Hi guys,
This idea seems to precede every single one of my posts, but sorry for the lack of writing again. However, the fact is that I’ve been very busy pretending to be a deep and profound person.
When I began this blog in particular, I made it my goal to try and immerse myself in all kinds of thought-provoking subjects, so that alongside my science-based A-levels I would be able to continue reading fiction and listening to music. And to an extent, it has sort of worked. I’ve read a decent sized amount of plotless literature (which forces you to think, lest you realise that you have spent the last two months reading about very unfortunate men) and I am trying to open myself up to French film and the like.
Therefore, for me to simply analyse how far I have gone, I am writing this post, where I plan to see what I have been doing with the purpose of becoming some sort of hipster, or whatever terminology has been coined to describe it. And I plan to do this in three different ways:
1) Literature
I remember the days in Years 8 and 9 where I would devour books like Mars bars, and would ignore friends on the way home in order to give me time to feed my compulsion for these books. You’d think this was great. Alas, it was the Cherub series.
And this is my pet peeve about literature at the moment, particularly that which is relevant to younger people. When surrounded by huge series such as Cherub (which consists of 16 books), Percy Jackson and The Hunger Games, kids will read nothing apart from the books of these series, without realising that every single book, bar none, is exactly the same, except with a different bad guy, in a different country and, in Cherub’s case, a different girl to have underage sex with.
It has take me quite a while to realise this, but of all my favourite books (except for The Hitch-hiker’s Guide To The Galaxy), none of them are members of a series. After all, it seems that a series would overall cumulate into a single story in itself. How is a brilliant book by a brilliant author supposed to leave plotholes or threads leading onto some sort of sequel. You never hear of the story about Snowball, from Animal Farm, founding his own ‘farm’ to combat the harsh regime of Napoleon. Humbert Humbert never tried to find himself another 12-year-old girl to lust over following Lolita running away. In fact Vladimir Nabokov had to create an entire backstory explaining the deaths of both Mr Humbert and Lolita prior to the publishing of the book.
Here is where the true issue of a series lies. If you provide a computer with some sort of algorithm, then it can plug out some sort of teenage vampire/spy/dystopian novel. Classic literature cannot be replicated. If you have ever analysed a book for an exam, you will realise (or bullshit your way into saying) that every single word has a meaning behind it which would contribute to scene-setting or character development. In Homer’s Iliad, if you study it in the original Greek, one could even go as far as to discussing the importance of word order or the sound of word. Whilst this may seem annoyingly picky, it is what makes proper literature so magical, and that is something unachievable within a novel like a Cherub book.
2) Film
Of the three means of pretentiousness which I have sought to discuss here, film is the one in which I am least developed. I don’t watch to many films, unless other people want to. I don’t follow directors in the same way that other people do. I don’t even know how to download films illegally. This has left me painfully behind in the world of cinema, having never viewed such classics as Shawshank Redemption or Pulp Fiction. I even used to think that Brokeback Mountain was a Vietnam-War film (which I realised a bit too late to save my dignity). And my favourite film is still Ratatouille, and it always will be.
However, following the commencement of awards season last January, I have been trying to view films in the same way which I now view books; taking them much less at face value and discussing the underlying meaning. In those two months prior to the Oscars I watched a plotless film about a struggling musician in the 1960s folk scene (Inside Llewyn Davis, amazing), a film about a man falling in love with an operating system (Her, amazing) and a historical drama that made me want to kill all the white people (12 Years A Slave, still amazing). I even found myself searching desperately for someone who wanted to watch Nebraska, a black and white film about an old guy wishing to walk across the US to ‘claim ma million dollas’.
There’s been French film as well. I was totally mesmerised after watching Les Choristes (The Chorus) in French class, one of the most extraordinary films I have ever seen. This led me on to Trois Coleurs: Bleu (incredible), Intouchable (utterly incredible) and Tomboy (complete crap). Leading on from that, I never expected that I would find a French film so poor. I guess that is another thing that can be gained from analysing film in this way. Even if you try desperately to like a film, you can still realise when it turns into a terrible film.
Directors are another thing about cinophiles that always confused me. Prior to awards season, I had heard of the Wachowskis (from Cloud Atlas, not The Matrix), and that was essentially that. However, awards season has since enabled me to track the styles of various directors, in the same way that musicians can be spotted from their style. The Coen Brothers can be spotted, possible, by their focus on 60’s folk music. Wes Anderson can be spotted by his quirkiness and keenness for perpendicular viewpoints, with the actor staring directly into the camera. Pixar can be spotted by the fact that they always use cartoons…
3) Music
Ah music. Despite the fact that music is my favourite of these three points, I will limit my ramblings, lest I find myself unable to cease writing.
My main point with bringing up music is that it is the only one where I can accept that taste is totally personal. There are some songs which I might find so beautiful I find myself on the brink of tears (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_IgPXKDxMzw, and you’ll see what I mean) and there are some songs that don’t change anything. However, it can easily be appreciated that some may think the opposite. Whilst this preposterous idea is inconceivable to me, nonetheless it is true.
Before I continue, I’d just like to say that P!nk and Olly Murs are the two exceptions to this rule. If you don’t think so then I’m very sorry, but you are wrong.
Right, back to my point.
So yeah, music is music. Random waves of energy being comprehended by our brains god-knows-how, and as Shakespeare said: ‘If music be the food of love, play on’. Music is subjective and this should be not only understood but encouraged. Surprisingly, it is something that takes a while to get fully comfortable with though. Some classical music fans will brand rock music as ‘bland and tasteless’, and Megadeth as ‘marijuana-fuelled white noise’. Likewise, some of these people may brand classical music as old-fashioned.
Some of you may think me a hypocrite for saying this, but it drives me up the wall, not with what music is ‘right’, but with what music is ‘wrong’. I find it tremendously silly when people brand huge genres of music as ‘crap’ and ban themselves from enjoying it. It seems unfortunately simple-minded.
And that may be the overall thought to be taken from this post as a whole. Open-mindedness is generally a positive characteristic to possess, and I can say with confidence that if you look at it in the right light, something beautiful will come of it. Maybe it begins by picking up that old CD which your dad plays in the car, or that Vintage Classic which looks a bit too long and fancy to be enjoyable. Provided that it is approached in the best possible way, you’ll have a whale of a time.
My Factless Autobiography 