Music and literature

Music and literature, in many ways, seem antithetical. Whereas music is a non-representational form, literature is. Literature connotes concrete meanings. Music, as Stravinsky controversially once said, cannot really express anything other than itself. It is pure form. If a pop/rock combo claim that their latest album is a social critique, that has much more to do with the lyric sheet than with the musical arrangements.

I think that music trumps everything in the end. When literature approaches its greatness it is usually when it is like music. My favourite novels are those which are ambiguous, open-ended and self-negating (in the sense that there are elements which do not fit and which contradict each other). The feelings it elicits are close to music: what does it mean? In the case of modern/post-modern literature, you can analyse the text and offer an interpretation. The text itself has no single meaning. Music can be analysed in terms of its use of harmony, metre, motifs etc., but semantically you cannot impute a meaning onto it.

When you listen to music, you do experience those kind of mystical moments.   In many ways, science is also driven by a desire to unravel the mysterious. Quantum mechanics is especially exciting in that its field of study keeps growing and growing. Even its experts scarcely know half as much as about it as we lay-men. Yet, whatever desires lead to its practice, science classifies and codifies. The ultimate aim is to solve the mysteries which make us scratch our heads. What can music ultimately say? Not as much as literature and certainly not as much as science. When I listen to J. S. Bach pieces I feel an overwhelming urge to grab hold of something and I am unsure what it is exactly. Literature should try to elicit those reactions.

Words in many ways are inadequate. Samuel Beckett wrote 'Every word is like an unnecessary stain on silence and nothingness.' Words often try to ascribe meaning to a world without meaning. There is no God; everything is one big mistake. If this is the case, who should care about that big teeming novel I'm keen to write? Who should care about the writing by the masters - Shakespeare, Tolstoy, Proust, etc. - when their insights are ultimately the attempt to make sense out of this meaningless wasteland called Earth?

Sadly, literature has not borrowed from music all that much. There are not that many novels about the lives of composers. The masterpiece on the subject is Thomas Mann's Doctor Faustus, based on the life of Arnold Schoenberg. This is the consummate novel about music in that it captures the ineffable, psychological and spiritual torments associated with it. Anthony Burgess wrote a novel - I haven't read it - about the structure of Beethoven's Eroica symphony in which he mimics the sounds of the music through language and onomatopoeia.

Before I got into writing, my desire was to become a composer. Sadly, time dragged on and on until it became too late. Composing is a lot of hard work. Also, I do not really have the kind of mathematical aptitude required. I turned to writing. Just as J. G. Ballard includes frustrated pilots because flying was his adolescent desire, my stories are crowded with frustrated composers. If I have never been able to write music, at least I have been able to pay tribute to it in some way. I have written stories about Alfred Schnitkke (my only published piece; available to purchase on the navbar to the right), Carlo Gesualdo (titled 'Desperate Lives'; available on the navbar to the right) and Olivier Messiaen.

Thoughts on Woody Allen

I have had in mind writing this post for several weeks. Woody Allen has of course been in the news of late for all the wrong reasons. Even if has been a child molestor, this should still not taint his great body of work. Rapists, murderers, sodomites can make great artists. We should learn to separate the life and the work. I don't mean to be disingenuous - if the allegations are true, then he is by no means an honourable man.

When I bring the name 'Woody Allen' up when talking to another devoted cinephile, it summons the same reaction as when I bring the name 'Frank Zappa' with a devoted fan of classical music. I receive a bemused reaction. He has made some funny films, but what has that to do with the likes of Bergman, Tarkovsky, Truffaut, etc.?

Others see him as a one-trick-pony who churns out the same film year in and year out. Even though several of his films overlap, and there can be predictabilities in his scripts, there is a lot more variety and breadth than people acknowledge. Even if many of his films might superficially appear to be similar, there is often an a priori concept behind it - a desire to reinvent himself and try something new.

The persona of Woody Allen is deeply ingrained into the popular consciousness. The nebbish, neurotic New York intellectual who has spent years in therapy. For people of a certain temperament, he is the celebrity one most readily identifies with. For a quirky neurotic like myself, I can look at Woody Allen dithering on screen and think 'By God, this is me!' And I am not alone - he elicits the same reaction from swathes of nervous people.

I will run through my favourite films of his and give comments. Of course, one cannot forget his early years as a stand-up comedian, where he provided the world with a repartee of witty one-liners. The comedy was sharp and incisive, though it was always very gentle. His skit 'The Moose' has me in stitches.



