This month's weblog posts

Greetings and hello.

This is a list of weblog posts for June 2002.

6/29/02; 8:33:18 AM: British Actor Deported. Steven Berkoff, the British actor, who was scheduled to perform his one-man "Shakespeare's Villains" this week in Ann Arbor and Grand Rapids, Mich., was deported on Tuesday, apparently for a visa violation."It was a nightmare," Mr. Berkoff told The Grand Rapids Press from London. "I have never been prevented from working in America before." Mr. Berkoff was told he had stayed one day past the limit of his 1997 visa, his American agent, Joe Ajlouny, said. [New York Times: Arts]

6/29/02; 1:36:05 AM: . . . for the burning bird & her plight . . . though she never burns here . . .

Ch'ienniang was the daughter of Chang Yi, a public official in Hunan province. She had a cousin named Wang Chu, an intelligent and handsome youth. The two cousins had grown up together and since Chang Yi both loved and approved of the boy he said he would accept Wang Chu as his son-in-law. Both young people heard and marked the promise; she was an only child and spent all her time with her cousin; their love grew day by day and the day came when they were no longer children and their relations grew intimate. Unfortunately, her father, Chang Yi, was the only person around who did not notice. One day a young public official asked Chang Yi for his daughter's hand. The father, heedless or forgtful of his earlier promise, consented. Ch'ienniang, torn between love and filial piety, nearly died of grief; the young man fell into such despair that he resolved to leave the district rather than watch his mistress married to another man. He invented some pretext or other and told his uncle that he must go to the capital. When the uncle was unable to dissuade him, he supplied the youth with funds along with some presents and offered him a farewell banquet. In a desperate state, Wang Chu did not leave off moaning throughtout the feast and was more than ever determined to go away rather than persist in a hopeless love affair.

The youth embarked one afternoon; he had sailed only a few miles when night fell. He ordered his sailor to tie up so that they might rest. But Wang Chu could not fall asleep; some time around midnight he heard footsteps approaching. He got up and called out: "Who is it, walking about at this hour of the night?" "I, Ch'ienniang," came the reply. Surprised and overjoyed he brought her aboard. She told him that she had hoped and expected to be his wife, that her father had been unjust and that she could not resign herself to the separation. She had also feared that, finding himself alone in a strange land, he might have been driven to suicide. And so she had defied general disapproval and parental wrath and had now come to follow him wherever he might go. The happily re-united pair thereupon continued the journey on to Szechwan.

Five years of happiness passed, and she bore Wang Chu two children. But there was no news of Ch'ienniang's family and every day she thought of her father. It was the only cloud in their happy sky. She did not know whether or not her parents were still alive; and one night she confessed her anxiety to Wang Chu. Because she was an only daughter she felt guilty of a grave filial impiety, "You have the heart of a good daughter and I sill stand by you," Wand Chu told her. "Five years have passed and they will no longer be angry with us. Let us go home." Chienniang rejoiced and they made ready to go back with their children.

When the ship reached their native city, Wang Chu told Ch'ienniang: "We cannot tell in what state of mind we will find your parents. Let me go on alone to find out." At sight of the house, he could feel his heart pounding. Wang Chu saw his father-in-law, knelt down, made his obeisance, and begged his pardon. Chang Yi gazed upon him with amazement and said: "What are you talking about? For the past five years, Ch'ienniang has been lying in bed, in a coma. She has not gotten up once."

"But I have told you the truth," said Wang Chu. "She is well and awaits us on board the ship."

Chang Yi did not know what to think and sent two maids-in-waiting to see Ch'ienniang. They found her seated aboard ship, beautifully gowned and radiant; she asked them to convey her fondest greetings to her parents. Struck with wonder, the maids-in-waiting returned to the parental house, where Chang Yi's bewilderment increased. Meanwhile, the sick girl had heard the news, and now seemed freed of her ill. There was a new light in her eyes. She rose from her bed and dressed in front of her mirror. Smiling and without a word, she made her way towards the ship. At the same time, the girl on the ship began walking toward the house. The two met on the river-bank. There they embraced and the two bodies merged, so that only one Ch'einniang remained, as youthful and lovely as ever. Her parents were overjoyed, but they ordered the servants to keep quiet, to avoid commentaries.

For more than fory years Wang Chu and Chienniang live together in happiness.

(A tale from the T'ang Dynasty [618-906 A.D.]) found in Extrordinary Tales byBorges/Casares

6/28/02; 7:51:59 AM: "You've slipped into the world of the raw and the cooked, or what Robert Rauschenberg called the space between art and life."

