Maggie's Farm

From Dalrymple's Destructive Creation:

...aesthetics are not science: aesthetics do not show the same inbuilt tendency to improvement. From the aesthetic point of view what comes after is not necessarily better than what went before, and is often worse, even much worse. Particularly in an age of progress, however, men are reluctant to admit that they cannot do better than their forebears; to admit it is to admit the heresy that beauty’s arrow, unlike that of time, does not fly in one direction only. A return to the pattern or design of the past – dismissed as pastiche, the worst of all architectural crimes, far worse than destroying an immemorial townscape – would indicate a deficiency of imagination, inventiveness and originality, all the qualities that make the artist, at least in the romantic conception of the artist. And architects, in their own conception, are above all artists: artists, moreover, when it is widely believed that the purpose of art is to challenge, to question, to transgress, never to celebrate, to harmonise, to console, to give meaning.

It's all interesting, but I think Dalrymple's larger point is that, in life, unpleasant things: poverty, ugliness, cruelty, dishonesty, etc. are the default settings. Special qualities are required to move the dial above the default setting, whether for an individual or for a society.

But back to the arts: there is no "progress" in arts. Just changes of fashion.

I greatly enjoy contemplating urban issues. As someone who grew up frequenting NYC, I suppose my bias is towards the high-density, mixed-use (ie residential and commerce combined), mix of very old and brand-new buildings, and the mixed-use (ie residential and commerce combined) environment that makes downtown New York such a vibrant and constantly interesting place, day and night. The city that never sleeps.

If I could afford a pied a terre there, I would do it. (The only reason NYC real estate is so high is because of government controls.) Take the elevator down, say Hi to the doorman, walk seven blocks to a neighborhood French bistro or your favorite pub past all the people taking their dogs for a walk. Nice way of life. New Yorkers are skinny because they walk everywhere - including to work in the morning. Well, subway if it's over a mile I suppose but it depends on the person.

Here's the article: Houston Rising—Why the Next Great American Cities Aren’t What You Think - While urbanists and developers tout the oldest and priciest American cities, they ignore or deplore the real growth that’s happening in more spread-out urban newbies, writes demographer Joel Kotkin. 

Listening to music while drinking. Charming.

Not many people read poems these days, unless they happen to also be song lyrics. Without the lyre, poetry must make its own music somehow. Furthermore, poetry is written to be heard, not read. Just as with Shakespeare's plays, the words on paper are dead and only voice can bring them to life.

(The reading of Milton's classic On Time on Dr. Merc's sim-gaming post here this morning is a perfect example.)

Here at Maggie's, we have always posted a Saturday Verse, with the general advice to read them out loud. One poem per week, like one masterpiece of art, is about all most people can or are willing to process. We might be tempted to read more poetry if they were Juvenal writing poems from the standpoint of a Roman switch-hitting prostitute servicing both his master and his master's wife to good and profitable effect. The wife first, one might hope.

Via Never Yet Melted's Contemporary Poetry: High-Minded and Evolved, a fine mini-essay by David Yezzi: The Bitter Fool.

I was chatting, this weekend, about how trolleys became obsolete when cars and buses developed. Buses are far more flexible, subways are quicker, and people love their cars. The Model T killed the trolley. With car traffic, trolleys are not much faster than walking. I have to admit, though, that the trolleys - and subways - in Vienna are great and easy for a tourist to figure out. However, Vienna has little car traffic.

I missed this one: Was the Rise of Car Ownership Responsible for the Midcentury Homeownership Boom in the US?

I heard this fellow Tom Corley interviewed on the radio last week. He studies the life habits of prosperous people compared to less prosperous people.

He said nothing surprising. For a few examples, he said the prosperous tend to delay gratification, exercise, set life goals, make life plans, volunteer, severely restrict their kids' TV and computer time, set examples of hard work and self-discipline for their kids, to be constructive with their time, and to be frugal except in matters of health and charity.

Sounds old-fashioned, doesn't it? Socio-cultural-character tendencies. These things have not made me rich, but they have made my life better. People tease me about my frugality, but I am never frugal about truly life-enriching things and I hate being slothful. God did not make me to sit on my butt.

Name, and date of birth if possible, please.

This beauty was parked next to us in the Lincoln Center parking lot tonight. We went in with friends to see the Nederlands Dance Co. on one of their very rare visits to the US, at the David A. Koch Theater. All 3 performances were sold out, unsurprisingly, but we got lucky.

On the drive home, Mrs. BD delivered a fine exposition, on our demand, of what the intentions were of their new choreographer team (splaining that it was less about rhythm and more like talking in movement). Their 20-person troupe is remarkably skilled. Then the topic of Sophie Guillam somehow came up, so after that she waxed eloquent about Sophie Guillam's performance in Sleeping Beauty with the Royal Ballet, which she had taken a BD daughter to see in NYC a few years ago. Our daughter had said to her Mom in the lobby - "Mom - Look! There's a real Princess." Her Mom said "No, sweetie, somebody just dressed up for the opening," and then turned and looked and saw it was Princess Margaret dressed in princess clothes to the nines, jewels, tiara, and a long green gown with a couple of attendants and guards.

Daughter had just thrown a sun dress over her wet bathing suit, rushing from swim team practice, never having combed her wet hair. She certainly felt underdressed. It seems that was an immortal performance because Guillam could do things with Sleeping Beauty that nobody else alive could do. Guillam later switched to modern dance because she became bored with her mastery of Ballet technique and wanted new expressive challenges.

We had a nice seafood supper first at the Atlantic Grill down the street from Lincoln Center.

NYC is always a blast for us, a jolt of vitality, a change of pace.

I always thought the legal part was the least of it, but we all know well what can happen when government sticks its nose into things. This is pretty good: 

Canada's Precedent in Legalizing Same-Sex Marriage: Is There Any Valid Reasons to Be Against Gay Nuptial

A quote:

If homosexuals and heterosexuals are really “equal” before the law, then logically heterosexual marriage must collapse into being little more than a legal construct as well. Indeed, marriage and family become mere adjuncts of the state after the removal of the de facto conditions that make the traditional family a pre-political institution in the first place. No longer is family something that, in the words of Douglas Farrow, “precedes and exceeds the state.” No longer is the family a hedge against the totalitarian aspirations of the state because no longer is the family prior to the state.

A good memoriam for Ebert.

He was good fun until he turned political.

I recently saw an interesting movie. Strangers On A Train. Hitchcock, 1950. Film noir.  I wondered what Roger might have said about it.

Sleeping Venus by Paul Delvaux (1944), via My Daily Art Display

I am halfway through Helprin's* latest novel, In Sunlight and in Shadow. I've read most of his novels.

It's a love story in New York, but also has been described as a love song to New York. I think he also approached it as a chance to put all of his thoughts about what life is about into the words of his protagonist. Thus sometimes he lapses into "telling" instead of "depicting."  His protagonist is Harry Copeland, a Jewish NYC leather goods manufacturer just returned from WW 2 who falls in love with an enormously wealthy and social WASP heiress.

Unlike his (I think) masterpiece, Soldier of the Great War, the new book could have used some vigorous editing but, like all of his stuff, worth the read because he is a very smart and observant fellow who just can't resist throwing all of his thoughts in there.

Helprin has an impressive and interesting bio. He had many adventures in life before settling down to write stories (and political commentary on the side). That's the best way to do it.

I like the detail that he does most of the manual labor on his farm in Virginia.

(* Note: Not to be confused with Mark Halperin, the Time Magazine politico)