Reading List: August.

Fiction: 

Caitlin R. Kiernan: Daughter of Hounds.
John Wray: Lowboy.
Scott Heim. Mysterious Skin.
Bryan Lee O'Malley: Scott Pilgrim, I-VI.

Films: 

Speak (2004, Jessica Sharzer) ***.
Inception (2010, Christopher Nolan) *** .
Shutter Island (2010, Martin Scorsese) ****.
Charlie Bartlett (2007, Jon Poll) ****.
Ginger Snaps I, II (2000/2004, John Fawcett/Brett Sullivan) ****.
The House of Yes (1997, Mark Waters) ***.
Garden State (2004, Zach Braff) ****/**.
Litte Miss Sunshine (2006, Jonathan Dayton/Valerie Faris) ****.
The Darjeeling Limited (2007, Wes Anderson) **.
Rent (2005, Chris Columbus) **.
Death Proof / Grindhouse (2007, Quentin Tarantino/Robert Rodriguez) **.
Memento (2000, Christopher Nolan) ***.
Music from Another Room (1998, Charlie Peters) ***.
Requiem for a Dream  (2000, Darren Aronofsky) ****.
Mary and Max (2009, Adam Elliot) ****.
Before Sunrise (1995, Richard Linklater) ***. 
Letters to Juliet. (2010, Gary Winick) *.
Sunshine (2007, Danny Boyle) ****. 
Slumdog Millionaire (2008, Danny Doyle) ***.
Splice (Vincenzo Natali) **.
Salt (2010, Phillip Noyce) ***.

Series: 
 
Mad Men, Season One, Two, Three.
United States of Tara, Season One and Two.
Damages, Season One, Two, Three.

Mein Computer heißt Jonathan.

"Of course, all this does not mean that speakers of Spanish or French or German fail to understand that inanimate objects do not really have biological sex — a German woman rarely mistakes her husband for a hat, and Spanish men are not known to confuse a bed with what might be lying in it. Nonetheless, once gender connotations have been imposed on impressionable young minds, they lead those with a gendered mother tongue to see the inanimate world through lenses tinted with associations and emotional responses that English speakers — stuck in their monochrome desert of “its” — are entirely oblivious to."

NY Times: Does Your Language Shape How You Think?, August 26, 2010

Linkliste unbehandelter Themen

Politics: 

A large number of US combat troops left Iraq last week, before their deadline in the beginning of September. The remaining troops will help to build up Iraqi security forces and military. The withdrawal comes with a rise in attacks, assassination and attempted killings. 

Foreign Affairs proposes a way of bringing the now nine-year-old Doha talks to an end. 

The Doha Round was launched in November 2001 with the ambitious goal of liberalizing world trade and lifting living standards around the globe, especially in the least developed nations of the world. An agreement on the Round would offer universal economic benefits by reducing farm subsidies, opening up new markets, and spurring investment.

[link]

This SWP study deals with the situation in Sudan before the January 2011 referendum about Southern independence.

Christoph Schlingensief died last week.

Pop Culture: 

I read this novel when I was 10 (the German title is quite an elegant translation: "Morgen war Krieg"). It might have contributed to my fascination with apocalyptic scenarios. The trailer for the movie... isn't that great. 

One of my problems might be that I always pictured the kids a bit younger. 

io9 lists some of the novels to look forward to in the coming months. I can't wait for William Gibson's Zero History.

Channel4 finally released bloopers of the fourth season of Skins. DO YOU LOVE MY GIRLFRIEND?

In other Lily Loveless is lovely related news, someone found information about a seven minute short movie that was shown at the East End Festival back in April. The director of Seven PM was promptly hunted down via twitter and interviewed by afterellen.

When Planets Collide.

"Our history is incomplete"

One - This is the new video from The Thermals. 

Two - The song is called "I Don't Believe You". 

Three - Their new record comes out on September 7th, 2010, and is titled "Personal Life".

Four - That's Carrie Brownstein.

Five - From Sleater-Kinney.

Six - Sleater-Kinney and The Thermals are my favourite bands.

Mut zum Gegenwind

"Schlingensief war einer der größten Künstler, die je gelebt haben", schreibt Elfriede Jelinek in einer ersten Reaktion auf den Tod des deutschen Regisseurs und Filmemachers. "Mit einer so unglaublichen Kraft hat er alle um sich geschart, seine Gruppe Behinderter, dann auch Schauspielerinnen, Schauspieler, Menschen, die wie von einer umgekehrten Fliehkraft buchstäblich an ihn herangerissen wurden (die er an sich gerissen hat), und mit ihnen hat er hat seine Projekte durchgezogen, vorangepeitscht, auch das Projekt seines Opernhauses in Afrika - ich dachte immer, so jemand kann nicht sterben. Das ist, als ob das Leben selbst gestorben wäre."
DerStandard: Jelinek: "Es kann keinen wie ihn mehr geben", 21. August 2010

Gestern noch das Interview in der Spex gelesen. Im Deutschunterricht hieß es immer, "Schlingensief verstehe ich nicht", und allein deswegen war dann das Interesse geweckt.

Linkliste unbehandelter Themen

I don't know if I can keep this up but maybe this will be a regular Wednesday item instead of something that happens whenever the number of links stored just seems too pressing. 

Politics:

Something seems to be terribly off in France: While articles trying to describe the issues in the banlieues have been a constant reminder of the failed migration and employment policies of the last years, targeting and mass deportation of Romas are new.

