It’s term I encountered in the book I’m currently reading, the book is about coffee houses, the culture, and in the first portion of the text, there’s a great deal of English history. I was sleepy when I was drifting through the English history section, getting parts of it confused with Shakespeare history, and Neal Stephenson’s Quicklsilver trilogy, as there are overlapping parts, histories and figures.
I’m certainly not a part of the great “free speech leftist web writers” group, or, for that matter, the right wingers, either. Due to being in Austin, and me with long hair, it’s generally assumed that I’m some kind of a liberal. Which I am, to a point, but let’s not carried away with the politics. What intrigued my with the coffee house debate, and some of the political maneuvering/wrangling discussed, was just that. In the late 17th century, just as coffee houses were emerging as a focal point for political discussion, just as the masses were reaching that critical point about the ability to discuss what their government was doing, there were proclamations issued as an attempt to regulate (read: staunch the flow) of liberal ink.
What struck me, though, was the corollary between various raging left and right wing writers, wars being fought on web pages, assailing everything from the TV wasteland to the current Republican regime.
One of the premier-published-proto diarist is Pepys. Ten years of history, in excruciating detail, who’s doing what to whom, and what he’s thinking about, what was for dinner, and how’s the wife? He’s referenced in the coffee house book as well as a cameo appearance in Stephenson’s novel.
Tie this to the web? It’s matter of understanding the precedents, and that’s why the gloss of English history through the lens of the coffee house culture was good.
The other side of the point, though has a lot less to do with politics and web pages, and lot more to do with what was happening with me. I finished the year out, finally wrote the last couple of scopes, in a fine fashion, I’d like to think, and that made me feel better. And that’s where the term came into play for me.
One year done. Or, better yet, another year done. I was no sooner done with December, though, than I was casting a scope for January, getting ready, as it were. Then, I started to fill in the template I’ll use for another year, just a text file, or, more precisely, a separate text file for each week, starting on Thursdays.
Which was why I liked that word, “prorogue,” although, its definition has nothing to do with writing. I’m out-of-session as of now, but I’m not disbanded.
What’s always fun, a sure sign of goodness, is that I’m ready to tackle those January scopes now, with renewed vigor and ideas.
Final thoughts:
The image was some graffiti along the First Street Bridge. The city is good about cleaning that up, fairly quickly, but there does seem to be an artist or two who strive to add art where art might not be meant to be. Which makes it highly ephemeral, in some respects.
Stay tuned, that will probably show up as a more fully developed thought – in a January horoscope. But that image, there’s the source.
I’m not sure if I should be listening to Wayne Hancock’s “87 Southbound,” alternatively done by Hank Williams III, but it is all about heading “south to San Antone.” Doobie Brothers’ “China Grove”? I can’t think of a song that sings about Randolph Air Force Base, down the street from where I’ll be.
There’s something decidedly less romantic and less of an image about watching pairs of T-38’s landing. It’s not like they are majestic planes, just pilots, learning to fly.
One of the first items that caught my attention Thursday morning was a year-end list.
It’s a little early to be doing a year-end list, but if I had to pick just one or two items from the last year? I’ve pretty much quit listening to the radio, so music is more of an iffy proposition. Two albums stand out, though, one is the Fat Boy Slim’s Palookaville, and the other is Robert Earl Keen’s What I Really Mean.
The addendum to the REK note, easily goes one step beyond a single album, although, and here’s that list idea again, one of my favorite pieces of his work is Live #2 Dinner.
July 4th was REK at the ballpark, then September was REK at Floores Country Store. The July 4th event was forgettable (not a baseball person) except that REK did perform, and he did perform well, and he did perform the “The Great Hank,” which, is a truly weird kind of a song, and one that I love. But it’s for people who like history, poetry, spoken word, and understand internal Texas references – certainly not a song with mass appeal. Just to make the song better, I was in a little place that would like to think itself a dive – it’s not, but thanks for asking – wherein, just like the song, the Astro’s were silently beating… never mind, it was just like the song, that’s all.
The point about seeing REK at Floores, though, that was a personal history, like, some people want to climb mountains, some people want to jump out of airplanes? Since I’ve found Live #2 to be one of the best albums of all time, in my personal collection, I was particularly gratified to see the artist, the venue, the weather, all come together.
Besides, that show officially kicked off the Xmas season, “It’s a rule, if you sing a song about a fish, you have to sing a song about Christmas,” or something like that, was the stage banter.
Merry Christmas from the Family.
Books:
One of my guilty pleasures is reading. In that vein, Tim Dorsey (Aquarius), live and in person, plus any one of his novels is a good read. As an author, he’s taken the “Florida Wacko Crime Thriller” genre to a new level, and I’m glad about that. Along those lines, Bill Fitzhugh (Libra), doing it to the South, and finally, up and coming Dripping Springs native, Ben Rehder (Leo), as his work continues to improve and entertain. San Antonio native and favored (Gemini) son, Rick Riordan is also worth watching, as there’s always that extra layer added to his texts. However, all of this material is purely escapist reading for me, just basic crime thrillers. I’ve got to give Tim Doresy the nod for over-the-top characters, and the two Texas authors for breaking into a tough category. And thanks to Bill Fitzhugh for the sound track (the south will rise again?)
From my reading list, two other books stand out, separate and apart, and quite unrelated, for style, action, plot, and even some poetic/lyrical language, Cormac McCarthy’s No Country for Old Men stuck with me. The red cover doesn’t hurt, either, but it’s a bloody, good book. Most of the high-brow lit types will give it a miss. Doubt it will make many “best of 2005” lists, and that’s their loss.
The other item that I so enjoyed reading was The Truth Will Out, superior academic sleuthing on a cold, cold trail, trying to piece together who Shakespeare really was. Fact or fiction? Coincidence? Almost conclusive evidence, when weighed in the authors’ examples. In the past, I’ve always stayed away from the authorship question, but I have to admit, it’s a good case and an excellently argued position.
What’s noticeably missing from this last year? Science Fiction. Used to be my favorite category, but these days, I’m less enthralled with it. I can think of a handful of authors I’d like to see new books from, but so far, I haven’t seen anything that’s truly piqued my curiosity in that area. Not lately, or, by keeping track of what I’ve been reading, nothing in the last year. Neal Stephenson, William Gibson and Bruce Sterling are authors that were once classified as “science fiction,” but anymore, their work is less SF and more just speculative fiction, a larger genre. Or mainstream, even. As an adjunct, the “sword and sorcery” sub-category within Science Fiction? Just never really cut it with me.
