I never thought I would find a copy of it on the shelves, let alone in Korea. But in the Youngpoong bookshop in the Central City shopping complex attached to the Seoul Express Bus Terminal, I boggled for a moment and then realized that, yes, what I was looking at was that very same book, a decade old and micheviously new-looking (the text reads pretty freshly too, a credit to Mr. Sterling). There it was, nudged between a Christian diatribe and a copy of Ayn Rand. I just had to rescue it. So I plunked down my ten-thousand won (about …
Hawks And Birdbrains
So I picked up a copy of the International Herald Tribune, which is The New York Times‘s International Newspaper, edited in Paris. Page one is splayed with scenes of the disorder of Baghdad. American soldiers haplessly watching as people ransack every building they can get into. And why the hell not? The city is empty of anyone who has stuff to defend… and all the people left behind, all those who are busy surviving this “operation”, have very little or nothing to lose. So they plunder: they plunder the houses of Saddm’s sons, which I have no problem with. They …
Patrick Süskind’s Perfume: The Story of a Murder
I have been thinking for a few hours, trying to figure out what this book is about. If you haven’t read it, you ought to. Here’s a page of reviews about it from over at Amazon. This book is impeccably horrible, which is to say that it is horrifying and perfectly so. Süskind is a master of the craft of writing, and the vividness he brings to every moment in this novel is so immersive that just for the quality of the book I cannot recommend it more highly. Suskind’s restraint is stunning; he refrains from any great detailed descriptions …
No Swimming In Seoul, But At Least The Coffee Is Good
I just discovered something somewhat retarded about the Seoul YMCA in Jongo, Seoul, which is that you can’t swim there without a monthly pass. I explained to the man (in what was, judging from his response, mostly comprehensible Korean) that I was in Seoul only for the weekend, and just wanted to practice, and was willing to pay the W5000 ($6 Canadian) to get access to the pool for one shot, but he said I couldn’t, that there was no way to go to the pool without a YMCA membership card (and my Iksan card is no good in Seoul …
음악 생각 한다…
삶이 때때로 이상하지만 때때로 신기해요. 지금은 서울에 밤을 기다리고 있어요. 왠야하면 족음 음악을 듣고싶었어… Musicland에서 좋은 CD를 샀어요… Kenny Garret의 “African Exchange Student” (“아프리가 사람 학생”, 아마도) 입니다. 와, 그 CD 케나다에 듣었어… 그런데 이저브렀어요. 그 음악 정말 예보요! “Someday We’ll All Be Free” 나의 재일좋은 노래이다. 와, 아름답다!!! 그래서, 나는 보통을 생각하고있어요. 청년기 나는 재즈 음악인 됐겠었어요. 와, 매일 연습 하고 음악론 공부 열심히 했어요. 내 찻본 사랑 음악 있었어요. 그러나, 성찰하고 음안만 하는것, 할수없었어. 왜? 1. 나는 천식 있어요. 내 직업 음악 연주는것 이스면, 어렵는 삶 이다. 2. 음악 만 좋아했어. 나의 생각에서, 조금 만 할수 업ㅆ었어요. 고통을 …
아이고!
와! 나는 잘 안해요! 시간을 정말 없었오요… 왠야하면 음악 연주와 blog는 만들는것과 수영 연습 하고 일해야됬어요. 지금은 서울에서 이 한국어 Movable Type Blog는 만들었어요. 오늘은 소프라노 색소폰 (saxophone) 거뒀어요. 낙원 산가에 좋은 악기에서 사람은 색소폰을 수리했어요… 잘 수리했다!!! 나는 정말 행복해요! *^^* 오늘은 많이 자겠어요. 고드가 조금 앞으다… 힘이 없어요. 그리고 내일 밤에 서울에 우리 밴드가 (“다방 밴드” 입니다) 연주고 놎에 익산시에 가야되요. 그래서 고드가 잘자야되요. 아저씨됐어요? 와… 놀라운 생각이에요!!! 지금은 고드 가야되요!
Wow!
I finally got all the Movable Type CSS-powered templates sorted out. Now to integrate the comments function in the way I want to, and then create a couple of more blogs based on the same format… a Korean-language one (basically the same as my blogspot one, but with comments enabled) and a personal (hidden, secret, inaccessible) one for working on my novel while on the road. I am pleased.
Ballard, Burroughs, and “Truth” in Writing
Today I read a rather interesting interview with JG Ballard at Salon. It’s mainly about Ballard’s thoughts on his own work and the work of William S. Burroughs, and I found it interesting because he had some very intriguing things to say about what he terms “the bourgeois novel”.
Hesse’s Demian
One night during a discussion between some friends, including my girlfriend, Hermann Hesse’s book Demian came up. One of the things I like about our relationship is that while neither of us simply runs out to read books that the other has read, we sometimes do recommend books to one another and eventually talk about them.
Technique and Politics in Hard SF
In his famous Harper’s piece,“Perchance to
Dream: Reasons to Write Novels in an Age of Images”, the now oft-discussed
Jonathan Franzen articulates his personal motivation for writing literature
in an age where the most powerful media is not print but image-based technology
like TV and film. He starts out the description of a retreat from the world
— a world that his persona in the essay feels has gone mad. He writes:
“I began to think that the most reasonable thing for a citizen to
do might be to enter a monastery and pray for humanity.” This, from
a man who describes his connections with the outside world as “the
twin portals of my TV set and my New York Times subscription.” He
decants nightmares of a Silicon Valley VR-helmet plague, and derides rampant
multiculturalism…