It’s not even Friday and already the Oscar blog has generated controversy over the oddest of subjects.
Who Knew That Carbs Were So Controversial?
– February 23, 2007Posted in: Uncategorized
Books To Jump Up and Down Over
Magic Hours by Tom Bissell: This marvelous collection of essays chronicles everything from film shoots to novelists rescued from oblivion. (The essay on the Underground Literary Alliance, with its portrait of raucous factions, unexpectedly reveals how soft today's literary world has become.) But if you peer between the cracks of these smart pieces, you may very well see how cultural lives are formed from the most unexpected life choices. And as we follow Bissell's development as a writer over the years, that goes for Bissell as well. (Bat Segundo interview with Bissell)
Angelmaker by Nick Harkaway: Harkaway's latest novel greatly improves on his previous book, The Gone-Away World, which I'm already on record as praising. Angelmaker adopts genre elements without ever feeling like a genre book, and it leads me to believe that Harkaway is well on his way to a narrative grace close to China Miéville's. Yet inexplicably this very fun book, which includes an eightysomething badass named Edie Banister, a mysterious mechanical object that may destroy the world, farcical scenarios involving lawyers and the police, and some unexpectedly moving moments about fatherhood, doesn't appear to be getting much attention in American newspapers. Nothing from the snobs at The New York Times Book Review, nothing from The Washington Post. And since I can't get Harkaway on Bat Segundo, I hope this Jump Up and Down mention gets you hopping as well.
The Age of Insight by Eric Kandel: Unless you're really pressed for time, forget Jonah Lehrer. If you want to understand creativity and its relationship to neuroscience, then the bowtie-wearing Nobel laureate is your man. In addition to being a physically beautiful book (you will drool over many of the paintings), there are helpful overviews on optical illusions, science, biographical backgrounds, and many vital figures from the Vienna Secession. Kandel's enthusiasm (and his call for greater unity between the humanities and science) is contagious.
I’m going to go on a limb and posit that Tao Lin wrote both halves of the “controversy.” This Tao Lin persona seems like an obvious put-on to me. I get a kick out of it, actually, because it’s pretty clever as a put-on since obviously there’s plenty of people who take what he (or she or they) say(s) at face value. I’m just surprised that the normally discerning Ed is one of them. (If he is indeed one of them.)
In fact, Tao and Fran are two different people. They invariably butt heads, and have for a number of years on Tao’s blog.
It’s dear. In a Hollywood movie, they’d fall in love. In real life, they will continue to butt heads until my friend Tao, a vegan, falls into a protein-deficiency coma of some sort.
Consider this online controversy a sort of nod to the romantic comedy genre.
It’s a rant, fer sure.
?!?!? Jesus Christ on a Ferrari. May, I assure you that I am NOT “Tao Lin.” I do think there’s a miasma of fakeness coming from and surrounding him, which you seem to be perceiving, but I am ME, Fran.
I think Matthew’s right about his assessment of the Fran-Tao situation, at least as far as the Hollywood movie and the real past and present are concerned (because I’m not gonna keep dealing with Tao forever) and except for the coma part, but I think that was a vegan joke and funny in an ironic way, even though I’m a vegan too and I eat more than enough protein and think protein’s fucking overrated.