Reviews of books, movies, CDs, whatever.
I finally got around to watching Season 8 Episode 1 (“Deep Breath”) of the revived Doctor Who. It’s the first one with Peter Capaldi as the Doctor. (What do we call him, anyway? Is he the 12th Doctor, even though we know that Matt Smith‘s 11 was really the twelfth?) So it’s probably worth a few words.
Warning: This will be rife with spoilers for which there will be no further apology.
Today (2014 May 23) is the 20th anniversary of the airing of “All Good Things…”, the final episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation. It cannot be denied that this series is directly responsible for the resurgence of American sci-fi on television – without the Enterprise-D, there would have been no Babylon 5, no Stargate, no reimagined Battlestar Galactica. Without the evidence that “geek culture” could make real money, there might well have been no Dark Night, no Lord of the Rings (movies), no Game of Thrones (series), no Avengers assembled.
Watching it again, I was surprised how well this episode holds up as a capstone to an amazing series. Sure, there are glitches – the anomaly grows larger in the past, except when it doesn’t, after being created by tachyon pulses emitted by three Enterprises except one of them was the Pasteur. But that’s just nitpicking. The key to Trek has never been the technobabble. It’s been the intricate interplay between sharply-drawn characters who wear their humanity on their sleeve, and the ineffable possibilities of existence itself. And ST:TNG still had that ineluctable optimism that characterized the original. It had hope in the stars and hope in us. As much as I enjoy the grittier fare we generally get these days, I will admit to missing that simple faith in the future.
Saturday 12 Noon
Panelist: Merav Hoffman (duh)
I don’t attend a lot of readings, because I generally prefer reading things at my own pace. I don’t find the timbre of the author all that engaging. On the other hand, Merav was a very welcoming presence at my first Lunacon and I wanted to make sure I at least caught her to say Hi, and this seemed a good time to do so.
I came in at the tail end of someone else’s reading, and I can’t really comment on it. Then, after a few minutes’ break, Merav asked us “Dogs or elephants?” Apparently she writes childrens’ stories and had two ready to go. The common consensus was, dogs.
Ironically, she then read a story of hers called (I think) “Circus”, but it wasn’t about a circus, it was about a dog named Circus. (It did also have acrobats in it.) It was sweet and simple, and flowed really smoothly. I was reminded of the Bard writing group at Hun, back when that was a going concern. (Part of me wonders if it would be worth reviving in some form.)
After “Circus”, she also read a reinterpretation of Rapunzel, or rather, a sequel of sorts. Almost as an aside, Merav mentioned that the origin of Cinderella lies in a story from China, which I had never heard.
A propos of nothing, I also have to comment on the surreality of the con: While Merav was reading about Rapunzel, a troop of Star Wars stormtroopers loped past the open door.
I’ve sort of blown the deadline on my 30 Days of Marc Cohn, but I can at least offer up this playlist. 🙂
I suspect I’m about to draw down the wrath of the Internet on me, but I finally saw The Hunger Games (the first one) and I’m simply not impressed.
Spoilers and such.
So Doctor Who has been bopping around time, space, and the BBC for 50 years now, and the Beeb put on a very special 50th anniversary episode. My thoughts below. And, to quote a certain archeologist: SPOILERS
So, that’s a bit of a tease, isn’t it? Lots to think about in the season 7 finale of Doctor Who, but first, as River might say, Spoilers! (There’s a recap available at tv.com.)
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“Rest for the Weary”
The Rainy Season
One of the things I like about Marc Cohn is that his songs aren’t all about finding, having, and losing the girl. Every album includes very personal songs that nonetheless seem to be universal. I’m also struck by how well his songs, without generally being all that upbeat, convey a certain subtle, almost unreasonable, hopefulness. More than optimism, it’s faith that, despite all appearances, there is something wonderful in even the most mundane times.
For a while this song was a touchstone in my life. It doesn’t really reflect any details of my personal history but I was very moved by the thought that someday, there will be rest for the weary. I think it’s both telling and fantastic that he passes by “love for the lonely” so quickly and dwells on “rest for the weary”. A lot of the time, that’s what we hope for: Not a surplus of joy but a cessation of struggle — just quiet time to enjoy life and life’s blessings.
I hope there was some laughter
Cause I know there were some tears
That is just an amazing line. It captures the whole arc of a family’s life. It’s also genuinely sad, in that he knows there were tears but he is unsure of the laughter.
Now I’m just another traveler
On another winding road
I’m trying to walk some kind of line
I’m trying to pull some kind of load
Now sometimes I move real easy
Sometimes I can’t catch my breath
Sometimes I see my father’s footsteps
And man it scares me half to death
These are the lines that made the song resonate with me. No child of suicide can ever think about his parent’s death without wondering, at least once, if there’s any difference — if the same siren song will call out. You try to understand but at the same time, you fear understanding. You don’t want to think the choice was senseless, but you don’t want it to make sense, either. And you always worry, in some corner of your mind, that you might have made the same choice, that you might still. For me, it’s never been a strong urge but I know that I shy away from thinking about my father’s death in part for this reason.
