Weekly Wikipedia Find: The Black Book

The Black Book is not your little, black book, you dog, you. No, the Black Book is English nomenclature for the Sonderfahndungsliste G.B., which was basically a 3000 name Adolf Milhous Hitler's enemies list. These names represent prominent British subjects and European exiles in Britain who were to be rounded up and presumably purged (executed) upon the successful completion of the Nazi invasion of Great Britain during World War II. Twenty thousand copies of the book were produced for the six paramilitary groups that were to follow the invasion forces. Two survive.

Wikipedia by Week

Week Fifty: Spear of Longinus
Week Forty-Nine: Moral panic
Week Forty-Eight: "The Move"
Week Forty-Seven: Cloaca
Week Forty-Six: Ship of fools
Week Forty-Five: Slattery Report
Week Forty-Four: Isolationism
Week Forty-Three: Foxy
Week Forty-Two: Young Woman with Unicorn
Week Forty-One: Cosmicism
Week Forty: Prisoner's dilemma
Week Thirty-Nine: Demimonde
Week Thirty-Eight: Haemophilia in European royalty
Week Thirty-Seven: Library of America
Week Thirty-Six: Honeypot
Week Thirty-Five: Glasgow smile
Week Thirty-Four: Hilbert's paradox of the Grand Hotel
Week Thirty-Three: Mono no aware
Week Thirty-Two: Royal intermarriage
Week Thirty-One: Amputee fetishism
Week Thirty: Turtles all the way down
Week Twenty-Nine: The Diogenes Club
Week Twenty-Eight: E pur si muove!
Week Twenty-Seven: Unico
Week Twenty-Six: Panopticon
Week Twenty-Five: Legendary
Week Twenty-Four: Ostern
Week Twenty-Three: Kilroy was here
Week Twenty-Two: Jack Parsons
Week Twenty-One: The Wold Newton Universe
Week Twenty: Anonymous
Week Nineteen: Monty Hall problem
Week Eighteen: Brown Booby
Week Seventeen: Dieter Dengler
Week Sixteen: New Jerusalem
Week Fifteen: Technological Singularity
Week Fourteen: Numbers Station
Week Thirteen: Culper Ring
Week Twelve: Mary Sue
Week Eleven: Byford dolphin diving bell accident
Week Ten: Deep-sea gigantism
Week Nine: Bloop
Week Eight: Rat king
Week Seven: Gustave Doré
Week Six: Tomorrow
Week Five: Borscht Belt
Week Four: Swampman
Week Three: Chinese room
Week Two: Ambrose Burnside
Week One: Lolita fashion

Weekly Wikipedia Find: Spear of Longinus

The spear of Longinus is the holy lance which pierced the side of Him that is Jesus Christ as he was on the cross. This piercing was undertaken by a Roman soldier, ostensibly named Longinus, like a little doe-eyed child curiously poking the body of a dead drifter he found in the woods, washed up on a bankside, beside some train tracks. "Yeah, it turns out he's dead." "So that's was a dead body looks like. Poke. Poke. Poke.

The lance was a much sought after objet for its occult value. It was said that during World War II Adolf Hitler himself was in possession of the lance, wielding its magical power and preventing Superman's entrance into the European theatre alongside the Allied Forces and affecting a quick victory for the good guys.

