers to the usual dopey questions so they don't have a fit of "omigod it's the QUEEN", teaching small talk on the fly. But then the Queen stops asking where they're from and how long was the drive and asks -- egads -- what they are READING!! Stunned, flummoxed, caught for words they croak uh ma'am, I'm from Brighton.
Well, something like that.
There is a lovely scene where the Queen decides to honour these authors she has come to admire so much and learns the lesson we all do. But for a meagre handful, when it comes to authors it is all in the book. A more dull or self-ref-and-reverential crowd you are unlikely to meet. Back when I was in book retail we used to want to seduce our customers by holding "Author Events" which were readings at their worst (seriously, unless you are in your jammies and about to go to bed do you want someone to read aloud? their own stuff?) or brief (sweet brevity) chats about the inspiration behind the book. The one exception was Martin Amis and if you ever have the chance to hear him speak about anything, go. Another exception was the youngest daughter of Charles Lindbergh whose name escapes me, who wrote some kind of memoir. Could have been interesting, given that the most famous Lindbergh child and the only one anyone can readily bring to mind is a dead baby. She told the story of taking her own son to see a Lindbergh museum, where the Spirit of St. Louis was housed. The museum keepers had a cherry picker there so that she and her son could rise from the ground and see the famous airplane up close. She reached her hand and touched the cockpit and said to her boy, "Isn't this amazing?" and he said "Yeah!!! For sure!!! I've never been in a cherry picker before!!!!" The book bombed but the event was nice.
The Queen's author event was not this successful.
The Uncomon Reader is, sadly, a short book but please, please, read it. It will make your day.
Wednesday, December 26, 2007
Wild Mary: A Life of Mary Wesley
Mary Wesley is a British author whose career took off like a shot at the age of seventy-something. This is brilliant news for those of us suffering yet another mid-life crisis.
As happens with many a biography, the introduction is the best part. From this excellent precis we move on to a rather tedious array of dates and dates -- who Mary was seeing or slept with during what month and year -- sort of putting the pin in the idea of "wild".
But back to the intro for a moment. Here we see Mary, the widow of a failed writer, who has written a kids' book which was published without much financial success, who cannot make ends meet, whose kids are strange or estranged, who suffers illness on top of poverty, who has one of those literary agents who, finally, after trying for years to flog the mss for Jumping the Queue and Haphazard House, sends an "encouraging" note to her client: "I don't feel we would have much chance of anyone willing to take either of these books. However I shall be very happy to keep the Mss and mention them to publishers as I see them, just in case someone is adventurous enough to give it a try." Damn me with faint praise! Luckily Mary took much the same view and then matters into her own hands.
What this wonderful intro shows is that Mary was too down and out to even be counted as down and out. That's how out. Her diary during one weekend reads, for each day, "ILL. Very ILL. Very ILL, raving. very ill." And then something wonderful happened.
Mary sold her damp cottage and moved and then, only then, life took off. Finally a publisher took her odd and adventurous Jumping the Queue, about a casually cruel and used up, cheated upon wife's decision to simply off her self (charming? indeed. Blew the dust off that British middle class "we're so lovely" thing) and voila, Mary churned out a book a year to raves for the next decade.
What Mary shows is that however dreary and despairing you may feel, so long as you are alive you still have a chance. And, slightly less maudlin, eventually perhaps talent will out. Mary's voice as a writer is fresh, acerbic, true and what she proves is that life didn't start with YOU -- your grandmother's generation was at least as sinful, smarmy, adventurous, crazy, sick, perverse, fun, funny and vile as yours. She just didn't say so at dinner parties and then publish the memoirs. Mary had the courage to say so.
I found these pages terrifically inspiring. Had I been sick and raving in a damp and remote cottage with nary a soul around to give a shite, had I been married to a hugely ineffectual dreamer, had I bothered to have kids who then could not be bothered, had I been impoverished and repeatedly spurned for the one thing I thought I could do (write), well, I may have jumped the queue. I tend to think if WILD SUCCESS has not found me yet, it never will. Ha. Mary was still reeling at my age, and WILD SUCCESS was still years away. But it was there, as was a hugely energetic and prolific and exciting LIFE. Amazing! She could NOT have felt any better than I do and look what happened!!
Now, if the rest of the book were as light and cheering as this we'd have a best seller for the ages. Sadly, the book tames Wild Mary. But, I'll press on and let you know if there are any other great lessons to be found. Suffice it to know that life starts when it starts, and isn't confined to age.
As happens with many a biography, the introduction is the best part. From this excellent precis we move on to a rather tedious array of dates and dates -- who Mary was seeing or slept with during what month and year -- sort of putting the pin in the idea of "wild".
