www.nemonymous.com
Des Lewis - GESTALT REAL-TIME BOOK REVIEWS
A FEARLESS FAITH IN FICTION — THE PASSION OF THE READING MOMENT CRYSTALLISED — Empirical literary critiques from 2008 as based on purchased books.
Thursday, October 03, 2013
Shards of Yesterfang
I arguably coined these words and expressions: ‘zeroism, egnisomicon, egnisism’ in conjunction with PF Jeffery (1967), ‘whofage’ in conjunction with PF Jeffery (1973), ‘agra aska’ (1983), ‘weirdmonger’ (1988), use of ‘brainwright’ in modern times (1990), Salustrade (1992) use of ‘yesterfang’ in modern times (1997), ‘wordhunger’ (1999), ‘nemonymous, ‘nemonymity’, late-labelling, veils-&-piques’ (2001), ‘denemonise’ (2002), ‘megazanthus’, ‘weirdonymous’, ‘chasing the noumenon’ (2003), ‘wordonymous’, ‘wordominous’, ‘the-ominous-imagination’, revelling in vulnerability (2004), ‘a woven fire-wall of words’, ‘the synchronised shards of random truth and fiction’, ‘nemoguity’, ‘vexed texture of text’, ‘fictipathy’, ‘nemotion’, ‘the hawler’, ‘the angel megazanthus’, ‘klaxon city’, ‘horrorism’ when used as a word for the philosophy of horror fiction (2005), ‘publication-on-reading’, ‘antipodal angst’, ‘the tenacity of feathers’, ‘a writer’s mandala’, ‘wordy weird’, ‘nemophilia / nemophobia’, ‘magic fiction’ as the obverse of the more common expression ‘magic realism’, ‘weirdtongue’ as the ‘name’ of a language, ‘Glistenberry’ as an alternative name for ‘Glastonbury’, ‘tonguage’ as a ‘conscious’ language, ‘yester-eggs’ as a term for Proustian ‘selves’, ‘the parthenogenesis of reality from artifice’, ‘all is for the pest in the pest of all worlds’, ‘Baffles’ as fables with muffled morals (2006), ‘fanblade fable’, ‘abutting the if’, ‘word clones / word clowns’, ‘bumps for books’, ‘rite of review’, ‘cone zero’, ‘a basket of coinages’ (2007), ‘small press cover ark(ive), the baser pulps’ ‘orrorfaces’, ‘the wheel culture’, ‘netogenic’, the first fiction about a ‘drogulus’, ‘Innerskull’, ‘meganthus‘ (2008), ‘CERN Zoo’ in literature, ‘Real-Time Reviewing‘, ‘ligottum‘, ‘the pit and the pessimum‘, ‘ligottus‘, ‘fubbcuckle’, ‘extraneity creep’, ‘pillowghost’, ‘intowards’, ‘powderghost’, ‘nightmare’s moat’ (2009), ‘THE TENSES’, ‘scream munch’ as another word for ‘captcha’, ‘skight’ – threepenny bit, ‘invitations from within’, ‘novellatory’, ’Ress’, ‘Venn Dreams’, ‘Tearsheet Doll’, scanbuncle, A Götterdämmerung of Guts , Holistic Horror (2010), SFtopia, Salustraders / Overspacers, Novellarette, Inquel, Gaddafery, Jungian autonymity, sudracide, an impesto novel, trendbaffler, our planet as reliquary, fictionatronics, Lovecraftianisation, “To know the worst is also to know the best“, vignellarette, “Nothing is controlled by logic other than logic itself.”, nightgators, Horror Genreators, dicksplay, roman littoral, ghostalt, poltergeistalt, horrasy, Horrasy: The Horrastic and the Heuristic, srednibution, srednidipity, Lovecraftian indescriptivities, bememorise, alephantiasis, reva-menders, metapomorphic, rarifiction, neoloquism, Was the God Particle born instable? (2011), angelivalent, literal-meaning dreaming, the ‘Higgs boson’ of Horror, The Weirdonomicon, Aickmania, shortcomings harnessed are stronger than strengths unused, privacy-trawler, disarming strangeness in connection with Robert Aickman, Fiction is like currency: belief is everything, oblique concomitant / oblique contaminant, age at the edge, A writer should make clouds shine even if the world’s sun has gone, The Call of the Silly, pastilential, eschairtology, e-born, read-tangler, ghorror, the authorial cloud, grosmance, quixotiose, most placating is playacting, 'friendly fire' fiction, dilemmachination, absurface, aeontonomous, HobbYiSt / Hobbit, aeontonomy, Horror Without Victims, fuckerlode, Earkth, Pronoun Horror, The Ives of November, PreMonday-ition, NoV - No Victims, an amid-life crisis, God created Ground in His own image by adding 'run' to His name, Old boots are always better than no boots, truth is never brash, End tring, Tendring is Trending, HorNET Nest, The empty future expects our arrival soon, if you fit, wear yourself, The Worldwide Cliff (2012), quantitative kamikaze, The Ohm Resistor of Literature, Only real books can be left anonymously on chairs, The Sibling Thing (as monster), lachrymonics, Cold Sororist, Gangster Gongsters, Cathrian, Cathrianity, Cathrechism, the optimum delusion, dogstone as a form of 'found sculpture', iDEATH as a form of internet implosion of self, Judge me on my works, not on my request thus to judge me, dyschronous recurrence, Belarhombus, the Palimp's Zest, abseil-surdity, paradoxilogically, Devolved Fiction, fratrinity, bock-hide, the Ligottian lurch, denouement or deligottiment, Does a Seraph suffer from Harpes?, AickMANN, RTRcausal, irrealoscopic, a Myth Pitch, Versionary SF, pallianthology, Historation Comedy, Holy Grailtrack, Born Ancient, Bringing the Dead to Book, urbographical (2013).
Sunday, September 29, 2013
Links to my Diderot reviews
“Brun complains loudly that Palissot, his guest and friend, has written some couplets attacking him. Palissot had to write the couplets, and it’s Brun who’s in the wrong. Poinsinet complains loudly that Palissot’s attributed to him the couplets he wrote against Brun. Palissot had to attribute to Poinsinet the couplets he wrote against Brun, and it’s Poinsinet who’s in the wrong………………”
From Rameau's Nephew by Denis Diderot
"After this argument, with which they could have circled the globe without running out of things to say or agreeing, they were overtaken by a storm which obliged them to hurry on their way…"
From Jacques The Fatalist by Denis Diderot.
From Rameau's Nephew by Denis Diderot
"After this argument, with which they could have circled the globe without running out of things to say or agreeing, they were overtaken by a storm which obliged them to hurry on their way…"
From Jacques The Fatalist by Denis Diderot.
Saturday, September 21, 2013
Hook-nosed men with patchwork dreams.
The flared trousers that belonged to Bowl were what could only be described as patchwork orange, if it is indeed possible to have different shades of orange to fill the various compartments of the trousers' quilted material. Judy argued that certain shades of so-called orange were more yellow than orange, or more red than orange, or more brown than orange, and only orange was orange, so how could any trousers be described as patchwork orange.
Bowl, Judy's other half of something they used to call an 'item', told Judy that they had once belonged to a showman with a hook nose and a squeaky voice, someone who wore those patchwork orange trews as well as a patchwork green waistcoat, a patchwork blue shirt like unstriped pyjamas, a patchwork white (a colour often called uni-polkadotted) hat and a patchwork pink face that was his real face.
This showman, Bowl told Judy, performed with a puppet crocodile, a tiny doll that he called his wife - plus a doctor and policeman who followed him about - and Bowl had often played the part of the policeman in a patchwork navy blue uniform.
Judy examined the patchwork orange trousers that Bowl had inherited before he started trying them on and she thought to herself that the showman could not have been very fastidious as a part of the trousers seemed to have a different shade of patchwork orange from the rest of the patchwork orange. A crucial patch that was more a patchwork purple patch than any patchwork orange patch. Funny how bodily fluids often ended up a coloured stain different from the colour as which it started out when first expended, she thought.
"Is he still alive, Bowl?" asked Judy.
"Ha, that's the mystery, Judy. The doctor kept him alive by putting him in various stories under various names to keep him alive, the doctor's methods of cure as well as prevention being the transformation of people into fiction with a healthier state than they were before they were transformed."
"What did the policeman do all the time?" asked Judy.
"He kept illness away by a laugh laugh laugh when swivelling his head round round round like this--" said Bowl, demonstrating a trick that was once common in the Good Old Days Shows at the end of every pier.
But there was nobody to watch Bowl because he was in a solitary cell of a prison - in a patchwork striped prison pyjama tunic. Bowl had murdered the man who wore the patchwork orange trews upon his hand like a glove and made them talk in a squeaky voice. Meanwhile, Bowl kept Judy in his head, which was safer for her than anywhere else.
Perhaps it wasn't a prison at all but somewhere safe from danger rather than keeping danger inside safe from those outside it. Somewhere to keep us all safe from hook-nosed men with patchwork dreams.
Each dream filled with shades of black black black.
His crocodile jaws going clack clack clack.
Bowl, Judy's other half of something they used to call an 'item', told Judy that they had once belonged to a showman with a hook nose and a squeaky voice, someone who wore those patchwork orange trews as well as a patchwork green waistcoat, a patchwork blue shirt like unstriped pyjamas, a patchwork white (a colour often called uni-polkadotted) hat and a patchwork pink face that was his real face.
This showman, Bowl told Judy, performed with a puppet crocodile, a tiny doll that he called his wife - plus a doctor and policeman who followed him about - and Bowl had often played the part of the policeman in a patchwork navy blue uniform.
Judy examined the patchwork orange trousers that Bowl had inherited before he started trying them on and she thought to herself that the showman could not have been very fastidious as a part of the trousers seemed to have a different shade of patchwork orange from the rest of the patchwork orange. A crucial patch that was more a patchwork purple patch than any patchwork orange patch. Funny how bodily fluids often ended up a coloured stain different from the colour as which it started out when first expended, she thought.
"Is he still alive, Bowl?" asked Judy.
"Ha, that's the mystery, Judy. The doctor kept him alive by putting him in various stories under various names to keep him alive, the doctor's methods of cure as well as prevention being the transformation of people into fiction with a healthier state than they were before they were transformed."
"What did the policeman do all the time?" asked Judy.
"He kept illness away by a laugh laugh laugh when swivelling his head round round round like this--" said Bowl, demonstrating a trick that was once common in the Good Old Days Shows at the end of every pier.
But there was nobody to watch Bowl because he was in a solitary cell of a prison - in a patchwork striped prison pyjama tunic. Bowl had murdered the man who wore the patchwork orange trews upon his hand like a glove and made them talk in a squeaky voice. Meanwhile, Bowl kept Judy in his head, which was safer for her than anywhere else.
Perhaps it wasn't a prison at all but somewhere safe from danger rather than keeping danger inside safe from those outside it. Somewhere to keep us all safe from hook-nosed men with patchwork dreams.
Each dream filled with shades of black black black.
His crocodile jaws going clack clack clack.
Saturday, August 24, 2013
Celebrity Big Brother - Summer 2013
Continued from here: http://weirdmonger.blogspot.co.uk/2013/08/big-brother-summer-2013-3.html
23/8/13
I've just seen the start of tonight's programme where in 15 minutes I have seen them all enter - and that has saved me from watching the two hours last night! 
As these include Les and Janice Battersby from the old days of Corrie when I used to watch it regularly, I might try to stick with this CBB if I can. But the rest of them look pretty awful.
And who is that mute blonde lady who looks a bit like Harpo Marx sitting in the secret room?
As these include Les and Janice Battersby from the old days of Corrie when I used to watch it regularly, I might try to stick with this CBB if I can. But the rest of them look pretty awful.