Wikipedia by Week

Week Forty-Nine: Moral panic
Week Forty-Eight: "The Move"
Week Forty-Seven: Cloaca
Week Forty-Six: Ship of fools
Week Forty-Five: Slattery Report
Week Forty-Four: Isolationism
Week Forty-Three: Foxy
Week Forty-Two: Young Woman with Unicorn
Week Forty-One: Cosmicism
Week Forty: Prisoner's dilemma
Week Thirty-Nine: Demimonde
Week Thirty-Eight: Haemophilia in European royalty
Week Thirty-Seven: Library of America
Week Thirty-Six: Honeypot
Week Thirty-Five: Glasgow smile
Week Thirty-Four: Hilbert's paradox of the Grand Hotel
Week Thirty-Three: Mono no aware
Week Thirty-Two: Royal intermarriage
Week Thirty-One: Amputee fetishism
Week Thirty: Turtles all the way down
Week Twenty-Nine: The Diogenes Club
Week Twenty-Eight: E pur si muove!
Week Twenty-Seven: Unico
Week Twenty-Six: Panopticon
Week Twenty-Five: Legendary
Week Twenty-Four: Ostern
Week Twenty-Three: Kilroy was here
Week Twenty-Two: Jack Parsons
Week Twenty-One: The Wold Newton Universe
Week Twenty: Anonymous
Week Nineteen: Monty Hall problem
Week Eighteen: Brown Booby
Week Seventeen: Dieter Dengler
Week Sixteen: New Jerusalem
Week Fifteen: Technological Singularity
Week Fourteen: Numbers Station
Week Thirteen: Culper Ring
Week Twelve: Mary Sue
Week Eleven: Byford dolphin diving bell accident
Week Ten: Deep-sea gigantism
Week Nine: Bloop
Week Eight: Rat king
Week Seven: Gustave Doré
Week Six: Tomorrow
Week Five: Borscht Belt
Week Four: Swampman
Week Three: Chinese room
Week Two: Ambrose Burnside
Week One: Lolita fashion

Weekly Wikipedia Find: Slattery Report

The Slattery Report or the "Problem of Alaskan Development" was the proposal that following the Night of Broken Glass incident at a German pogrom just prior to the outbreak of World War II, Alaska, then a territory and not yet a state, be used as a Jewish refugee haven, but faced opposition from American Jews. Instead, Alaska remained an Okie backwater from the dustbowl migrations.

Wikipedia by Week

Week Forty-Four: Isolationism
Week Forty-Three: Foxy
Week Forty-Two: Young Woman with Unicorn
Week Forty-One: Cosmicism
Week Forty: Prisoner's dilemma
Week Thirty-Nine: Demimonde
Week Thirty-Eight: Haemophilia in European royalty
Week Thirty-Seven: Library of America
Week Thirty-Six: Honeypot
Week Thirty-Five: Glasgow smile
Week Thirty-Four: Hilbert's paradox of the Grand Hotel
Week Thirty-Three: Mono no aware
Week Thirty-Two: Royal intermarriage
Week Thirty-One: Amputee fetishism
Week Thirty: Turtles all the way down
Week Twenty-Nine: The Diogenes Club
Week Twenty-Eight: E pur si muove!
Week Twenty-Seven: Unico
Week Twenty-Six: Panopticon
Week Twenty-Five: Legendary
Week Twenty-Four: Ostern
Week Twenty-Three: Kilroy was here
Week Twenty-Two: Jack Parsons
Week Twenty-One: The Wold Newton Universe
Week Twenty: Anonymous
Week Nineteen: Monty Hall problem
Week Eighteen: Brown Booby
Week Seventeen: Dieter Dengler
Week Sixteen: New Jerusalem
Week Fifteen: Technological Singularity
Week Fourteen: Numbers Station
Week Thirteen: Culper Ring
Week Twelve: Mary Sue
Week Eleven: Byford dolphin diving bell accident
Week Ten: Deep-sea gigantism
Week Nine: Bloop
Week Eight: Rat king
Week Seven: Gustave Doré
Week Six: Tomorrow
Week Five: Borscht Belt
Week Four: Swampman
Week Three: Chinese room
Week Two: Ambrose Burnside
Week One: Lolita fashion

J.G. Ballard Death Watch

As regular readers well know, I contemplated buying J.G. Ballard's The Atrocity Exhibition back in April.

Now comes word that Ballard has written his last book: his autobiography Miracles of Life, published in this year of our Lord two thousand and eight. However, all of his work has been vaguely autobiographical. This is what makes him such a fascinating figure, for me at least. The idea that one could draw a line from Jamie Graham of the 1940s Japanese-occupied Shanghai of Empire of the Sun to the automotive paraphiliac James Ballard of the transgressive new wave sf Crash. Either that, or its all one big joke.

