Wordie is Flickr for words.
Archive for November, 2006
30
Nov
So dumb it’s awesome
What a strange series. ‘Racist’ seems not quite up to the task of describing it – at least not in the way we use the term in modern America. It connotes a definite sense of superiority these days, whereas the Fu Manchu series is predicated on a deep insecurity about European inferiority to Asian culture. Yes, the white hero (Nayland Smith) always wins in the end, but he is plainly a superhero compared to his slow-witted white compatriots. It’s also true that most Asian folks depicted therein are cartoonish slaves utterly devoted to their master’s cause, so perhaps we can just get over ourselves and call it what it is.
In this episode, the such-as-it-is twist is that the evil doctor is working toward the same end as the protagonists against his super-duper-evil daughter. It’s an encyclopedia of bad writing, but it does come right out and call the bad guy “this menace to white supremacy,” so why not give it a point for honesty? And it leads the reader to wonder if there could still be people who think this way. Of course there are, and it’s good to know what we’re up against, even almost 100 years later.
Or…has the doctor won after all?
25
Nov
Explain, please
Janet needs help understanding how she came to this place: While walking to Trader Joe’s and sketching out her mental shopping list, she reflected on the deliciousness of wine, then thought to herself “Naw, I got hella bottles ta home” This sounds straight out of Achewood to me, but she insists that she hasn’t read it in quite a while (offering no excuses). Am I bringing her down to some horrible sub-hipster mentality? Is employment retarding her? Please advise. [Edited for accuracy 11/26, 4pm]
24
Nov
I was tricked!
I got an email that purported to be from Adolph Hitler, which I opened right away, as I had been expecting a response from him for quite a while. But – get this – it was spam! If you can’t trust Hitler, who can you trust?
20
Nov
Funny ha-ha
Kill a minute with Wikipedia Brown. Keeps getting weirder and funnier all the way through.
08
Nov
The great purge
No, not Congress, though that’s pretty awesome. After yesterday’s triumph for reasonable American people, I decided to flush my sig-quote file of all the terrible things said by Republicans over the past six years. It seems mean-spirited to continue to mock Santorum now that he can’t do as much damage, and I figured I might as well let Bush and Rice and the rest start fresh.
If you want to get even giddier, but can’t stand the thought of drinking any more, try this. The bottom line is that in 2008, Republicans defend 21 Senate seats to the Dems’ 12. If we put up a presidential candidate who can sell his or her message (give Kerry anything he wants to stay out of the race), we could see a much bigger blowout in two years.
I enjoy Burroughs’ writing tremendously, but find that a fair amount of his mid-career fiction is elusive, to put it mildly. That is not true of his non-fiction, as his obsession with precision and concreteness mirrors my own prejudices quite nicely. This collection of essays, notes and scraps is something I return to frequently, and I recommend it to anyone who wants to be a better writer or a better reader – or who wants to understand Burroughs better.
He thought more deeply and more clearly about writing than most, and while his thinking was more magical than mine (precisely and concretely magical, yes, but), I still find these pieces to be more sympathetic than most of that legendarily insipid genre of writers writing for writers about writing. He isn’t sharing his personal journey, he’s showing us where to get maps and supplies for our own.
You said it, sister