A editora norte-americana Melville acaba de lançar The Last Interview & Other Conversations, reunião de entrevistas realizadas com Roberto Bolaño por diversos jornalistas da América Latina ao longo dos cinco que ele levou para escrever 2666, romance de quase 900 páginas publicado postumamente em 2004. Parte da última entrevista, concedida à Playboy mexicana no mês da morte de Bolaño e reeditada no livro, foi disponibilizada no blog de literatura do New York Times. É curioso observar em retrospectiva um escritor de temática densa e alçado a cânone por críticos literários de todo o ocidente respondendo a questões típicas da linha editorial da revista, como “John Lennon, Lady Di ou Elvis Presley?”

Robert Wright, in the New York Times this weekend, articulated clearly his view of how the viral terrorism meme spreads, in an age of global communication, to psychologically susceptible people (like Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan): 

One reason killing terrorists can spread terrorism is that various technologies — notably the Internet and increasingly pervasive video — help emotionally powerful messages reach receptive audiences. When American wars kill lots of Muslims, inevitably including some civilians, incendiary images magically find their way to the people who will be most inflamed by them. This calls into question our nearly obsessive focus on Al Qaeda — the deployment of whole armies to uproot the organization and to finally harpoon America’s white whale, Osama bin Laden. If you’re a Muslim teetering toward radicalism and you have a modem, it doesn’t take Mr. bin Laden to push you over the edge. All it takes is selected battlefield footage and a little ad hoc encouragement: a jihadist chat group here, a radical imam there — whether in your local mosque or on a Web site in your local computer.

By this very selfsame logic, doesn’t it follow that Fox News, Rush Limbaugh, and Glenn Beck, by stoking Barack Obama hatred and demonization, are spreading an Obama assassination meme?

Chapter 100: The Pequod, of Nantucket, meets the Samuel Enderby, of London
I saw the Moby Dick exhibit at at the CCA Wattis Institute today. Loved the Rockwell Kent illustrations.

Herman Melville
Bartleby, l’escrivent
Traducció de Miquel Desclot
Barcelona, Proa Butxaca, 2004
85 pàgs., 7,5 €

En aquell temps hi havia molta feina per als copistes en el despatx d’un notable advocat conegut per la seva prudència i mètode. I en resposta a un anunci de feina, l’advocat lloga els serveis del jove Bartleby atret sobretot pel seu tarannà assossegat que contrasta obertament amb dos dels empleats d’aquella època, en Dindi, de “temperament papallonejaire”, i el d’en Grapes, de caràcter “fogós”. Què hagués passat si un copista de principis del segle dinou que treballés per a un advocat, un bon dia i després d’una senzilla petició d’ajuda, li hagués etzibat al seu cap un amable “preferiria no fer-ho”? Què s’amaga rere aquesta actitud en un personatge de conducta, d’altre banda, irreprotxable? Un individu irremeiablement abocat a la desídia més absoluta després de l’atreviment d’un primer “preferiria no fer-ho”. Tancat entre quatre parets, gairebé emparedat i resolt a no separar-se del seu amo.

No sabem el nom del narrador–advocat d’aquesta peculiar i surrealista història de Wall Street, però sí sabrem dels seus esforços per comportar-se com un home just i coneixerem el que per a mi és el seu alter ego, en Bartleby, l’escrivent. Aquest personatge té vida pròpia i és intemporal, eteri, perquè planeja com un corb sobre cadascú de nosaltres i en qualsevol moment es pot instal·lar a dins nostre. Com un hoste no convidat.

Però qui és veritablement Bartleby, ho arribarem a saber mai? És un mestre, un  il·luminat?, un crit de guerra?, un inconformista? o una crida al recolliment, a la pau d’esperit i al resistir silenciós en un despatx de Wall Street? De què és producte aquesta persona? De primera mà, mai sabrem què li passa pel cap. De tota manera el recordarem per la seva finor, delicadesa, exactitud… però també per la seva incorporeïtat i pels seus intents de transcendir una feina mecànica consistent a transcriure minuciosament uns documents legals. Pensem en els seus antecesors, els monjos,  que es dedicaven a preservar pacientment els coneixements en els monestirs,  i traslladem-nos ara a l’època actual,  on no hi ha oficina sense  fotocopiadora.  Potser en Bartleby era un visionari insatisfet a l’espera de nous temps.

Gairebé que he estat temptada per la cèlebre expressió I would prefer not to, i de poc que no m’estic de fer la ressenya d’aquest magnífic llibre de l’autor de Moby Dick. Però ben pensat, quants “preferiria no fer-ho” ens han quedat a mig camí de la gola i ens hem acabat empassant amb tota l’amargor,  saliva avall…  Bartleby m’ha fet pensar en les vides tan tristes que passem -laboralment parlant- bona part dels humans. Aquest llibre no l’he gaudit, l’he patit. Però ha valgut la pena.
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I had difficulty selecting a single film for some directors; therefore I selected more than one. These are all directors who have consecutively put out great films; I'm not going to list any directors who have only made a single good film (there are lots of those unfortunately).