Miracles of Life is Ballard's last book because frankly, he is dying. Terminally. Of advanced prostate cancer.

I still hope to get my hands on Ballard's The Atrocity Exhibition. And Crash. And The Drowned World. And Empire of the Sun. And High-Rise. And anything else, and there is plenty else.

The Atrocity Exhibition famously, or infamously, includes the short story "Why I Want to Fuck Ronald Reagan." Reagan at the time of writing and publication in 1967-8 was, of course, still just Governor of California and a politician-to-watch. Here best to remember the man, a living memoriam, is an excerpt:

THE CONCEPTUAL ROLE OF REAGAN. Fragments of Reagan’s cinetized postures were used in the construction of model psychodramas in which the Reagan-figure played the role of husband, doctor, insurance salesman, marriage counselor, etc.

The failure of these roles to express any meaning reveals the nonfunctional character of Reagan. Reagan’s success therefore indicates society’s periodic need to re-conceptualize its political leaders. Reagan thus appears as a series of posture concepts, basic equations which reformulate the roles of aggression and anality. Reagan’s personality. The profound anality of the Presidential contender may be expected to dominate the United States in the coming years. By contrast the late JFK remained the prototype of the oral subject, usually conceived in pre-pubertal terms. In further studies sadistic psychopaths were given the task of devising sex fantasies involving Reagan. Results confirm the probability of Presidential figures being perceived primarily in genital terms; the face of LB Johnson is clearly genital in significant appearance--the nasal prepuce, scrotal jaw, etc. Faces were seen as either circumcised (JFK, Khrushchev) or uncircumcised (LBJ, Adenauer). In assembly-kit tests Reagan’s face was uniformly perceived as a penile erection. Patients were encouraged to devise the optimum sex-death of Ronald Reagan.

Twelve minutes to midnight.

Bonus Memoriam: A shot from the David Cronenberg's film adaptation of Crash. Here we see the vulva-like scar on the back thigh, an automobile accident-caused leg wound, of a character before the main character penetrates it sexually, liberating-ly so. These cars, this "perverse technology," this reshaping of the human body by modern technology," all brought to the forefront, the new flesh:


Bon appétit.

The Sporting Life

team sports

rampant fervour

patriotic regionalism

squash

non-competitive

I'm doing something a little different with my post today. See by the original timestamp the genesis for this post was 5:19 PM on December 27th, 2007. And the above bullets were what I wrote at the time. Now often when I have an idea, I'll just put a little something down and save it as a draft for "later." Now sometimes later is a long time away. Currently, later is just over five months. By the time later comes around, well let's just say I had different expectations when I opened this post saying its time has come. More references to flow of space-time, mainly. Now let's see what I can make of this. Blogpost, Ho!

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I try to stay active. But there's only so much one can do. There is something purely rote, about isolated exercise, a "workout," spotter or not. It's just motions, no poetry. These days I spend about 70 minutes everyday on a treadmill. Now I don't necessarily enjoy this. It can feel like an obligation, too much of one sometimes. And anything that is an obligation often and irrefutably will breed procrastination (this blog for instance, for something that as a writing exercise and as such would expect to be fun, is often procrastinated). So often the treadmill will be procrastinated, sometimes until the late afternoon.

Now how do I do something everyday that gives me no joy? Well I love books and I love music, so often with me on the treadmill are a book to read and music to listen to. So this gives me time to read. Now I might love the idea of books more than I love the idea of reading so this makes me make time for reading where otherwise I might not. Likewise, while I exercise my brain, I also get to exercise my body. Obviously reading is not very easy to do while moving at 8.5 km/h, so some of my time is split between speedwalking, a steady gallop really, at 6.4 km/h. A good reading speed. And at the end of these daily sessions, I do feel good. A self-esteem boost! Take that, chronic depression.