His early films has been self-described as 'the early, funny ones.' My favourite of these would have to be Sleeper. A failed clarinetist who runs a grocery store awakes in a topsy-turvy Orwellian future. The film is strewn with great one-liners and the slapstick comedy is hilarious. The rest of the films from this period - Bananas, Everything You Wanted to Know about Sex - have their moments though feel as though they are novelty films. There are great moments, though several other scenes do not really hold together.

Allen would reinvigorate his comedic films with Love and Death. Although it is a comedy, it deals with the big themes of Russian literature. It is slapstick for lit undergrads. There are hilarious scenes between Keaton and Allen which spoof the writing of Tolstoy and Dostoyevsky. 'I don't love you, I love Sonya and Ulalov' and proceeds to list a number of endlessly long Russian names. (Often, the most cumbersome thing about the Russian writers is having to remember the names of the characters). If they happen to have run into some kind of mishap, Allen invariably turns to the camera and philosophises about the meaning of life.

The major turning point was, of course, Annie Hall. It is the first film where Woody Allen consciously wrote three-dimensional characters and where his film had a dramatic arc. That's not to say that it isn't littered with great jokes - it is. And, of course, you get the charming relationship between the two ditsy neurotics, Allen and Diane Keaton.

Allen made a major statement of intent when he made a film completely shorn of comedy - Interiors. It was a tribute to his idol Ingmar Bergman. (I haven't seen it.)

Then would come another classic, Manhattan. Since I saw the film, it is difficult for me to hear George Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue without picturing New York shot in monochrome. In this film we get the intellectual enclave of New York, where refined people go to art galleries and discuss whether Mahler or Mozart were overrated. The initial sequences are exhilarating. Allen stutters onto a tape recorder notes for literary projects. They are all perfunctory until he arrives at a phrase he likes, the Gershwin climaxes and there is a montage of precipitous Manhattan skycrapers. My favourite scene in the film is when Allen considers what makes life living. For all the meaninglessness of the universe, Allen can still find a few items here and there that makes up for it.



I've heard a few people say that, following Manhattan, Allen became inordinately indulgent. For me, he was only getting started. My favourite period in his career are his films in the 80s.

Just as Interiors was his Bergman homage, Stardust Memories was his homage to Fellini's 8 1/2. We see a star comedian beleaguered by the media papparizi. It is a meta-fiction film that Allen would revisit in the future. People were put off by the narcissistic self-absorption, but the film is magical and playful.

Woody Allen would meet his next muse Mia Farrow and they would go onto make my favourite films of his. Zelig is about an eternal chameleon. Shot as a mockumentary, it champions individualism and going against the grain. The Purple Rose of Cairo is a masterful film about the pleasures of fiction and how it trumps reality. Too much fiction can still create torments. Mia Farrow goes to the cinema every day to watch the same film, besotted by the male lead. The fictional lead jumps out of the screen and they start a romance. This leads to the ire of the real actor who wants the character to return to the movie! Broadway Danny Rose is a quirky comedy about a failed manager of entertainment acts.

Hannah and her Sisters is a novelistic narrative about three New York sisters and their predicaments. The pacing of the narrative is deft and we get as much drama as we do laughs. Allen contemplates committing suicide, but attends a Groucho Marx film and concludes that life is too precious. Allen proved in this film that the best parts he writes are for women. The sisters in the film are the most fully-formed characters in his work. The film was his most substantial insight yet into his neurotic/intellectual New York milieu.

The same narrative structure was preserved for my favourite Allen film (and a top 20 all time entry), Crimes and Misdemeanours. Whereas earlier films felt somewhat contrived whenever he ventured into serious cinema, the existentialist elements fit snugly here. There are touches of Bergman here and there, but this is wholly Allen's film. An esteemed dentist arranges the murder of his lover who vows to bring his reputation to an end. This runs in parallel to another Allen character who has a failed career as a documentary filmmaker. Once more, despite the horrors and setbacks, the film is very life-affirming. Whereas Allen thought the ending of Hannah and her Sisters was a tad bit sentimental, here there is enough doom and gloom to counterbalance that. Allen also makes stellar use of Schubert's 15th string quartet.



His relationship ground with Mia Farrow ground to a halt (the repercussions of which still sprout out in the media today). The break-up is painfully evident in Husbands and Wives. Modelled on Bergman's Scenes from a Marriage, and shot with hand-held cameras, it feels like a fly-on-the-wall documentary of the acrimonious break-up. This is one of the few Allen films without the slightest semblance of the feel-good factor - it is harrowing from beginning to end. Whilst it does of moments of humour, it is very black.