Paul Krugman and Rachel Maddow have used the unpaving of roads in Michigan, Pennsylvania, North Dakota and Indiana as an indicator for the continuing economic crisis and especially the enormous budget deficits of some US states and counties. This article in Slate argues that it might be a sound solution especially for roads that aren't used much, since gravel roads are much cheaper to maintain, and that this is also a sign of the depopulation of certain areas.

Pop Culture: 

CBC has a long and interesting interview with Ellen Page.

Jonathan Safran Foer talks to Die Zeit about meat. I'm currently more interested in plastic and how supermarkets manage to wrap vegetables in incredible amounts of it while the kind you can buy non-pre-wrapped are always more expensive and obviously less fresh. I also find it somewhat discouraging that the first initiative that pops up on google when it comes to plastic bags in Austria is a Freedom Party one from 2006. I remember stores in Dublin only offering paper bags when I was there in 2004, so why exactly does this need extensive studies before anything can happen?

...chased forever from our historical memory by the dog he invented

"But perhaps the greatest act of historical castration is of Jack London. This man was the most-read revolutionary Socialist in American history, agitating for violent overthrow of the government and the assassination of political leaders—and he is remembered now for writing a cute story about a dog. It's as if the Black Panthers were remembered, a century from now, for adding a pink tint to their afros."

Slate: Jack London's Dark Side, August 15, 2010

I hear ghosts.

I am not particularly fond of M.I.A.'s /\/\ /\ Y /\ apart from Born Free, but every time Meds and Feds comes on, I wonder who that voice at the beginning of the song is because it reminds me of Kathryn Prescott. Does anybody happen to know if that's a sample from a British movie or something? I can barely make out what she is saying. The song samples Sleigh Bell's Treats.

In other Skins-related (or rather, withdrawal-related) news, afterellen has an interview with Sofia Black D'Elia, who is going to play Tea in the American version that starts next January. That will be a fun two months, covering two separate seasons of Skins at once. I can only apologize in advance.

Keeping track...

Flood in Pakistan, affecting approximately 13.8 million people and spreading rapidly to India.
Massive forest fires in Russia due to a heatwave that might threaten nuclear facilities.
Meanwhile, the water in German Land Saxony in is retreating.

Rewatching the first and the second season of Mad Men,

realizing that my dislike of Betty Draper started in season three, and that I actually find her interesting and complex in the first two seasons. It also makes me appreciate January Jones as an actress.

"Weirdly enough, both Matthew Weiner and January Jones, the actress who plays Betty Draper, mentioned Plath as an inspiration for her character’s arc in Season 2. Apparently right before a scene in which Betty confronts Don about his philandering, Weiner asked Jones to read Sylvia Plath’s poem “Ariel” to get into character. “It confused me and freaked me out,” Jones told writer Bruce Handy, who writes: “Not knowing the coming plot lines (Weiner may not have either, at that point), she assumed this was his way of telling her Betty would be sticking her head in the oven for the season finale."

Slate: What's in store for the women of "Mad Men"?, August 17, 2009

Columnize Your Randomness, Kurzfassung

Feuerlöscher vs. Flammenwerfer, Dancing Pigeons - Ritalin

Dancing Pigeons - Ritalin from Blink on Vimeo.

a reason why I might end up liking the first season of Skins USA more than the fifth season of Skins UK apart from Bryan Elsley / syfy may have been "inspired" by Amber Benson's and Adam Busch's Drones for a new comedy show / Wyclef Jean wants to become President of Haiti / I remember a time when floods weren't a monthly issue.

I love the wording of that decision

“Proposition 8 cannot withstand any level of scrutiny under the Equal Protection Clause,” wrote Judge Walker. “Excluding same-sex couples from marriage is simply not rationally related to a legitimate state interest.”

NY Times: Court Rejects Same-Sex Marriage Ban in California, August 4, 2010

"'[M]oral disapproval, without any other asserted state interest,' has never been a rational basis for legislation," cites Walker. "Animus towards gays and lesbians or simply a belief that a relationship between a man and a woman is inherently better than a relationship between two men or two women, this belief is not a proper basis on which to legislate," Walker notes, with a jerk of the thumb at Kennedy."

Slate: A Brilliant Ruling, August 4, 2010

Third gen of Skins revealed...

 [link]

I WAS HOPING FOR A TRAILER OR SOMETHING; WELL WHATEVER. These kids are just basically going to have a really hard time until the new season airs.

Also: I felt like screaming at everybody who went all "they all look so boring, they will never live up to bla and bla", and I already have favourites (all the way to the left and all the way to the right) which is really shallow since we know nothing about the storylines yet - and still, I absolutely second this sentiment. The one exception being, possibly, Amy Pond.

random mixtape - i’m living in an age that calls darkness light

arcade fire. MY BODY IS A CAGE. the black keys. TEN CENT PISTOL. amanda palmer. IDIOTEQUE. radiohead. HOUSE OF CARDS. dinosaur jr. YOUR WEATHER. sonic youth. TABLA IN SUBURBIA. blumfeld. SUPERSTARFIGHTER. tocotronic. STÜRMT DAS SCHLOSS. clinic. THE EQUALIZER.

...

I just realized that I accidentally ordered the French version of Scott Heim's Mysterious Skin off Amazon which could be one of those pretty arguments for buying books at your local store (not that I could buy that book off any local store, but still, the idea is what matters - read the blurb, not the product description or something). Well, I wanted to work on my French anyways, and at least it's not Italian. Also in the shiny package: Lowboy by John Wray and Daughter of Hounds by Caitlín R. Kiernan (I figured that I could just buy it, after getting it more than twice from the library).

Also: Arcade Fire just released a concept album about suburbs, the place that will forever haunt me and my writing. "Ich will da nicht leben wo es niemals Leben gab" indeed.