Log24

See "Four Tops" in this journal.

See also posts now tagged The Tenor Metaphor.

This  post was suggested by . . .

A background check on Father Demo Square revealed
further information at . . .

This post was suggested by a recent New York Times  obituary
and by a discussion in a book review of the MoMA art event
"24 Hour Psycho" in the Times —

Other entertainment from the Times —

Geraldine Chaplin in "The Moderns" —

Background art — Gaugin.

Chaplin in the 12 AM Aug. 23, 2023, film at TCM …

Earlier . . .

The Source :

<span data-timeago="2015-03-13T21:38:56Z">9 years ago</span>

More recently, a view of a location I walked by yesterday —

"First important note: this isn't a final redesign of the site!"

A New York Times  piece  today . . .

. . . suggests a review of the "shadow work" concept in this  journal.

— Niall Ferguson, Kissinger, 1923-1968: The Idealist

From this journal on Guy Fawkes Day, 2011—

Cliffs of Moher

My father's father,
    his father's father, his —
Shadows like winds

Go back to a parent before thought,
    before speech,
At the head of the past.

They go to the cliffs of Moher
    rising out of the mist….

— Wallace Stevens,
   "The Irish Cliffs of Moher"

See also Kahn's The Art and Thought of Heraclitus and the references to a "Delian diver" in Chitwood's Death by Philosophy.

From
Death by Philosophy:

"Although fragments examined earlier may enable Heraclitus’ reader to believe that the stylistic devices arose directly from his dislike of humanity, I think rather that Heraclitus deliberately perfected the mysterious, gnomic style he praises in the following  fragment.

31. The lord whose oracle is at Delphi neither speaks nor hides, but  indicates. (fr. 93)

Heraclitus not only admires the oracular style of delivery, but recommends it; this studied ambiguity is, I think, celebrated and alluded to in the Delian diver comment. For just as the prophecies of the Delian or Delphic god are at once obscure and darkly clear, so too are the workings of the Logos and Heraclitus’ remarks on it."

String Theory: 

The Devil Came Up
to Cambridge

From a Log24 entry of Friday, December 3, 2004:

"Anything but the void. And so we keep hoping to luck into a winning combination, to tap into a subtle harmony, trying like lock pickers to negotiate a compromise with the 'mystery tramp,' as Bob Dylan put it…."
— Dennis Overbye, Quantum Baseball,
    New York Times, Oct.  26, 2004

From this morning's New York Times:

In memory of Mr. Blizard:

In the Labyrinth of Memory

Taking a cue from Danny in the labyrinth of Kubrick's film "The Shining," today I retraced my steps.

My Jan. 6 entry, "Dead Poet in the City of Angels," links to a set of five December 21, 2002, entries.  In the last of these, "Irish Lament," is a link to a site appropriate for Maud Gonne's birthday — a discussion of Yeats's "Among School Children."

Those who recall a young woman named Patricia Collinge (Radcliffe '64) might agree that her image is aptly described by Yeats:

Hollow of cheek as though it drank the wind
And took a mess of shadows for its meat

This meditation leads in turn to a Sept. 20, 2002, entry, "Music for Patricias," and a tune familiar to James Joyce, "Finnegan's Wake," the lyrics of which lead back to images in my entries of Dec. 20, 2002, "Last-Minute Shopping," and of Dec. 28, 2002, "Solace from Hell's Kitchen."  The latter entry is in memory of George Roy Hill, director of "The Sting," who died Dec. 27, 2002.

The Dec. 28 image from "The Sting" leads us back to more recent events — in particular, to the death of a cinematographer who won an Oscar for picturing Newman and Redford in another film — Conrad L. Hall, who died Saturday, Jan. 4, 2003. 

For a 3-minute documentary on Hall's career, click here.

Hall won Oscars for "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid" and "American Beauty," and may win a posthumous Oscar for "Road to Perdition," last year's Irish-American mob saga:

"Tom Hanks plays Angel of Death Michael Sullivan. An orphan 'adopted' by crime boss John Rooney (Paul Newman), Sullivan worships Rooney above his own family. Rooney gave Sullivan a home when he had none. Rooney is the father Sullivan never knew. Too bad Rooney is the

Rock Island
branch of Capone's mob."

In keeping with this Irish connection, here is a set of images.

"Like a chess player, he knows that to win a tournament, it is sometimes wise to offer a draw in a game even when you think you can win it."

— Roger Ebert on Robert Duvall's character in "A Civil Action"

Director Steven Zaillian will take part in a tribute to Conrad L. Hall at the Palm Springs International Film Festival awards ceremony on Jan 11.  Hall was the cinematographer for Zaillian's films "A Civil Action" and "Searching for Bobby Fischer." 

"A Civil Action" was cast by the Boston firm Collinge/Pickman Casting, named in part for that same Patricia Collinge ("hollow of cheek") mentioned above.

See also "Conrad Hall looks back and forward to a Work in Progress."  ("Work in Progress" was for a time the title of Joyce's Finnegans Wake.)

What is the moral of all this remembrance?

An 8-page (paper) journal note I compiled on November 14, 1995 (feast day of St. Lawrence O'Toole, patron saint of Dublin, allegedly born in 1132) supplies an answer in the Catholic tradition that might have satisfied Joyce (to whom 1132 was a rather significant number): 

How can you tell there's an Irishman present
at a cockfight?
     He enters a duck.
How can you tell a Pole is present?
     He bets on the duck.
How can you tell an Italian is present?
     The duck wins.