WORLD TELEVISION DAY 2013

“Television is chewing gum for the eyes.” - Frank Lloyd Wright
 
UNESCO is celebrating World Television Day today. This was proclaimed by the United Nations General Assembly in 1996 to encourage global exchanges of television programmes focusing on peace, security, economic and social development and the enhancement of cultural exchange. This commemorates the date on which the first World Television Forum was held in 1996.
 
Television is still one of the most influential forms of media presently. It is the arena where images, forms, styles and ideas surrounding the human existence are mobilised. Television makes its mark as the most popular medium for communication and information because of the considerable convenience it offers to its audience of all ages, nationalities and social status worldwide. Television does not require literacy and presents information in audiovisual form requiring no extra skills for comprehension.
 
Television and the significance of broadcasting as a fundamental means of communication and a standard gateway of information for the masses, most importantly in least-developed countries cannot be stressed enough. Television plays an effective role in disseminating information and knowledge and serves a powerful tool for reflecting and shaping human conditions and aspirations. Fostering freedom of expression and increasing cultural diversity in the media, particularly by improving the endogenous production capacities and supporting the distribution of quality audio-visual programmes are all suited for implementation using television.
 
The position of television as the means of primary entertainment in the home is accepted widely. Mainstream professional television in Australia was launched on 16 September 1956 in Sydney, launched in time to cover the 1956 Melbourne Olympics. The new medium was introduced by Bruce Gyngell with the words “Good evening, and welcome to television”, and has since seen the introduction of colour, and digital television, and the planned shutdown of analogue broadcasts set to take place between 2010 to 2013 (depending on the area). Local programs, over the years, have included a broad range of comedy, sport, and in particular drama series, in addition to news and current affairs. The industry is regulated by the Australian Communications and Media Authority.
 
As television technology developed throughout the 1960s, the medium dominated as the entertainment form of choice for most Australians. By 1965, it was estimated that 9 out of 10 Australian families owned a TV set. Nowadays of course, while all households have a television set, most have several.

POETRY JAM - LIGHTNING

“A poet is a man who manages, in a lifetime of standing out in thunderstorms, to be struck by lightning five or six times.” - Randall Jarrell
 
The theme of  “Lightning” is this week’s Poetry Jam stimulus for literary offerings by those who accept the challenge. Here is my contribution, rather apt as one considers the wild weather with horrific consequences that many places around the world have experienced.
 
The Watery Grave
 
And as the clouds gathered,
And as the lightning flashed,
As thunder roared,
The rains came…
 
The watery curtains cascaded down,
The rivers flowed and overflowed,
Became torrents; creeks turned to rivers
And the floods came…
 
And as the waters rushed,
And as the dams gushed,
The deluge broke the barriers
And the spate came…
 
The water covered all
In dirty brown slough;
Making lake of land
But the rains still came…
 
The might of surging waters
Overwhelmed man and beast,
Dragged down buildings, destroyed;
And death came…
 
Now as the waters still swell,
As displaced people shiver
From shock, fear, frustration,
Grim realisation came…
 
Silent, sunken, submerged,
What once was dry land and
Homes, cars, gardens, dreams,
All lie under a watery grave.

REMEMBERED SONG

“The power of a handwritten letter is greater than ever. It’s personal and deliberate and means more than an e-mail or text ever will. It has a unique scent. It requires deciphering. But, most important, it’s flawed.” - Ashton Kutcher

An old letter is this week’s stimulus for the weekly creative writing challenge organised by Magpie Tales . Here is my contribution:
 

Remembered Song, After the Fact
 

“And then you left me
Like a broken toy in a deserted playground
That no child will claim as its own.
And if I sit and write to you now,
It is all because I’ve loved you so.
Take care that you dress well,
The cold weather is still ahead.
And put your mind at ease,
I have not told anyone about us...
 

And then you abandoned me,
Like a stray kitten none wanted,
Preferring me to die slowly rather than dealing the death blow yourself.
And if I still persist in seeking you out,
It is all because I’ve loved so much.
Look after yourself, mind that you dress well,
The worse of the cold weather is still ahead.
And you know it well,
I tell none about the two of us...
 

And then you turned away from me,
As if I were a mistake
That nobody admits to having made.
And if I still remember you and cry
It is all because I’ve loved you so much.
Tell her to take good care of you,
The cold weather is still to come.
And put your mind at ease,
Nobody will ever find out about us...
 