And who is that mute blonde lady who looks a bit like Harpo Marx sitting in the secret room?
24/8/13
Excellent description of Courtney, Marion. Mangling the rabbit, though, was a scene to cherish from perhaps another Marx Brothers film...
It's funny how the the Battersby characters cling to Vicky and Bruce. I was rather shocked when Bruce said, in an enforced double bed scene with Vicky, that they must seem like the Battersbys. For me they *are* the awful Battersbys!
Whoever said that Ron Atkinson is more famous than Bruce and Vicky was right. Not only for his remarkable football career, but for his latter day TV pundrity from which he had to be sacked because of an allegedly racist comment, I recall.
25/8/13
A very fair report, Marion. Both helpful and enjoyable.
You said many of the things I was going to say about Ron, Louie, Carol and Charlotte.
The quoting of words by others - is that the same as using them for oneself?
The aggressive smashing of the cake was the first real aberrant thing to happen in this CBB. The earlier mangling of the rabbit was also a theatrical happening, but less aberrant. In some strange way, I like Courtney's personality (when sober), but not Charlotte's.
26/8/13
I agree with what you say about Ron but I did hear him mention the bomb.
The only HM I really like is Vicky.
Judging by BB and CBB, everyone walking about in the world is incredibly crude and/or dangerously idiosyncratic. Do these programmes give a false impression of life in general these days? Discuss.
27/8/13
28/8/13
BTW, I wonder why Courtney is in CBB and Gina Rio (obviously already a celebrity before she went into the house) was in the ordinary BB?
On CBB in general, 3 weeks is hardly any time at all for the long game of finding (or even losing) oneself. CBB is just a semi-rehearsed folderol.
Ordinary BB itself used to be 13 weeks in the old days, but now it is only 9 weeks. Hardly enough even for a snap-judgement rite-of-passage or Road-to-Damascus....
30/8/13
Get Ron out, get Ron out!
And Princesses Lauren and Courtney both seem to leave untidiness in their wake and naturally want to be looked after hand and foot!
31/8/13
You said many of the things I was going to say about Ron, Louie, Carol and Charlotte.
The quoting of words by others - is that the same as using them for oneself?
The aggressive smashing of the cake was the first real aberrant thing to happen in this CBB. The earlier mangling of the rabbit was also a theatrical happening, but less aberrant. In some strange way, I like Courtney's personality (when sober), but not Charlotte's.
26/8/13
I agree with what you say about Ron but I did hear him mention the bomb.
The only HM I really like is Vicky.
Judging by BB and CBB, everyone walking about in the world is incredibly crude and/or dangerously idiosyncratic. Do these programmes give a false impression of life in general these days? Discuss.
27/8/13
Marion wrote:
This is what is dangerous about the media - the gap between the reality of society and the media's love of oddities and the downright trashy and awful, presented as somehow representative of us all. What makes BB work, is not the trashy, but the moments when a human being peeps out from under the front they have erected in the belief it makes them interesting. I don't know if BB understands that. Tonight, for example, Lauren was genuinely discomfited when confronted with Courtney's genuine upset someone different appeared for a moment even if she was still wearing the Queen Alexandra pearls.
Indeed.
As a separate point, I don't know where BB will be going after this summer's two series.
Here three of the Hms were made, three times, to enact a semi-religious Ceremony of Judgement as robed figures in the Celebrity of Cult - and then any sacredness snatched away by divulging everything they said to the other Hms. This was a most ludicrous and, then, cruel event.
Nobody will believe in any privacy of secret room or diary room, again. Perhaps this Summer is actually intended to be the self-destruction of BB by BB.
(later)
How true and how apt, Marion.
But they seem to be poignantly pouting for a kiss...
Indeed.
As a separate point, I don't know where BB will be going after this summer's two series.
Here three of the Hms were made, three times, to enact a semi-religious Ceremony of Judgement as robed figures in the Celebrity of Cult - and then any sacredness snatched away by divulging everything they said to the other Hms. This was a most ludicrous and, then, cruel event.
Nobody will believe in any privacy of secret room or diary room, again. Perhaps this Summer is actually intended to be the self-destruction of BB by BB.
(later)
Marion wrote:
Next year's house will be full of Sams snoozing in corners and HMs sitting tight lipped and granite jawed in the DR. The betrayal of HMs confidences is suicidal.
BB HMs 2014
BB HMs 2014
How true and how apt, Marion.
But they seem to be poignantly pouting for a kiss...
28/8/13
Marion wrote:
She's also a party planner and wants to organise the birthday party for Courtney - everyone will dress up as Courtney (Lauren can hardly wait) and Lauren will bake a birthday cake with pink icing for her. (PLEASE, BB, let her do it!) Blast - I'm getting fond of the kindly woman and it's too early in the series to attach to an HM.
Lauren in happier times
A gem about Lauren, Marion! She's also a party planner and wants to organise the birthday party for Courtney - everyone will dress up as Courtney (Lauren can hardly wait) and Lauren will bake a birthday cake with pink icing for her. (PLEASE, BB, let her do it!) Blast - I'm getting fond of the kindly woman and it's too early in the series to attach to an HM.
Lauren in happier times
BTW, I wonder why Courtney is in CBB and Gina Rio (obviously already a celebrity before she went into the house) was in the ordinary BB?
On CBB in general, 3 weeks is hardly any time at all for the long game of finding (or even losing) oneself. CBB is just a semi-rehearsed folderol.
Ordinary BB itself used to be 13 weeks in the old days, but now it is only 9 weeks. Hardly enough even for a snap-judgement rite-of-passage or Road-to-Damascus....
30/8/13
Get Ron out, get Ron out!
And Princesses Lauren and Courtney both seem to leave untidiness in their wake and naturally want to be looked after hand and foot!
31/8/13
Marion wrote:
What a wondeful evening it was tonight - and it was all down to Lauren. She played comedy, pathos, tigress (well, angry kitten), tragedy, and triumph, and even possibly a murderess, slipping from one role to the other seamlessly.
Well, yes. But she sometimes has mouth surrounds a bit like Yogi Bear's...
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And Bruce needs to go on an anger management course.
Yes, a great episode. But Ron's clenched false-teeth grin always put me off...
1/9/13
Well, yes. But she sometimes has mouth surrounds a bit like Yogi Bear's...
And Bruce needs to go on an anger management course.
Yes, a great episode. But Ron's clenched false-teeth grin always put me off...
1/9/13
Marion guessed right away that it was a task because BB wouldn't let any item be promoted.
Des and Marion alike. But, thinking about it, this summer BB has regularly had frozen shots of used food and other packaging showing clearly Weetabix and other trade names.
Why and how is Lauren a celebrity? She claims not be used to mixing with people, only her Mum and Brother. Sitting up in bed she tries to cut a pathetic figure. But that is her 'game' - transcending a pathetic mode with a carefully moulded personality that she wants 'Lauren' to be. She alone so far has made this CBB interesting.
The others, other than Sophie, also cultivate fallibility as a game plan to lesser and greater degrees. But I have not seen enough of my potential favourite - Vicky - to tell what game, if any, she is playing.
But Bruce is truly a fallible character and I wonder if he is due to do a Vanessa Felz...
Des and Marion alike. But, thinking about it, this summer BB has regularly had frozen shots of used food and other packaging showing clearly Weetabix and other trade names.
Why and how is Lauren a celebrity? She claims not be used to mixing with people, only her Mum and Brother. Sitting up in bed she tries to cut a pathetic figure. But that is her 'game' - transcending a pathetic mode with a carefully moulded personality that she wants 'Lauren' to be. She alone so far has made this CBB interesting.
The others, other than Sophie, also cultivate fallibility as a game plan to lesser and greater degrees. But I have not seen enough of my potential favourite - Vicky - to tell what game, if any, she is playing.
But Bruce is truly a fallible character and I wonder if he is due to do a Vanessa Felz...
PS: I know I placed here a photo of Yogi Bear earlier, not realising till last night someone (who?) shouted out 'Yabber Dabber Doo!' when Ron left...
(later)
(later)
Marion wrote:
Lauren is a puzzle indeed. How much is real and how much cultivated it is nearly impossible to say. Her wardrobe changes are key = she shifts from vamp to 'Yellow Brick Road Dorothy'.. Even when cleaning, she had to have a cleaner's hairstyle. I think she really is a non-integrated person playing the part of different 'types' of female: Nurse, sexpot, giggly girl, Mummy, pitiful oppressed spinster and so on...and yet somehow the caricatures have real elements in her. Which is why she is so much more successful at beng poignant than Sophie (who isn't really scared of Lauren; her jaw is too strong for that and she wasn't made to be vulnerable) or Louie ( who apparently wept in the DR last night but didn't really). Lauren slips a perona off with her clothes and dons another within the hour.
Perhaps she truly doesn't know who she is and is trying everything on for size.
Very astute, Marion. This makes complete sense to my inexpert eyes regarding someone who is (recently?) Transgender.
Perhaps she truly doesn't know who she is and is trying everything on for size.
Very astute, Marion. This makes complete sense to my inexpert eyes regarding someone who is (recently?) Transgender.
2/9/13
Yes, Charlotte does lead the regrettable uncouthness on the ever downward path of what BB chooses to edit IN rather than edit OUT. As BB obviously needs to edit for an hour long summary, one needs to question their editorial policy. Meanwhile, though, their sponsors, Supercasino, have adverts I find both tasteful and hauntingly effective with that strange attractive striding blonde lady and the inscrutably rugged and thoughtful man spinning the disk, although I personally hate gambling.
I thought Vicky was marvellous when dressed up for the dancing and I thought her dancing, too, exceeded all the others. Shame on Louie for making her lose.
3/9/13
I rather admired the way Vicky handled the Charlotte-Bruce situation and she should be given the job of sorting out the Middle East.
Yes, the nomination process in general this summer has been devalued and made unfit for future purpose - a destruction of a 14 year tradition just for short-term 'entertainment' purposes.
Hopefully without being ungalant, I shall point out that Carol has a genuinely classic 'old lady' face but upon a beautiful young woman's body. And I'm liking her personality more, now. Between her and Vicky to win.
Lauren - I'm not sure she should win although she has been very entertaining but that entertainment value is now wearing thin.
4/9/13
Well, Sam and Charlotte this Summer's winners? Not very auspicious.
But I've enjoyed some things, been inspired by others, disturbed and annoyed, too.
But above all, I've enjoyed your reports, Marion. Thanks so much.
PS: loved the rain and smoke on Charlotte's exit!
I thought Vicky was marvellous when dressed up for the dancing and I thought her dancing, too, exceeded all the others. Shame on Louie for making her lose.
3/9/13
I rather admired the way Vicky handled the Charlotte-Bruce situation and she should be given the job of sorting out the Middle East.
Yes, the nomination process in general this summer has been devalued and made unfit for future purpose - a destruction of a 14 year tradition just for short-term 'entertainment' purposes.
Hopefully without being ungalant, I shall point out that Carol has a genuinely classic 'old lady' face but upon a beautiful young woman's body. And I'm liking her personality more, now. Between her and Vicky to win.
Lauren - I'm not sure she should win although she has been very entertaining but that entertainment value is now wearing thin.
4/9/13
Marion wrote:
'Lauren, have you been in the toilet?' Carol demanded. Lauren denied it, but interestingly, put her hands over her face and peekd through her fingers like a nuaghty child. Carol then ordered her to flush the loo. Lauren immediately complied,, headdown. Even Mario looked embarrassed. When she returned, Lauren lay on the floor all cureled up before announcing that she had had enough. This wasn't acting - this was real distress.
Yes, a classic BB moment, but the whole task was otherwise boring rubbish and I don't believe in a million years that Louie hadn't already been told by BB that was not real broken glass.
Sophie to go tonight.
