Category: Longform
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The Schrödinger's Cat Trilogy by Robert Anton Wilson (Books 2022, 4–6)
Yes, all I do is reread. Sometimes it seems that way, anyway. Well, it was the end of 2014 when I read this last. Seven and a quarter years seems fair. It’s a lot of fun, which is why I keep returning to it, I guess.
The missing scientists, that I mentioned last time? True, it’s never explicitly explained where they went, but I think it’s clear that they found out how to move into other worlds, and went off to visit next-door universes.
The three volumes are entitled The Universe Next Door, The Trick Top Hat, and The Homing Pigeons, by the way.
I’m still making my way through the mammoth book that I mentioned before, but slowly. It’s The Books of Jacob, by Olga Tokarczuk, and you’ll read about it here eventually.
Propaganda and Suffering
I’ve seen a strange set of opinions popping up on Twitter over the last week or so, essentially blaming the US, the UK, and/or NATO for Putin’s illegal and horrifying war on Ukraine. Which on the face of it is bizarre, at best.
It’s possible that NATO’s expansion over the last couple of decades was unwise. Yet who could blame small countries close to Russia from seeking the protection that membership brings? Putin’s belligerence was well known even before the current attack.
George Monbiot makes the point well in his excellent Guardian piece:
There is a strong argument that Nato should have been disbanded at the end of the cold war. But while Putin’s sense of threat seems to have been heightened by Nato expansion and mission creep, Nato expansion has also been driven in part by Putin’s belligerence. Are we really to believe that Estonia and Latvia joined because they wanted to attack Russia? On the contrary, it’s because they fear attack. While Nato’s growth is likely to have contributed to the crisis, it’s ridiculous to suggest that Russia is not the aggressor.
– George Monbiot, We must confront Russian propaganda – even when it comes from those we respect
He suggests that Russian propaganda is at least partly to blame. It seems have made inroads on the left. Monbiot mentions the Stop the War Coalition, which normally we would think is an admirable goal and organisation. But their recent letter claims the British government ‘have poured oil on the fire throughout this episode.’ I’m no supporter of Johnson or the Tories, but I don’t think that’s fair. They also say that they ‘do not endorse the nature or conduct of either the Russian or Ukrainian regimes.’
I don’t know what the Ukrainians have done except prepare to defend themselves, and then do so. I’m as against war as any former CND member from the eighties, but when a country is invaded, it has a right to fight back.
Monbiot says it well:
True anti-imperialism means opposing not only the west’s imperialism, essential as this is. It’s about opposing all imperialism, whether western, Russian, Chinese or other.
– George Monbiot, As before
As always, of course, it is the ordinary people who suffer. I recommend donating if you can, to one of the organisations working to help the people of Ukraine:
The Velvet Underground, 2021 - ★★★★
There's a lot to like here if you're already a fan — or at least, have some interest. Probably not too much if neither of those apply.
It has interviews with those who are still with us (or who were when it was made). Not just John Cale, Moe Tucker, Doug Yule, but members of Andy Warhol's Factory crew (the 'Superstars'), like Mary Woronov and Gerard Malanga.
I'd like to have heard more of the songs, especially the less well-known ones, and seen more footage of them, such as there is. It uses the documentary style that just films people speaking and edits those interviews together. That has a certain power, but I feel it might have helped to have a narrative, a voiceover elaborating on the story.
Recommended, though.
Withnail & I, 1987 - ★★★★
Long time since I saw this, so all I remembered really were the quotable bits ('We've gone on holiday by accident!')
The high dinginess and run-down state of Britain as the sixties ran down is skilfully evoked. It's very male, though. The only female character is the woman in the tearoom who refuses to serve our heroes. If that's the right word.
It's not laugh-out-loud funny, but it has aged surprisingly well.
13th, 2016 - ★★★½
A documentary about the prison-industrial complex, this is a tough watch. The title comes from the 13th amendment to the US Constitution. While abolishing slavery, that amendment also allowed for slavery to continue — at least for those incarcerated for a crime.
Tough, as I say, but it should be seen.
