Trying to find books and films and theater that won't put me to sleep. Trying to respark a love of cooking. Providing my nieces and nephews with my life as a cautionary tale. Accumulating lots of glow-in-the-dark religious figures, clay teapots featuring profiles of Chairman Mao, and battery-operated Japanese toys.
Anyone who is capable of kicking the cynicism out of me.
Some favorite albums: Entertainment! (Gang of Four), Secrets of the Beehive (David Sylvian), Lovers (The Sleepy Jackson), Maxinquaye (Tricky), Junkyard (The Birthday Party), Tilt (Scott Walker), Automatic Writing (Robert Ashley), Cut (The Slits), Astral Weeks (Van Morrison), Beat Rhythm News (Essential Logic), Teenage Snuff Film (Rowland S. Howard), I'm Stranded (The Saints), New Wave (The Auteurs), In the Space of a Few Minutes (Telstar Ponies), Pills 'N' Thrills and Bellyaches (Happy Mondays). Some favorite recording artists: Tindersticks, Afghan Whigs/Greg Dulli/Twilight Singers, Lee Hazlewood, Sparklehorse, Stina Nordenstam, Marvin Gaye, O.V. Wright, Serge Gainsbourg, Leonard Cohen, Chet Baker, Randy Newman, Nick Drake, Mark Lanegan, the Divine Comedy, Bob Dylan, and Chicago's own late lamented Dysfunctionells. I like to sing along to Marlene Dietrich, Malaria, and the Marvelettes, or Elis Regina if it's hot outside. To mellow out I listen to Balinese and Javanese gamelan, Satie piano pieces, string quartets by Bartok and Shostakovich, madrigals and part songs, and the odd bit of opera. Favorite piece of music, hands down, any genre: Arnold Schoenberg's String Trio.
Some favorite directors: Aki Kaurismaki, Robert Bresson, Carl-Theodor Dreyer, Derek Jarman, Jean-Pierre Melville. Some favorite films by other directors: Un Chien Andalou (Bunuel), Menilmontant (Krisanoff), Schwechater (Kubelka), Out of the Past (Tourneur), The Cabinet of Dr Caligari (Wiene), Night of the Hunter (Laughton), Bullet in the Head (Woo), Stranger Than Paradise (Jarmusch), L'année dernière à Marienbad (Resnais). Some favorite actors: Robert Mitchum, Bruno Ganz, Ray Winstone, Tcheky Karyo, Paddy Considine, Kate Winslet, Peter Lorre, Jane Birkin, Laurence Harvey. Laurence Harvey?!!! Yup. Go figure.
I enjoy learning geeky facts from the History International channel. I loved the original UK versions of "The Office" and "Coupling," and I was a big fan of the Blackadder series. I have deep affection for "The Daily Show with Jon Stewart" or "The Colbert Report."
Favorite authors: Joris-Karl Huysmans, Octave Mirbeau, Pierre-Jean Jouve, Denton Welch, Jean Genet, Rene Crevel, Gustav Meyrink. Favorite books by other authors: Wise Blood (O'Connor), The Dwarf (Lagerkvist), The Journal of Albion Moonlight (Patchen), The Experience of the Night (Béalu), Kaspar Hauser (Wassermann), Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens (Barrie). I like the poetry of the Romantics, Surrealists and German Expressionists, and medieval epics. I'm having a great deal of difficulty finding anything contemporary that I can admire, in fiction or in poetry. Suggestions are welcome, but I am admittedly persnickety.
No more heroes!