5/9/13
It was Courtney's summary programme last night, and I do think she is far more attractive in the dungarees and hairnet. Seriously. And she is far more astute than given credit for.
(later)
Yes, a classic BB moment, but the whole task was otherwise boring rubbish and I don't believe in a million years that Louie hadn't already been told by BB that was not real broken glass.
Sophie to go tonight.
5/9/13
It was Courtney's summary programme last night, and I do think she is far more attractive in the dungarees and hairnet. Seriously. And she is far more astute than given credit for.
(later)
I've now seen the interview on Ch.5 On Demand - and predictably it was Sophie. I think she was genuinely surprised by her own 'bossiness' when shown back to her.
Carol made a grand re-entrance and predictably nominated Courtney.
BTW, I enjoyed the Les and Janice Battersby reunion - but noted that it was played against the Corrie wall that once belonged to Stan and Hilda Ogdon.
Carol made a grand re-entrance and predictably nominated Courtney.
BTW, I enjoyed the Les and Janice Battersby reunion - but noted that it was played against the Corrie wall that once belonged to Stan and Hilda Ogdon.
(later)
Marion wrote: Were the flying ducks on the wall? 
yes, indeed, from those innocent days...
yes, indeed, from those innocent days...
6/9/13
Sex-obsessed Charlotte was actually quite funny during her self-appointed role as clairvoyant. "I can see a lady with a creased face..." "I have a vision of a large [redacted]..."
7/9/13
Indeed, and Louie's 'drunk' task was stupid, both setting the task and the way it was then performed. I didn't know he had once been a judge on 'Dancing on Ice' ...
...and I still can't believe that I didn't realise Lauren Harries was the precocious bow-tied boy who once appeared on Wogan around 1980.
And, wow!, Marion, thanks for that huge red blow up of a comic-strip Courtney!
8/9/13
I think this is the first time I've mentioned Abz in any of my posts here. But it was an engaging conversation he had with Lauren in the tree house - and his extended communion with a spider appealed to whatever there is in me that only enjoys cinema films that move very slowly like 'Claire's Knee', with minimalist music, and preferably with subtitles.
In hindsight, Dustin was interesting in his compulsion to get to the bottom of things, struggling with inexplicable things, a bit like Abz and the spider.
Lauren should win BB, I guess. The now elongated and curved out Little Lord Fauntleroy, slightly stooping, wayward, carrying an aura of my first impression of her as Harpo Marx and, decked out in her Royal jewels, inscrutably featuring in an atmospheric minimalist cinema film called 'Last Year at Marion-abad'...
But I have a soft spot for Vicky. I also loved her dancing with bright red lipstick a week or so ago.
9/9/13
I think Vicky lost herself some votes when she briefly gave what she saw as a typical image of a CBB viewer - i.e. someone messing about on the internet all day and then switching on the TV to watch CBB.
BBC Radio 4 Today programme this morning: "The National Trust will open the Big Brother house to the public for a weekend later this month [...]. Ivo Dawnay, London Director of the National Trust, explains why they have made this decision, and Ann Widdecombe, former Conservative politician, gives her reaction to the idea."
I've recently noticed I never mention Mario in my posts here. Just don't like him, I suppose.
But Abz is growing on me, slowly fluttering awake under my gaze...
10/9/13
7/9/13
Marion Arnott wrote:
Dull And Duller
Dull show. Dull eviction. Dustin and Bruce have gone, said their piece in their interviews and the waters will close over their heads and we shall not think of them again.
Dull show. Dull eviction. Dustin and Bruce have gone, said their piece in their interviews and the waters will close over their heads and we shall not think of them again.
Indeed, and Louie's 'drunk' task was stupid, both setting the task and the way it was then performed. I didn't know he had once been a judge on 'Dancing on Ice' ...
...and I still can't believe that I didn't realise Lauren Harries was the precocious bow-tied boy who once appeared on Wogan around 1980.
And, wow!, Marion, thanks for that huge red blow up of a comic-strip Courtney!
8/9/13
I think this is the first time I've mentioned Abz in any of my posts here. But it was an engaging conversation he had with Lauren in the tree house - and his extended communion with a spider appealed to whatever there is in me that only enjoys cinema films that move very slowly like 'Claire's Knee', with minimalist music, and preferably with subtitles.
In hindsight, Dustin was interesting in his compulsion to get to the bottom of things, struggling with inexplicable things, a bit like Abz and the spider.
Lauren should win BB, I guess. The now elongated and curved out Little Lord Fauntleroy, slightly stooping, wayward, carrying an aura of my first impression of her as Harpo Marx and, decked out in her Royal jewels, inscrutably featuring in an atmospheric minimalist cinema film called 'Last Year at Marion-abad'...
But I have a soft spot for Vicky. I also loved her dancing with bright red lipstick a week or so ago.
9/9/13
I think Vicky lost herself some votes when she briefly gave what she saw as a typical image of a CBB viewer - i.e. someone messing about on the internet all day and then switching on the TV to watch CBB.
BBC Radio 4 Today programme this morning: "The National Trust will open the Big Brother house to the public for a weekend later this month [...]. Ivo Dawnay, London Director of the National Trust, explains why they have made this decision, and Ann Widdecombe, former Conservative politician, gives her reaction to the idea."
I've recently noticed I never mention Mario in my posts here. Just don't like him, I suppose.
But Abz is growing on me, slowly fluttering awake under my gaze...
10/9/13
Marion wrote:
It was the BB moment to end all BB moments tongit - ad your fave, Vicky, did it, Des! But of that more later!
Yay! I watched it with glee and I knew also you would react thus, Marion.
Indeed, where have we got to in this world. BB teaches us a lot about social history - as well as truth and fiction which are often blurred but BB viewers learn to pick them apart; it teaches us of unwelcome things, but there's no point living with one's head in the sand ... and knowing about something is half the battle toward eventually exorcising it.
Lauren is still in that slow-moving cinema film I love so much. She is also an Anita Brookner heroine. And what she doesn't say often speaks louder than what some others do say.
(later)
Beautiful!
11/9/13
Indeed, the Rylan Bitch Fest was a cack-handed attempt by BB as a psychological ginger group.
And Ch 5 are playing their old games again, with an advert between parts of the show for Geordie Shore involving Charlotte herself.
And more stills of product placement within the show itself.
The Abz cushion mountains were a reminder of Close Encounters of the Third Kind. Nice one, Abz.
Lauren as ever was tantalisingly inscrutable.
Vicky is simply lovely in a basic good-natured yet stringently righteous broad-brush way. In fact, that last bit you could also apply to Lauren but with a metaphorical twin-set and pearl necklace on.
Vicky to win, Abz second, Lauren third.
12/9/13
Yay! I watched it with glee and I knew also you would react thus, Marion.
Indeed, where have we got to in this world. BB teaches us a lot about social history - as well as truth and fiction which are often blurred but BB viewers learn to pick them apart; it teaches us of unwelcome things, but there's no point living with one's head in the sand ... and knowing about something is half the battle toward eventually exorcising it.
Lauren is still in that slow-moving cinema film I love so much. She is also an Anita Brookner heroine. And what she doesn't say often speaks louder than what some others do say.
(later)
Marion wrote:
I was thinking about it all today. You and I both like Abz and Lauren - it occurred to me that both waft about the house in the scent of past times - Abz exhales a hint of gentle joss sticks and peace and love, man; Lauren shakes out of her stiffened petticoats a soupcon of Edwardian gardenia and lavender. We do not care for the stenches of thoroughly modern Charlotte. Long live milky pearls and kindness to moths!
I was thinking about it all today. You and I both like Abz and Lauren - it occurred to me that both waft about the house in the scent of past times - Abz exhales a hint of gentle joss sticks and peace and love, man; Lauren shakes out of her stiffened petticoats a soupcon of Edwardian gardenia and lavender. We do not care for the stenches of thoroughly modern Charlotte. Long live milky pearls and kindness to moths!
Beautiful!
11/9/13
Indeed, the Rylan Bitch Fest was a cack-handed attempt by BB as a psychological ginger group.
And Ch 5 are playing their old games again, with an advert between parts of the show for Geordie Shore involving Charlotte herself.
And more stills of product placement within the show itself.
The Abz cushion mountains were a reminder of Close Encounters of the Third Kind. Nice one, Abz.
Lauren as ever was tantalisingly inscrutable.
Vicky is simply lovely in a basic good-natured yet stringently righteous broad-brush way. In fact, that last bit you could also apply to Lauren but with a metaphorical twin-set and pearl necklace on.
Vicky to win, Abz second, Lauren third.
12/9/13
|
|
CONTINUED HERE
Wednesday, August 07, 2013
Big Brother - Summer 2013 (3)
'Continued from HERE
7/8/13
I think Hazel was particularly perturbed by Charlie's friend bringing up the Daley incident and Hazel is now thrashing around to divert attention away from it again. Until this incident, BB itself has been complicit in airbrushing away that incident - because nobody has talked about it until Charlie's friend just brought it up from such a devastating female standpoint on the outside of the house.
I feel sorry for Charlie as everything is being twisted out of proportion against her. In the long run, I think this may do her some good with the outside voters. Dexter certainly went over the top in this context by transcending his normal cool urbaneness with swearing bitterness (truly felt or not, I'm unsure).
As an aside, I was trying to imagine this extended dramatic scene (about 40 minutes?) with all the ganging up against Charlie being transcribed for actors to perform as a modern theatrical play. I think it would be revelatory. (Later) Marion wrote: I have my suspicions about Charlie's friend's outburst. She could not wait to throw the first stone. Was she prompted by BB?
You may be right to have those suspicions or she may just think she is the spokeswoman for an internet groundswell of opinion that due justice wasn't done to both participants in that incident. But I don't think it would have been prompted by BB as I get the impression, since Dan forbade the whole House to talk about it, that that act of airbrushing was first prompted by BB.
8/8/13
I don't know what to say about last night. It was all a bit of a muddle, even more muddling than normal. My loyalties change and my views of various housemates mix and match, but I have really no core loyalty with any of them, and the only things I can really depend on are actions I've seen (via the muddle of BB's editing) with my own eyes when certain Hms have been unguarded or drunk! If it weren't for Marion's reports I'd be in even worse of a muddle, but that does depend on Marion not being in a muddle herself! I have known and trusted Marion longer than any of these HMs (including one face to face meeting a few years ago), so my ultimate core loyalty is with her and her reports.
9/8/13
The bee task was like a piece of music entitled 'Attrition' as if by Morton Feldman, nothing happening except odd buzzes and endless playful stings, nothing changing to the participants in this hive of muddle, gently relaxing for us viewers it is true, but just wallowing in mock honey.
The basic fact about human existence is not that it is a tragedy, but that it is a bore. It is not so much a war as an endless standing in line.
H. L. Mencken
(later)
Marion says: But there are things to observe even when standing in line:Gina's utter selfishness; the enjoyment of the license to persecute demonstrated by both Gina and Chalie; the rebellion seething in Hazel which I cheered on because I am sick of seeing her tormented. Tragedy on the minor scale is there = be popular or be damned. And your prospects depend on accurate calculation = Hazel is not beloved but just supposing Gina has miscalculated that it is safe to persecute because of that. Not long to go ...
Yes, it is true that even minimalist music has rich textures. But the textures in this BB have been more a weave of muddled motives with only one set of jagged graph lines and we can only go on what we've been allowed to see, and that one set of jagged graph lines in this season were a single night with two people at best darkly tangoing in the secret room and at worst involved in a case of 'sexual cannibalism'.
(later)
That was a strange interview with Hazel about Daley - dealing solely with the girl friend situation (something I had forgotten about) and not with what actually went on in the room that caused the enforced and justified eviction of Daley. There was nothing discussed about Hazel's own actions in the room.