Anyway, here are my favorite directors and their best film(s) (in my opinion):

Steven Spielberg:

Best film(s) – Close Encounters of the Third Kind

Martin Scorsese:

Best film(s) – Taxi Driver

Nicolas Roeg:

Best film(s) – Walkabout

Ridley Scott:

Best film(s) – Alien/Blade Runner

Gus Van Sant:

Best film – Drugstore Cowboy

Stanley Kubrick:

Best film(s) – A Clockwork Orange

Werner Herzog:

Best film(s) – Stroszek/Aguirre, the Wrath of God

George A. Romero:

Best film(s) – Martin

David Cronenberg:

Best film(s) – The Dead Zone/Videodrome

Krzysztof Kieslowski:

Best film(s) – Dekalog (TV series)

Tim Burton:

Best film(s) – Ed Wood/Edward Scissorhands

Quentin Tarantino:

Best film(s) – Reservoir Dogs

Jean-Pierre Melville:

Best film(s) – Le samouraï

Frank Darabont:

Best film(s) – The Shawshank Redemption

Hayao Miyazaki:

Best film(s) – Spirited Away

George Lucas:

Best film(s) – Star Wars (episodes IV, V and VI)

Roman Polanski:

Best film(s) – The Tenant

(*NOTE* This blog-post was extracted from this thread of mine on the HikiCulture forums.)

Posted via email from HikiCulture – A Forum For Reclusive People (and Hikikomori) {HikiCulture.Com Site Blog}

When I watch nature documentaries on TV, I find myself experiencing a strange mix of clinical interest and upsetting empathy. I know that animals eat each other, that this is a fact and necessity of nature, but I can’t help pitying that grazing mammal as it hopelessly tries to kick itself free of locked crocodile jaws. For thousands of years of recorded history, humans have expressed a recognition of a similar dilemma as they hunt — the natural necessity of eating on one hand, the sacred value of life on the other.

In “The Pequod Meets the Virgin,” Ishmael weaves a narrative that evokes a similar mix of emotion. The majority of the chapter slowly and excruciatingly details the killing of an enormous and powerful whale, now sick in his old age. Ishmael alternates with pity for the dying, and cold indifference for the killing. But the brutality of the killing itself, undertaken for frivolous reasons, brings us to an uncomfortable moral ground. The whale was “horribly pitiable to see. But pity there was none. For all his old age, and his one arm, and his blind eyes, he must die the death and be murdered, in order to light the gay bridals and other merry-makings of men, and also to illuminate the solemn churches who preach unconditional inoffensiveness of all to all.” In framing the hunt thus, Ishmael frames the pursuit of whaling as needless, cruel, and unappreciative of the life in sacrifice — a group of bullies taking advantage of the weak.

So too, do we see in the Pequod’s interactions with the incompetent German ship, the Virgin. In competition to harpoon the whale, both crews fight tooth and nail, hurling insults as well as objects as they row into harpoon range. In the end, the Pequod’s boats win out, throwing their harpoons over the heads of the Germans, and knocking the captain out of his boat in the subsequent rush of the pricked whale. The glee with which the Pequod’s mates lord over not only their victory, but the failure of their competitors, complements their cruelty with the whale. Here we have not an unfortunate recognition that one side must win out over the other, but a joyful and abusive wielding of power.

Chapter 81: The Pequod meets the Virgin

Who knew, under placid waters
King Erudition writhes?
Barbed by weaker opposition,
Pitied for muted cries.

Were it head on, no one could resist him,
Strength of a thousand thighs,
But with one prick, hiding in the water,
King Erudition writhes.

And I, I, I,
Heavy with a grievance, heavy with a grievance.
And I, I, I,
Heavy with a grievance, heavy with a grievance.

The good folk, dark if for the pity
Man brings to suicide.
With a cheek turned, live your final moments
Deep in a ponderous mind.

And I, I, I,
Heavy with a grievance, heavy with a grievance.
And I, I, I,
Heavy with a grievance, heavy with a grievance.

Who knew, under placid waters
King Erudition writhes?
With a cheek turned, live your final moments
Deep in a ponderous mind.

And I, I, I,
Heavy with a grievance, heavy with a grievance.
And I, I, I,
Heavy with a grievance, heavy with a grievance.

(c) and (p) 2008 Patrick Shea
Words and music written by Patrick Shea October 6, 2008
All parts performed, arranged, and recorded by Patrick Shea October 31, 2009

*Lists: The 2000’s lists are beginning to come out. According to NPR, these are the 50 Most Important Recordings of the Decade. I didn’t appear on any of them. Though I have recorded a track-for-track remake of “For Emma, Forever Ago.” For personal reasons. In the shower.

*Holidays: Spread the holiday spirit! Santas as H1N1 catalyst. [spin city]

*Life: Will intelligent alien creatures look like us? Dollars to donuts, I am balder than any alien discovered in my lifetime. And I am a man of my word, so please collect if I’m wrong. [marginal revolution]

*Photos: Look at these Re-inhabited Circle Ks. Most of my knowledge of the Circle K franchise comes to me from Bill and Ted’s various cinematic adventures. In a way, that’s a cry for help. [eat me daily]

*Quizzes: I hate quizzes, but I got 10 out of 12 on this one. Is This Music Web Site Real? On a related note, MySpace might now be trying to buy Imeem. (I used to know more about this shit.)

*Literature: Read Moby Dick online. I once read “Crime and Punishment” on Bartebly over a series of unbearably boring work days. I didn’t feel bad about it, either. (Get it? One of the themes of C&P is undeniable guilt? Hello? Ugh.) [ebert]

*Ideas: Gladwell v. Pinker

*Obits: Wow, Ken Ober (former host of MTV’s “Remote Control”) has died at 52.

*Today’s links: F. Though I almost made it to a D- by not mentioning the Word of the Year.

I’d never read Melville’s Bartelby the Scrivener until this weekend. The story/novella’s wiki says he wrote it to cheer himself up in the midst of Moby Dick’s commercial failure.

