sit down, would ya!?

I attended Richard III at the Great River Shakespeare Festival last night. It was a good show. Well done. There were a couple moments when I fought off sleep (did I mention it was Richard III?) but overall it was quite engaging.

Actually, my only point of contention regarding the performance itself was the end battle scene which I felt just fell flat, and the famous "A horse, a horse, my kingdom for a horse" line seemed to come from nowhere and with no purpose.

I actually had a bigger problem with the audience, and this is something I've been noticing quite a bit, lately. They gave the performance a standing ovation. I'm not sure I could tell you the last time I went to a show where the audience DIDN'T give a standing ovation. (Help me out here, Kootch...did you guys get one for Rumors? I seem to think you did.)

Now I was raised to think of a standing ovation as a special honor for a truly spectacular performance. The best you've ever seen. Today we give standing ovations for our kids' recitals. Why do we do this?

Last night's show was good. But I expected it to be a fairly high quality production (that's how they have imaged themselves) and while they didn't disappoint, they didn't exceed my expectation, either. It was not the best production of Richard III I've ever seen, and even if I'd never seen Richard III before, it was not the best producion in general that I've ever seen. And yet, of course, the vast majority of the audience almost immediately gave them a standing ovation. Now, except for the lady to my immediae right, who clapped her hands as if she were a non-swimmer trying to tread water, and who actually was yelling "Bravo," it was probably not the best production most of these other people saw, either. But there is first that herd mentality happening. 'Other people are standing, I'd better stand, too.' And there is a perceived perception that one generally does stand up at the end of a play today.

I'm here to say, "Sit down!"

You don't really honor anyone or encourage their best work when you offer the highest praise all the time.

I had a vociferous conversation with a parent at our dance school about this. She's always the first to jump up to offer a standing ovation to the kids in the dance programs. She said, "As a mom, I know these are just kids, and I know they've worked so hard and they deserve a little gratitude." I agreed, but added that not a single one of those kids exceed our expectations. In fact, many of them came in below what we pushed for. Did we expect a lot? Absolutely. Did we expect more than they were capable of? Not if they worked hard. Certainly they deserved our praise, but not our honors.

It's tough, keeping your ass in the chair when everyone around you is standing. I'm sure that those near me must think I'm an intolerable curmudgeon (and maybe I am), but let's save the standing ovations for those times when we truly are awed by a performance or blown away by a production.

As you sit here now, can you recall ever seeing a play that absolutely amazed you? Where you couldn't stop thinking about it afterward? That's the play you should stand for. For everything else...applaud.

Now maybe, for some people last night, the production touched them, and it was the best thing they've ever seen. Great. Then by all means, stand up! Let the actors know! But for the rest of the herd...SIT DOWN!

storytelling

I've wondered if storytelling might be a dying art, but I've decided that isn't quite the case. Instead, storytelling is still found in its rightful form in casual get-togethers.

While Garrison Keillor has popularized storytelling with his radio series, I've been kept amused by the stories told by some old-timers in rural Minnesota. These are the men who know how to tell a story. (Though one of the best stories I've ever heard is from my friend Bill who can keep me in stitches with his story of preparing for his first day deer hunting.)

I've been known to tell a tale or two, myself, and have discovered that sometimes it is MUCH easier to tell a story than it is to write one. A friend of mine who is putting together a book of anecdotes from my rural county had asked me to put down one of my better stories that I tell. And I haven't been able to do it. Storytelling is often more than just the words, but the way it is told. And how can I get the important voice inflections and raised eyebrows down on paper? It's very difficult.

Some people can write a story as well as they tell it. For an example of this, check out my friend's book, Jailhouse Stories: Memories of a Smalltown Sheriff by Neil Haugerud.

But if you really want some great storytelling, sit down at a hog roast in some rural town, or turn out for a community picnic. The old-timers will be pleased to meet you and will spin a tale with little prompting.

a soundtrack in real life

I was sitting in the parking lot at Target during my lunch break (I'd gone to return some things for my wife) and I had the radio on and was reading a book. As I am likely to do in a parking lot, I looked up often, to check out the attractive young women going to and from the store. Just as I happened to notice one particularly fine feminine figure, Stevie Wonder's Superstition came on the radio. I might not have paid it any more notice except that as I watched I couldn't help but notice that the girl's hips bounced from side to side in perfect time to the opening refrain in the song, like a fleshy metronome.

