When Novels Mattered
Important article by David Brooks in NY Times.
He writes: I’m old enough to remember when novelists were big-time. When I was in college in the 1980s, new novels from Philip Roth, Toni Morrison, Saul Bellow, John Updike, Alice Walker and others were cultural events. There were reviews and counter-reviews and arguments about the reviews.
It’s not just my nostalgia that’s inventing this. In the mid- to late 20th century, literary fiction attracted huge audiences. If you look at the Publisher’s Weekly list of best-selling novels of 1962, you find works by Katherine Anne Porter, Herman Wouk and J.D. Salinger. The next year you find books by Mary McCarthy and John O’Hara. From a recent Substack essay called “The Cultural Decline of Literary Fiction” by Owen Yingling, I learned that E.L. Doctorow’s “Ragtime” was the best-selling book of 1974, Roth’s “Portnoy’s Complaint” was the best-selling book of 1969, Vladimir Nabokov’s “Lolita” was No. 3 in 1958 and Boris Pasternak’s “Doctor Zhivago” was No. 1.
Movies, Phantasy
In the past couple of weeks, I’ve been reading more and more alarmed voices calling for a moratorium on the development of advanced AI models. Even researchers who were previously enthusiastic about the positive potential of AI are growing concerned that we may be stumbling into building systems that could turn against humanity—like in one of those sci-fi movies where robots either enslave humanity or wipe us out entirely. Indeed, I just ready a study that expert on AI are more concerned that AI can harm humanity than the general public. Companion
Diary, Politics, Humor, People, Situations
The stock market lost 10% in two days after Trump announced his across-the-board tariffs on all imports into the United States. Yesterday, Elon Musk departed from the Trump administration’s insistence that everything is fine. The first big wedge between Trump and Musk seems to have appeared. See his video message to Italy’s far-right party congress. I am not quite sure how I should classify this on my blog. Humor? Elon Musk is for free trade between USA and Europe
Movies, Drama
Early on in watching Anora, I had the idea that this was a remake of Pretty Woman with a lot more skin than my grandmother would’ve appreciated. But the film then moved far away from a romantic comedy when the friends of the Russian billionaire’s son, Ivan, who plays the Richard Gere character in this film, learn about rumors that Ivan has tied the knot with a hooker. What a shame on the family! Apparently, the billionaire’s parents have given an associate in New York the task of keeping the spoiled son out of trouble.Anora
The film has three parts. The first one takes an attractive, American hooker and a charming young Russian billionaire and seemingly makes them fall in love with each other, although that is not what both of them had planned. In the second part, the adult supervision of Ivan is trying to make this love undone, and the third part I’m not revealing here because I don’t want to spoil your movie-watching experience.
Movies, Documentary
In all the videos I’ve seen about Chris Martin, the lead singer and creative force behind Coldplay, I always get the sense that he is a very nice chap. Some months ago, I discovered that a documentary about the band’s 20th anniversary in 2018 had been released. Watching it, you get the sense that the other three members are also very nice human beings. What makes them nice, in my book, is that none of them are particularly confrontational, so arguing about which songs should go on an album is hard for them, and I can relate to this. Watching a documentary about a successful band gives us the wrong impression that somehow the band’s success was preordained because they had superior skills. But as I found out in college, any band that plays on a college campus on a Saturday sounds amazingly good, and becoming a world-famous band involves a considerable degree of luck. When Chris Martin formed the band with the other members, he already had big plans for becoming very successful, and they are clearly among the few bands that can fill stadiums.Coldplay Documentary “Head Full of Dreams”