It’s so playful in how often it strays from its story, and in how much unnecessary wind-up the narrator takes to get us there. A comedy of “let’s see how long I can string this out,” and Melville riffs more than well enough to get away with it. Here’s the narrator, who just found out that the man he’s fired has never left the office:

I was thunderstruck. For an instant I stood like the man who, pipe in mouth, was killed one cloudless afternoon long ago in Virginia, by summer lightning; at his own warm open window he was killed, and remained leaning out there upon the dreamy afternoon, till some one touched him, when he fell.

Pretty great. It’s free here.

Very short books warrant very short reviews. This is a very short book, easily mistaken for a longish short story. This review will attempt to be as effectively concise. The task is difficult, because Bartleby, the Scrivener is an excellent work.

Though apparently there is shame in it, I will admit to not having read this book previously. I owe John Self (previous link) a debt for persuasively reviewing this book. It will now go on the list of those I want to re-read.

The book is narrated by an elderly attorney who recounts all he knows of the title character. At the time the attorney first meets Bartleby, he has in his employ three copyists. The only names we know them by are Turkey, Nippers, and Ginger Nut. Melville’s descriptions of these characters is quite entertaining. For instance, this is our introduction to one:

Nippers, the second on my list, was a whiskered, sallow, and, upon the whole, rather piratical-looking young man of about five and twenty. I always deemed him the victim of two evil powers — ambition and indigestion. The ambition was evinced by a certain impatience of the duties of a mere copyist, an unwarrantable usurpation of strictly professional affairs, such as the original drawing up of legal documents. The indigestion seemed betokened in an occasional nervous testiness and grinning irritability, causing the teeth to audibly grind together over mistakes committed in copying; unnecessary maledictions, hissed, rather than spoken, in the heat of business; and especially by a continual discontent with the height of the table where he worked.

Turkey is Nippers counterpart. He is only reliable in the morning, whereas Nippers is only reliable in the afternoon. The attorney suspects drink is the cause of Turkey’s midday transition. Not so Nippers:

But indeed, nature herself seemed to have been his vintner, and at his birth charged him so thoroughly with an irritable, brandy-like disposition, that all subsequent potations were needless.

Each of the other copyists likewise has humorously related personality quirks. The attorney, too, is not without his own oddities. But each of them has fit into this Wall Street office of an unambitious attorney. Bartleby upsets the inkwell.

Bartleby’s disruptive influence takes some time to be felt. At first, the narrator is happy to have him:

After a few words touching his qualifications, I engaged him, glad to have among my corps of copyists a man of so singularly sedate an aspect, which I thoguht might operate beneficially upon the flighty temper of Turkey, and the fiery one of Nippers.

Bartleby’s sedateness soon becomes a mild obstinance. Scriveners must check their copies for accuracy, but, the first time the narrator asks Bartleby to check the copy:

Bartleby, in a singularly mild, firm voice, replied, “I would prefer not to.”

Bartleby’s initial refusal is met with confused indulgence. As his preferences become more disruptive, his employer’s patience ebbs. Bartleby’s “I prefer not” becomes something of a refrain, leading to havoc in the office and consternation on the part of the narrator. Much of the meaning and fun of the book occurs after the second half, but I want to leave with a quote from midway. The narrator’s pity for Bartleby is overridden by his frustrations. He makes a particularly insightful observation:

So true it is, and so terrible too, that up to a certain point the thought or sight of misery enlists our best affections, but, in certain special cases, beyond that point it does not. They err who would assert that invariably this is owing to the inherent selfishness of the human heart. It rather proceeds from a certain hopelessness of remedying excessive and organic ill. To a sensitive being, pity is not seldom pain. And when at last it is perceived that such pity cannot lead to effectual succor, common sense bids the soul rid of it.

A cold, harsh world. Hostility from nature. Hostility from one’s fellow species. Alienation. Scar tissue as a written history of life lived. So dark, Ishmael! So dark!

In “The Blanket,” Ishmael examines and discusses a whale’s skin. In noticing small lines “engraved upon the body itself,” Ishmael first compares the whale to Egyptian pyramids and cliffs etched with undecipherable hieroglyphics, thereby establishing the skin as text. Ishmael continues, noticing the scar tissue that accompanies these lines, and here things start to get gloomy. The scars remind Ishmael of the scrapes left behind on rocks after contact with an iceberg. However, he notes that the scars on the whales most likely come from fellow whales. Connecting the violent erosion between vast and indifferent forces of nature with the violence of contact between members of the same species is quite an image. Add to that a discussion of men and whales, both needing warmth as an essential condition of life, both living in a world so devoid of warmth that they must make it themselves, and I’m ready to retreat into a fetal ball for the next week.

But we know Ishmael has been in a mood since the day we met him. What I find interesting is the fact that this particular mood can be so compelling, even as a guilty pleasure. Why do we indulge it? What’s so sexy about a scar? What’s so macho about hardship?

Ishmael closes the chapter feeling hopeless about making any comparison between man and whale: “Of erections, how few are domed like St. Peter’s! of creatures, how few vast as the whale!” In “The Blanket,” he gives us lament for the mortal insignificance of mankind. Bleak, Ishmael. Bleak.

Chapter 68: The Blanket

The skin of a man does tell of his history.
The skin of a man is thin as the breeze.
The skin of the whale is written as mystery,
Scarred in the vast, unspoken sea.

Learn your lessons from his presence,
Lifeless, laid at your feet.
Thick skin, blessed warmth, and refuge
Need a man to survive.

Much as the whale, does man need an inner warmth,
Though banished to live out his days in the cold.
Much as the whale, is man but a stranger
On the Earth he calls his home.