And now I am alone, forgotten,
Like a lost letter
None wants to claim.
And if I still care about you
It is all because I’ve loved you so.
Mind that you dress well, you are so weak
The coldest weather is still to come.
And you know full well,
I shall not tell anyone about us...”

MOVIE MONDAY - SHUTTER ISLAND

“I became insane, with long intervals of horrible sanity.” - Edgar Allan Poe
 

You sometimes watch a movie and while it keeps you interested and engaged, when it finishes you cannot really say whether you really liked it or not. These types of movies are perhaps the most unsatisfying as they are in a somewhat gray zone, not eliciting intense antipathy or a fervent liking for. We watched such a movie at the weekend, enjoying a great deal it on the one level, but feeling somewhat deflated and unsatisfied at its conclusion…
 

It was the 2010 Martin Scorsese film “Shutter Island” starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Ben Kingsley, Mark Ruffalo, Max von Sydow, Michelle Williams and Emily Mortimer. It is a period drama with a thriller-type premise, touching upon the theme of insanity and what drives criminally insane people to commit acts that are beyond our morality and sense of humanity.
 

Scorsese is a master film-maker and his direction is faultless, the cinematography of the bleak setting highly evocative, and the acting top class. In this respect, the film satisfies greatly. But somehow one feels cheated at the end – the desire to have a twist in the story line being greater than the desire to tell a good story, pure and simple. Perhaps our own desire for enjoyment as story listeners depends to a certain extent on our ability to predict the twists of the story. Or perhaps in our desire to identify with some of the characters and like them to a certain extent. And there are a lot of unlikeable characters in the film, whom we were supposed to like (or so it turns out in the end).
 

The plot takes place in 1954, when the World War II atrocities are still fresh in the minds of people, especially so for the US soldiers that took part in the storming of the Nazi concentration camps (and yes, there are some graphic scenes there). A US marshal, Teddy Daniels (Di Caprio) is assigned to investigate the disappearance of a patient from Boston's Shutter Island Ashecliffe Hospital for the criminally insane. Daniels has personal reasons for wanting to be assigned on the island, but once there he begins to think that he has been brought to the island as part of a twisted plot by hospital doctors whose radical treatments are unethical and illegal, or even quite sinister.
 

Daniels’ investigating skills soon provide a promising lead, but the hospital refuses him access to records he suspects would break the case wide open. As a hurricane cuts off communication with the mainland, more dangerous criminals escape in the confusion, and the puzzling, improbable clues multiply, Daniels begins to doubt everything - his memory, his partner, and his own sanity.
 

I am beginning to wonder whether a second viewing of the film may work better with me, and certainly this is a film that invites a revisit after some time. There is a lot of violence in the movie and some quite confronting issues and images that convey a sense of horror and highlight the depth of inhumanity that human beings are capable of. One is led to question the concept of “sanity” and how fragile our balanced mental state is. The film is worth watching, but be aware of its graphic and violent content.

ART SUNDAY - AUGUST MACKE

“The purest and most thoughtful minds are those which love colour the most.” - John Ruskin
 

August Macke (3 January 1887 – 26 September 1914) was born in Meschede, Germany. His father, August Friedrich Hermann Macke (1845-1904), was a building contractor and his mother, Maria Florentine, née Adolph, (1848-1922), came from a farming family in Germany’s Sauerland region. The family lived at Brüsseler Straße until August was 13. He then lived most of his creative life in Bonn, with the exception of a few periods spent at Lake Thun in Switzerland and various trips to Paris, Italy, Holland and Tunisia. In Paris, where he travelled for the first time in 1907, Macke saw the work of the Impressionists, and shortly after he went to Berlin and spent a few months in Lovis Corinth’s studio.
 

His style was formed within the mode of French Impressionism and Post-impressionism and later went through a Fauve period. In 1909 he married Elizabeth Gerhardt. In 1910, through his friendship with Franz Marc, Macke met Kandinsky and for a while shared the non-objective aesthetic and the mystical and symbolic interests of Der Blaue Reiter school.
 

Macke’s meeting with Robert Delaunay in Paris in 1912 was to be a sort of revelation for him. Delaunay’s chromatic Cubism, which Apollinaire had called Orphism, influenced Macke’s art from that point onwards. His “Shops Windows” can be considered a personal interpretation of Delaunay’s “Windows”, combined with the simultaneity of images found in Italian Futurism.
 

The exotic atmosphere of Tunisia, where Macke travelled in 1914 with Paul Klee and Louis Moilliet was fundamental for the creation of the luminist approach of his final period, during which he produced a series of works now considered masterpieces. August Macke’s oeuvre can be considered as Expressionism, (the movement that flourished in Germany between 1905 and 1925) and also his work was part of Fauvism. The paintings concentrate primarily on expressing emotion, his style of work represents feelings and moods rather than reproducing objective reality, usually distorting colour and form.
 

Macke’s career was cut short by his early death at the front in Champagne in September 1914, the second month of World War I. His final painting, “Farewell”, depicts the mood of gloom that settled after the outbreak of war. It is in sharp contrast to the painting above “Girls under Trees”, also of 1914.

BACH FOR MUSIC SATURDAY

“I worked hard. Anyone who works as hard as I did can achieve the same results.” - Johann Sebastian Bach
 
The Italian Concerto, BWV 971 – original title: Concerto nach Italienischem Gusto (Concerto after the Italian taste), published in 1735 as the first half of Clavier-Übung II (the second half being the French Overture) is a three-movement concerto for two-manual harpsichord solo composed by Johann Sebastian Bach. The Italian Concerto has become popular among Bach's keyboard works, and has been widely recorded both on the harpsichord and the piano.
 
The concerto is in three movements:

I) Without tempo indication

II) Andante

III) Presto

The Italian Concerto’s two lively F major outer movements, in ritornello style, frame a florid arioso-style movement in D minor, the relative minor. An Italian concerto relies upon the contrasting roles of different groups of instruments in an ensemble; Bach imitates this effect by creating contrasts using the forte and piano manuals of a two-manual harpsichord throughout the piece. In fact, along with the French Overture and some of the Goldberg Variations, this is one of the few works by Bach, which specifically require a 2-manual harpsichord.
 
Here is the Italian Concerto, arranged for oboe solo and strings with harpsichord continuo. Albrecht Mayer plays the oboe and makes of this keyboard work a magnificent full-blown baroque concerto. Bach himself would have loved this version, I am sure!

FOOD FRIDAY - LENTIL & BEAN STEW

“Lentils are friendly—the Miss Congeniality of the bean world.” - Laurie Colwin
 
With the unseasonably cool weather we have been experiencing in Melbourne this Spring, we have been having some hearty cold weather dishes. Here is a vegetarian lentil and bean stew that is tasty and packed with goodness!
 
Bean and Lentil Stew
 
Ingredients
1 cup dried cannellini beans, soaked overnight and cooked
1 cup brown lentils
6 cups vegetable stock
1 cup chopped carrots
1 cup chopped celery
1 large onion, chopped
1 tbsp. chopped parsley
2 bay leaves
1/2 tsp. black pepper
1/2 tsp. dried thyme
1/2 tsp. dried oregano
freshly ground black pepper to taste
 
Method
Soak the dried beans overnight in cold water, then drain, add fresh water, and cook over low heat until beans are softened but still have a slight bite to them. This will take 40 minutes to an hour, or possibly more, depending on how old the beans are. When beans are cooked but firm, they’re ready to be used in the recipe.
 
Chop carrots, celery, and onions into fairly small pieces. In medium sized soup pot, add lentils, stock, carrots, celery, onions, parsley, bay leaves, dried thyme, dried oregano. Let simmer at low heat about 30 minutes, until lentils and vegetables are starting to soften.
 
Remove bay leaves and add the cooked cannellini beans and about 1 cup water (depending on how much liquid has cooked out.) Continue to simmer at low heat, 45 minutes or more, until most of lentils have at least partly broken apart and dissolved into the broth. Taste for seasoning and add more black pepper and salt if desired. Serve hot.
 
Garnish with pesto and crushed toasted pita bread, if desired.
 
This post is part of the Food Friday meme,
and also part of the Food Trip Friday meme.

HUMMEL'S TEASEL

“Words without thoughts never to heaven go.” - William Shakespeare
 

Today, the Eastern Orthodox day celebrates the Feast Day of St Phillip the Apostle, who was one of the Twelve Apostles of Jesus. Later Christian traditions describe Philip as the apostle who preached in Greece, Syria, and Phrygia.
 

Today is also the anniversary of the birth of:
William Pitt the Elder, British Prime Minister (1708);
Robert Fulton, built first steamboat (1765);
Henri Dutrochet, described process of osmosis (1776);
Johann Nepomuk Hummel, composer (1778);
Charles Lyell, geologist (1797);
Claude Monet, French artist (1840);
Jawaharlal Nehru, first Indian Prime Minister (1889);
Aaron Copland, US composer (1900);
Marya Mannes, writer (1904);
Brian Keith, actor (1921);
Leonie Rysanek, soprano (1928);
Hussein I, of Jordan (1935);
Charles, Prince of Wales (1948).
 

The teasel, Dipsacus fullorum, is the birthday plant for this day.  The generic name is derived from the Greek dipsa = thirst, alluding to the leaves of the plant that are joined at their base forming a hollow in which water collects.  The plant is used as a weather oracle, the prickles closing up meaning it will rain.  The common name and the specific name are in reference to the plant’s prickly flower and seed heads which in the past were used by fullers to raise or “tease” the nap on woollen cloth.  The plant symbolises misanthropy and importunity.  Astrologically, this plant is ruled by Venus.
 

Johann Nepomuk Hummel (1778-1837) was a Hungarian pianist and composer. In 1785 Hummel went to Vienna where he impressed Mozart and was his student for two years. Hummel was thought to rival Beethoven in piano technique and skills of improvisation. His many compositions for piano include sonatas, chamber works and concertos. His work represents a link between the Classical and the Romantic in music. One of my favourite works of his is the Piano Concerto in A minor opus 85.

THE LAST

“We have one life; it soon will be past; what we do for God is all that will last.” - Muhammad Ali
 

Poetry Jam this week has set a challenge concentrating on “the last”. All things have an end, and for each thing there must be a last one. How more so for the one last day we live, surely that is ultimate finality… Here is my offering:
 

Death
 

“I've lived a good life,” said he to me,
“I've loved and hated, worked and played.
I've lived a full life,” he confessed,
“I've left only few things untried.
Experiences varied, broad I have collected,
All those I've met I've not regretted.”
 

“I look at death before me, now,” he told me,
“I like the purposefulness in his stony gaze.
I lean towards him with my hands outstretched,” he said,
“I long to live through this, my ultimate encounter;
My mind replete with images and sound
Will welcome this last meeting, sure to astound.”
 

“I tell you, don't be sad,” he said to me,
“I think this is a journey that will thrill me.
I tremble with excitement, not with dread,
I taste sweet wine, not bitter gall nor poison.
My heart is restful,” softly, he sighed,
“My soul is free…” he said to me - and died.

TO DANCE

“Poetry is an echo, asking a shadow to dance.” - Carl Sandburg
 
An Edgar Degas photograph, “Danseuse ajustant sa bretelle” has been provided by Magpie Tales to function as the creative spark for all who will take up her challenge. Here is my offering, with a slightly modified image (with apologies to Monsieur Degas!).
 
To Dance
 
To dance, her limber body
And her supple limbs, prepare;
The rhythm now part of her,
The melody like blood running in her veins.
 
Her feet, accustomed as they are
To practiced movement,
Step through their paces
With the ease familiarity brings.
 
And as the final preparation
Before the closed curtain is made,
Adrenalin rushes forth,
Like a fountain, firing up her every cell.
 
The music starts, the curtain parts,
And her body begins its own song:
A counterpoint of motion, adding
A new line of melody to the orchestral strains.
 
Each fibre, finely tuned, each muscle taut,
Each sinew stretching tight;
Herculean efforts made to seem effortless
As she pirouettes, and jumps, and nimbly dances.
 
The dancer manufactures her new world,
Her body a magic wand transforming sound
Into movement, and music into graceful gesture;
To dance, and make of flesh and bone, gossamer.

MOVIE MONDAY - DEDEMIN INSANLARI

“You know, those of us who leave our homes in the morning and expect to find them there when we go back – it’s hard for us to understand what the experience of a refugee might be like.” - Naomi Shihab Nye
 
We watched an excellent Turkish film at the weekend, a good production from the Ay Yapim company, which also produces many of the very good contemporary Turkish TV series. It was the 2011 Çagan Irmak film “Dedemin Insanlari”  (My Grandfather’s People), starring Çetin Tekindor, Yigit Özsener, Gökçe Bahadir, Sacide Tasaner, Hümeyra, Durukan Çelikkaya and Eirini Inglesi. The director also wrote the screenplay of this partly autobiographical film, which looks back at the history of his own family and the way they settled in Western Turkey after leaving Crete, Greece, in the 1920s.
 
A little bit of the historical context that is relevant to the movie will help the viewer, although it is not essential to be aware of it in order to appreciate the great story or the wonderful acting. After the first World War, Greece and Turkey were involved in a bitter conflict, which ended with the massacre of many people on both sides and decision to exchange populations. Greeks who had been living for generations on the Western coast of Turkey were sent to Greece and Turks living in Greece were sent to Turkey. Millions of people were involved and their stories are dramatic and tragic in many cases. The survivors who were forced to settle in new countries were seen as immigrants by the locals: The Turks who migrated to Turkey were always thought of as “Greeks”, and the Greeks who migrated to Greece were thought of as “Turks” – even though they immigrated into countries where the locals spoke the same language as them and had the same religion…
 
The plot of the movie is about a family whose grandfather came to the Western coast of Turkey from Crete. The family managed to settle in Turkey successfully and the majority of the film is set in the 1970s, where the grandfather is a shop owner, his son-in-law is assistant mayor and his young grandson is a cheeky, spoilt child who nevertheless does well at school.
 
The whole family has had to deal with prejudice from the locals who view them as interlopers and the young grandson is reacting violently in the same prejudiced way to a new wave of new immigrants into their neighbourhood, having become more local than the locals himself. The conflict that develops between grandfather and grandson, despite their great love for each other is explored beautifully by the movie. Ultimately, it is a coming of age movie where the grandson’s relationship with his grandfather forms the centrepiece of the movie, which nevertheless explores complex issues around the topics of nationality, ideology, the sense of belonging, community, prejudice, intolerance and the futility of war.
 
The acting is exemplary with amazing performances by all of the cast. Both Grandfater (Çetin Tekindor) and grandson (Durukan Çelikkaya) are outstanding and are the foundation of the film. Nevertheless they are supported admirably by every single other member of the cast. The director has done a marvellous job with both the sensitive screenplay and restrained direction, which highlights the plight of displaced people, but also acknowledges his own personal family history. The flash-backs and flash-forwards are done extremely well and with great effect, being central to the story.
 
There is a wonderful sense of humanity in this film. As a Greek myself, and as one whose father’s family was one of those that had to come to Greece from the Western coast of Turkey in the 1920s, this film touched a sensitive nerve with me. I saw this film with the same eyes that the Turks involved in the story did, but viewed from the “other side” of the Aegean Sea. The sea that separates and joins Greeks and Turks, the sea that serves as the means of division and union. The sea that carries a common history, a shared culture and dissolves in it the same dreams and aspirations.
 
We enjoyed very much this wonderful, touching and poignant film, which is sensitive to the point of view of both sides of Aegean Sea. Although it was a two-hour long movie, we lost track of the time and became thoroughly engaged in it. The film has a good dose of drama in it, but it is relieved by touches of humour. The dialogues are lively, the acting and direction is great, the music well chosen and apt. Great film, available on DVD, see it!

ART SUNDAY - HOGARTH

“Aim above morality. Be not simply good, be good for something.” - Henry David Thoreau
 
William Hogarth  (10 November 1697 – 26 October 1764) was an English painter, printmaker, pictorial satirist, social critic, and editorial cartoonist who has been credited with pioneering western sequential art. His work ranged from realistic portraiture to comic strip-like series of pictures called “modern moral subjects”. Knowledge of his work is so pervasive that satirical political illustrations in this style are often referred to as “Hogarthian”.
 
Hogarth was born in 1697 near the East End cattle market of Smithfield. His father, Richard Hogarth, made an unsuccessful attempt to open a Latin-speaking coffeehouse, which left the family bankrupt, Richard confined to Fleet Prison, and the young William fending for himself.
 
After apprenticing at a silver workshop, where he mastered the art of engraving, Hogarth opened his own print shop. The artist’s first widespread notice came with the publication of “The South Sea Scheme” (1721), ridiculing the greed and corruption of stock market speculators. “A Harlot’s Progress” (1732) brought Hogarth tremendous success and celebrity, leading to a second morality series, “A Rake’s Progress” (1734).
 
Throughout the 1730s and 1740s, the artist’s reputation grew and so did his interest in social and moral reform. Hogarth’s work took on a distinctly propagandist tone, directed at the urbanisation of London and the city’s problems with crime, prostitution, gambling, and alcoholism.
 
“Industry and Idleness” (1747) was designed to encourage young boys to develop a strong Protestant work ethic and thus achieve success. “Beer Street and Gin Lane” (1751), directed at the widespread sale and consumption of alcohol, were followed by “The Four Stages of Cruelty” (1751), which condemned rampant acts of cruelty to animals.
 
Hogarth died in 1764 in his home in Leicester Fields, leaving behind an extraordinary legacy. Working almost entirely outside the academic art establishment, he revolutionised the popular art market and the role of the artist. Hogarth strived to create works of great aesthetic beauty but also ones that would help to make London a better city for future generations.
 
The painting above is “The Lady’s Last Stake”, ca 1759, which may be a reference to Colley Cibber’s comedy “The Lady’s Last Stake” (1707). It is exhibited in the Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, NY, U.S.A. The success of this little picture, painted for Lord Charlemont, procured Hogarth a commission from Sir Richard Grosvenor to paint another picture “upon the same terms”. The painting has a theatrical treatment and commands admiration for its colour, drawing and expression.

MUSIC SATURDAY - PORPORA, ALTO GIOVE

“O’ What may man within him hide, though angel on the outward side!” - William Shakespeare
 
For Music Saturday, a beautiful aria performed by countertenor Philippe Jaroussky. It is “Alto Giove”, an aria for castrato male voice from  “Polifemo” (1735), an opera by the Neapolitan baroque composer Nicola Porpora (1686-1768).

The illustration is the 1733 painting, “Frederick, Prince of Wales, and his Sisters” by Philip Mercier (circa 1689-1760). In this portrait the 26-year-old Prince is shown playing the cello with three of his younger sisters; from left to right, Anne, Princess Royal (age 24) at the harpsichord, Princess Caroline (age 20) plucking a mandora (a form of lute) and Princess Amelia (age 22) reading from Milton. In the background is the Dutch House or Kew Palace at Kew where Anne lived before her marriage in 1734 to Prince William of Orange. The suggestion of harmony between the siblings belies the antipathy felt by his family for Frederick; it is said that he was hardly on speaking terms with Anne in the year that this portrait was painted.

FOOD FRIDAY - SPRING FRUIT SALAD

“Don’t drink at all, don’t smoke; you must exercise and eat vegetables and fruit.” - Robert Mugabe
 

We are experiencing strange weather these past couple of weeks. Rather wet, cool late Spring days mainly, punctuated by days of hot, fine, dry weather, interspersed amongst them. The garden is blooming, but roses are having a bit of a hard time, soaked one day, roasting the next. Similarly, the fruit available is not altogether the best, the weather playing havoc with their natural ripening.
 

Nevertheless, as is our habit we do enjoy fruit salads with whatever is available and yesterday we had a delicious one made with new season strawberries, the last of the pears and oranges, honey Murcott mandarins and Kiwi fruit.
 

Spring Fruit Salad

Ingredients
 

1 punnet of ripe strawberries
1 orange
1 honey Murcott mandarin
2 kiwi fruit
1 large, ripe pear
Juice of an orange
Juice of a lemon

2 tbsp raw sugar (or honey) – optional, but advisable as the fruit can be quite sour
1 tbsp of orange liqueur (Cointreau, Grand Marnier, Curaçao or Triple Sec)
 

Method
Hull the strawberries and cut them in quarters. Peel the orange, removing the rind and pith, leaving the exposed flesh. Cut into small pieces removing the core and seeds in the process. Do likewise for the mandarin.
Peel the kiwi fruit and cut into slices and then quarter them. Peel the pear and cut into small pieces. Mix all fruit together in the bowl.
Dissolve the sugar (or honey) in the mixed citrus juices and add the liqueur. Pour over the fruit in the bowl and chill the fruit salad.
 

This post is part of the Food Friday meme,

and also part of the Food Trip Friday meme.