If this were a movie, it would have been painstakingly planned to time the music to the young lady's hip swagger, and those of us watching the movie would have laughed, but somewhere in the back of our minds we would have thought "Oh yeah, like we would ever have music like that playing in time to her walk in real life."

How often, I wonder, does the radio or cd or tape, provide just the right soundtrack to real life?

cooking with laughter

I've got a new favorite author, and I'm loving this book. The author is Steve Almond and the book is Candyfreak: A Journey Through the Chocolate Underbelly of America. Clicking on the title of this blog will take you to Amazon.com where you can read the reviews and peek at the cover.

Let me share with you some of Almond's delicious prose:

"I suppose I was aware, in an abstract way, that there were men and women upon this earth who served in this capacity, as chocolate engineers. In the same way that I was aware that there are job titles out there such as bacon taster and sex surogate, which is to say, job titles that make me want to weep over my own appointed lot in life."

The book is falsely labelled and errantly stocked as a COOKING book. It is everything BUT cooking. It is history, it is nostalgia, it is self-help, it is outrageously funny, and it is extremely well written. I so look forward each evening to sitting down and "enrobing" (a candy confectioners term for the process of covering a candy bar in chocolate) myself in Almond's words.

I highly recommend this book.

tiny mix

I ran across a website this morning that I think would appeal to many of my song-loving friends.

Tiny Mix Tapes is a site wherein one can request a specific type of music mix and, if you're lucky, someone will create such a mix for you (actually, they create a listing of the mix -- you still need to find the songs yourself).

Check it out and see how challenging a mix you can request. Or better yet, see if you can create the perfect mix for someone else's request.

that community theatre production

My friend Kootch asked me to comment on RUMORS...specifically how I enjoyed it more than I thought I would.

Indeed, I did enjoy Neil Simon's Rumors the other night. More so than I thought I would. And I'm trying to figure out why. I don't much care for the script. I have a problem with it's essential motivation ... the host of a party is found dazed and with a bullet hole through his earlobe. Rather than seek help for their friend, a group of high profile, presumably intelligent people (doctors, lawyers, state senate candidate, etc), try to hide this fact first from each other and then from the police. If you can get over the reason for the play, you can likely enjoy it because Neil Simon, if nothing else, knows how to get laughs.

I suggest that Mr. Simon knew he had problems with the basic set-up as there is plenty of evidence in the script that he had characters attempt to bring up these very problems, but he managed to sidestep the issue at each mention.

So why did I enjoy it? I think that because the play succeeded in doing what it intended, which was, simply, to entertain.

And why did I enjoy it more than I expected? Probably because I wasn't sure how much I'd be entertained. One never quite knows the quality one will find in community theatre, but I did laugh at most of the correct moments, even knowing many of the jokes coming up.

Sure there was the usual community theatre kind of fare...forgotten lines, bad acting (oh, my poor friend Kootch...his "wife" was absolutely DREADFUL), and a set that seemed maybe a little too ambitious and unfinished, but for the most part the acting was quite good, and a set, after all, is only another tool to help the actors tell the story.

Good job, Kootch. Bravo, community theatre.

songs without words

I wrote, not long ago, about how I tend to listen to a song and think of the human voice as another instrument rather than listening to the words.

This evening I watched Star Wars III, and I was keenly aware of the wordless vocals in the awesome score. The human voice can create a sound with such power which simply cannot be duplicated. Words would have been superfluous.

community theatre

Would you drive two and a half hours to see a play? Would you drive two and a half hours to see a community theatre production? I've just done that, though I have yet to see the play itself. I've done it to see my friend Kootch on stage. My friend Kootch, who used to give me a hard time about doing all the theatre I did.

Community theatre is an interesting beast. We pay money to see amateurs try to act (some obviously much better than others) in plays that would almost certainly have no life it weren't for community theatre, and we often think of it as "cultural" or "art." But in reality, it's barely even entertainment. It's not even a step below watching a sitcom. So why do we do it?

Well...it is live theatre, and if not for the community theatres, sadly, many people would have no other theatre experiences in their lives. The more unfortunate part of community theatre is catering to the audience with the stock of plays which you can predict were either done in the last five years, or will be in the next two seasons. The communty theatre audiences don't want to be enlightened or moved, or made to think. They simply want to be entertained. Just try doing a communty theatre play that has a cuss word and see how many complaints are lodged.