But back to the intro for a moment. Here we see Mary, the widow of a failed writer, who has written a kids' book which was published without much financial success, who cannot make ends meet, whose kids are strange or estranged, who suffers illness on top of poverty, who has one of those literary agents who, finally, after trying for years to flog the mss for Jumping the Queue and Haphazard House, sends an "encouraging" note to her client: "I don't feel we would have much chance of anyone willing to take either of these books. However I shall be very happy to keep the Mss and mention them to publishers as I see them, just in case someone is adventurous enough to give it a try." Damn me with faint praise! Luckily Mary took much the same view and then matters into her own hands.
What this wonderful intro shows is that Mary was too down and out to even be counted as down and out. That's how out. Her diary during one weekend reads, for each day, "ILL. Very ILL. Very ILL, raving. very ill." And then something wonderful happened.
Mary sold her damp cottage and moved and then, only then, life took off. Finally a publisher took her odd and adventurous Jumping the Queue, about a casually cruel and used up, cheated upon wife's decision to simply off her self (charming? indeed. Blew the dust off that British middle class "we're so lovely" thing) and voila, Mary churned out a book a year to raves for the next decade.
What Mary shows is that however dreary and despairing you may feel, so long as you are alive you still have a chance. And, slightly less maudlin, eventually perhaps talent will out. Mary's voice as a writer is fresh, acerbic, true and what she proves is that life didn't start with YOU -- your grandmother's generation was at least as sinful, smarmy, adventurous, crazy, sick, perverse, fun, funny and vile as yours. She just didn't say so at dinner parties and then publish the memoirs. Mary had the courage to say so.
I found these pages terrifically inspiring. Had I been sick and raving in a damp and remote cottage with nary a soul around to give a shite, had I been married to a hugely ineffectual dreamer, had I bothered to have kids who then could not be bothered, had I been impoverished and repeatedly spurned for the one thing I thought I could do (write), well, I may have jumped the queue. I tend to think if WILD SUCCESS has not found me yet, it never will. Ha. Mary was still reeling at my age, and WILD SUCCESS was still years away. But it was there, as was a hugely energetic and prolific and exciting LIFE. Amazing! She could NOT have felt any better than I do and look what happened!!
Now, if the rest of the book were as light and cheering as this we'd have a best seller for the ages. Sadly, the book tames Wild Mary. But, I'll press on and let you know if there are any other great lessons to be found. Suffice it to know that life starts when it starts, and isn't confined to age.
Tuesday, December 25, 2007
The Girls, again
As it turns out, The Girls is not exactly as I thought it was.
The girls are conjoined twins and they are about to die because, well, conjoined twins do not live all that long and because one of them has an aneurysm that is about to end her life which means the other will die, too, by bleeding to death.
Being conjoined means of course that there is literally a shadow, a friend for life, the "other" who we are truly attached to -- but what this wonderful book shows is that as close as two people can be, it is impossible still to know one another.
The twins remember things differently though clearly they both witnessed the exact same thing; they protect each other from truths deemed to painful; they are often annoyed with one another. But most surprisingly, though they share every single thing, they don't know each other terribly well.
So, on a fundamental level, we are each utterly alone. No matter how attached we believe ourselves to be.
The girls are conjoined twins and they are about to die because, well, conjoined twins do not live all that long and because one of them has an aneurysm that is about to end her life which means the other will die, too, by bleeding to death.
Being conjoined means of course that there is literally a shadow, a friend for life, the "other" who we are truly attached to -- but what this wonderful book shows is that as close as two people can be, it is impossible still to know one another.
The twins remember things differently though clearly they both witnessed the exact same thing; they protect each other from truths deemed to painful; they are often annoyed with one another. But most surprisingly, though they share every single thing, they don't know each other terribly well.
So, on a fundamental level, we are each utterly alone. No matter how attached we believe ourselves to be.
Monday, December 17, 2007
The Girls
Perhaps all of life is the search for The Other, that soul which completes your own. Isn't this the promise of all love affairs, isn't this the hunger that makes spinsters and bachelors crazy?
In other hands The Girls by Lori Lansens would be peculiar or downright macabre. One thinks of Barbara Gowdy and her fascination with freaks and their strange ways, forced upon them by mismatched anatomy. A story detailing all their ins and outs probably tells us something about the human condition but not anything that you can take with you to a dinner party. The Girls, on the other hand, uses a peculiarity to tell the truth about something common to us all.
Ruby and Rose are conjoined twins, attached to one another literally at the head and therefore deeply attached through the heart. Ironically, because of their fixation, they cannot see one another and rely on mirrors when they need to look each other in the eye. Imagine being so close to someone and not to be able to actually SEE them -- isn't this something interesting to contemplate? How much of knowing is seeing, and how often does someone we know very well become invisible. What the soul knows the eyes don't need to see.
Well, it's a thought anyway.
Being so strange means in some ways that they have each other but no one else; they literally cannot live apart. All of life is a negotiation and every second is obviously spent with a witness -- you can see that there is a down side to having so close a soul mate.