Learn your lessons from his presence,
Lifeless, laid at your feet.
Thick skin, blessed warmth, and refuge
Need a man to survive.
Thick skin, blessed warmth, and refuge
Need a man to survive.

(c) and (p) 2008 Patrick Shea
Words and music written by Patrick Shea October 5, 2008
All parts performed, arranged, and recorded by Patrick Shea October 24, 2009

Ausi Judith- the way I have attended your shows, I am sitting here watching DVD ya LIRA and I am thinking how come Judith a sena DVD maar! Ke kopa DVD tu!!

Too bad locally we don’t get into the practice of recording some of the live shows, if we do, they stay in the archives- my most memorable show of yours was the first time I saw you LIVE ko Bassline while it was still ko Melville. It was my friend’s birthday and we asked you to sing Happy Birthday for him. Your performance le Nokukhanya and Swazi was outstanding! After that I never missed a single live show of yours I could afford to attend. The next memorable show was at Carnival City sometime last year 2008!

I know you can do this- you are one of the best performers we have in this country- Please please please record a DVD?!

O ka se phale ke LIRA man! LOL!! *Joke*

Nathan Bransford makes it simple: the format of your query letter should be boring and straightforward, and the description of your work is the part you need to “sweat.”  (By the way, I stole copied borrowed the blog title emphasis style from Nathan.)

He also links to two other very good recent blogs on query letters.  Holly Root at the Waxman Agency also emphasizes the importance of good writing over all else, while Michael at Dystel & Goderich downplays the formatting details while playing up the importance of reflecting your work in the query.

For my own part, I was never too obsessed with formatting issues like font or paragraph style.  Considering that I work as an editor in an organization with very strict formatting standards, and regularly kick writers in the face for daring to give me something in Courier New rather than Arial, I can’t decide whether it’s ironic that I’m more relaxed about format than the typical writer (as described by agents) or it’s expected that familiarity with ferocious format issues makes me less skittish in their presence.

But, I have to confess that I aaggoonniizzeed over how to accurately and adequately describe The Ligan of the Disomus in my queries.  Asking for suggestions from the handful of first-readers didn’t help much (thanks, tho, guys!) and neither did digging through photocopies of the original short story version that had been marked up by workshop partners.   “Melville + film noir + X-Files” was the best I got from them, and that just makes you think of an alien sea beast being hunted by Sam Spade.

Actually, come to think of it … symbolically that’s not as far off the mark as I, in my moment of self-deprecatory sarcasm, would have liked it to be.*  It’s … an unusual book.

Given the advice from Nathan, Holly, and Michael, I’m glad that the description is the part of the query I decided to obsess over, even if I’m still apprehensive about how well I captured the story and setting.  Zero responses so far, but that also means zero rejections!

_

*Confession: the train of thought presented here in regard to the workshop’s description of Ligan actually happened months ago, at the beginning of the query process.  Like a good writer, after rolling my eyes at myself, I tucked it away for later.

Novelist John Irving holds forth on Big Think on an array of writing issues in short videos excerpted from a long interview. He discusses his working habits—eight to nine hours a day writing in longhand in lined notebooks, seven days a week—and the deep rifts in America that trouble him. He talks about using post-it notes, the long process of revision, achieving syntactical unity throughout a long work, and the glory of the long, lavishly detailed, plotted, visual nineteenth-century novels of Dickens, Hardy, Melville, and Hawthorne. The tidbits are worth a listen.

Everyone reaches a point in growing up where he or she realizes the horror of most fairy tales and lullabies. From Cinderella’s stepsisters’ eyes being pecked out by birds, to a baby being blown out of a tree (why was it up there to begin with?), we grow up learning morals and values taught through terror. From there, it’s a pretty natural transition in high school to 1980’s horror movies and Victorian novels where adulterers are punished with horrible deaths.

“Squid” does not fit the bill of morality play, per se, but Ishmael presents the titular kraken in a creepy way evocative, at least to me, of scary stories and fairy tales. In the midst of a calm, Daggoo disrupts the crew’s collective lull with a possible sighting of Moby Dick. Upon reaching what they thought was a white whale, the four boats find instead a giant squid, “a vast pulpy mass” with arms “like a nest of anacondas, as if blindly to clutch at any hapless object within reach.” Ishmael continues, describing the squid as having “no perceptible face or front,” and being “an unearthly, formless, chance-like apparition of life.” Starbuck, of course, jumps to omen, saying that few ships have seen a kraken and survived the rest of their voyage, but Ishmael dismisses the concern, thinking rather that a kraken sightings are simply rare, which somehow “invest it with portentousness.”

A faceless, shapeless, blind reaper-of-souls, rarely seen and little understood? Sounds like a Puritan lullaby to me. And so I give you “Squid.”

Chapter 59: Squid

Matterhorn, now rising from the ocean –
A twisted form as roots into the deep.
As the mountains
Reach down and down
To the brimstone, the Kraken grasps the sea.

Nest of snakes, to blindly rip asunder
Hapless souls who chance into their reach.
Widen berth
From sin and sorrow –
Let The Whale drive him to the deep.

But beware (beware!),
As the weight descends
A whirlpool left behind.

So beware (beware!),
From the oceans fair,
Damnation grasping thee.

Though they say, the rising Whale as portent,
Bringing ’round the fateful end of days,
It’s the Kraken
That rises with Him
In the fray, will shatter all the world.