I'm about to see RUMORS. A play by community theatre god Neil Simon. It's not a very good play. It's funny. It's entertaining. And it probably won't offend anyone, so of course it's perfect for what it is. And truth be told...I'm looking forward to it, because I enjoy going out to the theatre. But I wouldn't mind if it were something with little more "bite" to it. Maybe next season.

vacation...sort of

My wife packed the Grand Caravan with our three kids, some clothes, and way more toys than any child has a right to own, and headed for the East Coast last night. At my urging, they stopped in my friend K's old stomping grounds, Beloit. This morning they were up early for breakfast and hoping to get underway. The goal was to get inside Pennsylvania but to be early enough that the kids could take advantage of a hotel pool and burn off some of that energy that builds up when sitting in a car for ten hours.

I admit that it was a weird feeling to watch them drive away and to know that I wasn't going to see them for two weeks. The last time I was away from the family for that long is when my oldest child was only six months old and we were moving from California to New York.

However, I already have more plans to fill that time than I can possibly get done -- especially bearing in mind that I work part time.

And while I will miss my family, I won't miss being packed into a beach house with four other families...my wife's sisters and their kids, and my in-laws as regular house guests. No, this is definitely a vacation for me as well.

working for a control freak

I sent my boss an email this morning telling her that I was offended by her following up on an issue.

My boss is on her maternity leave. She had the baby about a week ago. Before she left she typed up a five page list of "things to do" and three days after having her baby she asked me to follow up on something. I said that I would. Knowing that I wasn't going to be in the office yesterday, it was scheduled for first thing today. However, she went an did the follow-up from home yesterday (and as expected, the results aren't going to happen for two weeks anyway!).

This has been a continuing problem for me, and will likely mean that I won't stay here once she returns from her maternity leave (if she ever really leaves).

My boss admits that she's a control frek, but it will result in the demise of this operation. Rather than managing what people are doing and seeing to it that they are doing their jobs, she insists on doing it all herself. This usually results in things getting done late, or poorly, and then she can complain about her lack of help, but when anyone else in the office with the appropriate skills offers to do something, she doesn't let go of any project.

The artisitic director/director of dance for our facility has completely understood my frustration. Despite having a Masters in Dance and having danced professionaly with a major dance institute (and my boss has a BA in PR from a small, local school), our artisitc director has admitted that she feels she is nothing more than a proof-reader for the managing director. She is not allowed to create any kind of dance schedule or curriculum on her own.

The Stix here is looking for work, and after talking with the wife, may even go back to trying to write full time. There are a few, unexplored options in the area that I intend to look into, but I just don't enjoy sitting and doing nothing for eight hours, or having what little authority I am granted, undermined.

cub

I spent the day today with my oldest son at a Cub Scout Day Camp. Probably the only time in his life he will shoot a gun (a one-shot BB gun) or a bow & arrow. He tried to reason with me..."We have to get a BB gun and a bow and arrow, Dad!" "Why?" "So I can get better!"

I have reservations about cub scouting (I was a scout and had less than pleasant experiences...my brother was a scout and had a great time, going all the way to Eagle Scout), but as long as my son is enjoying it, we'll keep it up. I think that a lot depends on the leaders and how well they do keeping it interesting.

pyrotechnic art

Last night's firework display, marking the end of Steamboat Days, in Winona was mostly the same as I remember it as a youth in the 60's and 70's. It was nice to see it held along the banks of the Mississippi River once again. It seemed that the only thing that had changed was the look of the levy in Winona and the appearance of some of the fireworks themselves.

Because we often seem to be travelling or visiting around the Fourth of July, I can't remember the last time I managed to sit and watch a fireworks display, so last night was a bit of a treat, to be able to enjoy it with the family.

While I tried to enjoy the show the way I used to, and the way my children most likely do, it took on a new perspective for me.

At one point, during a momentary lull, I looked up and thought that it was the perfect night for fireworks -- the cloudless, midnight blue sky made an excellent backdrop for the vivid colors in the explosives. And thinking of the sky as a backdrop made me think of the fireworks themselves more as an artist's creation than simply as a display of color. A work of art, displayed briefly, fleetingly. Do pyrotechnicians, at least some of the better ones, ever think of the sky as their canvas and their fireworks as art?

I recently read a children's book called The Firework-Makers Daughter by Philip Pullman in which the making of fireworks was definitely seen as the work of an artist as they created different colors and worked to have the fireworks "do" things when exploded. The artistic pyrotechnician who sets off the fireworks could also think of himself as an artist as he plans the order in which each firework is displayed and where, in relation to the other fireworks it will explode.