The "other" is also the thread woven throughout The Thirteenth Tale, where Margaret was a conjoined twin whose "other" was sacrificed so she could live. She seeks her other constantly, and sees her in the reflection of her own face in mirrors and blackened windows.
Both books are fantastically good. Both describe a closeness and yet a yearning for something intangible which is missing, a lack that must be essentially human.
Like Margaret, I have always wanted a sister at the very least, a twin at the best. I have missed my unborn sister terribly. I don't imagine her so much anymore but when I was a child I felt her absence acutely, my ballast against the cruelties of the world.
The thing is, and it is just a passing notion, even if my sister and I were joined at the head if not the hip, there are things she would not know or like. Even conjoined we are essentially alone.
How sad is that?
Perhaps it isn't. Perhaps we can live in our own private paradise no matter what.
In other hands The Girls by Lori Lansens would be peculiar or downright macabre. One thinks of Barbara Gowdy and her fascination with freaks and their strange ways, forced upon them by mismatched anatomy. A story detailing all their ins and outs probably tells us something about the human condition but not anything that you can take with you to a dinner party. The Girls, on the other hand, uses a peculiarity to tell the truth about something common to us all.
Ruby and Rose are conjoined twins, attached to one another literally at the head and therefore deeply attached through the heart. Ironically, because of their fixation, they cannot see one another and rely on mirrors when they need to look each other in the eye. Imagine being so close to someone and not to be able to actually SEE them -- isn't this something interesting to contemplate? How much of knowing is seeing, and how often does someone we know very well become invisible. What the soul knows the eyes don't need to see.
Well, it's a thought anyway.
Being so strange means in some ways that they have each other but no one else; they literally cannot live apart. All of life is a negotiation and every second is obviously spent with a witness -- you can see that there is a down side to having so close a soul mate.
The "other" is also the thread woven throughout The Thirteenth Tale, where Margaret was a conjoined twin whose "other" was sacrificed so she could live. She seeks her other constantly, and sees her in the reflection of her own face in mirrors and blackened windows.
Both books are fantastically good. Both describe a closeness and yet a yearning for something intangible which is missing, a lack that must be essentially human.
Like Margaret, I have always wanted a sister at the very least, a twin at the best. I have missed my unborn sister terribly. I don't imagine her so much anymore but when I was a child I felt her absence acutely, my ballast against the cruelties of the world.
The thing is, and it is just a passing notion, even if my sister and I were joined at the head if not the hip, there are things she would not know or like. Even conjoined we are essentially alone.
How sad is that?
Perhaps it isn't. Perhaps we can live in our own private paradise no matter what.
Saturday, December 8, 2007
Between the lines
Amazing what you can read when you are ready to read between the lines.
All the fearsome truths, all the dangerous realities, all the things too frightening to face lie there plain as day, upright and ready.
You learn, between the lines, what the end of the affair really means. You read what the boss actually wants of you -- less you, more company mandate and task at hand; in fact, best if there is no "you" at all, just the delivery of numbers, business, perfect projects accomplished with the least amount of kerfuffle possible. Just say "yes" in the language he best understands.
Mostly understand what the cowards are trying to say -- they are the ones who most frequently lurk between the lines. If the words are wonderful and the actions are less so, you are in this netherworld.
It is easy to misunderstand what Between the Lines actually means. We are taught to forgive, we are taught that relationships are hard work, we are taught to accomodate.
If I were ever to have a child (and I will not) or if I were ever responsible for the guidance of one most especially a girl I would say this. Read the writing on the wall. Take the news bravely. Accept it and move on, knowing that you are worthy of better news and better treatment. This will protect you from having to live with the lies and deceptions of those who can't quite say clearly what they really mean. You'll see it in the first place.
All the fearsome truths, all the dangerous realities, all the things too frightening to face lie there plain as day, upright and ready.
You learn, between the lines, what the end of the affair really means. You read what the boss actually wants of you -- less you, more company mandate and task at hand; in fact, best if there is no "you" at all, just the delivery of numbers, business, perfect projects accomplished with the least amount of kerfuffle possible. Just say "yes" in the language he best understands.
Mostly understand what the cowards are trying to say -- they are the ones who most frequently lurk between the lines. If the words are wonderful and the actions are less so, you are in this netherworld.
It is easy to misunderstand what Between the Lines actually means. We are taught to forgive, we are taught that relationships are hard work, we are taught to accomodate.
If I were ever to have a child (and I will not) or if I were ever responsible for the guidance of one most especially a girl I would say this. Read the writing on the wall. Take the news bravely. Accept it and move on, knowing that you are worthy of better news and better treatment. This will protect you from having to live with the lies and deceptions of those who can't quite say clearly what they really mean. You'll see it in the first place.
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