But maybe still, was I looking for something more? So, then I come to the conclusion that sports are something that are both exercise and fun. But which sport? There are certainly so many. Each likely with their benefits, and their many many many detractions. I'd occasionally watched sports on the telly, but I had never gotten into them at any really "fan-like" level. There was always a distancing effect created by the rampart fervour and patriotic regionalism inspired in the diehard hardcore devotees (Two birds, one stone; Take that, past-me).

Certainly there were many solo person sports as well. Hang-gliding, snowboarding, boogie boarding, and other singles sports that John Kerry used to distance voters in the 2004 United States presidential elections while George W. Bush threw around a football, and which I quickly dismissed as too blueblood.

And for some reason I decided upon squash. There's always been something about squash. That room, maybe? Is it from the future? Maybe. But there was more. Maybe this idea of my childhood. You don't exactly see squash played, you see. Sure, a lot of courts had viewing galleries. But I'm thinking back before I knew that. Before I could think of it as something competitive, that had star athletes (at least stars in the world of competitive squash), before YouTube clips, before (again) the viewing galleries, it was something where you and your opponent entered a closed room, equipment in hand, and later you exited something decided. There was something mysterious and desirable about that idea.

And that's still something I desired.

Now a closer look a squash. What is all this special equipment you need? Who's going to play this, kings? Definitely a rich person's game, no? Let's see you need a racquet, a ball, probably goggles for safety's sake (stay safe, kids), and most vexing of all this room. This long room, with the hardwood court, and the walls, with the lines going up and down and maybe on angles (say what?!) and what is that, did someone weld a chunk of scrap metal to the front wall? The door closes behind you, everything about it flush with the wall, to be unobstructive, and you're sealed. A space capsule, right? Ready for the future? Well you better be.

So now we have decided upon squash. It's awesome, right (see previous paragraph)? It's a simple sport, requires little material, your relatively free university gym membership, and two or four people. Not exactly team, but less masturbatory than windsurfing. And I'm inclined to say it's not technically a contact sport but... Well think of tennis. Now think, instead of boundary lines, you have walls: you run into those walls. And instead of a net, you have a wall. This results in the two sides of the court (i.e. tennis) becoming mirrored as one (i.e. squash) and both players playing in the same field. Therefore, you have people colliding. Which is usually avoidable. I personally bounce off the wall far more often. Although, those person-on-person collision sometimes also including the floor while keeping the ball somehow in play is the most glorious wonder of this sport as seen from my imaginary perspective from the sometimes nonexistent viewing gallery.

Now you the skeptic say this sounds more like DeathBall 3000 than any fun. Well, fuck you, mister, I ate the horse you rode in on, he was delicious. Squash is pure fun. There's a certain rush going on with all this. When I play it's sort of noncompetitive. I barely keep track of the score (What is it 5-2 me, 5-3 me? Let's say 5-3). It doesn't matter that much. Instead it is a collection of moments. Those collection of moments, like life, add up to something so much more than statistics.

There is a certain moment that comes that I wish to highlight. There's a certain rush of playing that I mentioned. You're pumped. Blood is flowing. Maybe some endorphins being released in your brain from when you flattened your arm against the wall running for that return shot. You're wearing your goggles (stay safe, kids) and they're fogged up, likely from your sexy sexy perspirations (with all the sweaty sweaty pheromones in the air, the sealed room, the close proximity, squash is a highly erotic and sexually charged sport... hey there, wink, you're looking good to all my past competitors).

A calm comes over you. Everything slows down. Everything makes sense. You're moving at the same speed but processing it differently... faster. As if you have conquered time. The squash ball (single yellow dot... long the competition standard before the advent of technology allowed the development of the single yellow dot. What's that smell? The Singularity.) becomes a superdense orb, its own gravity field becoming the new point of relativity, warping the space-time continuum around it. (Or maybe its like that Futurama episode "Three Hundred Big Boys" where Fry uses a tax refund to buy 300 coffees in a day and reaches a moment of zen at the pinnacle and saves the day. Yeah, its a lot like that actually).