I think Emma was being deliberately disingenuous in keeping the questions solely on the girl friend situation - as some sort of diversion from BB's own actions or lack of actions that night?
The Gina and Hazel cat fight earlier felt a bit staged, in my view. Nothing compared to Ena Sharples and Elsie Tanner!
10/8/13
19.8.13
Des wrote:
on 16 Aug 13: Sam sees BB more as a spiritual rite of passage. A strange callow self-righteous lugubrious man-youth with some degree of sporadic intensity coupled with raw deadpan emotions and, yes, deadpan humour as shown a night or so ago. The slurred-but-rich-Welsh timbre voice conveys this persona uncannily. [...] Sam or Dexter to win!
Well done, Sam.
Well done, Charlie's Smile.
Thanks for all your wonderful reports, Marion.
Des
20.8.13
Indeed. I had a similar vision myself.
But Sam comes from Llanelli, where my late Dad came from, and Dad's own grandparents were deaf, by all accounts.
.
Dexter did look very sinister last night, as you say. I think he should get together with Hazel.
I hope to watch CBB but circumstances may prevent me. If so, enjoy it, Marion. And thanks again.
And here's to the Cheshire cat.
Continued here: http://weirdmonger.blogspot.co.uk/2013/08/celebrity-big-brother-summer-2013.html
7/8/13
I think Hazel was particularly perturbed by Charlie's friend bringing up the Daley incident and Hazel is now thrashing around to divert attention away from it again. Until this incident, BB itself has been complicit in airbrushing away that incident - because nobody has talked about it until Charlie's friend just brought it up from such a devastating female standpoint on the outside of the house.
I feel sorry for Charlie as everything is being twisted out of proportion against her. In the long run, I think this may do her some good with the outside voters. Dexter certainly went over the top in this context by transcending his normal cool urbaneness with swearing bitterness (truly felt or not, I'm unsure).
As an aside, I was trying to imagine this extended dramatic scene (about 40 minutes?) with all the ganging up against Charlie being transcribed for actors to perform as a modern theatrical play. I think it would be revelatory. (Later) Marion wrote: I have my suspicions about Charlie's friend's outburst. She could not wait to throw the first stone. Was she prompted by BB?
You may be right to have those suspicions or she may just think she is the spokeswoman for an internet groundswell of opinion that due justice wasn't done to both participants in that incident. But I don't think it would have been prompted by BB as I get the impression, since Dan forbade the whole House to talk about it, that that act of airbrushing was first prompted by BB.
8/8/13
I don't know what to say about last night. It was all a bit of a muddle, even more muddling than normal. My loyalties change and my views of various housemates mix and match, but I have really no core loyalty with any of them, and the only things I can really depend on are actions I've seen (via the muddle of BB's editing) with my own eyes when certain Hms have been unguarded or drunk! If it weren't for Marion's reports I'd be in even worse of a muddle, but that does depend on Marion not being in a muddle herself! I have known and trusted Marion longer than any of these HMs (including one face to face meeting a few years ago), so my ultimate core loyalty is with her and her reports.
9/8/13
The bee task was like a piece of music entitled 'Attrition' as if by Morton Feldman, nothing happening except odd buzzes and endless playful stings, nothing changing to the participants in this hive of muddle, gently relaxing for us viewers it is true, but just wallowing in mock honey.
The basic fact about human existence is not that it is a tragedy, but that it is a bore. It is not so much a war as an endless standing in line.
H. L. Mencken
(later)
Marion says: But there are things to observe even when standing in line:Gina's utter selfishness; the enjoyment of the license to persecute demonstrated by both Gina and Chalie; the rebellion seething in Hazel which I cheered on because I am sick of seeing her tormented. Tragedy on the minor scale is there = be popular or be damned. And your prospects depend on accurate calculation = Hazel is not beloved but just supposing Gina has miscalculated that it is safe to persecute because of that. Not long to go ...
Yes, it is true that even minimalist music has rich textures. But the textures in this BB have been more a weave of muddled motives with only one set of jagged graph lines and we can only go on what we've been allowed to see, and that one set of jagged graph lines in this season were a single night with two people at best darkly tangoing in the secret room and at worst involved in a case of 'sexual cannibalism'.
(later)
That was a strange interview with Hazel about Daley - dealing solely with the girl friend situation (something I had forgotten about) and not with what actually went on in the room that caused the enforced and justified eviction of Daley. There was nothing discussed about Hazel's own actions in the room.
I think Emma was being deliberately disingenuous in keeping the questions solely on the girl friend situation - as some sort of diversion from BB's own actions or lack of actions that night?
The Gina and Hazel cat fight earlier felt a bit staged, in my view. Nothing compared to Ena Sharples and Elsie Tanner!
10/8/13
Marion Arnott wrote:
- we don't actually know what happened when \bb left the room and showed the birds twittering instead.
But we do know they had a hug in bed the following morning.
I fear the Twins are now bound to win.
I certainly don't like any of the HMs after last night as this series goes into a mock climax which would be improved if it now remained unfinished like Schubert's 8th.
But we do know they had a hug in bed the following morning.
I fear the Twins are now bound to win.
I certainly don't like any of the HMs after last night as this series goes into a mock climax which would be improved if it now remained unfinished like Schubert's 8th.
(later)
I think they were both confused or stunned by that stage. Hazel's confusion was a bit in hindsight, too, in how best to create a rationale for herself during last night's interview, Hazel and Daley having drawn each other into such a drunken confused web of role-playing that arguably crossed a line from acting into a perceived reality that could have offended some in the audience and also upset the advertising sponsors. The man is generally punished more than the woman as a result of such role-playing webs getting out of hand. Hazel is a tough cookie and seemed, by the evidence, unaffected by the incident. Not that that excuses his actions. Or hers! Both should have gone then rather than leaving it to a rather cruel exit for Hazel last night! Not that she seemed fazed by it.
I hope to see neither Hazel and Daley again. I don't know if she did more tendentious interviews after the Emma one.
11/8/13
19/8/13
The concept of going into BB as a tabula rasa or an empty box - a nemonymous clean slate - is interesting, and then building a character like a child's dress-up toy -
but the high point of the series was Callum's spoked widget and his speech about it -
two separate but related incidents.
Char-lie meanwhile was the season's secret or 'lie' ... not that she lies herself. But she was Dexter's central 'lie'.
Meanwhile Sam did lie in bed!
Charlie to win. Though, sorry, Marion, I think the Twins are almost certain to win on a public vote.
I hope to see neither Hazel and Daley again. I don't know if she did more tendentious interviews after the Emma one.
11/8/13
Yes, the Twins maintained their loyalty to Hazel, but I wonder if they will maintain this loyalty when they've watched the whole season as it was shown to us?
From day one, I thought the Twins were annoying and irritating, and I still do. Gina has gone down in my estimation since I said she was my preferable winner. Marginally, now, Charlie may be the least bad choice - she is sometimes visually the famous portrait in the gallery with her frozen expressions and gypsy attractiveness, when the camera dwells on her slow motion, almost philosophical face. However, I still find it hard to stomach her garbled emotions when expressed by her speech rather than by her inscrutable looks.
Dexter is a wriggly fish and I can't like him. Sophie and Sam still grate with me and will win only by having not done much to annoy more people.
From day one, I thought the Twins were annoying and irritating, and I still do. Gina has gone down in my estimation since I said she was my preferable winner. Marginally, now, Charlie may be the least bad choice - she is sometimes visually the famous portrait in the gallery with her frozen expressions and gypsy attractiveness, when the camera dwells on her slow motion, almost philosophical face. However, I still find it hard to stomach her garbled emotions when expressed by her speech rather than by her inscrutable looks.
Dexter is a wriggly fish and I can't like him. Sophie and Sam still grate with me and will win only by having not done much to annoy more people.
12/8/13
Levi Roots is famous for appearing on Dragon's Den with his Reggae Reggae Sauce for food, not for singing, I believe. He is now a very successful businessman.
Anyway, it was an interesting turn of events with the Marcus Bentley commentary of the programme causing the action rather than being caused *by* it. Only on BB can such philosophical matters of time and causality be addressed.
I am going to cut through the mess of residual housemates.
Charlie should simply win because she has the nicest smile (one she inherits from her Mum).
13/8/13
That's the funniest line in this year's Marion Reports among many other funny, witty, truthful, ironic or outrageous lines.
14/8/13
The Dexterity of Marionettes.
The BB report of all BB reports, Marion. Making the inscrutable scrutable.
You've nailed it, Marion. Absolutely nailed it. Nailed it supremely.
15/8/13
Ps: the Eleusinian Mysteries did involve a Mother-Daughter cult, but I don't think Dexter is a slip of the pen for Demeter!
Anyway, it was an interesting turn of events with the Marcus Bentley commentary of the programme causing the action rather than being caused *by* it. Only on BB can such philosophical matters of time and causality be addressed.
I am going to cut through the mess of residual housemates.
Charlie should simply win because she has the nicest smile (one she inherits from her Mum).
13/8/13
Marion wrote:
This outrageous man is priceless.
Indeed, Dexter is. But should an outrageous man win BB?
Marion wrote:
Indeed, Dexter is. But should an outrageous man win BB?
Marion wrote:
The other event of note was that the Twins removed their shirts again and one of them lay on the grass screaming like an extra from War Horse.
That's the funniest line in this year's Marion Reports among many other funny, witty, truthful, ironic or outrageous lines.
14/8/13
The Dexterity of Marionettes.
The BB report of all BB reports, Marion. Making the inscrutable scrutable.
You've nailed it, Marion. Absolutely nailed it. Nailed it supremely.
15/8/13
What a silly task, what silly people. All of them!
Charlie should win, if someone has to win, simply for the best winning smile.
And I was annoyed to see Gina Rio in the actual independent adverts between the parts of the show - i.e. for a gossip magazine - and this is strictly against the rules of TV advertising (like Noel Edmunds advertising something between the separate parts of Deal or No Deal).
And did she record the advert before going into the House (in which case she was already a celebrity) or was she allowed out to record it? Either case, very disturbing.
16/8/13
Well, last night's programme made the whole series worth viewing. In fact it has made watching BB and reporting it here since 2004, worthwhile retrocausally. Where else can you get such real but uncertain emotions, beyond drama, beyond theatre...
I'm not sure Dexter did unravel. This whole series has been called Secrets & Lies from day one and BB has not flinched from the most significant and hurtful lies.
Sam sees BB more as a spiritual rite of passage. A strange callow self-righteous lugubrious man-youth with some degree of sporadic intensity coupled with raw deadpan emotions and, yes, deadpan humour as shown a night or so ago. The slurred-but-rich-Welsh timbre voice conveys this persona uncannily.
BB is also a game show. And if Dexter was playing the game, then so be it. But he simply must have thought, too, at the back of his mind, that this was likely to be another Lie. The complexity of the situation (and the many erratic sums of money on the wall) - all mind-boggling and Dexter has gone up in my estimation either for raw untrammelled honesty and gameshow greed (evident in the very clever 'Deal or No Deal' that has many wild emotions and similar trickery with sums of money in interface with the 'evil' Banker) or for unbelievable counterintuitive subtlety. Or both at once!
Sam or Dexter to win!
17/8/13
Dexter may have unravelled but judging by his behaviour he doesn't *think* he unravelled, which is half the battle.
I wasn't surprised when Sophie went last night. Not much to her. Surprised she lasted so long.
Sam is slowly growing on me - unwelcomingly.
I fear the Twins will win. Bearing in mind their drawbacks, they have played the optimum game for who and what they are.
Celebrity Big Brother starts Thursday.
18/8/13
Charlie should win, if someone has to win, simply for the best winning smile.
