CCLaP Fridays: On Being Human: An Introduction
My introductory essay to my series, “On Being Human” has been posted on CCLaP. Continue reading CCLaP Fridays: On Being Human: An Introduction
Tag: film
Introducing CCLaP Fridays
I will be writing reviews and themed essays at the Chicago Center for Literature and Photography. Continue reading Introducing CCLaP Fridays
What I’m Reading 2012 and Other Business
What I’m Reading 2012 Overview: I’m currently reading five books. Each poses certain challenges (in some cases, self-imposed challenges) to me as a reader, reviewer, critic, historian, and aesthete. While New Year’s Resolutions get broken seconds after they’re uttered, these challenges will form an informal backbone to my reading schedule. As it stands, I want to increase the frequency of my blog posts from bimonthly to weekly. (The same goes for my other blog, Coffee is for Closers.) The positive responses from readers has really inspired me to do more. As you’ll see with these challenges, I want to “raise … Continue reading What I’m Reading 2012 and Other Business
The Letter Killers Club, by Sigizmund Krzhizhanovksy
New York Review Books publishes a forgotten classic of genre mashups and social satire. Continue reading The Letter Killers Club, by Sigizmund Krzhizhanovksy
The Singular Exploits of Wonder Mom & Party Girl, by Marc Schuster
Audrey Corcoran is unhappy, affected by the vague nameless malaise that creeps into those with thwarted ambitions and unrealized desires. Audrey works at Eating Out, a “shopper magazine” one usually sees in grocery stores and restaurants. In this case, the “magazine” – really a glorified press release and advertising delivery device – caters to the businesses on the Golden Mile, a strip of middlebrow chains and franchises. The Singular Exploits of Wonder Mom & Party Girl chronicles Audrey’s alienation and annoyance at the petty power games and trivialities in her comfortable middle class existence. Living with her two children, the … Continue reading The Singular Exploits of Wonder Mom & Party Girl, by Marc Schuster
80sSFF: Apocalypse Now (1979) and Apocalypse Now Redux (2001)
The first part in a series dedicated to examining the science fiction and fantasy films from 1979 to 1989. The series will investigate whether these films possess certain ineffable qualities missing from today’s films of the same genres. Kurtz: I expected someone like you. What did you expect? Are you an assassin? Willard: I’m a soldier. Kurtz: You’re neither. You’re an errand boy, sent by grocery clerks, to collect a bill. Why are we beginning a series devoted to the science fiction and fantasy films of the 1980s with Apocalypse Now? Francis Ford Coppola’s epic Vietnam War film holds the … Continue reading 80sSFF: Apocalypse Now (1979) and Apocalypse Now Redux (2001)
New name, same blog
What’s all this then? As they say in boardrooms across this fair land of ours, it’s “time to take things to the next level.” The Driftless Area Review now has a more memorable web address: https://driftlessareareview.com/ It’s easy to remember, you have less to type, and should help with Google searches. If you’re a publisher or author, my contact information remain the same. Make sure to update your bookmarks. Continue reading New name, same blog
An Interview with David Schmahmann, author of The Double Life of Alfred Buber
Why is Alfred Buber an important character for modern readers? Alfred Buber’s story is a riff off several things: isolation, male loneliness, a feeling some of us may have that for others life is richer, more sensual, more rewarding than it ever will be for us. Buber is frozen by that feeling, by the sense that he is a spectator at his own life, shut out of any chance at love, at being wanted, at feeling full and satisfied. He mistakes these feelings, I think, for desire, and I believe many men do this: conflate loneliness with desire, as if … Continue reading An Interview with David Schmahmann, author of The Double Life of Alfred Buber
Notes from Irrelevance, by Anselm Berrigan
Genealogy Anselm Berrigan comes from an esteemed family. The son of poet Ted Berrigan and poet Alice Notley, his brother is the poet and songwriter Edmund Berrigan. Anselm’s wife Karen Weiser also works as a poet. Notes from Irrelevance shows that Anselm didn’t get his book deal by trading on his father’s name. (America, despite its populist and egalitarian posturing, has a yen for dynasties and nepotism. See: the Presidency, Ford Motor Company, etc.) Content Notes from Irrelevance could easily bear the subtitle, “One man’s search for meaning in the second decade of the 21st century.” Throughout the short … Continue reading Notes from Irrelevance, by Anselm Berrigan
Critic’s Notebook: The Best Science Fiction and Fantasy Movies of the 1980s
Introduction “Interest in film, pop and television stars and science fiction peaks between the ages of 12 and 13.” Media Genres and Content Preferences by Carmelo Garitaon and Jose A. Oleaga, Patxi Juaristi (The London School of Economics and Political Science). One of the most challenging aspects of criticism is Taste. How is it formed? What differences are there between Good Taste and Bad Taste? Can these differences be investigated with an objective concrete analysis, or is it a phenomenon based entirely on subjective experiences? The creation of Taste occurs when we grow up, sifting through the various cultural products … Continue reading Critic’s Notebook: The Best Science Fiction and Fantasy Movies of the 1980s
The Driftless Area Review 