6/28/02; 12:18:21 AM: . . . a link is a promise . . .
At 09:12 AM 6/19/2002 +1000, Adrian wrote:

> ok, i think of hypertext links as like performative speech acts (they're promises). i think of hypertext links as being the *same as* film edits. film edits are also promises. as performative speech acts they have force (they're like order words) and so inside their promise that they make sense there is also this excess of force that means they will make sense. this force leaks out each side of the edit/link which is why the meaning of the before and after can change, without changing what the before and after is. ie the kuleshov effect. same content different meanings yet the thing (the image in that case) that effects the meaning (the edit) in no way changes the image itself. same thing happens in link node hypertext particularly where complex structures are invovled. so, this is what i mean by performative. links/edits are promises.

6/27/02; 1:36:49 AM: . . . encountered this story twice today . . in two completely different contexts . . . a story i am much aquainted with . . . since it comes here it goes . . .

The Dream of Chuang Tzu

Chuang Tzu dreamt he was a butterfly and, when he awoke, he did not know if he was a man who had dreamt he was a butterfly or a butterfly who was dreaming he was a man.

6/26/02; 9:14:08 AM: "Mr. Herbert is one of many musicians who, rather than appropriating extracts from others' songs, use found, ambient and other naturally occurring sounds as the foundation for their tunes. Mr. Herbert has even written a manifesto to help define his work. Mr. Herbert's document forbids the use of drum machines and sampling from other people's music. Debra Singer, the associate curator of contemporary art at the Whitney Museum of Art who organized the sound-art exhibition in the museum's 2002 biennial, said she enjoyed Mr. Herbert's album. She said, "Even though musically it's very engaging, what really distinguishes it is the concept behind it and the source of the sounds." She also appreciated how Mr. Herbert combined digital music-making technologies with "deliberately simplistic gestures" like banging a DVD against the microphone instead of sampling its soundtrack."

(nytimes: arts)

6/25/02; 11:46:06 PM: O N C E
I did hear him,
he did wash the world,
unseen, nightlong,
real.
O N E and unending,
annihilate,
I'ed.
Light was. Salvation.
(from Breathturn * Paul Celan translated by Pierre Joris )

6/24/02; 9:21:54 PM:

My thoughts are wounds in my head. My brain is a scar. I want to be a machine. Arms to drag legs to walk no pain no thinking. (Heiner Müller, 'Hamletmachine')

Heartplay
A May I lay my heart at your feet.
B If you don't make a mess on my floor..
A My heart is clean..
B We'll see, won't we..
A I can't get it out..
B Would you like me to help you..
A If you wouldn't mind..
B It'll be a pleasure. I can't get it out either..
A cries.
B I will remove it surgically. What have I got this penknife for anyway. We'll have this sorted out in no time. work will keep you from despair. Right, there we are. But this is a brick. Your heart is a red brick..
A Yes, but it beats only for you..
(1981)
A beats B to death with the brick..
(Addition, July 1991).
------------- Heiner Müller -----------------
from Heiner Müller Theatremachine translated and edited by Marc von Henning

6/23/02; 4:13:50 PM: teachers . . . it happened again . . . just as sure as april is the cruelest month and it is summer . . . despite an incredible ambivalence - when the air outside becomes oppressive & there's no relief inside, not even in the basement, & seeds of the poplar trees choke the air piling like gentle snowdrifts along the front walk - the words of this mythological beast find a way into the voice of the mind like an addiction, a craving . . . inspite of myself the Strange Music seeks me out and the music repeats endlessly. . . school is out for my students&teachers . . . there ain't no cure . . .

I met a man who lost his mind
In some lost place I had to find
Follow me the wise man said
But he walked behind
(Leonard Cohen )

Discuss cohen

6/23/02; 4:00:34 PM: . . . time to honour (mw) wood s lot . . . an incredible harvester of the web . . . little nuggets are turned into gold mines [my little Thomas Bernhard find: character assassination from The Voice Imitator & a simple pointer turns into richly researched feed] . . . a wonderful project would be to somehow organize the wood s lot archives into a encyclopedia of the web (wiki style maybe)/or some other way which i cannot imagine but others certainly not only imagine but know . . . i've read wood s lot describe himself as a simple cut&paste worker . . . no - a crafted artist weaving a brilliant&mesmerizing ever evolving web tapestry which necessitates a visit a day . . .

6/22/02; 11:21:12 PM: Viewing an Ancient City With Futuristic Glasses Large detail from an 1865 temple photograph by Samuel Bourne in a show about Varanasi at the Asia Society.