Maybe they already do and it's just not appreciated that way by most. I think it's an intriquing idea, in any case.

my kids

I'm going to take the moment here on Father's Day, to say how wonderful I think my kids are. I am over-all pleased with the young adults they are growing in to.

I am not a traditional father...I do not (or at least during their most formative years did not) go off to a 9 to 5 job. I was often around during the day to listen to how their school day went and to encourage them in their activities. It certainly must make a difference to be around.

My 7 year old son today said, "Since me and (my brother) are men, we're kind of like "half dads," so we should get Father's Day presents, too."

Happy Father's Day to all you dads and half dads.

small town summer

It must be summer in rural Minnesota...there are a dozen choices for local festival days. This keeps dad busy.

sports in a small town

Listened this evening as my local boy's baseball team got their butt's kicked in the State Finals baseball game (final score was 11-2). I don't feel too bad, though...they went into the State Finals unseated and played the final game against the number 1 ranked team in their division. Add to that the fact that these same boys (or many of them anyway) took first place at the State Finals in football, and second at State in basketball, and just getting to State in three different sports is no small accomplishment in itself.

While I generally haven't held high school athletics in too high esteem, I do now see their value in a small town where athletics are generally one of the only activities offered to youth.

I will also boast for a moment...the boys basketball team, in addition to taking 2nd place at the State Finals, were also awarded/recognized as the team with the highest academic average and also the most polite/best behaved team. I feel that these are equally (if not more so) deserving of recognition. The school principal and athletic director also recognizes this and often speaks more about this than the athletic achievements.

I also want to note that when the teams return home for a welcome, after a few speeches, the team lines up to shake hands with everyone who wishes to walk through and congratulate them. I've taken my children to the football and basketball welcome-homes and have been impressed at how nearly every one of the high school boys shook hands, smiled, and spoke briefly with my children even though they often didn't know who they were.

I do feel that this is great role modelling for the youth.

there are words in those songs?: or, I failed the test miserably

My friend Mo posted a link to an 80's music song quiz on another blog to which I belong. I failed the test. Miserably.

But it's no surprise, really, because I have always admitted that I'm not very keen on the lyrics in songs. Funny, I suppose, from someone who adores words the way I do, and tries (with some moderate success) to hack out a living as a writer. But when it comes to music, it really is all about the music for me. When there are lyrics in a song, I am not hearing the words, I am hearing the words as notes and the human voice as an instrument and I am hearing how the entire composition is balanced. I prefer instrumental tracks, as you can imagine, because too often the words get in the way. If the correct words aren't chosen to blend as notes with the music, the song is discordant to me, even though when taken separately the song is a "hit."

Perhaps this is one reason that I enjoy jazz as much as I do. Even the jazz singers have recognized the voice as instrument -- look at scat singing!

Sure, I bopped around and pretended to sing along to the hit songs in the 70's and 80's, but I was damned bad at it. Worse now. My wife will often try to describe a song to me by repeating some of the lyrics, and I almost never know what she's talking about. But when she can get a bit of the tune, it usually comes to me.

So, Mo...I failed the test. Single digit. I did get correct the questions I answered, but most of those lyrics were so foreign to me that I couldn't even pretend they were familiar. I wasn't searching or reaching, it wasn't as though I sort of knew them, or that the missing words were on the tip of my thoughts. They weren't there at all.

Now...if you can find the same sort of test with snippets of music....

burning books

If you needed more reason to dislike the politics and policies of megacorp Wal-Mart, they recently (or so I read) aired a television ad in an Arizona community where there was a very strong anti-Wal-Mart movement. The ad compared the anti-Wal-Mart campaign to the burning of books in Nazi Germany.

Much?

banning books

It is absolutely stunning to me that books are still banned or challenged (an attempt to ban) from libraries across the country. Of the top ten most frequently banned or challenged books, six of them are specifically targeted towards younger readers. I suppose it makes a perverted kind of sense that organizations and groups would try to "protect" our children from "subversive" literature, but it still takes the wind out of me to think that in a country where reading and reading habits are so poor, and perhaps on the decline, there are people out there trying to take books away from those who want to read.

One of the most challenged books is anything in the Harry Potter series (and no, for those of you who will think it funny to leave a comment, it's not becuase the books aren't particularly original). Certainly the censorship hasn't hurt Potter's sales, but I'm pretty firm in my belief that any book a child wants to read is better than not reading anything.