(c) and (p) 2008 Patrick Shea
Words and music written by Patrick Shea October 4, 2008
All parts performed, arranged, and recorded by Patrick Shea October 17, 2009

the edible attribution: sincerity

this week’s book of grievances will suffer the sincere. this show will explore the association between seeing and believing,  the damaging impact of the cult of the serious on society, and the assessment of the real risk in the wake of the impossibility of the sincere. O! to the roles we play! here’s the mp3: Sincerity

i will engage the following texts for this irreverent exegesis of solemnity:

Moore, Capitalism

Melville, Les Enfants Terribles

Levinas, Totality and Infinity

Coens, A Serious Man

Monty Python, “Joke Warfare”

Zupancic, The Odd One In

Bohr, Atomic Theory and the Description of Nature

Heisenberg, Physics and Philosophy

Sologub, The Petty Demon

myth of the straightforward

aren't we all on the outside

Fraud is very a popular problem in Workman’s Compensation cases, ICORP Investigations help put an end to it in the New York area.

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In London they talk about the weather, in Johannesburg they talk about the crime. I can’t tell if it’s merely a national obsession or a very real paranoia, but I can’t have often a conversation with a South African I’ve just met that doesn’t bring up crime.

Today I was sitting at a cafe in Melville, enjoying some live jazz with my friend Laura and a lovely woman and her daughter who have recently sold me some great second-hand furniture with which to furnish my new home. They’re moving to the UK to get out of Johannesburg and away from the crime. The daughter, 15, asked to walk a block down the street to check out a second-hand book store and the mother didn’t want her to go, presumably worried about the car guards and the men selling trinkets on the street. Later she commented on the fact that I was going to drive Laura to the airport, “not in the city more than two months and already you jump into your car and go wherever you please!” as if that was some feat of bravery. Or a mixture of all three.

As Laura and I drove to the airport some two hours later we drove through a part of town that isn’t necessarily the safest but during the (fading) daylight hours and with two of us in the car. We weren’t lost, we had a map and knew where we were headed but also aware that in a city we don’t know so well with so many pockets that should really be avoided I did wonder if I hadn’t mistaken this woman’s tone as being one of respect instead of incredulity at my naivety.

I get so mad at well-meaning people who condescendingly tell me to be careful but it seems to be the standard response to my expressions of love for this city, this country and the work I do here. I am careful, most of the time. I do understand that this place has a crime problem. But it also has a paranoia problem. And I won’t live my life in fear. That’s a decision that each person makes and I’m not going to spend every moment of my life here scared that the man with the gun is going to turn up. Leaving my house is dangerous, staying in it alone more so. Driving down the street is dangerous, walking more so. Being in Johannesburg is dangerous, being a woman more so.

I drove the long way home, listening to the last hour of the only good radio station, “Solid Gold Sunday” and admiring the sunset, thinking that I’d better get used to admiring the view rather than taking the short-cuts, because that’s my decision too. And so I’ll be careful, but I won’t stop living out of fear of the alternative.

“The Gam” begins where “The Advocate” left off — giving readers one more reason that whaling is a superior pursuit to other maritime professions. We learn in “The Gam” that whalers are superior in their practice of greeting and socializing with crews of other whaling vessels when, by chance, they meet on the open seas. Though initially discussing the common sense and courtesy of the practice, Ishmael quickly, and at length, turns his discussion toward the snobbery implied in not valuing the gam as whalers do. He chides the “metropolitan superiority” of the English whalers toward the “Nantucketer, with his nondescript provincialisms,” as well as the aloof dismissal with which a merchant ship passes others it encounters in its travels. Of course, there are practical reasons that a gam benefits a whaling vessel where it would not benefit a merchant vessel — exchanging intelligence for one — but Ishmael ignores these considerations in favor of mocking the fancy pillows that merchant captains sit on when being ferried to another vessel, contrasted with the manly asceticism seen in a whaling captain, standing upright in mid-boat, uncomfortably trying to keep his legs.

In “The Gam,” Ishmael touches in me what I think is my biggest difficulty with class — a social pressure to discuss it only in winks and nods; interpretations of gesture, education, or background; and, most bizarrely, consumer choice, not in how much to spend, but in which brand to spend it on. Like a monster under the bed, our imaginations often fill in the unknown with the terrible, and so we assume awful, mean-spirited judgments in others, which in turn create awful, mean-spirited judgments in ourselves. We’re in a hall of mirrors, defensively reacting to each others’ reactions, taking on uncomfortable postures to garner credibility, snubbing and feeling snubbed, all to the loss of any sort of truthful human interaction. It’s our own fault.

Chapter 53: The Gam

Whaling ships are having a good time
Roaming on the open sea!
Pirate ships are villainous rascals,
Locked in their castles
With no “good day” to me.

Merchant ships are spurious dandies,
Brushing off their brethren without a heed.
Slaving ships are running from something,
And ceremony mars
The meeting Men of War.

On the open sea,
Lend the courtesy
As the whalers do with every passing of keels.
Oh, let’s have a gam,
I’ll extend my hand
To all sailors who share the jaunty rhythms of the sea.

Passing correspondence between us,
Pluck upon my tethers to home,
Tell us where the whales run the thickest,
Wherefore the riches
Surface from the foam.

On the open sea,
Lend the courtesy
As the whalers do with every passing of keels.
Oh, let’s have a gam,
I’ll extend my hand
To all sailors who share the jaunty rhythms of the sea.

Whaling ships are having a good time
Roaming on the open sea!
Join us for a bit of a ramble,
And let the ocean handle
The grave philosophies.

On the open sea,
Lend the courtesy
As the whalers do with every passing of keels.
Oh, let’s have a gam,
I’ll extend my hand
To all sailors who share the jaunty rhythms of the sea.

