In 17th-and-18th-century Europe and America, storage boxes of all kinds proliferated: bible boxes, bridle boxes, voting boxes, keepsake boxes for baby’s first tooth and lock of hair, and photo boxes, among others. Writing boxes stored physical writing tools as well as ephemeral fruits of writing—traces of literacy, ritual, and memory. Like laptops today, writing boxes were common tools of working writers.
Tag: 08.18.18
Tom Clark, Poet And Biographer Of Poets, Has Died At 77
Clark was hit by a car and killed on Friday, not too long after updating his blog. He was friends with the Beat Poets, wrote a biography of Jack Kerouac, and was editor of the Paris Review from 1963-1973. The publisher of his 2010 poetry collection wrote that his recent “depict nocturnal walks in Berkeley, California — not the Berkeley of a faded, nostalgic, radical past, but rather the multi-cultural Berkeley of today that circulates in the streets outside the university gates.”
How One Stand-Up Comedian Copes With A Devastating Loss
Comedian Adam Cayton-Holland: “I don’t really have a joke about it. It’s more like a public service announcement that I make into the microphone, urging people to seek help, urging people to not feel ashamed of feeling powerless when it comes to their brains. You can see the audience tense up. I pepper in a few jokes here and there, to try to cut the tension. Which kind of works. It’s not perfect, but it’s real.”
The Baltimore Symphony Is Going International For The First Time In 13 Years
Principal horn player Philip Munds was with the orchestra the last time they went abroad in 2005, and he’s missed it: “It’s really good for the orchestra to play in different places. … It makes you step it up. It broadens our awareness and gets us hyper-focused.”
In A Painful Year Of Loss, One Of The Last Great Culinary Idols Keeps On Going
Madhur Jaffrey, actor and cookbook writer, will not call herself a chef, but her cooking has changed the world. Then there’s this: “A now-famous appearance, in the ’90s, on one of Julia Child’s shows. Watching an extra-tall Julia coo and flutter, as Madhur regally goes through the instructions on making shrimp in spicy coconut sauce — as the coriander seeds hiss, and the fenugreek pop — is (thank you, YouTube!) an adventure in odd-couple gold.”
Late-Night TV Has Several Problems, But One Is That There’s An Awful Lot Of It
And there was more of it before Netflix abruptly canceled Michelle Wolf’s and Joel McHale’s late-night format programs. What if viewers simply don’t exist for this kind of show anymore? Even “Conan O’Brien, TV’s longest-serving late-night personality, is poised to take his hour-long Conan on TBS to 30 minutes next year.”
Google Employees Are In Revolt Over The Company’s China Policies
“Don’t be evil” is long gone, obviously, but this time, Google may have gone too far. “China considers censorship a state secret, vastly restricting what Google can tell even its own employees about what its plans are. Meanwhile, a group of at least 1,400 employees is leading a charge to stop Dragonfly in its tracks.”
Taking A ‘Concept’ Show On Tour Is Totally Acceptable, Critic Says
Lyn Gardner: Consider the issue that “many British artists and companies cannot hope to make a living in the UK and desperately need international touring fees” – but that Brexit is taking those international opportunities away. Perhaps the ‘concept’ show can fill in, at least if companies work together.
Boots Riley, Director Of ‘Sorry To Bother You,’ Is Not Joining The Celebratory Reviews Of The New Spike Lee Movie
Riley says that despite his deep love and appreciation for Lee, the new movie BlackkKlansman is not what African Americans need right now. Riley: “This is being pushed as a true story, and it is precisely its untrue elements that make a cop a hero against racism. … For Spike to come out with a movie where a story points are fabricated in order to make Black cop and his counterparts look like allies in the fight against racism is really disappointing, to put it very mildly.”
Artists Get A New, Huge Canvas: The Tennis Court
The pictures from above are truly amazing – but how do the players know where they are? “This project, ‘Art Courts,’ was spearheaded by the United States Tennis Association as part of a 50th anniversary celebration of the U.S. Open. Organizers hope to inject a dash of enthusiasm and color into community tennis courts in underserved neighborhoods — as well as enliven a sport that, to some, possesses a reputation for stuffiness and adherence to rules.”