In looking over the list of challenged books, and the reasons for challenging them, I thought it was actually laughable that the children's book series Captain Underpants is challenged for "modeling bad behavior." I've got twenty bucks that says the people who challenge that book are the same people who let their kids sit around and watch Rugrats during the day. (My 7 year old son breaks into hysterics, laughing at the antics in Captain Underpants.)

I don't have a problem with people who choose not to read something because they find it offensive for some reason. But I don't understand the reasoning behind trying to make sure no one else ever reads it. (Have I ever found a book so awful that I discourage people from reading it? Yes. Would I go to the extreme of trying to remove it from the shelves? No.) Reading is so damned important, it's GOT to be encouraged whenever and wherever. I will steer my own kids towards books that I think are suitable or un, thank you. Keep your censoring paws off my library!

If you're curious about what kinds of books are still banned, you can click on the title of this blog and you will be taken to the American Library Association page about banned books.

reading books

I wrote last night that my book browsing has dwindled, but I must admit that my book reading time hasn't changed much in the past twenty-some years. While I'm not certain, I must average about a book a week.

So...if I'm not browsing the bookstores, where am I getting these books that I read?

Those who know me could probably attest to the fact that I've enough books on shelves and in boxes in my home that I probably would never go dry for an unread book -- these from my single and heavy browsing days.

Secondly, though, I make great use of my local library system. Laughable, I suppose, from someone who never visited the inside of the library on his college campus. However, I have invested heavily (financially and time-wise) in my local library. And the library internal loan system means that any book in any one of fifty or so libraries could be in my home within a week of requesting it. This is where I do my book browsing...on the library search page! (And being on the library Board of Trustees means that I never have to pay a late fee!)

While I won't spend $30 on an author who is new to me, I WILL borrow a book by a new author. It is not unlikely then that I will later buy that persons newer books if I've found the storytelling to be consistently appealing (for instance, author Paul Watkins is now on my list of possible authors I will buy new, having read a number of his works from the library.

Then, of course, there are the used books. Is there a dedicated book reader out there who DOESN'T like used book stores? It is amazing to me what gems can be found among the dusty books shelves of a used books store or in the clutters of an on-line used books seller. It is, perhaps, even more amazing that anyone would ever get rid of a book, but I certainly am grateful that some do. Here, though, I am more likely to also pick up a book by an untested author, to try a book just because it sounds or looks interesting. It's a shame, though, because no one but the bookseller is making any money on it.

browsing books

In addition to reading about the publisher troubles in book returns, I've also read some concerns that retailers have over the demise of the book browser. More and more, they report, people come in for a specific item and go, often double parking right in front of the doors to do so.

This most certainly would account for part of the decline in book buyer. But why aren't people browsing as they used to?

Obviously I can only offer my own insights. As a dedicated book browser, I know my own time in book stores has dropped drastically. In part this is a result of family life and the lack of time to be out just browsing. But in part it is also because I am less likely to be buying books today. And why? Because of the cost, for one.

The cost of a book seems exorbitantly high. The publishing industry is quick to let us know that the price of a book has not kept pace with inflation, but they fail to take in to consideration the price of alternative entertainment. Do I pay $30 for a new book, likely to be read once, and only by myself, or do I pay half that for a movie which is likely to be watched many times, and by more than one person in the house? Okay, the answer is obvious -- buy the damn book. But the reality is....

And if I'm paying the greater price for a book, I'm less likely to take a risk on something new. Do I really want to shell out $25-30 on an author I've never heard of? No. And thus, why spend the time browsing? As I mentioned to my friend Kootch just the other day, there are three, maybe four authors whose books I will buy new, in hardcover, when they come out. And this being the case, why bother browsing?

returning books

I've been reading some reports from this years Book Expo, and one of the hot topics seems to be publisher/retailer concerns about returns.

For those of you who aren't aware of it, the major book publishers allow retailers to return unsold books for full credit. The publishers pay for the shipping on the returns as well. One might think this is advantageous to the publisher who can resell the the books in a different market (such as "remainders"). Unfortunately, the cost of book returns simply can't be justified (and when it comes to paperbacks, only the cover needs to be returned in order for the retailer to get full credit).

Certainly I've wondered what risk is involved in opening a bookstore when your merchandise can be returned at no cost!

I would guess that the rules are going to have to change, and likely soon (apparently the CEO of Barnes & Noble has agreed that publishers need to change this method), and I think that if it does change, it may provide better service.

