And when it's over, I'll go back.
I did something over the weekend that I haven’t done since I was a child. And much to my extreme surprise (and delight), it was good. You should try it. Wish I could tell you what it was. How sad for you.
My life has been full of complex and confounding literature and film lately. My exploration of Kafka began when I was at my parents’ place over the Christmas holidays, where I found (inexplicably) a copy of The Trial, his unfinished masterpiece, in my bedroom. So I picked it up and was immediately intrigued by the foreword, which discussed the difficulties in translating Kafka, some of the many apparent missteps in past translations of his work, and the challenges in piecing together this new edition of The Trial (released in 1999, I think).
Next thing I knew I was immersed in a strange and dark tale of a world in which people are prosecuted for unnamed crimes by a legal system that has essentially no ties to reality (whatever that may be), and thus answers to no one and remains completely unaccountable for its actions. Huh.
I flew through it, and was hungry for more. The edition I read contained a hundred or so unfinished fragments of the story, which were interesting to read, but made me feel that I probably would have gotten more out of this particular work if I had read other Kafka first, and was therefore more familiar with him and what he’s about. So since then I’ve read quite a few more, and am still working my way through others, and yeah, I don’t think it would have helped. It’s fun though. Each is like working through a puzzle, and I guess that’s the kind of engagement my mind has been hungry for lately.
As far as film is concerned, I saw Caché in the theater last week, and man, what a piece of work that was. I love French film, and this one was intriguing and confounding and shocking (I’ve never heard an audience gasp the way they gasped during the film’s one truly disturbing moment), and anchored by two incredible performances by two amazing French actors: Daniel Auteuil and Juliette Binoche. I’m still thinking about it and trying to piece it all together, a week after seeing it.
On top of that, I unwittingly watched the movie Swimming Pool over the weekend, not realizing that it too is a confounding foreign thriller-that-may-not-be-a-thriller. What is it with me and my film and book choices lately? When it rains it certainly pours. So on top of Kafka and Caché, I now have this tale swimming around in my brain, getting all mixed up with everything else. Oh god, and then on Sunday I watched Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, which just adds another layer to my current mental mash-up.
Everyone should familiarize themselves with all of these things immediately, so that we may discuss them. That is all.
My life has been full of complex and confounding literature and film lately. My exploration of Kafka began when I was at my parents’ place over the Christmas holidays, where I found (inexplicably) a copy of The Trial, his unfinished masterpiece, in my bedroom. So I picked it up and was immediately intrigued by the foreword, which discussed the difficulties in translating Kafka, some of the many apparent missteps in past translations of his work, and the challenges in piecing together this new edition of The Trial (released in 1999, I think).
Next thing I knew I was immersed in a strange and dark tale of a world in which people are prosecuted for unnamed crimes by a legal system that has essentially no ties to reality (whatever that may be), and thus answers to no one and remains completely unaccountable for its actions. Huh.
I flew through it, and was hungry for more. The edition I read contained a hundred or so unfinished fragments of the story, which were interesting to read, but made me feel that I probably would have gotten more out of this particular work if I had read other Kafka first, and was therefore more familiar with him and what he’s about. So since then I’ve read quite a few more, and am still working my way through others, and yeah, I don’t think it would have helped. It’s fun though. Each is like working through a puzzle, and I guess that’s the kind of engagement my mind has been hungry for lately.
As far as film is concerned, I saw Caché in the theater last week, and man, what a piece of work that was. I love French film, and this one was intriguing and confounding and shocking (I’ve never heard an audience gasp the way they gasped during the film’s one truly disturbing moment), and anchored by two incredible performances by two amazing French actors: Daniel Auteuil and Juliette Binoche. I’m still thinking about it and trying to piece it all together, a week after seeing it.
On top of that, I unwittingly watched the movie Swimming Pool over the weekend, not realizing that it too is a confounding foreign thriller-that-may-not-be-a-thriller. What is it with me and my film and book choices lately? When it rains it certainly pours. So on top of Kafka and Caché, I now have this tale swimming around in my brain, getting all mixed up with everything else. Oh god, and then on Sunday I watched Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, which just adds another layer to my current mental mash-up.
Everyone should familiarize themselves with all of these things immediately, so that we may discuss them. That is all.
posted by P/O at 1/10/2006 12:24:00 PM
1 Comments:
Juliette Binoche was also good in her small part in I'll Sleep When I'm Dead. I saw some of Swimming Pool on IFC, but I missed the first half and was completety lost. What I did see was pretty sexy, though.
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