6/21/02; 12:02:49 AM: character assassination" "Two philosophers, about whom more has been written than they themselves have published, who met again - after not seeing one another for decades - in, of all places, Goethe's house in Weimar, to which they had gone, in the nature of things, separately and from opposite directions - something that, since it was winter and consequently very cold, had presented the greatest difficulties to both of them - simple for the purpose of getting to know Goethe's habits better, assured each other, at this unexpected and for both of them painful meeting, of their mutual respect and admiration and at the same time told each other that, once back home, they would immerse themselves in each other's writings with the intensity appropriate to, and worthy of, those writings. When, however, one of them said he would give an account of his meeting in the Goethe House in the newspaper that was, in his opinion, the best and would do so, in the nature of things, in the form of a philosophical essay, the other immediately resisted the idea and characterized his colleague[base ']s intention as character assassination." (Thomas Bernhard. The Voice Imitator)

6/20/02; 12:03:16 AM: reflection . . . hmmm . . . 1/12/02 started blog to explore presentation of self in a cybernetic system . . . began 'if'. writing . posting . linking . publishing to ex(periment)plore self presentation [pl(d)ay st(p)age] . . . 3/28/02 disenchanted with chronology {as a theatre practitioner/educator found} Chaikin's metaphors of "space" (grounded in practical actor training) > catagorized(archived) items into 'space', 'place', 'territory', 'zone', 'sphere', 'abadonment', 'exile', 'occupation' and 'habitation' . . . 6/2/02 trashed it . . . not blog suicide but letting it all go . . . hmmm . . . found an unused site > registered >blog squatting . . . still ['if'...ing] outlining . . .

6/20/02; 12:02:07 AM:

"To support arts education partnerships, grants of $3.1 million to 31 public schools and 39 cultural organizations in New York were made yesterday by the nonprofit Center for Arts Education in ceremonies at the Riverside Church. Each partnership between a school and a cultural institution is to receive $100,000 over three years."

nytimes: arts

6/19/02; 12:00:38 AM: . . . complete random . . . "Only if poets and writers set themselves tasks that no one else dares imagine will literature continue to have a function." (Calvino. Six Memos for the Next Millennium,112) the concepts: (Calvino's Reality: Designer's utopia) Lightness

Whenever humanity seems condemned to heaviness, I think I should fly like Perseus into a different space. I don't mean escaping into dreams or into the irrational. I mean that I have to change my approach, look at the world from a different perspective, with a different logic and with fresh methods of cognition and verification (7).

6/17/02; 11:45:06 PM: ".these t.ex][e][ts r _code wurk_ remnants d-voted to the dispersal of writing that has been n.spired and mutated according 2 the dynamics of an active network . " :: caw[meant] :: . . . know no code . . . txt.z u spec[u]lashon N 4orge (s)zen(se) . . . "today, we are all closed in concentration camps we call nations." -William Burroughs

6/17/02; 8:46:33 PM: "In learning to write, the child must disengage himself from the sensory aspect of speech and replace words by images of words." . . . maybe/maybe not a contextual pointer via V.D.

6/17/02; 8:01:17 PM: "Publish Link, Pay 1200 Euros " (PapaScott: June 17, 2002 Archives) . . . check out all the links and wonder about link consequence . . .

6/16/02; 11:00:54 AM: "However, the fact remains that, as human beings, we don't want to "be" other people. We want to connect with others, find some common territory, share space in a way that is mutually meaningful. We want to 'be,' but not if that means we can't be ourselves." ( Mann. Cyborg p 24) :: comment :: . . . the creative process . . . to enter into a relationship [connect/share] . . . the tension/contradiction between learning and experience . . . seeing a real-time video, listening to a live broadcast, reading a blog as it is typed . . . the physical presence of a human . . . "Someday is today -- the eye is a camera and I am a camera" (Mann) . . . the we are a projector -- we are a projection . . . great balls of fire . . .

6/15/02; 10:44:33 PM: Sunday, March 10, 2002 Faithfully, Fatefully, and Fatally Pinter TheNewTheatreCo-op . . . The Birthday Party by Harold Pinter . . . Directed by Susan Williamson . . . with a stunningly caring hand she has shaped a classic of modern theatre into a edgy parable of deceptive & poignant terror . . . . . .brilliant Pinter . . . the cliche, Language Of Silence, made visible by the controlled and imaginative voice of the actor. . . each moment, the actions shatter our illusions (delusions) that we can celebrate the mundane daily existence. . . . scene after scene gnaws at the borders of our attempts to construct meaning. The entire cast flawlessly touches Pinter's claustrophobic, almost archaic and ancient, soulscape with moments of intensity that open into the heart with ease and immensity. . . ."the nerves break" as each word is mercilessly articulated with a passionate cadence and cruel laugh . . . the characters jostle and juxtapose in complex relationships ranging from the recognizably banal to perpetually mysterious . . . . . . the insignificant to sit or not to sit . . . relentless interrogation . . . thoughts repeated . . . meanings twisted . . . questions dissolving without resolution . . . the actors weave a seamless web of precise actions of existential angst that emotionally permeates like a cold cup of tea . . . . . . plunged into darkness the voices pierce and startle, echoing chaotically against all hope and reason . . . Thank you Henry and Susan for sharing your skill, knowledge and wisdom. Your lights are a beacon for us all.

