The 18th Poetry Challenge is to write a poem that functions both aesthetically and as an interpretation or critical analysis of a character from classical fiction. Any character appearing only in works published before 1923 is acceptable. Pressing on!
And now something completely different for our poetry lovers. Marc Blitzstein: The Airborne Symphony: http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLUSRfoOcUe4Y6ZlodlhVEjvqTJ7cf-fI8
Originally posted on Palestinian Chanter:
I am very excited to write my first blog-on-demand entry 🙂 I’m so happy to see more people reading the blog and even happier to…
I’m quite happy today. Someone was getting rid of their Finale 2008 software and was willing to part with it for a mere $70.00 on Amazon. I snatched it up. Despite claiming to be for both Mac and PC, It refused to install on my Macbook Pro (a laptop I’m borrowing from school) but installed beautifully on our extra PC, a used machine we picked up a while back for $80.00 so that Ian could play games while we were using our regular PC. It hasn’t seen much use since… Read more Hurrah! →
What is good poetry? I’ve been saying that good poetry possesses poetic virtues and I’ve been busy naming them and talking about how to recognize and balance them. However, Josh suggests a shortcut, which is to find out who would pay what price for which poem. In other words, if poetry has value, people will be willing to exchange other value for it. In our society the only large market I can see for poetry is popular songs. As I continue to listen to country music (and get a lot… Read more Josh’s Bright Idea →
Art despises us and we despise art. At least, this is true of everything that we have been taught to call art. I’ve more or less come to believe that film is our own true art form, the artistic language of our present society. Film is the one form that nearly everyone in our society interacts with. Not everyone reads books, and fewer and fewer people look at paintings or listen to music. True dancing by itself is a curiosity. The examples that are being made have been divided into… Read more Film Is Our Art →
Byzantine Chant is stark for a reason; it eliminates all the excess in the music and cuts to the core. Constantine Cavarnos has written of its “inner essence…its pureness…its mystical quality, its power of evoking contriction.” One may compare harmonizing chant to colorizing Ansel Adam’s photography. It may add visual richness, but there is a unique beauty found in his black and white photography: starkness, definition, and clarity. There is a contrast between light and shadow, which disappears when the element of color is added. Furthermore, there is a link… Read more Furthermore, There Is A Link Between Byzantine Chant and Iconography →
I finally finished The Monk of Mount Athos. It is not the sort of book that it’s wise to gobble up at a sitting, though I could have done so as it is rather short. It’s more like the Gospel, that you can slowly absorb a few paragraphs at a time. Needless to say, and no insult intended, I recommend it. Johnny and I are memorizing the Paschal Troparion in Greek. That is, I’ve already done so, and the more I sing it, the more Johnny is able to sing… Read more Update →
Slow Literature 