Following this he made more light-hearted films which I think are very underrated: Manhattan Murder Mystery, Bullets in Broadway (another favourite), Mighty Aphrodite and Deconstructing Harry. Bullets in Broadway deals with the sheer shallowness and pomposity of the artist-as-genius. A gangster type writes a broadway hit which is wrongly attributed to an aspring playwright. Deconstructing Harry is another meta-fiction film which examines the creative process. There are a few skits which are racously funny.

Following 1997's Deconstructing Harry, Allen's films faced a gradual and steep decline. His working aesthetic - shoot quickly without rehearsel - now led to films which felt hackneyed and shoddy. The only exception for me has been Midnight in Paris, a whimsical jeu d'spirit wherein a literary enthusiast meets his literary heroes in 1920s. (I had a somewhat epiphanic experience when I saw the film in a cinema in Buenos Aires. I was so excited that I resolved to write a story on the experience, but it turned out turgid.) The critics were hasty to canonise Blue Jasmine, but to me it suffered the same problems as the rest of his late-period work - patronising, dated scripts and too much explanatory dialogue. Cate Blanchett gave an assured performance, but the film still felt like counterfeit currency to me.

However much I may despair over the quality of his recent films, Woody Allen's status as one of the greats in the history of the medium is incontestable. What I most like about his films is the comfort we find in fiction and stories (for instance, how seemingly innocent women fawn at the feet of nervous wrecks.) When you start watching a film and you hear the same new Orleans 1920s swing, you know you are about to enter a world which is so familiar yet so reassuring.

Primordial heaven

Manfred and the Alpine Witch (1837) by John Martin

Three cheers for pluralism!

Right-wing libertarians glibly argue in favour of pluralism and are against all forms of censorship. The main reason they take this cause is that they prefer 'small' governments. A government which regulates the media is perceived to be intrepid. A government which regulates the market is considered to be worse still. The main reason they align themselves with these causes is that they want all types of business to flourish. They want to advance their own nefarious interests.

It is a shame that the idea of pluralism and free press has been appropriated by this political ideology. More than anything, it is a classical liberal idea advocated by John Stuart Mill. Mill envisioned a pluralist media where all voices, from the most radical to the most conservative, were voiced. There are some problems with this, though, as I will later divulge.

Like many people from the right-wing libertarian faction, I am somewhat annoyed by 'insensitivity.' I still think that all material should have its place in the media. If a certain article 'offends' a certain minority, I still do not think it is just to remove it. If it is a facile attack, then in a truly pluralist society it will be criticised by other more moderate voices in the media.

Recently, a far-right islamist was banned from appearing on television. But, if you think about it more closely, he is the beneficiary. When Nick Griffin appeared on Question Time, there was mass furore. Once he appeared in the programme, he expressed his asinine views and made a complete tit of himself. As a result, he lost his political influence and the BNP has been superseded by other far-right fringe parties. If these bigots are given air time, people can look at them objectively and they lose their political prominence.

The one 'problem' with the society Mill envisioned is that pluralist societies can allow fascism to gain political currency. After the unification of Italy in the late 19th century, there was an initiative called 'Risourgimento' wherein all voices, from zionism to socialism to fascism, were given equal power. As there were no restrictions as to what fascism could say or do, with effective propaganda it swayed millions. (Similarly, the Weimar republic in 1920s Germany was also quite enlightened.) Although pluralism can create the conditions for fascism takeover, once fascism governs it is the polar opposite of what pluralism advocates. It bans and censors. Public discourse only peddles fascist ideology.

The main incentive for pluralism is that a discourse is created wherein everyone can express their point of view. The more division, generally, the better. There should also be room for dissent.  A discourse which is too homogeneous will not be an interesting one.

That's revolting!

'Everything human is pathetic. The ultimate source of humour itself is not joy, but sorrow. There is no humour in heaven.' - Mark Twain

Certain subjects are so taboo that they do not seem fit subject for humour. Jibes at minorities, sweeping generalisations and jokes on sensitive topics are deemed imprudent. This is true to some extent, as long as it is treated with irony. Bawdy jokes about gays, rape, race are a crass way to get laughs. It is what Germans call shaudenfraud. a way of laughing at other people's misfortunes. When Bernard Manning makes jokes about 'Pakis' we do not laugh because it is meant literally and conforms to stereotypes.

 However, when you make a joke in the vein of Manning with undertones of irony, it becomes funny. You are not laughing at the victims of such tirades, you are laughing at the type of people who make those jokes in the first place.