And I was annoyed to see Gina Rio in the actual independent adverts between the parts of the show - i.e. for a gossip magazine - and this is strictly against the rules of TV advertising (like Noel Edmunds advertising something between the separate parts of Deal or No Deal).
And did she record the advert before going into the House (in which case she was already a celebrity) or was she allowed out to record it? Either case, very disturbing.
16/8/13
Well, last night's programme made the whole series worth viewing. In fact it has made watching BB and reporting it here since 2004, worthwhile retrocausally. Where else can you get such real but uncertain emotions, beyond drama, beyond theatre...
I'm not sure Dexter did unravel. This whole series has been called Secrets & Lies from day one and BB has not flinched from the most significant and hurtful lies.
Sam sees BB more as a spiritual rite of passage. A strange callow self-righteous lugubrious man-youth with some degree of sporadic intensity coupled with raw deadpan emotions and, yes, deadpan humour as shown a night or so ago. The slurred-but-rich-Welsh timbre voice conveys this persona uncannily.
BB is also a game show. And if Dexter was playing the game, then so be it. But he simply must have thought, too, at the back of his mind, that this was likely to be another Lie. The complexity of the situation (and the many erratic sums of money on the wall) - all mind-boggling and Dexter has gone up in my estimation either for raw untrammelled honesty and gameshow greed (evident in the very clever 'Deal or No Deal' that has many wild emotions and similar trickery with sums of money in interface with the 'evil' Banker) or for unbelievable counterintuitive subtlety. Or both at once!
Sam or Dexter to win!
17/8/13
Dexter may have unravelled but judging by his behaviour he doesn't *think* he unravelled, which is half the battle.
I wasn't surprised when Sophie went last night. Not much to her. Surprised she lasted so long.
Sam is slowly growing on me - unwelcomingly.
I fear the Twins will win. Bearing in mind their drawbacks, they have played the optimum game for who and what they are.
Celebrity Big Brother starts Thursday.
18/8/13
Marion wrote:
Dexter admitted that his life had been on the road to nowhere before BB and then came up with one of his convoluted mysterious metaphors: now that he's been on BB, he can start life afresh because hitherto his life had been confined by padlocks and chains and locks (of his own devising), but BB had broken them all one by one until he was left with only a box which he will open when he gets outside. Charlie LOVED this speech - right up her alley. She kept nodding and agreeing andd saying that this was exctly whet she felt, even to the mysterious box. She was hilarious and suggested some primal screaming.
It is as if, retrospectively, the convoluted or 'Mysterious' Dramantic Exterlie has ever been the raison d'etre of this whole rite of passage since June. Charlie was effectively offered to the house by her blood Mother (Jackie) as in the Old Religion sacrifices of Ancient Times, for the Goddess's way to work through the Rituals or Mysteries. The Eleusinian Mysteries much more powerful than the Christian Mystery Plays...
Gina and Sam, last night, were now *literally* acting out their Ancient version of the Greek Chorus which -- in hindsight, alongside the earlier 'evil' catalyst Callum (not a Love Triangle but an Illuminatus Pyramid when also taking into account the contrastively 'wrong' union of Hazel and Daley) -- they and the other housemates have ever enacted since day one as a Tragi-Comic Chorus around the Dramantic Exterlie core.
Ancient Religions, representative of the world's original soul, are now perhaps returned to our times -- the Phoenix rising just when the modern versions of Ancient countries sadly destroy themselves in more ways than one.
Anyway, the Primal Scream clinched this deal for me!
(later)
Marion wrote: Did they keep saying 'But not in a sexual way' during the Eleusinian Mysteries?'
Do you think that the male participants were probably quite relieved?
Come to think of it, GIna's face and hair do rather resemble one of those Classical Greek actor's masks.
Primal scream did it for me too!
And the box may become clearer later. Not necessarily Pandora's.
As an aside, the Twins are grotesquely Rabelaisian... rather than cherubs or cupids, I guess.
It is as if, retrospectively, the convoluted or 'Mysterious' Dramantic Exterlie has ever been the raison d'etre of this whole rite of passage since June. Charlie was effectively offered to the house by her blood Mother (Jackie) as in the Old Religion sacrifices of Ancient Times, for the Goddess's way to work through the Rituals or Mysteries. The Eleusinian Mysteries much more powerful than the Christian Mystery Plays...
Gina and Sam, last night, were now *literally* acting out their Ancient version of the Greek Chorus which -- in hindsight, alongside the earlier 'evil' catalyst Callum (not a Love Triangle but an Illuminatus Pyramid when also taking into account the contrastively 'wrong' union of Hazel and Daley) -- they and the other housemates have ever enacted since day one as a Tragi-Comic Chorus around the Dramantic Exterlie core.
Ancient Religions, representative of the world's original soul, are now perhaps returned to our times -- the Phoenix rising just when the modern versions of Ancient countries sadly destroy themselves in more ways than one.
Anyway, the Primal Scream clinched this deal for me!
(later)
Marion wrote: Did they keep saying 'But not in a sexual way' during the Eleusinian Mysteries?'
Do you think that the male participants were probably quite relieved?
Come to think of it, GIna's face and hair do rather resemble one of those Classical Greek actor's masks.
Primal scream did it for me too!
And the box may become clearer later. Not necessarily Pandora's.
As an aside, the Twins are grotesquely Rabelaisian... rather than cherubs or cupids, I guess.
19/8/13
Marion Arnott wrote:
Dexter responded that he had become the person he wanted to be .
The concept of going into BB as a tabula rasa or an empty box - a nemonymous clean slate - is interesting, and then building a character like a child's dress-up toy -
but the high point of the series was Callum's spoked widget and his speech about it -
two separate but related incidents.
Char-lie meanwhile was the season's secret or 'lie' ... not that she lies herself. But she was Dexter's central 'lie'.
Meanwhile Sam did lie in bed!
Charlie to win. Though, sorry, Marion, I think the Twins are almost certain to win on a public vote.
19.8.13
Des wrote:
on 16 Aug 13: Sam sees BB more as a spiritual rite of passage. A strange callow self-righteous lugubrious man-youth with some degree of sporadic intensity coupled with raw deadpan emotions and, yes, deadpan humour as shown a night or so ago. The slurred-but-rich-Welsh timbre voice conveys this persona uncannily. [...] Sam or Dexter to win!
Well done, Sam.
Well done, Charlie's Smile.
Thanks for all your wonderful reports, Marion.
Des
20.8.13
Marion wrote:
I have a vision of next year's house being cluttered with HMs napping all over the place, using their sheepskin jackets as pillows.
Indeed. I had a similar vision myself.
But Sam comes from Llanelli, where my late Dad came from, and Dad's own grandparents were deaf, by all accounts.
.
Dexter did look very sinister last night, as you say. I think he should get together with Hazel.
I hope to watch CBB but circumstances may prevent me. If so, enjoy it, Marion. And thanks again.
And here's to the Cheshire cat.
Continued here: http://weirdmonger.blogspot.co.uk/2013/08/celebrity-big-brother-summer-2013.html
Friday, July 19, 2013
INSIDE
Mat and Hilda were a couple who did a lot of role-playing to spice up their marriage. Often they never knew if the other one was being serious or pretending. That is the art of role-playing -- to believe in your own role and that of the other with the excitement of not knowing when one role turned into the real self and vice versa. I'm not an expert, of course. I'm only going on what Mat and Hilda told me -- but what they told me separately was often different from what they told me together.
Eventually they invited me to join in with their games. Knowing I was single, they presumably thought I was flexible enough to fit in to whatever they decided I should do. I would be so grateful for their company I would be amenable for any demeaning role, even a situation that bordered between life and death. Or so they thought.
My only experience was a Murder Dinner, one that I once attended as a gypsy girl in drag -- and I ended up being the murderer. I spent many years in prison as a result -- but that was better than being the one who was murdered. A life inside was better than a life without. But of course all those years turned out to be imaginary and here I was about to be welcomed by Mat and Hilda on the night of the ultimate role-play.
I had been told at first there would be nobody at all in the house and that I should make myself at home inside and there would be plenty of nibbles scattered about. And I was to expect the unexpected -- and I suspected that I would not recognise Mat and Hilda when they eventually arrived. This seemed a bit off because the original thought of mine was one of pleasure at being in Mat and Hilda's company. But to sit there in an empty house, listening to the clock tick, fiddling with cheesy crisps in a half-hearted fashion, sipping lukewarm Lucozade, expecting, at best, complete strangers....
None of this really seemed fair. I imagined myself back in prison - and the windows grew bars before my very eyes. But I was woken from my day-dream by the sound of steps coming down the stairs. I had earlier been upstairs but there had been nobody around. I even poked my head in the loft and the various cupboards.
The soft crump of carpet slippers, the shamble and shuffle in the hall ... then Mat and Hilda hopefully bursting into the room dressed in wonderful costumes and make-up, wanting me to enjoy playing up to the role they wanted me to play...
I watched the door slowly open --
-- and then slowly shut again. Somehow, I knew it wasn't me inside the room. It was me out in the hall not daring to come in, terrified at the thought of who may be inside the room in my place. A gypsy girl in ghostly drag -- once called Mathilda -- looking inside the mirror above the fireplace and seeing nobody there.
.
[Last night's speed-writing exercise at the Clacton Third Thursday Group.]
Tuesday, July 16, 2013
Big Brother - Summer 2013
Part (2): Continued from HERE.
16/7/13 (later)
16/7/13 (later)
I have now looked at the footage shown last night on the TV programme. Chilling, indeed, and although I do not disagree with anything said above about Daley, I do wonder whether Hazel should have been thrown out, too.
17/7/13
I saw the interview, too. I think it is a Shakespearean tragedy - Daley is overtly very articulate but in many ways inarticulate and confused about his own feelings. Hazel seems still to be fulfilling her audition promise that once scared Gina* so much and I still do not exonerate Hazel from irresponsible taunting (and if a man had so forcibly and blatantly pulled down a woman's pants he would have been immediately and rightly evicted without any later opportunity to explain it to a sympathetic housemate), but she did not deserve the dark endgame in the secret room and Daley was right to apologise for his own unforgiveable actions. He should also have apologised to Hazel directly.
* “Hazel.. well, I dunno. You said that you’re going integrate into the group for two weeks, and then you’re going to s**t stir. And you said you’re evil inside,” Gina claimed.
PS: I also noticed that Hazel jumped into bed with Daley on the morning after the incident.
[There are transgressions that are worthy of immediate eviction, in descending order of objective seriousness: call them A, B, C. And similarly descending transgressions all worthy of an initial formal warning: D, E, F.
If Daley was guilty of A, Hazel was guilty of C, I feel, just on the evidence of the 15 minutes or so shown at the end of the previous night's summary programme.]
18/7/13
An excellent shopping task for a change and thanks, Marion, for the usual wonderful description.
Something very SF about being frozen in time and having other bodies walk around who are not frozen in time. And the Hms did very well.
I, too, believed that BB lobbed in the tennis ball. But surely not. But if it crossed the minds of us two, then, maybe it's true. It would be like playing with fire and would be reprehensible, if BB did lob it in. There was a tennis ball found before in this series left exactly where the camera could focus on the writing. Dexter found this earlier ball but didn't impart its information, I recall. This time they did not need to focus on it, as Sophie picked it up and immediately read it aloud.
Back to the Daley-Hazel incident; they were both drunk. I sense, the more I think about it, that this started off as a mutual role-playing exercise (which they possibly felt consciously or sub-consciously appropriate in the context of BB and one instinctively designed to make a buzz), one that got out of hand. Many couples, I believe, role-play in their normal life together, from which they get a kick. I saw a stage-play about this subject recently at the theatre, i.e. THE LOVER by Harold Pinter which is about just such a situation. And Hazel is arguably still play-acting about it. For her perceived actions (the blatant physical exposure of Daley, her own dubious handling of Daley's neck and play-slapping him, her audition espousal of 'evil', her getting into bed with Daley *after* the event etc), I am still convinced that Hazel should also have been thrown out. Daley was the worst offender (unforgiveably so), but that does not prevent lesser offences being properly punished, too.