If a store can't just send back its inventory, they are likely to select their books based on the demographics of their shoppers, rather than simply stocking whatever some desk-jockey in Ohio says they should stock. Publishers may become more seletive in what they publish, rather than publishing a wide range of titles hoping for a hit. Small house publishers, who often don't accept returns, may have a better chance at getting their books in stores if they are playing the field on the same terms as the larger publishers.

More selective publishing and better stocked stores could just maybe help get sales of books back to a respectable level.

fishing

I took my boys fishing today. Nearly all day in the hot sun. And still they whined about stopping at 6:30pm.

Where do the fishing genes come from? Both boys love to go fishing. My oldest would fish all day, every day, if we let him. I was not like this and no one in my wife's family was this way either. (My older brother, however, is an avid fisherman himself.)

Just what is it about fishing that can really attract a child's attention? My fishing-loving son is quite an active lad, so to see him sit still for four, five, six hours on end is quite unusual. But where did he develop this interest?

Tony

The Tony Awards were aired this past weekend, and I missed it.

Not that I care, particularly, but if I were to watch any awards show, it would be the Tony's...simply because it ties in to theatre (which I greatly enjoy).

I lost interest in the awards programs long ago (actually I can tell you precisely when I gave up the Academy Awards -- when Moonstruck was the big winner). Most of the shows don't seem to truly recognize "the best" any more, but often pander to those that "deserve" the award (often two very different accountings).

The Antoinette Perry Awards (the Tony) were in the news a bit when the nominations were announced, due to an article in the NY Times in which a columnist blasted the awards as being rather pointless and self-serving. I'm not sure why the article creted the small fury that it did -- he was right. Broadway is no longer representative of the best in theatre. Perhaps at one time Broadway was the epitome of theatre, but with so many, incredibly wonderful theatres around the country producing new works one need only look to their nearest metropolis for excellent theatre. Even in New York City, the cost of producing a show on Broadway has become prohibitive. Most won't take a chance on a new show at those costs and usually bring in shows that originated at theatres around the country. Even top names such as Arthur Miller and Neil Simon have had their world premieres Off-Broadway in recent years.

I think that most of these big awards mean less and less the more they promote them, and I for one, just don't care much for them anymore.

art in space

An article in yesterday's The Guardian reported that an agency was seeking proposals for arts projects to be conducted on the international space station (you can read the article by clicking here). The group is encouraged by evidence of the astro-, cosmo-, and what-nauts doing such activities as playing guitar, taking photographs, and paintings on some of the metal walls.

I am first reminded of Stardance, a sci-fi book by Spider and Jeanne Robinson which had a dancer perform a ballet in weightlessness of space.

I am encouraged that some powers-that-be might possibly see the value in the arts. To provide arts and arts experiments on the ISS could help bring awareness of the importance of arts in our lives. Which of course could be another tool for keeping (or returning) arts curriculum in our schools.

I also think it's just pretty damned cool.

A classic Star Trek episode comes to mind. One where a travelling group of actors performs for Captain Kirk and crew. I hadn't understood the correlation to the "old west" when I first saw it, but I know now that when the United States was still a vast, unknown territory, troupes of actors would visit the small, make-shift and shanty towns, bringing a sense of culture and high art where there otherwise wasn't any.

This organized opportunity with the International Space Station could very well be the first step in bringing culture and high art to still another new location as well as retoring it here on Earth.

Project Gutenberg

Project Gutenberg is an on-line service offerng free e-books which are in the public domain. I daresay they have the largest collection of e-books on the internet.

Somehow, Project Gutenberg has managed to stay out of the current fray set off by Yahoo and Amazon -- two internet giants who have planned to "archive" their books on the internet. Of course the opponents argue that this infringes on copyright, to which I would agree.

So far, in my browsing through the Gutenberg files, I've found only classic literature which I imagine to be free of copyright. My favorites are "spurious and doubtful works of William Shakespeare." I look forward to reading his The Merry Devil and Fair Em!

And while I think this is certainly a worthwhile project, I have a problem reading book-length material on a computer screen. Certainly I could downlaod any of these works and print them out, but you lose the magic of holding a bound and printed book in your hands. If I had to read a Bronte novel, I'm still more apt to look for one at a used book store than I am to download a copy for free.

The nice thing, though, in surfing through their catalog, is coming upon little treasures that I might not otherwise have seen.

