The language and spirit of great literature, great rock music, and the greatness of stone generally - mountains, streams, especially wooded groves strong with oak; any good music - especially uncanny and subtle rythms. The creation and the principle being. Not least the great spirit/medicine/power with which the Earth and its wilderness like a battery is charged....
For New Years Eve dinner: Stephen Tyndale, Mick Jagger, Will Self, Tom Stoppard and Ian Brown to talk about all that is and the implications of it for our relationship with the Universe. Party to this and in no way secondary Alison Goldfrapp, Jeanette Winterson, Cate Blanchette and from history Elizabeth I. It would be wonderful to converse with each group seperately at first, then bring them together.
Rolling Stones, Ian Brown, Arctic Monkeys, Who, Kinks, Clash, Jam, Velvet Underground, Primal Scream, Stone Roses. Native American storm dance. Goldfrapp, Madonna (I know, but she has a powerful spirit), Islamic music, Leanard Cohen, Eurasian Traditional generally, especially Afghan. ...
Taxi Driver - gets funnier every time I see it, Scorcese has a very dark sense of humour! Withnail and I - faultlessly sharpe script. Gladiator - power and epic grandeur. Pulp Fiction - novel, stylistic and superlative script. The Pliladelphia Story - Hepburn, Grant and Stewart in their prime. King Arthur - for capturing the flinty granite and cool damp life of this magical Island. ...
Rome, Lost, Tribe, Question Time, News, Big Brother (yes, I know, but it's still the neatest, cleanest 'reality goldfish bowl' of contemporary psychologies laid painfully bare: 'strategies' and attempts at 'self presentation' usually come apart and reveal themselves over time where karma works its thing through the greater reflection of the million plus.) The Office (UK version), anything by Ricky Gervaise (he has a classic, almost great novel-istic wit)....
The magical yet visceral Odyssey of Homer. Hamlet, Shakespeare's superlative drama of brooding luminosity; uncanny immediacy and tragic greatness delivered through keep shattering lines. Emily Bronte's Wuthering Heights; elemental Howarth moors bare their flinty granite teeth and spark the earthiest, most towering of gothic passions. Fitsgerald: cinematic elegance delivering the subtle perfecton of the American 20's that predestined a later dissapointment, both personal and cultural. John Updike's marvelous Forty Stories: the wise father and anti-dote to Fitsgerald's inebriate glamour with it's flip side of eviscerating disillusionment. Breakfast at Tiffany's; Truman Capote superlative and perhaps earthier inheritor of Fitsgerald's charm of elegance. Saul Bellow's great short work, the stories and The Theft; the greater length but still efficiently written works Ravelstein and Humbolt's Gift. The list is endless... To be continued...
Mick Jagger for what he knows but doesnt show. Churchill for his language and greatness of spirit. Foolscrow for his superlative personal humility and sensitivity to the transcendent magnitude of what is way beyond yet within the everyday. Ian Brown for walking the talk. James Lovelock for bridging the gap between the eco-warrior and contemporary science so one day soon we might all walk green together. Picasso for his object lesson in vitality of spirit, archaic dynamism and atavistic power. Ted Hughes for his tragic and final sacrifice of Western delusion upon the iron anvil of native potential - he snatched a victory for nature from the jaws of personal desolation and defeat. And last but most certainly not least, Foolscrow revisited for his strength in humility and uncanny powers of receptivity to The Great Spirit, The Great Mystery and Medicine; Wakan Tanka.