(c) and (p) 2008 Patrick Shea
Words and music written by Patrick Shea October 2, 2008
All parts performed, arranged, and recorded by Patrick Shea October 11, 2009

LI STOCKS

EARNINGS REPORTS

NY COMMUNITY BANCORP [NYB, Westbury] Q3-09: REV: $403M v $398M (+1.26%); NET: $98.6M v $58.1M (+69.71%); NET/SHR: +$0.28 v +$0.17 (+64.71%)

ARROW ELECTRONICS [ARW, Melville] Q3-09: REV: $3.67B v $4.3B (-14.65%); NET: $12.6M v $76.1M (-83.44%); NET/SHR: +$0.10 v +$0.63 (-84.13%)

POST MARKET

Cedar Shopping Centers [CDR, Port Washington]

TRADING: CURRENT SESSION

ISSUES AT 12:14 – MOVES: 20↑ 38↓ 20→; ↑/↓ = 0.53; CASES: SMTB +$0.33/23K; HITK -$1.98/454K; MSON +6.98%/1K; APDN -16.99%/801K

INDICES AT 12:14 – UNWTD: 1,142.30 -1.28%; WTD: 3,053.97 -1.72%; CAP: 1,027.81 -1.53%; VOL: 18.90M; DS&N: -0.47% -1.12% -1.73%

NEWS

ECONOMIC

Durable Orders for September – PREVIOUS -2.4%; EXPECTED: 0.75 ACTUAL: +1.0%

Durable Orders for September (No Transport) – PREVIOUS: 0.0%; EXPECTED: 0.4% ACTUAL: +0.9%

New Home Sales for September – PREVIOUS: 429K; EXPECTED: 445K ACTUAL: 402K

Crude Oil Inventories for Week Ended 23 OCT- PREVIOUS: 1.31M ACTUAL: 0.78M

BUSINESS

SECURITIES INVESTIGATION: Holzer Holzer & Fistel, Announces Investigation Allion Healthcare Sale

ATLANTA, 28 OCT 2009 [GlobeNewswire via Trading Markets] – Holzer Holzer & Fistel, LLC is investigating whether Allion Healthcare, Inc.’s directors complied with their fiduciary duties in approving the proposed buyout of Allion by H.I.G. Capital, LLC.

DEAL: Leading Service Provider Chooses CosmoCall Universe to Expand Its Hosted Telephony Services

MELVILLE, 28 OCT 2009 [PRWEB] – CosmoCom, a global leader in Unified Customer Communications and Contact Center Consolidation, announced today that PBfleX, a high-end communications service provider and IT integrator, has bundled CosmoCall Universe technologies into their hosted telephony solutions.

DEAL: Telephonics Wins Follow-on Contract for Counter IED Jammer Production

JERICHO, 28 OCT 2009 [Business Wire via Sys-Con] – Telephonics Corporation, a wholly owned subsidiary of the Griffon Corporation, announced today that its Electronic Systems Division received a follow-on contract award in excess of $45M from the Sierra Nevada Corporation for continued production for the Counter Radio Frequency Improvised Explosive Device – Electronic Warfare (CREW) 3.1 Program. This follow-on award extends delivery of the CREW 3.1 devices through March 2010.

DEAL: VAI Provides Syntec Industries with Shipshape ERP Software

RONKONKOMA, 28 OCT 2009 [PRNewswire via Sys-Con] – Vormittag Associates, Inc., a leader in enterprise resource planning (ERP) solutions for the distribution, manufacturing, retail and service industries, and an IBM Premier Business Partner, announced today that Rome, Georgia-based Syntec Industries , a manufacturer of quality marine, recreational vehicle (RV) and housing carpets, that also offers trims, vinyl, leathers, suede, fabrics, logo mats and adhesives, has implemented VAI’s S2K Enterprise 5.0.

LISTING: PC Group, Inc. Receives Delisting Notice from NASDAQ

NEW YORK, 28 OCT 2009 [GLOBE NEWSWIRE] – PC Group, Inc. announced today that it received a NASDAQ Staff Determination on October 22, 2009 indicating that the Company has not regained compliance with NASDAQ Marketplace Rule 5450(b)(1)(C) within the extension period granted to the Company through October 19, 2009.

MORNING BRIEFING FOR WEDNESDAY 28 OCTOBER 2009

EVENING BRIEFING FOR WEDNESDAY 28 OCTOBER 2009

LI STOCKS

EARNINGS REPORTS

ANTE MARKET

New York Community Bancorp [NYB, Westbury]

POST MARKET

Cedar Shopping Centers [CDR, Port Washington]

Arrow Electronics, [ARW, Melville]

TRADING

PREVIOUS SESSION

ISSUES AT CLOSE – MOVES: 22↑ 40↓ 16→; ↑/↓ = 0.55; CASES: VECO +$1.29/2,580K; NTY -$1.09/564K; SYBR +18.18%/<1K; ABR -11.40%/209K

INDICES AT CLOSE – UNWTD: 1,157.12 -0.75%; WTD: 3,107.52 -1.54%; CAP: 1,043.79 -1.31%; VOL: 42.26M +28.07%; DS&N: +0.14% -0.33% -1.20%

NEWS

ECONOMIC

Durable Orders for September – PREVIOUS -2.4%; EXPECTED: 0.75;

Durable Orders for September (No Transport) – PREVIOUS: 0.0%; EXPECTED: 0.4%

New Home Sales for September – PREVIOUS: 429K; EXPECTED: 445K

Crude Oil Inventories for Week Ended 23 OCT- PREVIOUS: 1.31M

BUSINESS

SHARING EXPERTISE: Comview Announces Wireless Telecom Expense Management Webinars

HUNTINGTON STATION, 27 OCT 2009 [PRNewswire via Sys-Con] – Comview Corporation, a leading provider of telecom expense management services, announced today that it will be sponsoring a three part webinar series squarely focused on the most pressing challenges facing telecom expense management (TEM) professionals and their companies.