6/15/02; 8:52:28 PM:

". . . the idea of the Vicarious Soliloquy has allowed me to explore the relationship between learning and experience. Developing the Vicarious Soliloquy system brought me to a point where I realized that much of WearComp's potential has to do with facilitating the act of being instead of doing." ( Mann. Cyborg p19)

6/15/02; 3:42:44 PM: "International Herald Tribune" Whether it shapes trends or merely reflects them, Kassel 's "Museum of 100 Days" has long since established itself as the world's most important venue for contemporary art. . . . Documenta 11 is predominantly a literary show, small wonder when one considers that Enwezor studied political science and literature and more often describes himself as a poet rather than a curator. The narrative, whether fictional or documentary, ethnographic or political, is perhaps the most dominant idiom here. Sometimes, indeed, literature is directly thematized, as in a handsome series of black-and-white and black-on-black paintings by the Bronx-born Glenn Ligon - all variations on a passage from James Baldwin's essay "Stranger in the Village." :: comment :: . . . am obsessed with any Documenta . . . during my decade in europe this venue transformed my way of seeing . . . had the opportunity to even participate in workshops offered during the exhibition . . . hope many are able to visit . . .

6/14/02; 6:28:12 PM: to any visitors who wish to know more about this outline / expand / collapse format visit s l a m . . . Marc is the creator & master . . . ( if you use Radio it is a one minute download & install)

6/13/02; 11:15:11 PM: Your eyes are widely opened flowers.
Your eyes are widely opened flowers.
Only their centers are darkly clenched
To conceal mysteries
That lure me to a keener blooming
Than I know,
And promise a secret
I must have.
By Alice Walker

6/12/02; 10:57:54 PM: Implicit Stillness voices
the passing into ourselves
lie in deep rapture
sleeping in revelations
creating a grace of seeing
and listening for
an ecstasy of understanding
being and time
white roses
rising through
flesh

6/11/02; 11:07:55 PM: . . . reading Cyborg / digital destiny and human possiblility In the age of the wearable computer by Steve Mann with Hal Niedzviecki . . . opens with a Marshall McLuhan quote:

"The computer [is] the most extrordinay of man's technological clothing: it is an extension of our central nervous system. Beside it the wheel is a mere hula-hoop." (War and peace in the Global village)

6/10/02; 11:07:03 PM: . . . it rains & rains & rains . . . for the first time this spring . . . in the hearts of all there is joy & celebration . . . as noah rebirths . . .

there are two ways to take care of your life. you can develop yourself as an artist, or you can forget yourself and devote your life to art. that's a big difference. the first is to enslave yourself in your ego. it feels good for a while, but it doesn't last for long. this is to become a host for the guest. the second way is to become a host for the host. you must turn your ego into fuel and burn your life for the benefit of all beings. you will become a kind of fool. but this is the way to find peace. just climb the mountain every day. - dainin katagiri (lifted from hyperfiction)

6/9/02; 1:44:35 PM: David Bowie, 21st-Century Entrepreneur. David Bowie, one of rock's most astute conceptualists since the 1960's, has now emerged as one of rock's smartest entrepreneurs. By Jon Pareles.

"I tried to make a checklist of what exactly the album is about and abandonment was in there, isolation," he said. "And I thought, well, nothing's changed much. At 55, I don't really think it's going to change very much. As you get older, the questions come down to about two or three. How long? And what do I do with the time I've got left? "When it's taken that nakedly, these are my subjects. And it's like, well, how many times can you do this? And I tell myself, actually, over and over again. The problem would be if I was too self-confident and actually came up with resolutions for these questions. But I think they're such huge unanswerable questions that it's just me posing them, again and again." [New York Times: Arts]

6/8/02; 10:18:40 AM: Members of Iranian Troupe Are Refused Entry by U.S. By Celestine Bohlen.. The Lincoln Center Festival has reduced the number of shows of a musical drama from Iran, after 10 members of the Iranian troupe were denied visas to enter the United States.