Everything slows down. Your perspective is different, warped, better. You have reached enlightenment. That is why I play squash. For those moments of zen, and pure bliss. Then you come down from the mountain, your pact with God made, you look at your partner, wondering if he/she understands, or even made the same pact. Then you make a return, and the cycle begins again.

I wish I could play squash more than I have as of late. I think I played three times last month. And only once, maybe twice a month, the four previous months (i.e. whenever I came to town). I might, I just might, have to join the squash league in the fall. I'm pretty sure that's a real thing.

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Well, I think I acquitted myself well. Happy D-Day, everybody!

Top Five V: The Films of Steven Spielberg

1. Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981)
2. Jaws (1975)
3. Empire of the Sun (1987)
4. Jurassic Park (1993)
5. Munich (2005)

Unseen: Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (2008), Amistad (1997), Always (1989), The Color Purple (1985), 1941 (1979), The Sugarland Express (1974)

N/A: Shorts, TV Films (Unseen: Duel (1971)), Anthology Films

Honourable Mentions:

• Minority Report (2002)
• "D-Day Invasion," Saving Private Ryan (1998)*
• Schindler's List (1993)*

*If this was an Essential Spielberg list and not my personal top five, these "important" films about WWII would have a spot.

Update 25/05/08: I have since seen 1941 (1979). Having seen it, I can say that the entire film is shot with a sickly, gauzy softness that tries to purpose itself as cinematic shorthand for nostalgia.

Nazis Make Great Villains

A Case Study

Those evil bastards, usually but not always necessarily German, make an easy villain for your story. Whether your story takes place from 1933 to 1945 or really anytime after that, making your villain a Nazi gives your viewers an instant rooting interest in your heroes and a hate for that villain. Here are four examples where this works:

A) Red Skull

Captain America's archenemy, Johann Schmidt was a Nazi general and confidant of Hitler who originally wore a red skull mask while coming into conflict with his adversary in publications during World War II. Both characters were put into suspended animation/publication limbo, though, with Red Skull being revived by and later head of terrorist organization HYDRA. Later, after rapidly aging, dying of old age, having his brain placed in a cloned body of Captain America, and abandoning his Nazi philosophy, he was exposed to his favourite poison, the Dust of Death, and his face was turned into the literal version of his once-mask, the Red Skull. Skull, is still pretty much a Nazi, though, once and forever, and is even shunned by other villains such as Magneto (a Jewish Holocaust Survivor).




B) Tyrannosaurus Reich

Tyrannosaurus Reich is a villain of short-lived superhero, Major Bummer, a slacker mistakenly imbued with superpowers by a pair of aliens. T. Reich was pulled to Earth through an interdimensional portal. His dimension: one of Nazi dinosaurs. His abilities include human-level intelligence, tyrannosaurus-level strength, the ability to manipulate firearms, and being epic.




C) Swarm

Swarm is a Marvel comics villain who most often fights Spider-Man. He's no ordinary man, though. No, he's composed of bees. He has a body of bees. Bees. But not just any ordinary bees. No, Nazi bees. Let this sink in. Bees. With Nazi sympathies. Nazi bees.




D) Raiders of the Lost Ark and Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade

These B-movie-style films are both globetrotting and set in that period of action & adventure film strips, the 1930s. What perfect adversaries for our Dr. Jones then, then our beloved Nazi villains? Who else would you rather see than Nazi interrogator Toht have their face melt off? Austrian collaborating scientist Elsa Schneider, maybe, but she would have to settle to falling into her death down a chasm. Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom said, Nazis, no time for love, and instead featured a Thugee death cult.

Weekly Wikipedia Find: Kilroy was here

Kilroy was here is a ubiquitous graffito popular among U.S. servicemen in the era of World War II and the Korean conflict. The graffiti itself is a depiction of a long-nosed, Ziggy-looking motherfucker peeking over a wall with the phrase "Kilroy was here" inscribed beside it. Many legends have sprung up for its origin, due to the varied places where it could be found. It's origins still, like many American things, belong to the British "Chad" and the Australian "Foo was here."