EMPLOYMENT: LI Job Market Shows Signs of Life

LONG ISLAND, 27 OCT 2009 [Carrie Mason-Draffen & Patricia Kitchen for Newsday] – … the moribund Long Island job market is showing some signs of life. The Island’s economy has lost jobs every month since September 2008, amid the worst economic downturn since the 1930s and great uncertainty. But experts say the market is taking steps – albeit baby ones – toward a recovery.

SUPPORTING EDUCATION: Canon USA and Christopher Newport University Introduce Canon Leadership Scholars

LAKE SUCCESS, 27 OCT 2009 [BUSINESS WIRE] - Canon U.S.A., Inc., Canon Virginia, Inc. (CVI) and Christopher Newport University (CNU) are proud to introduce the 24 members of the 2009-2010 Class of Canon Leadership Scholars at a ceremony at CNU on Tuesday, October 27th at 4 p.m.

DIVIDEND: State Bancorp Declares Dividend of 5¢; Elects Richard Lashley to Board

JERICHO, 27 OCT 2009 [GLOBE NEWSWIRE via Street Insider] – The Board of Directors of State Bancorp, parent company of State Bank of Long Island, declared a cash dividend of $0.05 per share at its October 27, 2009 meeting.

EXECUTIVE MOVES: CA Appoints Ratan Sanjay Director of Communications Service Providers

MUMBAI, 27 OCT 2009 [Channel Times] – CA, Inc., a leading independent IT management software company, announced the appointment of IT and telecoms veteran Ratan Sanjay to the post of director for communications service providers (CSP) for India and SAARC region.

EVENING BRIEFING FOR TUESDAY 27 OCTOBER 2009

MIDDAY BRIEFING FOR WEDNESDAY 28 OCTOBER 2009

The chapters of Moby-Dick come mostly in two flavors — those concerning Ishmael, Queequeg, Ahab, et. al.; and those that describe the whaling world in great detail. Lovers of Moby-Dick hear it often from casual readers — love for the Ahab action, hate for the whaling discourse — but beyond being important, the latter chapters are actually the thrust of the novel. By Chapter 45, Ishmael has steeped his audience in  a potentially confusing discourse on whaling minutiae long enough to begin explaining his methods. “The Affidavit” is not the only chapter of its kind in Moby-Dick, but differs significantly from later apologetic chapters, such as “The Crotch,” in two ways.

First, by citing in great volume tales similar to that of the Pequod, Ishmael seeks to negate the wonder of the narrative Moby-Dick is most well-known for. Explicitly, Ishmael tells these tales to educate his audience beyond disbelief, and to prevent that his readers “might scout at Moby Dick as a monstrous fable, or still worse and more detestable, a hideous and intolerable allegory.” Beyond this purpose, however, Ishmael’s attempt to turn the story of Ahab and Moby Dick into banal fact effectively shifts that story from the center of his narrative into an elaborate frame for the true focus of his story — the whaling life fleshed out in full.

The second major difference between “The Affidavit” and other chapters of its kind is the I-swear-on-my-mother’s-grave tone Ishmael takes in his accounts of the incredible. Ishmael swears himself up and down this chapter, to the point where I, for one, stop believing him. At one point, for instance, Ishmael seeks to substantiate an account of a whale attack that he read in a book by claiming himself the nephew of the captain of the ship in question, and tells us that this uncle gave first-hand affirmation of the account.

To me, this roundabout, ad hoc fact-checking from Ishmael in “The Affidavit” somewhat transforms the novel itself into one giant chapter fleshing out perhaps the most essential aspect of the whaling life — storytelling. In the telling of a tale that would be utterly fantastical were it not so banal, that would seem pure fancy were it not the sworn truth of its teller, we find ourselves fully transported to a distant forecastle, in a distant ocean, in a distant time.

Chapter 45: The Affidavit

I’ll testify to the reverend’s holy words:
All truth told here.  It’s your choice to believe it,
Irrevocably.

I’ve seen it thrice — embattled monsters torn
From dealing fateful blows, brought back after years gone by.
Death follows.

No simple brute — a thoughtful, malicious eye
Turns back assault, and stove in many leaders.
Irrevocably.

You will never be
Broken, lest irreverent
To powerful things
When you face them.

Haughty disbelievers knocked from donkeys
On the road to Damascus.  It’s your choice to believe it.
Death follows.

(c) and (p) 2008 Patrick Shea
Words and music written by Patrick Shea October 1, 2008
All parts performed, arranged, and recorded by Patrick Shea October 4, 2009

The Campfire

An Imitation of Herman Melville, esp. Moby Dick

The Dutch Africa, and all the ample planes round about there, is much like some oceanic abysm, where once in a fortnight you come upon a sea-worn pipe or stool leg and recollect the company of men.

It was not a great while after the affair with the impala[1], that one evening shortly after dusk, the Zulu guide, whom I had taken to calling Esau, stayed our horses and descended from his saddle.  His body was taut and hovering in stillness to listen, his long great skull cocked like and pear as it is twisted from its branch.  As Esau stood lingering beside you humming with quiescence, so fiercely studying the mad reddening horizon, you would have thought him some sage or soothsayer beholding the lots of destiny.

