a brief history of violence
Posted under: *duration:long, reality reigns supreme
Tags: death, history, Steven Pinker, violence
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Frank Zappa’s Last Interview
Posted under: *duration:short, heroes don't come cheap
Tags: death, Frank Zappa, music
Frank Zappa’s last television interview. He is talking about his friend Nicolas Slonimsky, 1993.
Here’s what Frank says:
“He’s just a brilliant mind. And a very warm-hearted spirit. And these are qualities not often found linked together in human beings. And… I just liked him. One of the things I really liked about him was his wardrobe. I always was impressed with his wardrobe from the first time he came over, because he had that look. He had the look of a real guy from that era, you know what I mean? The right kind of shoes, the right kind of tweed, rumple, worn for a thousand years. Kinda… sport coat, pants too short. He was wonderful. He was a fully developed character.”
Nicolas Slonimsky (1894-1995) was a musicologist, conductor, composer, author and much more. Check out his lectures on archive.org or simply do a google search. Zappa was right when he said that Slonimsky was a wonderful person.
R.I.P. David Foster Wallace
Posted under: *duration:long, art surpasses reality once again, heroes don't come cheap
Tags: David Foster Wallace, death, literature, necrology
(David Foster Wallace interview starts at 23:15)
I’ve been planning to make this post for the great American writer David Foster Wallace in my “heroes don’t come cheap” section for some time now, but today I heard David Foster Wallace has taken his life some days ago. A great and tragic life, he suffered severely from depression. I discovered David Foster Wallace one day I was bored stiff, and didn’t want to linger around my house all day, so I decided to get out and headed a direction and ended up at a second hand store. I was kindy woosy that day, wandering around instinctively. By pure luck a book (amongst thousands of books) caught my attention: “The system of the Broom” (Dutch edition) glimpsed in the corner of my eye. I was reading Wittgenstein at that time, and I immediately knew it probably referred to his language construction-models. I took the second-hand book, looked inside for the price. 4 euros is a bit of an amount for a second hand book I never heard of. However I never hesitated and bought it in an instant. Immediately after reading it I fell in love with Wallaces marvelous use of language and subtle proze about human language and interaction and communication. His sharp remarks on post-modern society, and lonesome critique on ‘Irony’ as something that really doesn’t do a lot of good in communication between people, made him an great inspiration for my art practice. I dare say that his work changed my life… for the better.
(this week this post will be up to commemorate DFW, also see previous posts of David Foster Wallace.