I urge all readers and book lovers to check out their site: www.gutenberg.org

kids cartoons - part 3

One of the worst things that ever happened to children's television is when a law was passed requiring that broadcasters air a particular amount of "educational" programming for children, per day. Suddenly the broadcasters didn't want to take a chance that what they aired wouldn't count as educational and so the makers of children's television (Hanna-Barbera and Ruby/Spears were the two main producers) began to make cartoons that were heavily moralistic and didactic. But they weren't fun!

Certainly there was good reason for this law -- too many parents were letting television raise their children, therefore television was required to educate. But children need to laugh. They need to know that not everything in life has to be an educational experience.

Perhaps it was a good thing. Perhaps that by making television boring, kids watched less. I don't know if any studies have been done. But of course about this same time, the video game boom began, so kids were switching off the tv tube and switching on the Playstations and Game Boys.

Kids know. They know how to avoid the obvious educational programming. Take away their fun television, and they find another mindless outlet.

One of the first television cartoons to break away from the moralistic, educational cartoon-making was The Animaniacs. A wacky, silly, anything-goes series that made kids laugh but contained a LOT of humor that only the adults might catch. The series was produced by Steven Spielberg.

The Animaniacs worked because it drew from its cartoon roots. You can do ANYthing in a cartoon, and so you should. Drop 500 ton anvils on someones head, pull a mallet bigger than you from your coat pocket, hit someone so hard that they soar out in space. And the writing was intelligent. You had to know a little something about film and literature history to catch some of their best jokes -- yet while the little kids might not catch the West Side Story motiff, they will enjoy seeing pigeons puff themselves up and act "gang-like" to protect their territory. Drawing on popular culture was very popular in the heyday of the MGM cartoons, and so The Animaniacs brought that back in to play.

Almost certainly The Animaniacs never would have been done if it hadn't had Spielberg's name on it. For this I am grateful. I believe that is was a combination of this Spielberg production and the now plethora of channel choices that has brought a resurgence of quality kids cartoons. The Fairly Oddparents owes a great deal to The Animaniacs and classic cartoons: intelligent writing, an anything-goes attitude, and drawing on popular culture in some story-lines and character creation.

It is fortunate that we now have so many different channel choices. Because of stations like The Cartoon Network and Nickelodeon and The Disney Channel, we can have volumes of cartoon programming. And if only two hours have to be educational, the rest can be just plain fun.

It is good that the children who watched great cartoons in the 50's and 60's are now making their own cartoons. But will the kids from the 80's and 90's be doing a few years hence?

kids cartoons - part 2

Based on what I see on television when my children are watching cartoons, I would guess that people will look back on this era and claim it as a Golden Age for chidlren's cartoons.

First of all, the animation is superb. The attention to detail is what separates the good from the bad. The classic Looney Tunes and old MGM cartoons had animation that has never been equalled. Watch one sometime and take note of the movement -- the smallest things move, even things that weren't critical to the story. This quality animation carried through even to television, with the work of Hanna-Barbera. Their cartoons in the early to mid 1960's was excellent. Again, attention to detail was paid, even though on the tighter television budget. Some of their best work (and also some of the last of their good work) might be in the old Jonny Quest series.

Then came the 70's.

Whether it was strictly budget or the thought that cartoons were inferior and didn't need so much attention, the animation became stilted and jumpy. Movement was not smooth, and there was no more movement than absolutely necessary. There might be entire scenes with nothing at all moving in the frame, just a voice-over.

This might well have killed cartoons altogether. The 1980's are note-worthy only for the fact that there was little to no cartoon show on Saturday morning television. The only cartoon show that comes to mind during this era is He-Man and the Masters of the Universe and various spin-offs (i.e. She-Ra). Granted, I was no longer a child of cartoon-watching age, but I was a hopeful Hollywood writer who wanted to work in children's television.

Today, however, the baby-boomers have come of age, and certainly they remember the quality cartoons of their youth and have brought that quality back to television. And with the advances in computer animation, made it easier to produce cartoons that are fun to watch again.

Compare the visual look of Speed Racer to Jimmy Neutron! In my opinion, Speed Racer is the epitome of bad animation. Just count how many times we see a close up of eyes so that we don't even have to have the animation of a mouth moving!

Spongebob is not so different than Top Cat or Yogi Bear (the good years). The characters move fluidly (pun slightly intended) and there's more than a one-color background.

