Memex 1.1
The great John Naughton shares my frustration with corporate slogans. As he points out, consultants are paid huge wodges of money for this dross – you wonder why the companies concerned never seem to follow up by asking their clients if the slogans made an impression.
Curtis Bowman: Theodore Dalrymple
Here’s an interesting blog piece (what IS the word for a small section of a blog? – entry perhaps?) on Theodore Dalrymple (who would have guessed that’s a pseudonym?) whose writings I have often been intrigued by. Curtis Bowman is not unsympathetic, but objects to TD’s dogmatism. I know what he means, but on the other hand, TD bases his observations on years of empirical evidence. He writes about what he comes across on a daily basis as a prison doctor – and it is a catalogue of, mainly, bottomless stupidity. Dalrymple often shows, as he does in the passage quoted by Bowman, how these people seem incapable of helping themselves, and simply drift from one disastrous – I was going to write “decision” but the point is they don’t make decisions – one disastrous scenario to another. They are passive observers of their own downfall. What concerns me is the fate of their children. These kids have no chance to grow up as reasonable members of a civil society. The right wing press, and some police spokesmen, I’ve noticed, have taken to calling them “feral children” and one can see where they get that idea. Schools are routinely blamed for the problem, though, as I remember wearily pointing out to people more than once when I was a schoolteacher, you can’t do much with kids who don’t attend school.
The underclass that Bowman refers to is, literally, reproducing itself, and I worry about where it will lead.
Trouble is, this makes me sound like a Daily Mail reading reactionary. I’m not. None of the mainstream British parties is leftwing enough for me. Still, though, I can’t see how current policies – if we can dignify the short term opportunism and soundbites of the main parties with that term – can do anything to address the problem of the breakdown in civil society.
Guardian Unlimited | The Guardian | Nothing but the truth
More here from Jonathan Coe on BS Johnson. Coe makes the point that Johnson used the novel as a form, which might contain anything, including autobiography. The novel, in this view, doesn’t have to be fiction. In that sense, Johnson compares to the early heroes of the genre, who went to great lengths to present their writing as if it were a true account of real events, mostly from an autobiographical viewpoint. Defoe’s Moll Flanders is the most notable example.
Coe also places Johnson in the modernist tradition, rather than the postmodernist. It’s true that many writers routinely labelled postmodern look very much like classic modernists when you get down to cases. Johnson’s innovations, startling though they still seem, are nothing compared to Finnegans Wake or Flann O’Brien’s At-Swim-Two-Birds.
This modernist / postmodernist dilemma might be easily resolved if we all just decided that the modernist era hadn’t really finished, that modernist tendencies had just developed. Then postmodernism, in literature anyway, would disappear – which would be a very postmodern gesture…
Guardian Unlimited Books | Special Reports | Top prize for biography of writer who won no glory
This is good to see. The Samuel Johnson Prize has been awarded to the obscenely talented Jonathan Coe for his biography of the almost forgotten – but not now – experimental novelist of the sixties, BS Johnson. His work is uncategorisable, really, and he was writing at a time when Kingsley Amis was considered daring. I hope the recognition that this biography has been given will see a revival in Johnson’s fortunes. Maybe his books will stay in print long enough for me to set them as class reading for my postmodernism module…
On the way to work today, I overtook a lorry with the legend: “Rawlings Transport – keeping it real”. I don’t know where to begin on this – “keeping it real” was what hippies in Haight Ashbury did in 1967. Why a transport company – sorry, logistics solutions provider – should feel the urge to keep it real is beyond me, and, I suspect, them. I imagine the MD has a tragic pony tail.
Arriving in the bustling heartland of West Lancs, I was confronted with a sign for the upcoming Ormskirk street festival, which is being sold under the tag “Ormskirk Comes Alive”. Hmmm – does this confirm, as many people think, that it’s usually dead? Uncomfortably close to the Royston Vasey slogan, methinks.
The OU’s new expensive advertising campaign campaign hit the TV screens last night. The slogan they’ve gone with is “Powering People”, which makes it sound like they’ll be plugging students into the National Grid. This might not be such a bad thing, on reflection…
Even so, there’s an ever-rising number of these mindless taglines, and I suspect I’ll be returning to them in the future.
The Observer | Business | John Naughton: Log into the confessional, my son
Interesting article from John Naughton, whose Observer column is always worth a read. I hadn’t heard of this peculiarly named Vannavar Bush before, but he seems to have had some far-sighted ideas. The idea of association was, of course, very much part of the modernists’ armoury in novels such as Joyce’s Ulysses. In fact, Molly Bloom’s soliloquy at the end of the novel is nothing more than an extended exercise in associative thinking. Yes and yes…
Guy Fawkes’ blog of parliamentary plots, rumours and conspiracy
Came across this blog by accident. I’m obviously not keeping up very well, since it’s clearly a pretty famous blog. Entertaining, intelligent and, as the Grauniad says, incendiary in places.
Unsurprisingly, Guido doesn’t have a full profile, so I wonder who he is. Obviously London-based, and clearly someone with insider knowledge. Maybe a media hack? My left-wing sensibilities were a little disturbed to see that it was named blog of the year by the Adam Smith insitute, and a line in the Guardian calls Guido a “Tory boy”- but from what I can see he’s equally withering about politicos of all persuasions. Good stuff.
Guardian Unlimited | Guardian daily comment | Degree devaluation, from Lucky Jim to Average Joe
Much food for thought in this article. What Jackie Ashley doesn’t go into is the “university as lifestyle choice” brigade. These students are interested in the parties and the fun, but not the work. Two anecdotes to underline this: I confronted a very elusive student recently, who is currently enrolled again as a first year having failed his first year last year. I said that, since he hardly ever attended classes, hadn’t submitted any coursework, and had made precisely zero contribution to the course, that he could hardly be classed as a student. He was extremely annoyed, and told me that he most definitely was a student, “because I’ve paid my fees.” So that’s all right, then. Another student, who has managed to spend four years completing(full time) two years’ worth of study, told me she wouldn’t be choosing my third year module next year. I asked why, and she told me that she couldn’t because it was on a Thursday. When I looked blank, she explained, as if to a mental defective, that Wednesday night was traditionally the night for getting completely wasted in the student bar, so Thursdays were simply not possible. I’m not holding my breadth for her graduation…
This link will show you a picture of Boris, our excellent male cat, companion of Phoebe. He likes being upside down, and is therefore a good mascot for Topsyturvydom. He also features on my profile – why would you want a picture of me?