I was inclined to pick up this book based on Karen Healey’s quick review on her LiveJournal (you’ll have to scroll down to find it in the list):
It’s about the difficulty of hope, how terrible things happen for no reason, how the mechanics of poverty and oppression keep great people down, how they can be combated, and how faith – of many kinds, including in one’s God, in one’s self, and in one’s friends and allies – can be maintained, lost, regained, and blaze like a beacon for others. There’s barely any hints of romance.
Unfortunately, for me, it’s told in 1st person point-of-view, and i’ve found that with 1st person you have to actually like the narrator’s voice well enough to keep on. And i didn’t. Perhaps if i’d pressed on i’d have gotten past Amber’s irritating narrative stylings, but these days i don’t waste more time on a book than i have to. Sorry, book!
I don’t have much to say about “Sherlock Holmes.” I’ve never read any of the works by Conan Doyle (tho’ i think i’ve read versions for kids when i was in school) and i’m not even sure i’ve seen a full episode of any previous versions of Sherlock Holmes. I have picked up enough about Holmes from popular culture to be fascinated by the character, but i’ll admit that i was really only interested in seeing this version because i was interested to see what Ritchie would do with such a fascinating character. Also, Robert Downey Jr. and Jude Law are pretty.
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“Komaneko” came out in 2006 in Japan. I got to see it last november at The Grand Illusion Cinema, and this year Andy got it for me as one of my birthday presents.
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It is difficult to adequately wrap-up this book because i read it slowly over a 2-month period. Perhaps that’s the 1st thing to say about it: This is not the sort of memoir that i was able to breeze thru’ because it was engaging and consuming and whisked me away.
This is a very, very thinky memoir. Rothenberg is analyzing and deconstructing the framework of her personal history while she is recounting it. The thoughtfulness of her narrative is very rich and dense, and i found it somewhat hard going at times.
That said, i think her memoir has the potential to be a very important piece to understanding the institutional nature of racism, classism, and sexism. I found it helpful to have someone note the framework of these -isms every step of the way as they told the story of their own life. Tho’ i think that it will speak best to people who have grown up under similar circumstances: white, educated, middle-to-upper-middle class.
(Note: Rothenberg does touch on why she writes about herself as white altho’ she is the child of Orthodox Jewish parents.)
There were instances where i wished Rothenberg would have more thoroughly investigated her class privilege — for example, in the last chapter where she speaks about her love of travel and how much of it she’s done. I also distinctly remember the phrase “dead-end job” that leaped out and startled me with its implicit classist assumptions.
Overall, tho’, i would still give this a recommendation for people who are interested in an examination of how race, class, and gender can impact an individual life.
I think Andy and i have been borrowing this DVD from a co-worker for almost 2 years now. I don’t now why it’s taken me so long to watch it.
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We wanted to watch a Kurosawa, but i didn’t want one of his evening-eating epics. Hence “The Men Who Tread on the Tiger’s Tail,” which clocks in at a brisk 58 minutes.
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