Muse by Craig Ranapia

Just in case you haven't had enough winter weather porn for one lifetime, how could I resist the magnificent conclusion to James Joyce's The Dead (and you can find the complete story on-line here):

The air of the room chilled his shoulders. He stretched himself cautiously along under the sheets and lay down beside his wife. One by one, they were all becoming shades. Better pass boldly into that other world, in the full glory of some passion, than fade and wither dismally with age. He thought of how she who lay beside him had locked in her heart for so many years that image of her lover's eyes when he had told her that he did not wish to live.

Generous tears filled Gabriel's eyes. He had never felt like that himself towards any woman, but he knew that such a feeling must be love. The tears gathered more thickly in his eyes and in the partial darkness he imagined he saw the form of a young man standing under a dripping tree. Other forms were near. His soul had approached that region where dwell the vast hosts of the dead. He was conscious of, but could not apprehend, their wayward and flickering existence. His own identity was fading out into a grey impalpable world: the solid world itself, which these dead had one time reared and lived in, was dissolving and dwindling.A few light taps upon the pane made him turn to the window. It had begun to snow again. He watched sleepily the flakes, silver and dark, falling obliquely against the lamplight. The time had come for him to set out on his journey westward. Yes, the newspapers were right: snow was general all over Ireland. It was falling on every part of the dark central plain, on the treeless hills, falling softly upon the Bog of Allen and, farther westward, softly falling into the dark mutinous Shannon waves. It was falling, too, upon every part of the lonely churchyard on

the hill where Michael Furey lay buried. It lay thickly drifted on the crooked crosses and headstones, on the spears of the little gate, on the barren thorns. His soul swooned slowly as he heard the snow falling faintly through the universe and faintly falling, like the descent of their last end, upon all the living and the dead.

And for those of you whose attention spanshave been destroyed by the interweb,  here's the same scene from John Huston's strangely appropriate final film, with Donal McCann and Anglieca Huston.

This is going to blow my reputation as a foul-tempered misanthrope, but I'm a sucker for well-mannered chutzpah.  And when an e-mail arrives from friend of the blog Rich Lock with "shameless request for a plug" in the subject line, how could I say no?

My wife, Georgina Scull, has written and produced a radio programme which is being broadcast in the arts slot on RNZ on Sunday. Details below:

The Arts on Sunday with Lynn Freeman

3:04 The Sunday Drama: The Secrets I Keep, by Georgina Scull

Two years in the making this is a compelling first person doco-drama where three actors recreate the real-life confessions of three everyday New Zealanders who have held life-long secrets (RNZ)

http://www.radionz.co.nz/national/schedules/20110724

Happy to oblige, Sir.  I would presume my cultured readers were listening to The Arts on Sunday anyway -- which this week includes what I'm sure will be a sparky panel on local drama funding with NZ on AIR CEO Jane Wrightson, Rachel Gean fromTV3 and Kathleen Anderson from TVNZ -- but this sounds more than usually intriguing.

And if you're inexplicable unable to find a wireless receiver this afternoon, the audio will be available here.

ELSEWHERE...

Don't forget the Wellington Film Festival kicks off this Friday -- and judging from the opening night reaction in Auckland, The Tree of Life is going to cause one or two *cough* lively discussions in the lobby afterwards.  The Dunedin and Christchurch programmes are also on line, and bookings are open. 

WARNING: POST CONTAINS CONTENT POTENTIALLY TRIGGERING TO SURVIVORS OF SEXUAL ABUSE

Being a small-l liberal who believes in free speech, free association and assembly, free markets and a free press -- is hell on the back.  All too often, you find yourself doing an intellectual pole dance, hanging upside down with your arse hanging out in defence of people you normally would tell to get off your lawn before the minefield goes live. 

Ian Wishart — whose unseemly fixation on the malign influence of Helen Clark’s supposedly Sapphic genitalia is the least of his literary sins —is very close to the top of that distinguished company.  Breaking Silence: The Kahui Case, the Kahui twins' mother, Macsyna King's "tell-all" memoir isn't going to be getting a review here. 

But I’m more than a little concerned that The Warehouse and Paper Plus in bowing to pressure from the Boycott the Macsyna King Book group on Facebook (which I will not link to, as it's hardly difficult to find and some of the content is not only defamatory but in extremely poor taste) and not carry the book.  Prominent independent booksellers like Unity Books’ Jo McColl and Women’s Bookstore proprietor Carole Beu are on the record that they intend to follow suit.

Now, let’s get one or two things straight.  I absolutely and unconditionally respect the right of booksellers to determine their own stock as they see fit – even if I don’t agree with their reasoning. 

I would also be a total hypocrite to criticise anyone for using their power as consumers in a free market to organise a consumer boycott,  after I encouraged people to shun Penguin New Zealand after their feeble response to Witi Ihimaera being outed as a recidivist plagiarist.  Nor do I feel terribly well-disposed towards enriching Random House New Zealand when I see Paul Henry smirking from atop a stack of his apologia pro vita twatcock memoir.