Legally Blonde, 2001 - ★★★
We’ve been enjoying the more recent work of Reece Witherspoon lately, in The Morning Show and Big Little Lies, so it was interesting to go back to see her in her younger days.
It’s a fun enough film. There were no surprises, in part because I’ve seen the live musical, but mainly because it’s not the kind of film that offers surprises.
Dateline: 2022-02-22
Just wanted to note the loveliness of today’s date: 2022-02-22 in ISO format, or 22/2/22 or 22/2/2022 in either US or normal numeric date formatting.
All those 2s. I find it very pleasing. There won’t be another date like it for a while. 200 years, in fact.
The Kids by Hannah Lowe (Books 2022, 3)
I don’t think I’ve ever written about a book of poetry here before. That’s because I don’t read that much of it. Whenever I do, I think, ‘I should read more poetry.’
This won the Costa, but that’s not the main reason I picked it up. The author, Hannah Lowe, was a tutor on my MA course. She taught my Creative Nonfiction (CNF) module. Which sounds a long way from poetry, but a person can have skills in more than one type of writing. She was very good as a tutor, and in fact I got my highest single mark in CNF.
It’s a very short and easy read, but some of the poems go to some dark places. Others — most, I’d say — are highly positive and life-affirming. They were inspired by her time teaching sixth formers in English schools. Which made me wonder on my CNF class chat, should we be worried about what her next collection’s going to be about?
Hopefully she won’t repeat herself. These are all sonnets, or in one cases a series of sonnets under one title, and very good, as the awards people clearly think.
Raw Spirit: In Search of the Perfect Dram by Iain Banks (Books 2022, 2)
Posting about books is slow because I’m reading something gigantic. More of that later (possibly much later). But in the interstices, a return to The Great Banksie Reread). My friend John mentioned recently that he had just read this for the first time, which prompted me to revisit it (that, and perhaps some great whisky I got for Christmas).
Mildly surprised to realise that when I wrote about it before in The Whisky Post it was not one of my typical book posts. I guess in 2003 I wasn’t doing that. It was just over 18 years ago. Wow.
I concur with my earlier opinion, but note this quote:
Banks gives us a brief overview of the steps in the distilling process, fairly early on, and then makes appropriate use of the various technical terms during later distillery visits. All fair enough. But there is one term for part of distillery’s apparatus — the lyne arm — that he starts referring to without ever explaining what it is (I’m fairly sure: it is possible that I just missed that explanation, but I don’t think so).
Well, I offer an eighteen-year-late correction: he does define the lyne arm on first use. I must have missed it the first time. And I note with mild but resigned annoyance that the link in the quote above is dead, even though the site, Whisky Magazine, is not.
Anyway, well worth a look if you haven’t read it. You may not learn that much about malts, and the scene has changed a lot over the time, but it’s still a joy to spend time with him.
And it seems like Glenfiddich no longer make the Havana Reserve expression. If you search for it online there are prices quoted of around £400 a bottle(!), though no actual bottles for sale. Which is a shame, because it was good, and I’m sure it would still sell if they made it. Maybe they stopped being able to get the rum barrels.
The Word on Wordle
To celebrate the news of Wordle’s sale to the New York Times, here’s my result from today:
Wordle 227 2/6
🟨🟨⬛🟩🟩
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩
The first time I’ve got it on the second line.
While I don’t blame Josh Wardle for making a ton of money out of it, it does perhaps slightly undercut the narrative over the last few weeks about how he did it for his partner and for fun. But like I say, who can blame him?
It does seem likely that the NYT will put it behind their paywall eventually. As they did with the formerly-free review site The Wirecutter when they bought it, for example. Which would be a shame.
Something I meant to write about before, but never got round to, was how all the mainstream press wrote about it. They made it hard to find, and, I think, helped to encourage the scammy app store rip-off versions. Because they (mostly, from what I saw) did not say that it was a web-based game, and worse, they didn’t link to it. That’s sloppy at best.
Anyway, it seems I’ve done it successfully for 21 days in a row:
