HIS CRACKLY EXHORTATION TO “KEEEP Looking Up!” now residing in the ears and cassettes of those who loved his weekly five minute-PBS-slice of observational astronomy, Jack Horkheimer, AKA “The Star Hustler,” passed through the luminiferous aether this morning on the…
Category: Crit
Examination, analysis, appreciation.
An Analysis Of, And Physiological Metaphor Regarding, Lower North America’s Current Two-Party Political Landscape, You Should Pardon My Language
REPUBLICANS HAVE NO HEART; DEMOCRATS, no balls.
Blog: “Oy Bay”
JEWISH BLOGS CAN BE DICEY: on the one hand are individuals writing about everything from raising kids in Israel to student-rabbiing to Torah to protesting one’s Torah(1), and on the other are institutions often conducting “outreach” or fundraising. The former…
First Graf: VALIS
IN FEBRUARY AND MARCH OF 1974, science-fiction author Philip K. Dick had a series of experiences which might have been psychosis, hallucination or divine grace. Phil often tended toward the last explanation, at least in print, and based a handful…
5 Thoughts: The Idolatry of Gay Bashing
1. READ A LETTER TO THE SF Chronicle’s editor this morning by a gentleman saying he voted for Prop 8, the anti-gay marriage initiative, because heterosexuals own the word “marriage.” 2. I’ve heard this argument before, and like the other…
All Purpose Disclaimer
THE VIEWS OF THE AUTHOR may not reflect whatever he’s thinking about now, or however he’s thinking about it, although they most likely did when he wrote whatever you read; thus and likewise, he is not responsible for anything you…
First (Two) Graf(s): The Universe Next Door
THE TITLED BOOK IS PART of a trilogy, and it’s hard to say it’s the “first” part since Robert Anton Wilson wrote Schrodinger’s Cat such that the reader can open any of its constituents (The Universe Next Door, The Trick…
Advice to (Young) Writers
SEEK IMMORTALITY THROUGH YOUR WRITING — not your writhing. (Adapted from a quip by Ann.)
First Graf: Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead
THIS MOST ELEGANT OF STOPPARD plays is, I think, best viewed live — the 1990 film, for all its polish, loses something as it’s translating. Live it should be: for “live” is what it’s about, and specifically but not exclusively:…
Pithyism #4 of 8+
KNOWLEDGE IS POWER, BUT SO is imagination: isn’t it sad that today’s kids will never know the fun we had speculating about Martians?
First Graf: The DQ of UK
THIS TITLE DOESN’T REFER TO either German nobility, soft ice cream or the British Isles, but the first paragraph (“graf” in news-speak) of one of my favorite novellae, H.P. Lovecraft‘s The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath. Though mostly famous for his…
Harvey Pekar Z”TL
A MOMENT OF SILENCE WOULD be inappropriate to mark the death this morning of autobiographer, comix legend and music critic Harvey Pekar, since (depending on your view) the former Cleveland Heights resident is right now either a) arguing with “God,”…