2018 : Page 5 of 11 : Some People Juggle Geese

1984 by George Orwell

I re-read the dystopia 1984 in preparation for a talk I gave on language.

The main ideas I remembered from having read the novel at least twenty years ago were:

the government reduced the size of the English vocabulary (to control thought)
the government was constantly destroying and rewriting the nation’s news articles (to control facts)

I found those ideas so compelling that I forgot all about the main character’s love interest and the secret horror that proved to be his undoing.

Of course, the novel is also famous because it says that:

totalitarian dictators like the novel’s “Big Brother” typically keep tabs on their citizens by means of ubiquitous surveillance
you can (eventually) make anybody believe that two and two are five

See below for what stood out in the novel when I re-read it.

Continue reading 1984 by George Orwell

I felt like maybe there were too many characters who had their own subplots. Still, it was fun, and apparently it made buckets of money, which counts for something (though not a lot, since the notably vacuous Minions grossed a billion in 2015).

Not having played the video game, I’m still not sure what happens to The Underminer, but can I just say I really love that as a name for a mechanical mole villain?

https://itunes.apple.com/us/movie/incredibles-2/id1392900449

Superfast! (2015)

I’m a sucker for car racing movies. Some are Disney while others are deadly; some are comedies while others are merely laughable; some are wacky Wachowski one-offs while others are furiously approaching double digits.

The worst I’ve seen in the wake of the fabulously successful Fast and Furious franchise was undoubtedly the shoestring-budget direct-to-DVD production 200mph (2011). If any movie about a car wreck could be called a train wreck, that was it.

On the other hand, I didn’t expect to like Death Race, but it was great! The sequel was also pretty good, though the second sequel wasn’t.

Due to my hit-and-miss nature of my past experience with car movies, my expectations for this parody/spoof were extremely non-specific. I didn’t know Superfast! was, like Scary Movie, Epic Movie, Vampires Suck, et al., written and directed by the much derided team of Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer. I had no interest in any of their other movies and didn’t see them.

All of which is to say that maybe I shouldn’t have enjoyed Superfast!, but I did, perhaps because the filmmakers’ humor was new to me, even if it’s stupid and old and tired to most everyone else.

Anyway, even if it was a bad movie, it wasn’t as bad as 200mph.

https://itunes.apple.com/us/movie/superfast/id1229229788

See below for some links to reviews as well as a plot summary (with SPOILERS) in the form of a beat sheet in the style described in Blake Snyder’s Save the Cat.

Continue reading Superfast! (2015)

We Love Bedok by Urban Sketchers Singapore

Want to see inside? There’s a link to a PDF sample on the publisher’s page for We Love Bedok.

Our Neighbourhoods

Thus far, Urban Sketchers Singapore and Epigram Books have produced books of sketches of:

Toa Payoh, Tiong Bahru, and Katong are sold out at the publisher.

When and Why I Read We Love Bedok

This is an attractive locally-produced book.

Genre: non-fiction (art)
Date started / date finished: 20-Jun-18 to 21-Jun-18
Length: 96 pages
ISBN: 9789810754327 (paperback)
Originally published in: 2013

Lu Xun and Evolution by James Reeve Pusey

How often does one read a book whose genre is roughly equal parts philosophy, biology, Chinese history and literature? Not very.

Caveat lector. This book is not an ordinary monograph in Chinese intellectual history. It is not just about China. It is not just about Lu Xun. It is certainly not an introduction to Lu Xun, or to his works. It is not an intellectual biography. It is not “an appreciation.” It is not a study of Lu Xun’s genius or his art (although both will shine through). It is a philosophical critique of Lu Xun’s thought and a philosophical and political critique of what Chinese in the People’s Republic have done, and may yet do, with Lu Xun’s thought, and it is a reflection on philosophy and biology.

Some non-fiction books barely scratch the surface of a whole discipline, explaining the same terms and repeating the same well-trodden foundational anecdotes. It’s refreshing, once in a while, to read something truly niche.

Also refreshing is the author’s use of language play. For a serious book, it sure has a lot of jokes. Frequently, the same word is used in two senses in the same sentence. It’s self-indulgent and self-referential, but I find it charming. Any stupid old book could be distant, detached, and dry; this one feels like it was written by a real live human being who really, really likes to write, and who cares deeply about the topic at hand.

The topic at hand is an analysis of Lu Xun’s understanding of the implications of evolutionary theory for his country. Do ideas about evolution suggest that the Chinese have an inevitable destiny, good or bad? Do those ideas suggest that they are the makers of their own destiny, and should strive to evolve, individually or as a whole country? What ideas about evolution did people have in Lu Xun’s time, and which did he encounter, and how did he interpret them and incorporate them into his work throughout his writing career? How have his writings since been used, reused, and reinterpreted?

See below for scattered notes on the content and style of this treatise.

Continue reading Lu Xun and Evolution by James Reeve Pusey

Character names in A Swiftly Tilting Planet by Madeleine L’Engle

The plot of A Swiftly Tilting Planet requires the characters and the reader to discover the genealogy of the dictator Mad Dog Branzillo. His lineage is filled with people whose names are different spellings and arrangements of the same handful of names.

I have made a giant family tree chart to illustrate the relevant relationships.

A Swiftly Tilting Planet Family Tree

DO NOT ASK me how long it took to do this. I have no idea. Waaaay too long. But please do let me know if you think I’ve got any of the lines in the wrong places. I have the source files and thus can update this thing if necessary.

I also made a PDF of the characters in A Swiftly Tilting Planet.

I listed the characters and described their relationships below, coding the most important good ancestors and helpers +green and the most important bad ancestors and antagonists -red.

Continue reading Character names in A Swiftly Tilting Planet by Madeleine L’Engle

Madeleine L’Engle’s Time Quartet: Various Awesome Covers!

2 Unknown + 2 by Rowena Morrill

I have not been able to identify the artist responsible for the Wrinkle in Time and Wind in the Door paperback covers that I remember from when I was a kid. The name of the artist is not anywhere on or in the paperbacks themselves, and the internet doesn’t seem to know!

*A Wrinkle in Time*, *A Wind in the Door*, *A Swiftly Tilting Planet*, 1976 Dell paperbacks (ISBNs 0440998050, 044098761X, 0440901588, 0440952522)

Someday hopefully someone will recognize the artist’s work by the work itself, and publish a statement online somewhere. (Mysterious artist! Whoever you are! I am nostalgic for your art! Come forth!)

Update: The internet knows now! The late Richard Bober did the cover art for A Wrinkle in Time. Still not sure about Wind in the Door though.

The covers for A Swiftly Tilting Planet and Many Waters are by Rowena Morrill. And here’s her original sketch of Charles Wallace on the unicorn, which was not a thing I at all expected to be floating around on the internet. (Thanks, internet! You’re awesome.)

See below for other cover art for L’Engle books in my collection.
Continue reading Madeleine L’Engle’s Time Quartet: Various Awesome Covers!