Cluster blog
1) The Guardian’s quietly moving memorial to those who were killed by the recent invasion.
1a) One thing I don’t get, from this side of the Atlantic, is this fuss over Jayson Blair. US blogs are full of it. I mean, come on, for years the US media has been peddling the lies of the White House without any shame or (meaningful) reflection. What’s new? Rather than scapegoat this little guy (Blairs tend to be liars, it seems), impeach the murderous liars in the junta.
2) I wouldn’t call Eric Blair a liar though. That’s George Orwell, you see. On Saturday (June 14th), the BBC is broadcasting a biographical film on the man. The wonderful Chris Langham plays Blair/Orwell; a perfect choice. You can read Orwell’s ouevre at the online George Orwell Library. Personally, I am ambivalent about it. His novels are dreary (see Kundera’s devastating essay on 1984, somewhere) and his essay arguing that writing at its best is “a window on the world” is typical English philistinism dressed up as commonsense.
3) The Pernice Brothers’ latest LP, Yours, Mine & Ours (sic). Lead songwriter Joe Pernice says he doesn’t remember writing the songs, due to a post-911 trauma. After each listen, I don’t remember them either. Perhaps that’s what makes me play it over and over.
4) Finally, two more blogs I’ve been enjoying (last time I listed field notes, and now I don’t know why. I think I was confusing it with another; not that there is anything wrong with it). As I explained before, I can’t add them to the blogroll as I have no control over Spike, at all. So: God of the Machine. This despite the far right links (Little Green Footballs is the scum on the rim of the Neocon vent of bigotry and greed). The entry for May 28 is a valuable discussion of Wallace Stevens’ poem The Emperor of Ice Cream. And then there’s writing, another poetry-related blog.
Other Splinters posts of interest:
- Orwell Today
- Censored Preface To Animal Farm
- Failure was his forte
- Orwell’s Diary Goes Blog
- Visible Darkness One of the best and best looki…