Friend of Muse Lew Stoddart adroitly fisks at Kiwipolitico the slushy equation of  a boycott -- which neither of us support, FWIW -- with a ban or censorship.  Since I've done it myself, along with Wishart and commentators who should know better, I'll just say "fair call, will do better."

Something else that also needs to be called out by its right name is craven and blatant corporate hypocrisy. I really had to roll my eyes at reading this in Wednesday’s New Zealand Herald from Paper Plus CEO Rob Smith:

He said the amount of concern over the "highly emotive content" in the book was the main reason for not stocking it.

Paper Plus has a strong heritage as a family friendly store and its decisions were always made with the wellbeing of children at the front of their mind, he said.

Has Mr. Smith ever set foot in his own stores?  A little unscientific browsing yesterday, found Paper Plus, The Warehouse and Unity Books  all selling copies of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. It’s arguably the best-selling work of fiction in translation since The Bible.  It also contains excruciatingly graphic and intense descriptions of child sex abuse, rape and the violent degradation of women.  If nothing else, this tome's original Swedish title, which literally translates as 'Men Who Hate Women', deserves a Nobel Prize for Truth in Advertising. 

I've even seen (shrink-wrapped and appropriately labelled) copies of American Psycho in Paper Plus stores and both branches of Unity Books --  a novel whose many felicities includes a lengthy description of a woman having a rat inserted in her vagina before she's cut in half with a chainsaw, genitally mutilated then raped. In that order. 

(Before you bolt to the comments to suggest I  get back on my meds, neither of us are clinically psychotic.  I know the depiction of an act in a novel or film is not the act itself.  I'm just suggestion that there are lot of people -- myself includes -- for whom presenting rape and abuse as entertainment is "highly emotive content" as well.  Certainly not "family-friendly" unless your name is Manson.)

Paper Plus, The Warehouse and Unity also have little concerns about selling “true crime” non-fiction, self-justifying memoirs written by convicted criminals.  I also had little problem finding DVDs and tie-in books of Underbelly -- an Australian fact-ional drama that's been accused of glamourising murderous thugs like Terry 'Mr Asia' Clark while re-victimising their survivors and, shall we say, playing fast and loose with history for dramatic effect.  

Now, the simple truth is that if you get enough people shouting loudly enough on Facebook in the middle of a recession that's hitting retailers like a steel-cap stiletto in the junk, you pay attention. Still, if booksellers are going to outsource their judgement to social media, could they respect us enough not to pretend they’re looking out for the children instead of their bottom line?

The Herald story I linked to above had another quote, this time from Warehouse merchandise manager Nick Tuck that should have been examined more closely by journalists.

[He] said the company had decided not to stock Breaking Silence in any of its 89 stores or online after receiving "significant" comment from customers.

"Overwhelmingly, they have told us that they do not wish to buy it or see it on the shelves. We have listened to our customers, and The Warehouse has chosen not to stock the book."

So, Mr. Tuck, what delicate ratio of phone calls, e-mails and FB "likes" constitutes "significant" for the largest retailer in New Zealand?  And how consistently will this be applied in future?  While the "book burning" hyperbole in Brian Rudman's column on the topic is particularly useful, he asks asks a perfectly legitimate question:

Unity Books' owner, Jo McColl, told National Radio she would cancel her order, or if it was too late, throw the books in the bin when they arrived.

The evidence from the Coroner's Court this week had made her feel "quite queasy about anyone making money out of this story".

She argued it wasn't censorship because booksellers made choices of what to stock all the time, and that anyone who wanted a copy of this book could buy it online from the author.

But that avoids addressing the dangerous precedent now being set by booksellers.

Since the twins' brutal killing in 2006, the country has been shocked, disgusted and intrigued by this unsolved case.

Now, because an unknown number of people want to silence one of the prime suspects from publishing her story, they're threatening boycotts of offending booksellers, and the shopkeepers are quickly caving in.

This leaves them vulnerable to the next wave of book-burners. What happens when the next "I euthanised my mother" book turns up and right-to-lifers come bashing on the door? Or a new Richard Dawkins book upsets the Christians? For the sake of an easy life, will the booksellers toss those on the bonfire as well?

Contra Rudman, I would point out that McColl isn't exactly wrong.  It would be physically impossible and economically suicidal for any bookseller to try and stock every one of the hundreds of thousands of books published in English alone, every year.  Many independent bookstores also "narrowcast" to specialist audiences -- foodies, SF/fantasy geeks, feminists, GLBT folks, poetry fans to pick a few favourites of mine.

Nor do I really think Ms. McColl or Carole Beu would be purging queer-lit from Unity or Ponsonby's Women's Boosktore no matter how many people "liked" a BOYCOTT THE SODOMY BOOKS Farcebook group started by Density Church or Family First.  I'd also surmise that Richard Dawkins, Chris Hitchens and Philip Pullman are pretty safe on High Street too.