I hope you don't mind me exploring this as it develops in my mind. We have always debated the possibilities when significant events occur since discussing BB from 2004. Or perhaps I should have let sleeping dogs lie with the signal break-up initially preventing me seeing the incident.
(later)
17/7/13
I saw the interview, too. I think it is a Shakespearean tragedy - Daley is overtly very articulate but in many ways inarticulate and confused about his own feelings. Hazel seems still to be fulfilling her audition promise that once scared Gina* so much and I still do not exonerate Hazel from irresponsible taunting (and if a man had so forcibly and blatantly pulled down a woman's pants he would have been immediately and rightly evicted without any later opportunity to explain it to a sympathetic housemate), but she did not deserve the dark endgame in the secret room and Daley was right to apologise for his own unforgiveable actions. He should also have apologised to Hazel directly.
* “Hazel.. well, I dunno. You said that you’re going integrate into the group for two weeks, and then you’re going to s**t stir. And you said you’re evil inside,” Gina claimed.
PS: I also noticed that Hazel jumped into bed with Daley on the morning after the incident.
[There are transgressions that are worthy of immediate eviction, in descending order of objective seriousness: call them A, B, C. And similarly descending transgressions all worthy of an initial formal warning: D, E, F.
If Daley was guilty of A, Hazel was guilty of C, I feel, just on the evidence of the 15 minutes or so shown at the end of the previous night's summary programme.]
18/7/13
An excellent shopping task for a change and thanks, Marion, for the usual wonderful description.
Something very SF about being frozen in time and having other bodies walk around who are not frozen in time. And the Hms did very well.
I, too, believed that BB lobbed in the tennis ball. But surely not. But if it crossed the minds of us two, then, maybe it's true. It would be like playing with fire and would be reprehensible, if BB did lob it in. There was a tennis ball found before in this series left exactly where the camera could focus on the writing. Dexter found this earlier ball but didn't impart its information, I recall. This time they did not need to focus on it, as Sophie picked it up and immediately read it aloud.
Back to the Daley-Hazel incident; they were both drunk. I sense, the more I think about it, that this started off as a mutual role-playing exercise (which they possibly felt consciously or sub-consciously appropriate in the context of BB and one instinctively designed to make a buzz), one that got out of hand. Many couples, I believe, role-play in their normal life together, from which they get a kick. I saw a stage-play about this subject recently at the theatre, i.e. THE LOVER by Harold Pinter which is about just such a situation. And Hazel is arguably still play-acting about it. For her perceived actions (the blatant physical exposure of Daley, her own dubious handling of Daley's neck and play-slapping him, her audition espousal of 'evil', her getting into bed with Daley *after* the event etc), I am still convinced that Hazel should also have been thrown out. Daley was the worst offender (unforgiveably so), but that does not prevent lesser offences being properly punished, too.
I hope you don't mind me exploring this as it develops in my mind. We have always debated the possibilities when significant events occur since discussing BB from 2004. Or perhaps I should have let sleeping dogs lie with the signal break-up initially preventing me seeing the incident.
(later)
Marion wrote: I think we witnessed something important happening there, something that happens in domestic abuse cases - that eerie change in his manner, almost trancelike, when Jekyll disappeared and he came back to himself...
Yes, I'm sure you're right. And spot on with that description, Marion. This thread is something important happening, too, I feel.
Yes, I'm sure you're right. And spot on with that description, Marion. This thread is something important happening, too, I feel.
Marion wrote: As for Hazel still playacting - hmmmm. Ther problem is ,I think, that she doesn't quite know how to react - too stunned.
I hear a rumour that she has told the other Hms that she misses Daley and wants him back on the show. But that's the Daily Star for you! (Or Daley Star!)
I hear a rumour that she has told the other Hms that she misses Daley and wants him back on the show. But that's the Daily Star for you! (Or Daley Star!)
19/7/13
Marion wrote: There was a barber's shop quartet as well singing the 'You're all fake' song and making outrageous allegations, the most outrageous being that Dan isn't really gay. .
Perhaps not so outrageous. I had already been wondering that point - this is his method of being allowed to caress and canoodle the opposite sex?
I hope the twins go tonight
.
(later)Marion wrote: Maybe he really is a mole in that floral vest?
bi-molar?
20/7/13
21/7/13
Charlie seemed to get out of hand now that mum's mummed off.
And I can't imagine Sam and Sophie ever getting interesting even when they've now had their heads put above the parapet.
In fact I am losing the will to live about all of them!
But totally loved Gina's imitation of the Essex accent a night or so ago. The only HM with star potential.
Perhaps not so outrageous. I had already been wondering that point - this is his method of being allowed to caress and canoodle the opposite sex?
I hope the twins go tonight
.
(later)Marion wrote: Maybe he really is a mole in that floral vest?
bi-molar?
20/7/13
Marion wrote: Hms in the secret room are not immune from nomination at all - and tomorrow thy are to select another HM to join them. This is a twist too far. Whatever happened to the clarion call to the punlic - 'You decide'?
Indeed, Marion. Sam and Sophie are, I believe, due to choose someone else for the secret room but will they know their choice, like themselves, will automatically be up for eviction? Sadly, they won't choose Hazel as they think that will bring back bad memories for her. And I am losing interest in this residual group. Gina (Nikki) will win - although Nikki in her day, didn't actually win the show but she won the fame afterwards. Perhaps Charlie as a dark horse. Dexter's cartwheel was symbolic of something, not sure of what yet, though. He is the man of many faces to face the world - more so than Callum.21/7/13
Charlie seemed to get out of hand now that mum's mummed off.
And I can't imagine Sam and Sophie ever getting interesting even when they've now had their heads put above the parapet.
In fact I am losing the will to live about all of them!
But totally loved Gina's imitation of the Essex accent a night or so ago. The only HM with star potential.
(later)
Marion wrote: He and Callum indulged in a balletic amorous rivalry full of yearnings and unrealised passions, Callum to the point of being scary , what with intense facial contortions, windfarm gestures, and deeply meaningful intense stares. Dexter flitted round her like a butterfly dying to laugh. In the end, Charlie delared Dexter sweet and Dexter announced that he and Charlie were like two planets aligning themselves. I don't know that this what BB had hoped for but it served him right and it was very funny.
Funny, Marion, how your later-than-normal reports make me enjoy the whole programme for the first time - retrocausally, as it were. Thanks.
Funny, Marion, how your later-than-normal reports make me enjoy the whole programme for the first time - retrocausally, as it were. Thanks.
22/7/13
Yes, Dexter is a loose catalyst - and hard to read. Good BB-type provocation
Gina screeched a lot last night with another Nikki-like tantrum. I don't think you mentioned her much in your long report, Marion, but she is likely to win the whole show, they say.
The Love Square emerged last night. Charlie - Dexter- Dan - Callum.
Despite Marion's excellent report - I think this lot are trying too hard (to make an entertaining show), i.e. beyond their own natural personalities ... and I AM losing the will to live... As to Sophie and Sam, they are like people on a fairground ride just to keep others company. They don't try hard enough. The Twins tweedle along as ever.
23/7/13
Gina screeched a lot last night with another Nikki-like tantrum. I don't think you mentioned her much in your long report, Marion, but she is likely to win the whole show, they say.
The Love Square emerged last night. Charlie - Dexter- Dan - Callum.
Despite Marion's excellent report - I think this lot are trying too hard (to make an entertaining show), i.e. beyond their own natural personalities ... and I AM losing the will to live... As to Sophie and Sam, they are like people on a fairground ride just to keep others company. They don't try hard enough. The Twins tweedle along as ever.
23/7/13
Marion wrote: I am still not happy with this twist. We can laugh at HMs or criticise them but they are doing their best to entertain and don't deserve a cruelty like this. And it is cruel to let Sophie and Sam be happy thinking they've done Dan a favour and lent him some of their immunity. It is cruel to let the rest of the HMs worry for the week that they are all up for eviction.
Wise words, oh soothsayer.
The most hilarious thing last night was further evidence of the complete unsuitability of Sam and Sophie to be HMs in a BB show. I wonder how they got through the auditions
24/7/13
27/7/13
Wise words, oh soothsayer.
The most hilarious thing last night was further evidence of the complete unsuitability of Sam and Sophie to be HMs in a BB show. I wonder how they got through the auditions
24/7/13
Callum was impressive last night as the therapist. However, in the old days BB did not have such artificial set-ups but proper games and tasks.
His scrying widget was however sheer genius and alone worth winning the whole show for. The synchronised spokes of random truth and fiction.
Gina has the widest margins of (i) prepared sleek and puckish beauty and (ii) non made-up gurning when just awake ... whereby you can't believe they are the same person..
25/7/13
*unless that was a 'lie', too, rather than breaking what should have remained a 'secret'?His scrying widget was however sheer genius and alone worth winning the whole show for. The synchronised spokes of random truth and fiction.
Gina has the widest margins of (i) prepared sleek and puckish beauty and (ii) non made-up gurning when just awake ... whereby you can't believe they are the same person..
25/7/13
Marion wrote: I'm beginning to hate BB personally.
The task was silly, too, and irritating. Callum as a Robbie Williams lookalike is the only reasonably entertaining thing at the moment. Gina was told something that Dexter said in the diary room (will the HMs ever say anything sincere and private again in the diary room, a place that should be as sacrosanct as a confessional?).
Gina speaks of 'the public' as some sort of likeable single-minded wise being like an Oracle (which is in the tradition of BB if not always its current practice) and presumably for this Oracle to call Hazel the snake of the house must have been based on their watching of the Daley and Hazel footage available to them, i.e. the two of them that made that particular tango (which is also my own view), so I am willing to go along with that judgement in the old 'You Decide' philosophy of BB. But the judgement should never have been imparted to Hazel while she is still a HM. That was cruel.
26/7/13
Irrespective of the game-spoiling represented by BB's gradual verifying* of the Hms' self-ranking as to the Public Oracle voting on the eventual result (how many voted and who and why bother with the final, we might as well all go home now with our tennis balls?), yes, irrespective of all that, I was surprised at the result. Why Sam and Sophie so high, for example? And Callum so low? But the Public tides are now already set in motion, and none of us can even try to be Canute.
The task was silly, too, and irritating. Callum as a Robbie Williams lookalike is the only reasonably entertaining thing at the moment. Gina was told something that Dexter said in the diary room (will the HMs ever say anything sincere and private again in the diary room, a place that should be as sacrosanct as a confessional?).
Gina speaks of 'the public' as some sort of likeable single-minded wise being like an Oracle (which is in the tradition of BB if not always its current practice) and presumably for this Oracle to call Hazel the snake of the house must have been based on their watching of the Daley and Hazel footage available to them, i.e. the two of them that made that particular tango (which is also my own view), so I am willing to go along with that judgement in the old 'You Decide' philosophy of BB. But the judgement should never have been imparted to Hazel while she is still a HM. That was cruel.
26/7/13
Irrespective of the game-spoiling represented by BB's gradual verifying* of the Hms' self-ranking as to the Public Oracle voting on the eventual result (how many voted and who and why bother with the final, we might as well all go home now with our tennis balls?), yes, irrespective of all that, I was surprised at the result. Why Sam and Sophie so high, for example? And Callum so low? But the Public tides are now already set in motion, and none of us can even try to be Canute.
27/7/13
Marion wrote: In the end, Sam, who will not get out of bed (or get into it without his sheepskin jacket) ,and smug dour little Sophie who has contributed very little to the house, won the public voters over. I canot see why, unless it was a case of the vote was split between them. At any rate, we have lost a vivid HM to a pair of mediocrities.
