Walking in on "Bob."

[digitaldiscipline]

This is a discursion from my calling James Joyce one of the most overrated writers in the history of ever on Twitter/FB this morning. It got me thinking, and the path of those thoughts is much like the path of what those thoughts were about, in that my giving you the closing argument without the road to get there makes no fucking sense.

"Who the fuck is Bob?"

For whatever reason, when I was in college, there was a huge amount of focus on the Modernists in art and literature at my school, so I was up to my goddamned eyebrows in Joyce and Faulkner and Picasso and Dali and their contemporaries; not just their work, but their work in the context of what they were trying to say, and the conventions against which they were trying to rebel, and all that shit that gives art historians such tweed-jacketed hard-ons. I'm not saying that it's bullshit, because nothing exists in a vacuum, and it's entirely possible that the socio-political atmosphere of the day was in many ways influencing their modes of expression.

I'm not immune; I have a print of Munch's "The Scream" rolled up in my closet, and it pre-dates my figuring out what the fuck "goth" was, or that I was/am one.

But, regardless, Modernists spurred Post-Modernists, and whatever else came after, and if you walk into an art installation, or pick up a book by one of the more avant-garde practitioners of the movement, or turn on some jazz... if you're not familiar with the cultural conversation, you're left thinking, as I am, "WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS SHIT?"

Which brings me back to that paraphrasing of Ayn Rand hanging out up there.

If you had wandered into my suite during my junior or senior year of college, you'd have met one of my suite-mates, whom we all called Bob. He answered to Bob. He called himself Bob.

If you'd looked at any of the dorm room assignments, however, you'd be stumped. There was no Bob, Bobby, or Robert anywhere to be found. We had a Greg, two Steves, a Keith, a Brian, a Ryan, and myself. But, nevertheless, there was "Bob," big as life (bigger, actually; he was a jovial six-five galoot).

"Bob" was an acronym, you see, a shortening of "Bunsey, Old Bean."

None of us had the last name of "Bunsey," either.

One guy did, however, have the last name of "Birner," which, now, yes, you begin to see, don't you?

"Birner" becomes "Burner" becomes "Bunsen Birner" becomes "Bunsen" becomes "Bunsey" becomes "Bunsey, Old Bean" becomes "Bob."


But you, no, you walk in at "Bob," and have no fucking idea how it came about.

And for that, I blame Joyce and his ilk. Not everyone has the time or the inclination to back-trace an infinite number of footnotes and influences, to ferret out everything against which you rail for contrast.

If you riff on a theme so thoroughly that the theme itself is lost, you have fallen off the melody, traipsed incoherently beyond "fugue," and become mere noise (or as some would have it, "jazz"). Don't be put out when people look askance at your affected, evolved, or contrived weirdness.

Being misunderstood isn't always a sign of genius; it may simply be a result of your not making any fucking sense at all.

Have your "Bloomsday." I will instead have some Bloom County.

"Good day, sir."

Comments

[mimerki.livejournal.com]

Being misunderstood isn't always a sign of genius; it may simply be a result of your not making any fucking sense at all.

This is my issue with Joyce. I don't get the sense that he is playing with language and structure and having fun, at which point I might not want to read him but at least I'd respect what he was doing. I get the sense that he's being deliberately difficult to make up for the fact that he's not very good at what he does. Okay, and the syphilis making him crazy. His early work is mediocre, his later work is just deliberately obscure verbal vomit.

It's sort of the opposite of how I feel about Dali, who clearly has the technical skills to be doing something else and is, therefore, doing his own thing for whatever reason. It's not even like how I feel about Faulkner, who I just don't much like but who's basically competent as a story-teller.

[ldybastet.livejournal.com]

Being misunderstood isn't always a sign of genius; it may simply be a result of your not making any fucking sense at all.

Yup! :D Kudos to this post and its writer!

(No, I can't stand Joyce or jazz either.)

[zymergist.livejournal.com]

heh, inside jokes in a group where all the insiders have slowly left. Monkeys, bananna, and firehose corprate inertia principal.

[nex0s.livejournal.com]

mere noise (or as some would have it, "jazz")

Gonna have to disagree with you on the whole jazz thing.

I don't like Joyce at all, so I understand where you are coming from, but to lump in the music of the entire African American diaspora in with one syphilitic white man seems a little... out of balance, shall we say?

N.

[etcet.livejournal.com]

I suspect that I'm ignorant of a lot of jazz history because I simply don't care for it, but what "great" jazz I've been exposed to (Coltrane, Davis, etc) has basically been the audio equivalent of staring at romanji - I understand that there is some kind of artistic talent at work, and it's saying something, but I'll be fucked if I can understand the first thing about it. There's a learning and appreciation curve there that is simply beyond me to approach (both based on my tastes, and the perceived ROI for doing so).