But I've no reason to be  so confident about Paper Plus, The Warehouse or the new prorietors of the Whitcoulls/Borders group who between them dominate the book trade in New Zealand.  Anyone who thinks that wouldn't have a real impact on the trade (and publishers' willingness to risk publishing contentious books) and people for whom the big chains are their best, even only choices, are being disingenuous at best.

If you want to make a case that Ian Wishart is a twenty gallon drum of douche whose relationship with truth is not a good one, I'm not going to argue.  Think Macsyna King is a ghastly bitch not fit to have custody of goldfish, who must be guilty of something?  You're entitled to your opinion, but I'm also entitled to tell you to take it elsewhere. (Also, anyone who shares the incoming Children's Commissioner's views on the right to silence as it pertains to can we just say I agree to disagree, and leave the legal debate to the comments on whatever Public Address'  legal blogger has to say.)

The problem with supporting freedom of speech is that you defend the rights of ghastly people -- not only Wishart and King, but folks whose exercise their freedoms of speech to talk nonsense.  And retailers who need to get on-line and buy one slightly-used spine.  Now if you'll excuse me, I see a pole that needs a quick going over with the Spray 'N' Wipe before my next show...

(This post is an expanded version of my '180 Seconds with Craig Ranapia' piece, that will be broadcast on Public Address Radio this Sunday, 7pm, on Radio Live.)

I know this is waaay off-topic for a culture blog, but long-time Public Address readers know that I'm a big fan of same-sex marriage and epically ambiguous about the separate but equal-ish (more or less) status quo for same-sex couples created by the Civil Union Act 2004.

So, it should come as no surprise that the passage of a same-sex marriage bill through the New York State Senate by a 33-29 vote (and with the support of four members of the GOP majority) makes me a very happy camper indeed.

But the speech made by one of those Republicans, Mark J. Grisanti -- a married, devout Catholic from a very conservative district up-state who campaigned against same-sex marriage -- made me tear up.

I shouldn't be so moved by hearing a politician saying that 1) evidence changed his mind, 2) he was just wrong and 3) would accept the consequences of doing the right thing.  (And the usual suspects on the far-right have already declared war on the GOP legislators who voted for the bill.) But there you go, and here we are.

I'll leave you to compare and contrast with with this tag-team fudge 'n' waffle (ugh) Broadsides column from Nikki Kaye and Jacinda Adern in the Herald last week.  It's not really good enough to say you'd vote for some hypothetical bill you know will never happen; but when a right-wing Republican is schooling the MP for Auckland Central (and her Labour challenger) in what political courage, and respect for gay and lesbian families, looks like?  Ponsonby, we have a problem.

Until then, here's The Fifth Dimension's cover of Laura Nyro's Wedding Bell Blues on Top of the Pops.  And, no, before you ask - you're probably not on drugs.

"O Lord God, let me not be disgraced in my old days. Or if Thou wilt not help me, do not help these scoundrels, but leave us to try it ourselves."

Leopold I, Prince of Anhalt-Dessau, (1676-1747), attr., prayer before the Battle of Kesseldorf, December 14, 1745.

 

She was the sort of woman who, if she had been taken in adultery, would of course have caught the first stone and thrown it back.

Anthony Powell, A Writer's Notebook

 

You probably need to have had a 'country' upbringing to feel the withering effect of that adjective: "You're the brainy one, aren't you?" It still makes me flinch.

Diana Athill, 'Molly Keane', Stet: A Memoir

 

Who on earth invented the silly convention that it is boring or impolite to talk shop? Nothing is more interesting to listen to, especially if the shop is not one's own.

W.H. Auden, A Certain World

 

"Always providing you have enough courage  -- or money -- you can do without a reputation."

Margaret Mitchell, Gone With the Wind

INTERVIEWER

What did you mean when you said that a poem should act like an empty suitcase?

KAY RYAN

It’s a clown suitcase: the clown flips open the suitcase and pulls out a ton of stuff. A poem is an empty suitcase that you can never quit emptying.

Kay Ryan, interview, Paris Review (Winter 2008)

 

I myself have never been able to find out what feminism is; I only know that people call me a feminist whenever I express sentiments that differentiate me from a doormat or a prostitute.

Rebecca West, 'Mr Chesterton in Hysterics', The Clarion November 14, 1913

 

Society is a very culpable entity, and has to answer for the manufacture of many unwholesome commodities, from bad pickles to bad poetry. But society, like "matter," and Her Majesty's Government, and other lofty abstractions, has its share of excessive blame as well as excessive praise.

George Eliot, 'Silly Novels by Lady Novelists', The Westminster Review, October 1856

 

Habit is necessary; it is the habit of having habits, of turning a trail into a rut, that must be incessantly fought against if one is to remain alive.

Edith Wharton, A Backward Glance

Commonplace Book is an irregular feature made up of other people's words that are insightful, amusing or just too clever for words.Tobias Wolff's memoir This Boy's Life contains this line: "My first stepfather used to say that what I didn't know would fill a book." I have a row of them.