For instance, the Peter Cook/Dudley Moore duo Derek & Clive, at its best, is thunderously funny. There are the kind of diatribes you might here at a pub in the heartlands of England. The word 'cunt' is used as punctuation. There are the kind of absurd claims drunken men make ('the worst job I ever had...'). We laugh when a man hits the deck and breaks his fucking neck, when Clive kills a thousand Jews in Golders Green after seeing Nazis on TV, why people don't 'label' things. One laughs, although one may not think one ought to. A laugh is largely involuntary. I still think that D & C is playing around with these type of stereotypes. It turns Bernard Manning on its head.

Likewise, in Mel Brooks' iconic film The Producers we get a musical skit called 'Springtime for Hitler.' Whilst some may think that the horrors of the Third Reich are too sensitive to even be lampooned, once more it is hilarious. A rag-tag of ideas, rather than a coherent ideology, it is revealed for all its silliness. Nazism is demeaned through laughter. Satire attacks fascism with laughter and consigns its subject to ignominy.

Pathos is also funny. Acute suffering - such as a terminal illness - is never funny. Though a more moderate type of pathos, such as falling over, is funny. The subject is clumsy and buffoonish; he elicits laughter. Laughing at this type of minor misfortune can be mean-spirited, but it diminishes staid moroseness. No-one wants to live in a portentous world where everything is taken at face value.

Rare & Racy

Rare & Racy is the ultimate book shop. When I found about its existence back in 2006, I was flabbergasted that such a shop existed in Sheffield. It is adorned with photographs of jazz greats, sells all kinds of literature, social study books, history books, mint viynls etc. etc. It is a cornucopia of delights.

I wandered through there when I was a dreamy teenager and still a frequent customer to this day. I can spend hours there. The architecture of the place is homely. They play strange ambient records, which creates an eerie ambiance. When I first stumbled across it, I was thrilled to find that they stocked John Zorn/Tzadik CDs as no other place in Sheffield did. Even as my tastes have broadened, I still always find something to my liking there.

At first the people who ran the place were somewhat aloof and grumpy. Now they welcome me with smiles! It opened in 1969 - before the sign was a little more on the psychedelic side - and it always reeks of weed.

Sadly, it is closing down soon. The property is been bought and they can't afford to relocate. In an age when everyone shops online through the tax-dodger monolith Amazon, when the written word is becoming digitised and when corporate business outsell local outlets, it makes no sense for this treasure trove to continue to exist. It is a crying shame. I will always remember this place and the innumerable pleasures it brought to me. As my book and viynl collections attest, I am indebted to it.

Law and morality

There has always been a major dichotomy between law and morality. To many the law, whatever the 'law' consists of, must be adhered to. If it is broached, the offender must be punished.

Laws are social constructs. They can either be moral or immoral. Legislation is passed by leaders of various political persuasions. Even a political constitution, the bed-rock of any society, can be immoral. To cling to a constitution which has clearly led to dire consequences - such as gun ownership in the USA - is ludicrous.

If a person finds the law immoral, he should break it. Insisting on being law-abiding for the sake of being abiding is the same as being reverent or pious. It is a dogmatic adherence to something toxic.

A governing body is capable of passing immoral actions and illegal ones at that too. In the case of the Iraq war, the UN charter declared the war illegal. Whilst no war can ever be moral, it cannot be denied that this middle eastern misadventure was carried out with mendacity. It was a gruesomely pointless war which was never justified. If a governing body commits such an egregious war crime, direct action should be taken against it.

Palestine is not a recognised state. If Palestine does not 'legally' exist, does this discredit Palestinian culture and people?  And when the Israeli state illegally occupies Palestinian land, how is this justified? Once more, 'illegal' direct action should be taken to curtail these coercive measures. Although it is not a constitution as such, the utopian ideal of Zionism justifies these actions. This reflects the toxic Machiavellian idea of the ends justifying the means. The foundation of an existing society - be it Zionism or the American constitution - should not continually enforced throughout the centuries if it results in such turmoil.

One of the main charges taken against Wiki Leaks is that they 'broke the law.' Bradley Manning's leaks revealed the sheer blood lust of American troops. Edward Snowen has revealed the security breach and phone tapping carried out by Bush and Obama. It is patently clear that if the government is undertaking such immoral actions, which have dire consequences, it cannot hide under the meretricious cloak of the 'law.' The truth about immoral actions undertaken by governments must be revealed, otherwise citizens are being hoodwinked.

This is why Wiki Leaks is such an invaluable source. The only option is to reveal immoral acts undertaken by governments. Rousseau believed that humans were born free and that that freedom was deprived when we are conditioned by society. If we want to reclaim that freedom, we should not dogmatically adhere to these socially constructed strictures.