Indeed. And Emma Willis made no Secret of this when interviewing Dan.
Also I agree about the Twins. Intermittent visions of poopy fat that - like the thought of Kinga's wine bottle - will outlast the people themselves.
Meanwhile, Gina believes Hazel is evil because she saw evidence of Hazel claiming to be evil on film. As was later borne out by the cold evidence of two drunken people being or pretending to be 'evil', also on film, a film that Gina hasn't yet seen.
28/7/13
Also I agree about the Twins. Intermittent visions of poopy fat that - like the thought of Kinga's wine bottle - will outlast the people themselves.
Meanwhile, Gina believes Hazel is evil because she saw evidence of Hazel claiming to be evil on film. As was later borne out by the cold evidence of two drunken people being or pretending to be 'evil', also on film, a film that Gina hasn't yet seen.
28/7/13
Marion wrote: I have commented before on the richness of Dexter's metaphors, far better than Callum's if that is any test of mental superiority.
Yes, but only Callum had the widget of spokes his demonstration of which has been this season's highlight for me.
Spot on, Marion, with the Dandy and Beano japes concerning the stakes, boos, brown Es etc, and an example, too, of BB's comic book cruelties that, in real comics, don't affect people but only anthropomorphised drawings of animals like Biffo the Bear. I think the HMs are getting more and more war weary with all this which is not a good recipe for flair and entertaining repartee.
29/7/13
Yes, but only Callum had the widget of spokes his demonstration of which has been this season's highlight for me.
Spot on, Marion, with the Dandy and Beano japes concerning the stakes, boos, brown Es etc, and an example, too, of BB's comic book cruelties that, in real comics, don't affect people but only anthropomorphised drawings of animals like Biffo the Bear. I think the HMs are getting more and more war weary with all this which is not a good recipe for flair and entertaining repartee.
29/7/13
Marion wrote: There were the usual caricatures of HMs and stick persons - Callum's was strange though. In it he bore the weight of the world on his shoulders, resisting the force of a central explosion, and there was a long dark tunnel at the end of a straight road through which he swore there was light. The odd thing was that he was the only HM in the picture. The Twins think he needs therapy - that may well be true.
Most geniuses need therapy! Callum is the only original in the house. Well, Gina, too. For that alone, he or she should win.
It seemed somehow symbolic that Gina bears out Hazel's own opinion of herself by seeing evil in her eyes. The camera shots are not close enough for viewers to judge, but I am prepared to believe Gina sees evil in them. And then Charlie tries to gouge Hazel's eyes out with a cucumber! Only on BB!
Still, in the main, the haunting figures in the BB sponsored advert for 'S*perc*sino' (asterisks because this forum does not allow you to post the full name of this company), -- i.e. the blonde woman striding toward the table, the cool laconic guy with untidy hair but handsome face etc and the spinning chip and the no. 17 or the no. 20 -- are far more interesting than this set of HMs in general!
30/7/13
Callum nominated Dexter, saying that he should be in prison because talking such utter crap for so long is surely against the law.
If that were true, our prisons would be even more overcrowded and most of us would have to be allowed to stay at home to continue our illegal ways unpunished. That sounds like a good SF plot to write...
Most geniuses need therapy! Callum is the only original in the house. Well, Gina, too. For that alone, he or she should win.
It seemed somehow symbolic that Gina bears out Hazel's own opinion of herself by seeing evil in her eyes. The camera shots are not close enough for viewers to judge, but I am prepared to believe Gina sees evil in them. And then Charlie tries to gouge Hazel's eyes out with a cucumber! Only on BB!
Still, in the main, the haunting figures in the BB sponsored advert for 'S*perc*sino' (asterisks because this forum does not allow you to post the full name of this company), -- i.e. the blonde woman striding toward the table, the cool laconic guy with untidy hair but handsome face etc and the spinning chip and the no. 17 or the no. 20 -- are far more interesting than this set of HMs in general!
30/7/13
Callum nominated Dexter, saying that he should be in prison because talking such utter crap for so long is surely against the law.
If that were true, our prisons would be even more overcrowded and most of us would have to be allowed to stay at home to continue our illegal ways unpunished. That sounds like a good SF plot to write...
Marion wrote:
Sam the Sleeper resides in the house, pristine and free of nominations. So does Sophie. And we are at risk of losing Callum, Dexter or Hazel if the Ghastly Twins aren't kicked out. And if there are two evictions this week, even if the Twins go, we will lose another big character while Sam snoozes and Sophie scowls.
Many still live under the radar in real life. I'm beginning to think that is a good idea. I'm intending to slip away from interaction on the internet. As a start, I left Facebook nearly two months ago and fiddled with Twitter for a day or so only to abandon it for good. 'Horror Without Victims' is my last book and I feel in my heart that I am heading toward the end of my pretentious real-time reviewing. And this will probably be my last season of BB commentating. And then I shall be like those old people who used to sit at home listening to 'Have A Go, Joe' with Wilfred Pickles on the steam wireless and pottering around the house or garden as long as their legs don't give out, with very few remembering they are still there, still alive, till they are dead. Ah bliss.
31/7/13
You know, after the recorded revelation of HMs making their nominations while they are still HMs not only prevents BB from asking these particular HMs for frank nominations in the diary room again but also prevents BB from asking any HMs in future BBs from doing the same. The cat is finally out of the bag. And BB is finished.
1/8/13
A much more interesting programme last night, one that was truly on the uncomfortable edge of truth - where BB excels and where nothing can equal it, nothing dramatic (theatrical or fictional) or real (the news, real life). It started off with a remarkably articulate real wrestler (looking a bit like Michael the 'postman' now physically beefed up) who also was genuinely frightening in arranging the task - as Callum was frightening later with his purple mist echoing the vision in his earlier painting -
(Daley and Hazel had some sort of mutual mist, too, earlier in the series. Perhaps it's in the air there?)
Dexter, in his own way, was also frightening as his reaction to Callum developed cumulatively.
Gina and Hazel (despite the latter's reputed 'evil') were kittens, by comparison.
This is the first time for ages I've left a BB programme still thinking about it constructively as well as anxiously. And Sam gained some mist points too via his passionate words to Dexter about Dexter's own pre-fight trash talk with Callum. Sophie, too, with her appraisal of the situation in the DR. Why DID Callum bring his own family into the argument?
2/8/13
Me, too. And, if two evictions, Hazel along with them.
The Dexllum feud is too priceless to lose from Wonderland.
Feuds are a fact of life, sadly, in this age of the Jabberwiki.
3/8/13
Callum's whole essence in the house was Cumulative Calumny: it started with seeing Dexter as a rival, but then his concocted duplicitous backstory for Dexter grew and grew upon itself until even Callum believed his Calumny - and now it is an obsession of overbearing bitter truth based on a lie that Dexter the real person and Dexter the game-playing Housemate are the same thing (which they *may* be but magnified out of all proportion when seen through the hothouse glass darkly). This obsession may now diminish as he gets some perspective from outside among his friends and family, just as probably Sallie, outside the house, gradually saw her sheer hatred of the equivalence of Michael the actor (the real person) with Michael the postman (the game-playing calumnious 'Housemate') was equally unsustainable or otherwise it would eat her up.
Many still live under the radar in real life. I'm beginning to think that is a good idea. I'm intending to slip away from interaction on the internet. As a start, I left Facebook nearly two months ago and fiddled with Twitter for a day or so only to abandon it for good. 'Horror Without Victims' is my last book and I feel in my heart that I am heading toward the end of my pretentious real-time reviewing. And this will probably be my last season of BB commentating. And then I shall be like those old people who used to sit at home listening to 'Have A Go, Joe' with Wilfred Pickles on the steam wireless and pottering around the house or garden as long as their legs don't give out, with very few remembering they are still there, still alive, till they are dead. Ah bliss.
31/7/13
You know, after the recorded revelation of HMs making their nominations while they are still HMs not only prevents BB from asking these particular HMs for frank nominations in the diary room again but also prevents BB from asking any HMs in future BBs from doing the same. The cat is finally out of the bag. And BB is finished.
1/8/13
A much more interesting programme last night, one that was truly on the uncomfortable edge of truth - where BB excels and where nothing can equal it, nothing dramatic (theatrical or fictional) or real (the news, real life). It started off with a remarkably articulate real wrestler (looking a bit like Michael the 'postman' now physically beefed up) who also was genuinely frightening in arranging the task - as Callum was frightening later with his purple mist echoing the vision in his earlier painting -
(Daley and Hazel had some sort of mutual mist, too, earlier in the series. Perhaps it's in the air there?)
Dexter, in his own way, was also frightening as his reaction to Callum developed cumulatively.
Gina and Hazel (despite the latter's reputed 'evil') were kittens, by comparison.
This is the first time for ages I've left a BB programme still thinking about it constructively as well as anxiously. And Sam gained some mist points too via his passionate words to Dexter about Dexter's own pre-fight trash talk with Callum. Sophie, too, with her appraisal of the situation in the DR. Why DID Callum bring his own family into the argument?
2/8/13
Marion wrote:
All I hope for is the eviction of Tweedledum and Tweedledee.
Me, too. And, if two evictions, Hazel along with them.
The Dexllum feud is too priceless to lose from Wonderland.
Feuds are a fact of life, sadly, in this age of the Jabberwiki.
3/8/13
Callum's whole essence in the house was Cumulative Calumny: it started with seeing Dexter as a rival, but then his concocted duplicitous backstory for Dexter grew and grew upon itself until even Callum believed his Calumny - and now it is an obsession of overbearing bitter truth based on a lie that Dexter the real person and Dexter the game-playing Housemate are the same thing (which they *may* be but magnified out of all proportion when seen through the hothouse glass darkly). This obsession may now diminish as he gets some perspective from outside among his friends and family, just as probably Sallie, outside the house, gradually saw her sheer hatred of the equivalence of Michael the actor (the real person) with Michael the postman (the game-playing calumnious 'Housemate') was equally unsustainable or otherwise it would eat her up.
4/8/13
Marion wrote: I am gaining more respect for Hazel, I must say.
Yes, she is managing to 'regroup' her persona, despite sharing the mutual "mental mist" with Daley (him then being justly punished by being taken out of the game and she not).
(later)
5/8/13
Sam is a strange kettle of fish, with a sporadic, slightly tormented uplift of its lid to show it's boiling.
On the whole, my winner is indeed Gina, as the least bad choice.
6/8/13
An excellent report, Marion. Two weeks to go! And then immediately I presume there will be a CBB to follow on? How can we cope with all these riches?
Sam's lid was rattling away last night. Out of his depth, but may receive the sympathy vote.
I felt sorry for Dexter as that was another cruel task handed out by BB to Gina, though she did it well!
And Sophie did another "I'm not bothered" speech. She is growing on me, being an Essex boy myself, although she is probably more East London than Essex, though they do blur together and I do come from East London stock as well as being born and living in Essex ... and Welsh on my father's side!
Continued HERE.
Yes, she is managing to 'regroup' her persona, despite sharing the mutual "mental mist" with Daley (him then being justly punished by being taken out of the game and she not).
(later)
Marion wrote:
Now, Des, we're never going to agree on that one. She didn't threaten violence and she didn't threaten death - that's why he's out and she's still in.
And she's a much more interesting HM now that he's gone.
Now, Des, we're never going to agree on that one. She didn't threaten violence and she didn't threaten death - that's why he's out and she's still in.
And she's a much more interesting HM now that he's gone.
She invited what she got, if you watch solely the evidence of the whole scene in question. And, indeed, she didn't threaten violence, but she enacted it!
I think what they both said and did to each other was unforgivable. However, his behaviour, I agree, was worse than hers, when taken at face value. We mustn't forget, meanwhile, both were taking these actions with the full knowledge that they were being filmed for public watching.