Although it probably wasn’t written that way, this is why the song is hopeful, for me: It gives voice to a hope I have, which is that after everything, my father found peace and rest.
“Girl of Mysterious Sorrow”
Burning the Daze
I’ll make a confession. I did not get, at first, that this song was about graveside remembrance. In fact I felt quite clever to figure it out. Listening to it again, it now seems pretty obvious and I was just dense the first time around. There is cleverness in the song, in that he never comes out and says he’s at a graveside, but it really isn’t as subtle as I had thought. In any event, it seems clear now that this is a part of his Missing Mother triptych (along with “Ghost Train” and “Momma’s in the Moon”). It would be trite to comment that losing one’s mother, especially when young, will be a formative experience that naturally influences everything else that comes in life. It’s no surprise that he’s moved repeatedly to engage with that loss on every album. Here he tackles head-on the lack of answers to questions he never had the chance to ask.
I’m coming to see you, tomorrow sometime
Gonna bring you some roses, gonna tear off the vines
Gonna talk to the wind that blows through the trees
Kiss you like always from down on my knees
Gonna ask you some questions, get no replies
Wipe all the tears, falling down from my eyes
‘Cause the one that I wanted, I never could know
I think I was misled because I was still in my literal stage of lyric comprehension. I probably should have remembered that roses grow in bushes, not on vines, and thus the second line is about clearing a tombstone. The first of many heartbreaks comes with “Gonna ask you some questions and get no replies”.
Gonna park in the street, gonna open the gate
Walk to the spot where you always wait
I’ll be shaking my head like I usually do
‘Cause the name and the dates tell me nothing about you
Here we see why he keeps coming back: He has the facts of his mother’s life but not the truth of it. She died when he was very young, before he could know her as a person at all. One imagines he’s had family stories (although most likely people have been circumspect even in those), but he has nothing to connect them to. He’s looking for meaning, for a connection that was broken far too soon, and this patch of ground is the only place he has to look for it.
But I’ll sit in the shadows and let you explain
All of the sadness and all of the pain
Did it all seem so hopeless you just had to let go?
This is odd at first. How can he wait for her to explain? She’s dead. But that’s the point: He’s spent his whole life waiting for understanding that simply isn’t going to come. There’s also the first hint of something even darker here. I have no knowledge of the circumstance under which Marc Cohn’s mother died but this line makes me think it might have been suicide. If not that, then the end of a long drawn-out illness. People who die suddenly, unexpectedly, usually wouldn’t be described as having “let go”.
Yeah I’m coming to see you but I really can’t stay
There’s just a few things I needed to say
Like why were you hiding so much of yourself?
Why were you living for somebody else?
The lyric site I consulted has this as “but I really can’t wait”, but that’s pretty clearly wrong. First, why would he be eager to visit? The rest of the song sounds resigned and reluctant. Second, of course, is the deeper meaning. His life, unlike hers, moves on. He can visit her in the past but he can’t linger there.
It might be putting too much import on a word choice probably motivated by rhyme scheme, but I think it’s significant that he doesn’t ask the questions; he says them. He isn’t really expecting to understand. He’s just expressing bemusement and confusion. He might not even believe there is an answer.
Well I know that I’ve always been looking for you
But lately it’s not such a hard thing to do
‘Cause it seems like inside every woman I know
There’s a girl of mysterious sorrow
A bit of self-analysis for Cohn, here. He knows that his mother’s death has cast a shadow over everything he’s done, even when he wasn’t conscious of it. Her death informs his life, all the choices and desires and hopes and fears. He’s been searching his whole life for the connection he can never make. And then he’s explicit: He’s been looking for his mother in all the women he’s known. He senses there’s something universal to her story, to her plight (which is one reason why I believe it might have been a suicide). The “mysterious sorrow” is that unbridgeable ineffable something that he can’t quite puzzle out but which he sees reflected around him.
This song speaks to me on two levels. First, I recently lost my mother in a car accident. Although I haven’t visited a grave yet, and though I had the joy of knowing her throughout my life, I can’t hear Cohn’s plaintive loss without feeling an echo resonate in that empty place that has erupted in my heart. There’s something primal about losing one’s mother, something universal and personal all at once.
Second, I did lose a parent to suicide, though it was my father and not my mother. I was closer in age to when Cohn lost his mother, too, right on the edge of teendom and looking for answers and guidance as I grew into a man. It took me four years to even begin asking the questions, much less finding the answers, and like Cohn, I really can only say them, not genuinely ask them. There is the same unbridgeable gap between what I feel and whatever my father felt. Part of me worries I will never understand. Part of me is terrified that someday I will.
More on my father and I when this compilation hits “Rest for the Weary”.