Idiotprogrammer: Texas Literary Blog

Month: May 2004

  • Living Obituaries

    Just when I thought I knew about every significant Indian writer writing in English (see my hibernating Asiafirst weblog ), Mark Sarvas of Elegant Variations reminds me of another, Kamala Markandaya, author of 10 books. According to Francis C. Assisi’s lovely profile, in The Nowhere Man Markandaya is more concerned with unfolding the sense of…

  • The Cost Of Culture

    Here are some thoughts about the music industry and the economics of culture on share the music weblog.

  • Titillating Indulgent Aestheticism and Kevin Kinsella

    Kevin Kinsella’s Langour Management is one of my favorite sites, and recently he took a break from posting on Russian literature to feature a satirical look at artists. His story, Beaver shots as a break from literature is a clever diversion: James had been working on a series of self-conscious self-portraits, Marcus, a series of…

  • Susan Sontag on War Photographs

    Amazing essay by Susan Sontag on War Photographs (specifically the Iraqi prison war photographs). A few preliminary thoughts: 1)The Guardian has been printing some incredible essays recently (almost better that the highbrow U.S. publications). 2) Sontag’s comparison between Soviet gulags and the Bush Administration’s follies is a little extreme, but on the other hand, any…

  • Mainstream Media’s Condescension

    I don’t normally rip off a blogger’s post in toto, but I thought the hilarious post of Stephanie Aulenback justified blatent ripping off: This week a couple of clueless articles having to do with a startling new phenomenon called blogging* appeared in the New Yorker and the New York Times. I have a suggestion for…

  • Comforting Disaster

    A. O. Scott on a mediocre disaster film: The ending of “The Day After Tomorrow” reminds you that the aim of disaster movies is not so much to raise alarm as to dispense comfort. In this one everybody (except the vice president), behaves remarkably well, even when overcome with panic. There is hardly a moment…

  • Gore’s Litany

    Gore’s speech calling for Rumsfeld’s resignation. The speech is too good to take excerpts from. Superficial thoughts: It is really exhausting to read all the instances of Bush’s stupidity/incompetence. A liberal is aware of all this stuff, but it’s frightening to take it all together in a single read. Gore’s military critique of Bush’s policies…

  • Shirky’s Nomic World

    I know that slashdot and boingboing will catch this on their radar: Clay Shirky on the nomic world. (Link not available yet, but it will be shortly). In fact what often happens, both online and off, is that structures are created which look like citizen input, but these structures are actually designed to deflect participation…

  • Found Photos

    Every so often I revisit foundmagazine.com (see my other post about it) . Every time I come, I find some gem. This time, I found a section devoted to old abandoned photographs. Also look here, and here.

  • Lucky Chinese Women

    Parapundit speculates about the impact of the skewed gender demographics on China (and ultimately North Korea). One possibility: Chinese men will find North Korean wives to marry. Another possibility: More wars.

  • Madonna’s Political Statement

    I’ve lost respect for Madonna over the years (partly because she’s owned by corporations), but I found the articles about her recent political tour to be hilarious. A Reuters article writes: LOS ANGELES? She sits in an electric chair and dances and sings against a backdrop of war images, President Bush, and Saddam Hussein, but…

  • My Unsolved Heart Weblog

    For those of you who are interested, I started a new weblog (my 7th!) called Unsolved Heart. Still a work in progress. More details later.

  • Reflectoporn

    People who put nude reflections of themselves on ebay products they are selling .Worksafe. Here is the photograph that started the craze.

  • The Picaresque/Coincidence Connection.

    Dan Green wrote a thoughtful essay about literary coincidences. Click more to read my reply.

  • List of My Books

    Anybody want to see a list of all the books I own? Ah, the joys of Save As html.

  • High Cost of Dieting

    From Dr. Mercola, comes this amazing article by Nanci Hellmich about the high cost of dieting.