hegemony rules

Philip Seymour Hoffman is one of my favorite actors.  As Scotty J. in Boogie Nights, Allen in Happiness, Lester Bangs in Almost Famous, and Truman Capote in Capote, Hoffman delivers some of the most honest and unflinchingly human portrayals in contemporary American cinema.  Apparently, the NYT agrees with me (or, I agree with them).  Their profile of PSH appears in today’s NYT magazine, and it’s clear that the man behind these characters is equally complex:

Caden Cotard [PSH's character in Synedoche] seems to echo many of Hoffman’s own internal debates and anxieties. “I took ‘Synecdoche’ on because I was turning 40, and I had two kids, and I was thinking about this stuff — death and loss — all the time,” Hoffman continued. “The workload was hard, but what made it really difficult was playing a character who is trying to incorporate the inevitable pull of death into his art. Somewhere, Philip Roth writes: ‘Old age isn’t a battle; old age is a massacre.’ And Charlie, like Roth, is quite aware of the fact that we’re all going to die.” Hoffman looked around the theater. The stage manager was arranging furniture; the actors were lolling on a sofa; Andrew Upton was chatting with an assistant. “In 80 years,” Hoffman went on, “no one I’m seeing now will be alive. Hopefully, the art will remain.”

I’ve been thinking a lot recently about the creative process.  There’s something about creativity that requires an intensity of focus – a drive to be sure – inspired by the intense realization that we are mortal and fallible and when we die we leave so little behind.  Art, then, is driven by this need to make our lives meaningful and important.  But I wonder if this same drive can become overwhelming.  If we’re constantly having this metadialogue about the relative permanence of what we’re creating, does this allow us the freedom to make mistakes?  To create “bad” art?  When I’m having difficulty writing, I think it’s because I’m spending too much time thinking like an editor rather than as a writer.  Words don’t hit the page because I’ve already decided they’re not quite right.  This means it’s harder for me to enter a flow state and actually get to the business of writing.

(All this musing is no doubt inspired by the fact that I’m supposed to be writing right now and am procrastinating a bit.  Oh, the irony!).

One of my new favorite quotes also comes from this article:

“Sometimes when I see a great movie or a great play I think, ‘Being human means you’re really alone…’”

Read the complete article.

I’m coining a new word, courtesy of Dictionary.com’s Word of the Day.

blogviate \BLOG-vee-ayt\, intransitive verb: To use one’s blog to speak or write at length in a pompous or boastful manner.

I may be a bit ambivalent about Adbusters magazine’s mission,^* but I thought this call for short written submissions for their next issue looks interesting…

Dear Jammers and Creatives,

We’re already hard at work on the next issue – #68, dedicated to creative non-fiction – and we’re hoping that some of you will let us pick your brains. We’re looking for 100 to 200 word, punchy, sad, crazy, or rude pieces inspired by a major event or epiphany in your life. It could be about anything really . . . a haiku, a poem, a travel remembrance, an anecdote about living in the post s11 era, a piece about discovering one of your family’s dark secrets. We’re looking for stories that provoke and that go straight to the heart, with a “slice of life” feeling to them.

We’d like to pepper these short pieces throughout our upcoming issue. One warning: the deadline is tight, so we need all submissions sent to editor@adbusters.org by July 26th. If we decide to go with your submission, you’ll get to see your name in print, and we’ll also pay you 50 cents/word.

Remember: keep it short, keep it true, and fire it off to us as quickly as you can.

Cheers,
The Adbusters Team.

^*I mean, I do have a pair of black Converse that I know I probably should trade in for these, but…it’s just not the same.
 

If you fall a few words short of the daily goal, a slap on the wrist will do—perhaps something like the forcible removal of a pinkie nail using needle-nose pliers. Failed to produce at a satisfactory pace for a week straight? Hire a local tough to deliver a good kneecapping. (Make sure it’s scheduled during nonwriting hours, and that the blow isn’t so severe as to require extended hospitalization, which would take away from writing time.)

And if, for example, you’re under contract to complete a writing-advice book and you still have a third of it to go with only three weeks until the deadline, chain yourself (literally) to the chair with your feet immersed in a bucket of acid (not too caustic, just strong enough for a tingling burn). Believe me, you’ll have never typed faster in your life.

Read more helpful writing tips at McSweeney’s Internet Tendency.
 

I just happened to catch Tom Wolfe on CSPAN2 (Book TV – and, yes, there is such a thing) speaking at Duke. He ended his talk with a few book recommendations for people interested in learning how to write well. They all come from 1893-1939 – the “greatest time period for the American novel.” Also, they’re all authors who have influenced his journalistic approach to the novel.

Here’s the list:

• The Grapes of Wrath
• Red Badge of Courage
• Elmer Gantry
• Sister Carrie
• Appointment in Samarra or BUtterfield 8
• Look Homeward Angel

I’ve read the first two, and now have some new additions to my “should probably read when I have a moment to spare” list. Oh, and I saw Capote last night, and it was amazing.

Something’s up. I’m not sure what it is, yet, but I have the distinct impression that my brain is in the process of being rewired by an as-yet-unknown force that has left me with little will and even less impetus to blog. It may have a little (ok, a lot) to do with my exams and dissertation which keep peeking their heads around the corners of my mind and often descend upon me late at night, shaking me awake from my normally sound slumber with whispers about a future that is both exciting and terrifying. It may also have something to do with the fact that GWB is almost certainly going to win the election – thus proving, once again, that Americans ingest jingoist propaganda with the same voraciousness that they eat Big Macs. Or, it may have something to do with my temporary change in venue and the extreme contentedness I’m feeling (thanks, A), which has left me wondering if my will to write is inversely related to my happiness – a scary proposition that I refuse to contemplate when in my right mind. (The tortured artist thing is so played out.)

Those are all excuses, however, which mask a much larger question – if I love writing so damn much, why is it so hard to do? Why do I struggle with the structure and cadence of each sentence as though each might be my last, as if someone at my funeral might actually say, “Well, she was a good writer some of the time, but did you see the split infinitive and comma splice in her last blog posting?” And then, of course, the over-analytical, slightly OC part of me kicks in and wonders if all of these questions are a veiled (and narcissistic) attempt to procrastinate.

Some stuff that I didn’t write but found interesting (and especially good if you’re wanting to procrastinate):

• Lossless, pleather, DSL, and dream catcher are now official entries in the 11th edition of the Merriam Webster dictionary.

• Craftster, the hipsters’ crafting Web site, finally has its own blog. Recent postings include patterns for iPod cozies and a listing of sources for button making.
• Adbusters has created an anti-brand – Blackspot Anticorporation – to market their anti-sweatshop, Chucks-inspired sneaker. Naomi Klein is mad.
• I stumbled upon the blog of death and thought of the famous Emily Dickinson poem.
• Edward Tufte, he of information design genius, has made one of his newest book chapters available online. Mmm…arrows!

Ugh, where’s my soma?