Balance issues notwithstanding, I think "artistic expression that leaves me cold, if not actively looking for an escape or alternative" covers a lot of ground[1]. That this happens to include the modalities of jazz' improvisational style is just the way my tastes run; I lack an appreciation of anything that has flung itself so far afield as to barely remain recognizable (power noise and fusion cuisine, for instance, both hit my "off" button pretty instantaneously for the same reason; John Waters is likewise in my "fuck off" bucket).

There are very few things that press my 'do not want' button in quite this same way - particular flavors of punk rock, for instance, and gangsta rap, and Sinatra, led zeppelin and the doors; stream-of-consciousness writing; hardcore porn; and pretty much anything to do with "fashion."

I fail at avant garde, and I'm all right with that. Basically, it boils down to a matter of "If I can't figure out what the fuck is happening, I have better ways to spend my time." If I want to be irritated, frustrated, and confused, I get enough of that from daily life; I don't want that from art. There is, to me, a difference in being challenged by something and being put off by it.


[1] It also includes the completely un-improvizational stylings of country music and cop dramas.

[hellsop.livejournal.com]

It's a challenge starting at the end where all the refinement has happened. To put it into familiar terms, starting with Coltrane and Davis is like taking a neophyte drinker and expecting them to prefer a peaty Islay single malt over a piña colada because the whisky is "better". I still drink more deeply from the Glenn Miller and Tommy Dorsey well than Coltrane.

[sskipstress.livejournal.com]

Count Basie and Art Pepper are among my personal poisons along with Miller and Dorsey.

[nex0s.livejournal.com]

Thank you.

Personally, I actually listen to more "palpable" jazz like Ella Fitzgerald, Glenn Miller, Billie Holiday, and Josephine Baker. Though there is some avant garde jazz that I enjoy (Davis being some of it, but not all of his work).

I think I'd be less pissed off and (quite honestly, kind of hurt) if Rafe had said he hated "avant garde jazz" or something. That I get. But to sweep ALL of JAZZ under the table makes about as much sense to me as saying ALL OF ROCK SUX because I hate Death Metal.

N.
(who's gonna have a scotch in a minute)

[etcet.livejournal.com]

Fair enough. I wasn't trying to make any kind of sweeping social commentaries beyond "if you're not familiar with the cultural conversation [a piece of art is attempting to contribute to], you're left thinking, 'WTF?'"

Be that as it may, I don't, however, like *any* jazz, but that's not Miles' fault for being avant garde. My problem, such as it is, is that jazz seems to originate, kind of, from Big Band and Swing... which I also don't enjoy.

It's a long, long walk across musical genres to get to something that I listen to for pleasure from where jazz lives. The closest "shortcut" I can think of is by way of something like Aaron Copland. I had a mix tape of a bunch of variations on and versions of Bach's toccatta & fugue in D minor, including a three-piece jazz cover (piano, bass, and drum), and, even loving the song as much as I do, that was the most-skipped part of the tape.

I described my impression of jazz in another context as "intentionally stumbling around the vicinity of the melody without ever actually stepping on it." I recognize that there's talent and nuance needed to do that skillfully or artfully, but it's an art that simply leaves me cold because, while I can appreciate the skill, I don't enjoy the result.

To me, it's the same lack of reaction as I have watching baseball or basketball. Sure, they're amazing athletes doing incredible things, but I'd still rather watch paint dry.

[nex0s.livejournal.com]

Actually, jazz is older than that and comes out of ragtime.

I suspect I'm particularly sensitive to your objection/dislike because it is the same argument I've heard applied to much of black arts - music, painting, sculpture, etc. "This work is not regimented and orderly and western so it is wrong."

I don't like classical music myself. Too regimented, too strict, I find it boring unless it accompanied by dance. But I dont deny it's historical importance, and I don't use it as an example to poor out how much I hate something else. Then again, classical music is very much the music of "the establishment", while jazz is the music of an oppressed people. Your dislike & vehemence doesn't exist in a vacuum.

For my own sanity & for the sake of our proto friendship I'm going to withdraw from this conversation.

[sskipstress.livejournal.com]

I read Portrait of the Artist once, and I may as well have pulled words at random out of a magnetic poetry factory.

[felisdemens.livejournal.com]

I also dislike these things. Which is why I can't stand later Neal Stephenson.

[etcet.livejournal.com]

Stephenson got his career-ending "fuck off, you smarmy jackass" from me after a couple hundred pages of *lying to the reader* towards the end of The Confusion.