But quality cartoons is more than just the animation. The story has been revived in children's programming. Perhaps I'll talk a little about that tomorrow.

kids cartoons - part 1

Has anyone watched todays kids cartoons? Probably not, if you don't have children.

Well, let me assure you that todays kids are getting some quality television cartoons -- unlike the children from the past twenty years.

Tops on my list for cartoons is Spongebob Squarepants. If you haven't seen the cartoon, it's almost certain you've seen the merchandising.

What makes Spongebob so popular is that it's FUNNY. For those of us who were children in the 60's we might ask, "Yeah? Aren't cartoons supposed to be funny?" One would think so, but that hasn't been the standard in cartoon-land for a looooong time. Spongebob is funny for the sake of being funny. It is stupid, for the sake of being funny. It does not try to squeeze a moral in to each story. It is entertainment. Pure, simple, fun, funny entertainment. It is a throwback to the days of the good Tom & Jerry cartoons -- complete with eye-popping violence that is so ridiculous that no child will ever try to emulate it.

And of course it is the cartoon that the christian conservatives are trying to ban.

Number two on my list of todays best cartoons is The Fairly Odd Parents. This cartoon is also funny, but also delves into the realm of 'anything-is-possible-in-a-cartoon' -- ala those great old MGM cartoons. Again we have stupidity for the sake of humor, but we also have a main character whose every wish is granted by his fairy godparents, and so the wishes in each episode are limited only by a child's imagination. This cartoon manages to sneak in an over-all moral ("be careful what you wish for"), but the writing is superb. A classic episode is one in which the main character wishes for silence, and the entire episode is then done with music, but no dialog. A disaster is about to strike (a meteor is speeding toward his hometown) and our character can't avert it because he can't speak, so he can't wish for his fairy godparents to send it away.

The supporting cast for Fairly Odd Parents is part of makes this cartoon really fun to watch. The leader of all the fairies is a militaristic, Arnold Schwartzenegger type. Our lead character, Timmy, is a comic-book fan, and his favorite comicbook hero is "The Crimson Chin" -- whom we often see in action.

Third on my list is Jimmy Neutron. I don't watch this with my children too much, but I am amazed by the animation. Jimmy is an egg-head genius who still goes to a regular elementary school and is in every other way a typical little boy -- always wanting to build new super things and not being able to figure out the girls. The animation is that "3-D" animation used in such movies as Shrek and A Bug's Life. That a regular cartoon can be created with this advanced style of animation is really amazing.

watching fiction

My friend Mo clued my in to a pretty interesting site. Think MTV, -- not for music, but to literary shorts. I only watched/listened to four stories, but found them quite interesting and unique. Check them out at: http://www.vidlit.com. My favorites were "Craziest" and "The Arithmetic of Nurses" and "How I Paid for College."

the wal-mart cash wrap sales

I generally make it a habit to avoid Wal-Mart at all costs. Unfortunately, I was in the new "super store" to pick up some cheap paper for work this morning.

Aside from everything that the corporate Wal-mart stands for, part of what I don't like about Wal-Mart is their patrons. This hit home even more-so as I stood in the check-out line, thinking that maybe I'd pick up a pack of gum or roll of lifesavers. There was no candy in the check-out lane. Instead, there where the stores stock items that they hope will be purchased as impulse buys, were flints for lighters, lighter fluid, chewing tobacco, and pipe tampers.

"Hey, Yolanda, don't we need new flints for that Bic at home? Why don't you go ahead and pick up that pack of eight there?"

"Sure, Jed. And why don't you get that there tamper instead of using your fingers all the time. Show a little class for a change."

those fan films, again

A week or more ago I blogged a piece about fan film-making, pointing out how a Star Wars fan film was making big news.

Today I read an article on the Canadian Broadcasting Company's web page about a Star Trek regular who will be making an appearance in a Star Trek fan film. Walter Koenig, best known as Star Trek's Mr. Chekov, will be reprising his role in an episode of the New Voyages series -- a fan film series that is creating Star Trek's "lost" fourth season. They have two episodes available for download on the internet.

What is interesting about this fan series is that the episode Mr. Koenig is to appear in, is being written by D.C. Fontana -- a writer for the original Star Trek series.

The author of the CBC article asks the question, if a film using Star Trek characters, has an actor from the original Star Trek series, and is written by one of the original series' writers, what makes it a fan film, and not a professional Star Trek film?

A good question. And no matter what we come up with for an answer (production values, bad acting, lack of pay, no making money off of the sales, etc) we can point to "professional" films that fit the same bill.