We were not chance witnesses to a private domestic situation but part of many witnesses to a television event, staged by both parties, as is borne out by the footage. Both deserved immediate eviction for crossing a line, in my view.
So it will be a travesty if she wins. And, thus, for me, she does not deserve any respect at all. It is the above introduction of the words 'more respect' into this context that I am currently finding difficult to stomach, not a reprise of an old debate on which we know we beg to differ.
Disregarding any of that, I don't actually find her an interesting housemate, either.
I think what they both said and did to each other was unforgivable. However, his behaviour, I agree, was worse than hers, when taken at face value. We mustn't forget, meanwhile, both were taking these actions with the full knowledge that they were being filmed for public watching.
We were not chance witnesses to a private domestic situation but part of many witnesses to a television event, staged by both parties, as is borne out by the footage. Both deserved immediate eviction for crossing a line, in my view.
So it will be a travesty if she wins. And, thus, for me, she does not deserve any respect at all. It is the above introduction of the words 'more respect' into this context that I am currently finding difficult to stomach, not a reprise of an old debate on which we know we beg to differ.
Disregarding any of that, I don't actually find her an interesting housemate, either.
(later)
Marion wrote:
I'm sure Daley was terrified of her!
She's the only one who had the gumption to tell Callum to put a sock in it. She's a match for Gina when it comes to last words. She's got Dexter on side and sorted Charlie without actually quarrelling with her. She has never faltered in the tasks, no matter how gross. On top of all that, she has survived a week of BB bullying.
She deserves some credit for being such a tough cookie.
She's the only one who had the gumption to tell Callum to put a sock in it. She's a match for Gina when it comes to last words. She's got Dexter on side and sorted Charlie without actually quarrelling with her. She has never faltered in the tasks, no matter how gross. On top of all that, she has survived a week of BB bullying.
She deserves some credit for being such a tough cookie.
Indeed.
But she should never have been left there to prove what a tough cookie she may be.
She may win, I accept.
PS: if she is such a tough cookie, that should also now be factored retrospectively into the earlier incident with Daley.
But she should never have been left there to prove what a tough cookie she may be.
She may win, I accept.
PS: if she is such a tough cookie, that should also now be factored retrospectively into the earlier incident with Daley.
.
5/8/13
Marion wrote:
The Twins in their flabby glory were foisted on us yet again right at the opening of the show. They they were, all a-wobble at the shower in the garden, lovingly documented by the cameras. Why, I ask myself? Why? They were not interesting, not witty, not insightful, anything but beautiful, and yet we were expected to watch. It got worse in the bedroom when in their usual hilarious fashion they romped, dropping one another on the floor and screaming with laughter. There followed a ticklefest in which other Hms joined in, encouraging the brats in hilarity and flatulence.
We are on all fours on that, Marion. Sam is a strange kettle of fish, with a sporadic, slightly tormented uplift of its lid to show it's boiling.
On the whole, my winner is indeed Gina, as the least bad choice.
6/8/13
An excellent report, Marion. Two weeks to go! And then immediately I presume there will be a CBB to follow on? How can we cope with all these riches?
Sam's lid was rattling away last night. Out of his depth, but may receive the sympathy vote.
I felt sorry for Dexter as that was another cruel task handed out by BB to Gina, though she did it well!
And Sophie did another "I'm not bothered" speech. She is growing on me, being an Essex boy myself, although she is probably more East London than Essex, though they do blur together and I do come from East London stock as well as being born and living in Essex ... and Welsh on my father's side!
Continued HERE.
Tuesday, July 09, 2013
Books with Souls
The design (by Garry Nurrish) throughout 'Weirdmonger' (2003) by DF Lewis
“I feel that the souls of original writers — for the more original a writer is, the more powerful is the pressure of his projected soul — are real presences that have their dwelling inside the printed pages of the author’s books;…” – from ‘The Inmates’ by John Cowper Powys
“Every book has a soul. The soul of the person who wrote it and of those who read it and lived and dreamed with it. Every time a book changes hands, every time someone runs his eyes down its pages, its spirit grows and strengthens.” — from ‘The Shadow Of The Wind’ by Carlos Ruiz Zafon
"What we're saying is that the magazine is more than the contents: it's the physicality of product which adds to the volume something more than the words themselves. E-books have their place (I think most of my own output is available in e-book), but they do create a homogenous reading experience. As much as anything else, it's also a willingness to be different, to buck the trend. Those people with an affinity to this will be those who become our readers." -- Andrew Hook (HERE)
Thursday, July 04, 2013
HPL the Panther
HP Lovecraft Texts
I have been informed recently that the Oxford University Press has just published HPL fiction using the original magazine texts.
It’s a question of debate, in my view, as to which are the texts best used, i.e. EITHER the ones that the author approved or allowed by default into magazines etc. when he was alive and that effectively created his ‘fame’ in the first place OR his original manuscripts as revised texts that have been brought forward after he died? I suspect, with HPL, that some of the former are preferable to the latter but also vice versa, as someone was demonstrating recently on the TLO thread.
Well, if HPL complained again and again in his lifetime about the original magazine texts, and if we have hard evidence for that contention, then it would lend support to the argument that only the revised texts should apply. But as an exponent of the age-seasoned literary theory of the Intentional Fallacy, I also feel that this is a complicated matter and that each original magazine text and each revised text should be treated on their individual merits and, in hindsight, if HPL could look down from where he is now, he may even agree with that!!
Caveat: I was brought up on the Panther texts of HPL fiction in the 1960s, with which I fell in love.
It’s a question of debate, in my view, as to which are the texts best used, i.e. EITHER the ones that the author approved or allowed by default into magazines etc. when he was alive and that effectively created his ‘fame’ in the first place OR his original manuscripts as revised texts that have been brought forward after he died? I suspect, with HPL, that some of the former are preferable to the latter but also vice versa, as someone was demonstrating recently on the TLO thread.
Well, if HPL complained again and again in his lifetime about the original magazine texts, and if we have hard evidence for that contention, then it would lend support to the argument that only the revised texts should apply. But as an exponent of the age-seasoned literary theory of the Intentional Fallacy, I also feel that this is a complicated matter and that each original magazine text and each revised text should be treated on their individual merits and, in hindsight, if HPL could look down from where he is now, he may even agree with that!!
Caveat: I was brought up on the Panther texts of HPL fiction in the 1960s, with which I fell in love.
Tuesday, July 02, 2013
Versionary Literature
I arguably coined these words and expressions: ‘zeroism, egnisomicon, egnisism’ in conjunction with PF Jeffery (1967), ‘whofage’ in conjunction with PF Jeffery (1973), ‘agra aska’ (1983), ‘weirdmonger’ (1988), use of ‘brainwright’ in modern times (1990), Salustrade (1992) use of ‘yesterfang’ in modern times (1997), ‘wordhunger’ (1999), ‘nemonymous, ‘nemonymity’, late-labelling, veils-&-piques’ (2001), ‘denemonise’ (2002), ‘megazanthus’, ‘weirdonymous’, ‘chasing the noumenon’ (2003), ‘wordonymous’, ‘wordominous’, ‘the-ominous-imagination’, revelling in vulnerability (2004), ‘a woven fire-wall of words’, ‘the synchronised shards of random truth and fiction’, ‘nemoguity’, ‘vexed texture of text’, ‘fictipathy’, ‘nemotion’, ‘the hawler’, ‘the angel megazanthus’, ‘klaxon city’, ‘horrorism’ when used as a word for the philosophy of horror fiction (2005), ‘publication-on-reading’, ‘antipodal angst’, ‘the tenacity of feathers’, ‘a writer’s mandala’, ‘wordy weird’, ‘nemophilia / nemophobia’, ‘magic fiction’ as the obverse of the more common expression ‘magic realism’, ‘weirdtongue’ as the ‘name’ of a language, ‘Glistenberry’ as an alternative name for ‘Glastonbury’, ‘tonguage’ as a ‘conscious’ language, ‘yester-eggs’ as a term for Proustian ‘selves’, ‘the parthenogenesis of reality from artifice’, ‘all is for the pest in the pest of all worlds’, ‘Baffles’ as fables with muffled morals (2006), ‘fanblade fable’, ‘abutting the if’, ‘word clones / word clowns’, ‘bumps for books’, ‘rite of review’, ‘cone zero’, ‘a basket of coinages’ (2007), ‘small press cover ark(ive), the baser pulps’ ‘orrorfaces’, ‘the wheel culture’, ‘netogenic’, the first fiction about a ‘drogulus’, ‘Innerskull’, ‘meganthus‘ (2008), ‘CERN Zoo’ in literature, ‘Real-Time Reviewing‘, ‘ligottum‘, ‘the pit and the pessimum‘, ‘ligottus‘, ‘fubbcuckle’, ‘extraneity creep’, ‘pillowghost’, ‘intowards’, ‘powderghost’, ‘nightmare’s moat’ (2009), ‘THE TENSES’, ‘scream munch’ as another word for ‘captcha’, ‘skight’ – threepenny bit, ‘invitations from within’, ‘novellatory’, ’Ress’, ‘Venn Dreams’, ‘Tearsheet Doll’, scanbuncle, A Götterdämmerung of Guts , Holistic Horror (2010), SFtopia, Salustraders / Overspacers, Novellarette, Inquel, Gaddafery, Jungian autonymity, sudracide, an impesto novel, trendbaffler, our planet as reliquary, fictionatronics, Lovecraftianisation, “To know the worst is also to know the best“, vignellarette, “Nothing is controlled by logic other than logic itself.”, nightgators, Horror Genreators, dicksplay, roman littoral, ghostalt, poltergeistalt, horrasy, Horrasy: The Horrastic and the Heuristic, srednibution, srednidipity, Lovecraftian indescriptivities, bememorise, alephantiasis, reva-menders, metapomorphic, rarifiction, neoloquism, Was the God Particle born instable? (2011), angelivalent, literal-meaning dreaming, the ‘Higgs boson’ of Horror, The Weirdonomicon, Aickmania, shortcomings harnessed are stronger than strengths unused, privacy-trawler, disarming strangeness in connection with Robert Aickman, Fiction is like currency: belief is everything, oblique concomitant / oblique contaminant, age at the edge, A writer should make clouds shine even if the world’s sun has gone, The Call of the Silly, pastilential, eschairtology, e-born, read-tangler, ghorror, the authorial cloud, grosmance, quixotiose, most placating is playacting, ‘friendly fire’ fiction, dilemmachination, absurface, aeontonomous, HobbYiSt / Hobbit, aeontonomy, Horror Without Victims, fuckerlode, Earkth, Pronoun Horror, The Ives of November, PreMonday-ition, NoV – No Victims, an amid-life crisis, God created Ground in His own image by adding ‘run’ to His name, Old boots are always better than no boots, truth is never brash, End tring, Tendring is Trending, HorNET Nest, The empty future expects our arrival soon, if you fit, wear yourself, The Worldwide Cliff (2012), quantitative kamikaze, The Ohm Resistor of Literature, Only real books can be left anonymously on chairs, The Sibling Thing (as monster), lachrymonics, Cold Sororist, Gangster Gongsters, Cathrian, Cathrianity, Cathrechism, the optimum delusion, dogstone as a form of ‘found sculpture’, iDEATH as a form of internet implosion of self, Judge me on my works, not on my request thus to judge me, dyschronous recurrence, Belarhombus, the Palimp’s Zest, abseil-surdity, paradoxilogically, Devolved Fiction, fratrinity, bock-hide, the Ligottian lurch, denouement or deligottiment, Does a Seraph suffer from Harpes?, AickMANN, RTRcausal, irrealoscopic, a Myth Pitch, Versionary SF. (2013).
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