Eileen McMahon, the spokeswoman for the festival, said the 10 performers were refused visas at the United States Consulate in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, because they were deemed at risk of becoming economic refugees. The other actors in the troupe were given initial clearance, having proved that they are not likely to stay on past the expiration of their visas, but they are now awaiting a security check, Ms. McMahon said. [New York Times: Arts]

6/7/02; 5:45:08 PM: Salon.com Technology | A new teenage wasteland?

"And almost wholly missing from the bulk of the book is the sense of the hacker as someone creative, as a programmer who comes up with solutions to a problem rather than just exploring a network, or using code nabbed from somewhere else. "The Hacker Diaries" would have benefited immensely from at least a dabble in some of the historical ground covered in Steven Levy's "Hackers" or the huge wealth of commentary inspired by the rise of the free software/open-source movement as an outgrowth of hacker culture. Instead, repeatedly, the term "hacker" is used indiscriminately, grouping together people who trade in pirated software, who deface Web sites, who want information to be "free" and who are simply really, really good with computers. "

6/6/02; 8:52:36 AM: Martin Esslin, Drama Theorist, Dies at 83. Martin Esslin, a drama critic, teacher and the author of "The Theater of the Absurd," a seminal book for experimental playwrights, died on Feb. 24 in London. By Mel Gussow. [New York Times: Arts]

Writing about Jan Kott, a fellow critic and European émigré, Mr. Esslin placed him in a grand tradition as one of the "truly creative thinkers whose contributions set in motion new lines of speculation and research," words that could also be applied to Mr. Esslin himself.

6/5/02; 1:18:21 AM: Love Tightly coiled, like a snake it sits
In my very heart, weaving spells
Or murmurs for days on end
Like a dove on my white windowsill.
In the sparkle of hoarfrost a gleam,
In the carnation's slumber a hint,
And secretly, surely it leads
From all joy and peace of mind.
It can sob so seductively, sigh
In the violin's yearning prayer,
And it happens, a stranger's smile
Fills me with a sudden fear.
by Anna Akhmatova
November 24, 1911
Tsarkoye Selo
Translated by Daniel Weissbort

6/4/02; 12:02:30 AM: NYTimes WRITERS ON WRITING By DIANE ACKERMAN Poems Foster Self-Discovery

This wasn't a planned book, but one that geysered up naturally over a year and a half, during which I wrote poems daily. I began writing them to corral the unruly emotions that arose during intense psychotherapy, a process I explain a little in this excerpt from "Omens of Winter":

On Saturday, the huge international art exposition Documenta 11 opens in the small German city of Kassel and remains on view through Sept. 15. Begun in 1955 and now held every five years, Documenta is, in the words of the artist Joseph Kosuth, "This moment when the artists of America, Europe, Asia and Africa are fused together as a real global community."

In one sense, then, Documenta 11 is simply mirroring the existing globalization of contemporary art.

6/3/02; 1:05:54 AM: Petals fell upon us from the apple trees.You thought it might have been a fall of snow, taking shape within the early light of summer. Birds sang somewhere in the snow, recalling songs of other seasons gone into the light. The apples that began to grow upon the branch were put away, the snow came down upon us. Perhaps the sky is but a tree invisible that sheds its snow, and we are grass, sensing the fall upon us, nothing more. If we have names, they shall be lost within the changing of the light. We will be known by how its passing pauses on our skin - the wind, the snow, the light. Taking your hand in mine begins within the mind. It is a passage of the light that rests wherever our bodies hold themselves within the seasons underneath the sky. Other birds rise up and sing, drawing the air into their song. We reflect upon the sun, the memories of birds descending on our breath. (E.D. Blodgett.Apostrophes III alone upon the earth,p.8)

6/2/02; 1:43:50 AM: . . . wiped out a month . . . four months . . . most of the past . . . because if it can't be (re)stored / (re)collected / (re)lived / (re) searched / (re)membered. . . it may be gone . . . if it goes where does it go . . . needing to begin . . . needing to end . . . will be missed . . . "Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try again. Fail again. Fail better. " - Samuel Beckett (via archipelago ) . . . lots of reasons . . . started the experiment under the influence of theater & the act defies preservation . . . the appearance remains . . . the guts (soul) removed . . . the empty space . . . _______________________________ 17 I grew out of a dark, vicious
swamp, rustling like a thin reed,
breathing a forbidden life
languidly, passionately, sweetly.
No one sees me
drooping into my cold, marshy home,
welcomed by the quick whispers
of autumnal time.
I like this cruelty, this insult,
and in this dream-like life
I envy everyone in secret,
I'm secretly in love with all of you.
______________________________ Osip Emilevich Mandelstam
(trans. Burton Raffel & Alla Burago)