Having determined our path a safe one, Esau motioned that I was to dismount that he might lead us along on foot.  The sun carried on its sinking and by the time night unfurled its wings I saw the thing my Zulu prophet had known; a withering campfire.  Oh, my sea-worn pipe! My stool leg! Could the zephyrs of Fate deliver me to comrades in this enduring peregrination?  But though well nigh the hour for slumber, this dwindling flame was the only soul to greet us.  Drawing his single blanket from about his shoulders, Esau cast it at his feet for a bed, then tethered our horses to a nearby thorntree.  A good bunk is a mighty good thing, and I fashioned my hammock as a rude arboreal cradle.

“What think ye of these stars, Esau?”

You know the Esquire Big Black Book for Fall 2009 has fallen into hands it shouldn’t have fallen into if they’re choice of the “The Most Important Meal of the Day” is breakfast, and the breakfast James Bond supposedly has is “Scrambled eggs with chopped chives, served on hot buttered toast with pink champagne.” That sounds more like what James Bond’s mom might have for breakfast. Or James Bond when he’s cross-dressing. Or what he might order for the Bond girl before he leaves her at the hotel, where she then dies all coated in gold paint. James Bond has Scotch for breakfast. (Or is that just me?) Or at least a strong espresso.

Although I did like their list of books to help you sleep: Swann’s Way by Marcel Proust, Moby-Dick by Herman Melville, The Metaphysical Club by Louis Menand, Infinite Jest by David Foster Wallace, and Gravity’s Rainbow by Thomas Pynchon. The last one was also a finalist for the National Book Award’s Best of All Times Category, which tells you something about the people there (i.e. they don’t read like I do much). That and that they all seem to have voted for Flannery O’Connor, who is nice in that grandmotherly sort of way, and that’s why I’ve always tried to like her, but is she really the BEST? I guess most readers must be grandmothers. That would make sense. I voted for Faulkner.

I also agree with quite a few of their “Nineteen Things a Man Should Never Say.” With the obvious exceptions – “Teens,” “cool,” and “bye-bye” get a pass from me. Instead I’d add “bro/bra,” “word,” and “totally.”

The next book I’m going to read while I’m pretending to get writing done is David Finkel’s Good Soldiers. I’m looking forward to it. It’s time to replace Vietnam as the dominant American war story in fiction and near-fiction, and these sort of well-written book-length exposés might do it.

And finally, in case I haven’t mentioned it, I’m not the most creatively gifted of my siblings. My younger sister is. She’s a photographer. She took the picture up in my blog header. Apart from author portraits, she also does photo shoots that turn average brides into models, average grooms into sujets d’arte, and, most recently, my nephews into advertisements for the fact that my family makes endearing children…

Jonah

Abner

“I, Ishmael, was one of that crew; my shouts had gone up with the rest; my oath had been welded with theirs; and stronger I shouted, and more did I hammer and clinch my oath, because of the dread in my soul.”

Soon after Ahab’s stark raving introduction of Moby Dick to the crew, as well as his demand for the crew’s oath to help him hunt the whale, Ishmael pauses to address some of the bigger questions that may be lingering in the minds of his audience, namely, who is this crazy captain, so what about the whale, and why doesn’t anyone stop Ahab’s reckless quest for vengeance?

The whale becomes an idea: Ishmael says that while rumor abounds in all maritime professions, in the whaling world, rumor runs highest, for “they are by all odds the most directly brought into contact with whatever is appallingly astonishing in the sea.” Because of the inconsistency of communication within the profession, due to the length and solitude of a cruise, rumor runs unchecked. Thus, tales of ferocious encounters with Moby Dick bounce among whalers in such a way to lend the whale an aspect of “ubiquity,” both in space and in time, and “immortality is but ubiquity in time.”

Ahab’s transformation: For Captain Ahab, Moby Dick is not so much legend as scapegoat, and it’s an important difference. By Ishmael’s account, Ahab’s initial encounter with Moby Dick (attacking the whale with a knife, losing a leg) was little more than impulse. But the loss of his leg seemed so cosmically unfair* that he “piled upon the white whale’s hump the sum of all the general rage and hate felt by his whole race from Adam down.”

Amorality v. immorality: Early in the chapter, Ishmael attributes to fear his complicity in the tragedy to come, but by the end of the chapter says simply, “I gave myself up to the abandonment of the time and the place.” Does Ishmael regret not preventing the demise of the Pequod? Does he see no other option? Does he feel it not his place as storyteller to interfere with his narrative? In some ways, this is the conundrum of the modernist writer or the proto-anthropologist — are we immoral in amorally disengaging ourselves from the course of events?

*Stab with a knife, bite off a leg — seems somewhat fair to me.

Chapter 41: Moby Dick

Let’s talk of the depths:
We’re of the cavernous Earth.
We take in the rocky chasms
At the very moment of birth.

Under the heart
(In all a darkness),
An ancient and fragile king
As pillar, quivering.

As a whale under the ocean, no one knows
All to bear from private spaces.

Now spin me a yarn,
No simple matter of fact.
In facing the grandiose
We take a supernatural tact.

So as within,
Deep down below
An ancient and fragile king
As pillar, quivering.

As a whale under the ocean, no one knows
All to bear from private spaces.

In all the world
There is a weight of defeat
Breaching the placid surface
With an ubiquity.

So grand, indeed,
Call it the devil and plead,
Or muster the soul’s harpoon
From madness.

(c) and (p) 2008 Patrick Shea
Words and music written by Patrick Shea September 30, 2008
All parts performed, arranged, and recorded by Patrick Shea September 28, 2009