Wikipedia by Week

Week Twenty-Two: Jack Parsons
Week Twenty-One: The Wold Newton Universe
Week Twenty: Anonymous
Week Nineteen: Monty Hall problem
Week Eighteen: Brown Booby
Week Seventeen: Dieter Dengler
Week Sixteen: New Jerusalem
Week Fifteen: Technological Singularity
Week Fourteen: Numbers Station
Week Thirteen: Culper Ring
Week Twelve: Mary Sue
Week Eleven: Byford dolphin diving bell accident
Week Ten: Deep-sea gigantism
Week Nine: Bloop
Week Eight: Rat king
Week Seven: Gustave Doré
Week Six: Tomorrow
Week Five: Borscht Belt
Week Four: Swampman
Week Three: Chinese room
Week Two: Ambrose Burnside
Week One: Lolita fashion

Film Review: Letters from Iwo Jima

Letters from Iwo Jima

Directed by Clint Eastwood. Written by Iris Yamashita. Story by Iris Yamashita & Paul Haggis.

Starring Ken Watanabe, Kazunari Ninomiya, Tsuyoshi Ihara, and Ryo Kase.

2006.

This film was originally titled Red Sun, Black Sand before being released as Letters from Iwo Jima. Red Sun, Black Sand is infinitely cooler sounding, but Clint Eastwood didn't make that film; he made Letters from Iwo Jima. A film needs to choose it's title, and this is the title that fits.

Letters starts and ends with a framing story that is slight and irrelevant. Flags of Our Fathers, Letters' Pacific Theater companion piece also directed by Clint Eastwood in the same year, also used a framing device to somewhat more profound effect as did producer Steven Spielberg's Saving Private Ryan. Why these war films feel the need to contextualize by establishing a present day epiphany is beyond me, and it only detracts from what otherwise is a fine film as is the case here.

It's interesting watching a film from the Japanese perspective of World War II. With them as the protagonists, you cheer them on in their fight against the Americans. Besides the fact that they are reviled as the enemy (they did after all attack Pearl Harbor), how often, especially in regards to modern warfare, do you watch the heroes hold a defensive position? Where's the gung ho, ra ra ra aspect in that.

The use of flashbacks only proves to slow down the momentum. The worst moment comes when Shimizu (Kase) reiterates the beautiful simplicity of the scene where Baron Nishi (Ihara) read aloud from a letter from home taken off a dead American soldier. Yes, "his mother's words are the same as my mother's words"-- we understood it the first time with the looks on the Japanese soldiers' faces, we didn't need to be hit over the head with it. This contribution is no doubt the influence of Paul Haggis. Haggis' lack of subtlety seems to be his trademark at this point, and was a major flaw in his other Clint Eastwood collaborations as well as his own directorial efforts. The only places where it hasn't seemed problematic were his screenplay for Casino Royale and, fittingly, (snicker) Walker, Texas Ranger.

The one flashback that manages to earn its keep is General Kuribayashi's (Watanabe) remembrance of his American military hosts on what appears to be a diplomatic point in time. It manages to highlight the central themes: being patriotism versus the horror that is war. Soldiers are just good men, mostly innocent, fighting for what they've been told is right, not too blame for the machinations and politics of their leaders.

There is also a sense of conflicting thoughts of tactic. Kuribayashi finds dissent among some of the officers beneath him who would like to die an honourable death fighting. I don't know what the Japanese reaction to the film was, but I get a sense from oriental/occidental critical theory that Asian societies are supposed to be more of a collective sensibility versus Western individuality, and I get a sense of that here, somewhat. But then again, all films need to find a focus, and that means individuals. And the individual with a standout role here is Kazunari Ninomiya as the soldier of our focus, Saigo. He is a coward. He is a good soldier. He is not a soldier. He is a simple baker. He is a husband. He is all these things. And he captures them all well. Especially, considering his early scenes that present him as a somewhat bumbling, comic relief of the 'Is my commanding officer standing directly behind me as I ignorantly say unpatriotic words' variety.