POETRY JAM - BALLAD

“The only true wisdom is in knowing you know nothing.” – Socrates
 

Poetry Jam is a meme that relates to a creative challenge issued by Mary on her blog of the same name. This week the challenge is:

•    To think of what you KNOW for sure and write about it

•    To think of what you DON’T know for sure and write about it

•    To think about what you WISH you knew for sure and write about it

•    To use one of the above quotes as inspiration for your poem

Here is my offering:

The quote by Socrates that begins this entry today made me ponder somewhat about the things that I know for sure. “Know” is a tricky word because many of us use it in ways that are not altogether the way that the meaning of the word is given by the dictionary. Which immediately made me look it up, and herewith the three main meanings of the word!

know |nəʊ|: verb ( past knew |njuː|; past participle known |nəʊn| )

1 [with clause] be aware of through observation, inquiry, or information: Most people know that CFCs can damage the ozone layer | I know what I’m doing.

• [with obj.] have knowledge or information concerning: I would write to him if I knew his address | [no obj.]: I know of one local who shot himself.

• be absolutely certain or sure about something: I just knew it was something I wanted to do | [with obj.] : I knew it!

2 [with obj.] have developed a relationship with (someone) through meeting and spending time with them; be familiar or friendly with: He knew and respected Laura.

• have a good command of (a subject or language).

• recognise (someone or something): Isabel couldn’t hear the words clearly but she knew the voice.

• be familiar or acquainted with (something): A little restaurant she knew near Leicester Square.

• have personal experience of (an emotion or situation): A man who had known better times.

• (usu. be known as) regard or perceive as having a specified characteristic: The loch is known as a dangerous area for swimming.

• (usu. be known as) give (someone or something) a particular name or title: The doctor was universally known as ‘Hubert’.

• (know someone/thing from) be able to distinguish one person or thing from (another): You are convinced you know your own baby from any other in the world.

3 [with obj.] archaic have sexual intercourse with (someone). [a Hebraism which has passed into modern languages; compare with German erkennen, French connaître.]

And hence to the challenge: I know that I love my sweetheart. Does my sweetheart love me? I wish I knew for sure if my sweetheart loved me!

Ballad

My love loves so true

All the green leaves in Springtime;

My love loves the blooms and the breeze.

The doves on the wing

The splash of the fountain,

The laugh of a child.

My love loves so well

The gold dancing wheat fields,

The poppies, the song of the lark.

A cool murmuring brooklet

In the deep shady forest

Away from the midsummer’s heat.

My love loves so much

All the bright hues of autumn

The big cool drops of rain.

The scent of wet earth,

The ripe berries

The taste of sweet young wine.

My love loves so true

Each winter snowflake,

My love loves the sighs of the wind.

The crackle of fire blazing,

The mirror of lake frozen, wan.

My love loves all of these,

But my love loves me not,

My love loves me not.

GUY FAWKES DAY

“Society exists for the benefit of its members, not the members for the benefit of society.” - Herbert Spencer
 
Today is the Cry of Independence Day in El Salvador; Liberty Day in the US Virgin Islands; Guy Fawkes’ Day in England; and is also a Dismal Day.
 
It is the anniversary of the birthday of:
Ida Tarbell, writer (1857);
Raymond Duchamp-Villon, artist (1876);
Will Durant, writer (1885);
Joel McCrea, actor (1905);
Roy Rogers, actor (1912);
Vivien Leigh (Vivian Mary Hartley), actress (1913);
Art Garfunkel, singer (1942);
Elke Sommer, actress (1942);
Sam Shepard, playwright (1943);
Andrea McArdle, actress (1963);
Tatum O’ Neal, US actress (1963).
 
The silver wattle (mimosa), Acacia decurrens dealbata, is the flower for today’s birthdays.  It symbolises sensitivity, exquisiteness and fastidiousness. Some people consider it unlucky to bring this fragrant flower into the house.
 
Please to remember
The Fifth of November,
Gunpowder treason and plot;
I see no reason
Why gunpowder treason
Should ever be forgot.
 
‘Twas God’s mercy to be sent
To save our King and Parliament
Three score barrels laid below,
For old England’s overthrow
With a lighted candle, with a lighted match
Boom, boom to let him in.
              Anonymous Hertfordshire Rhyme
 
In England, Guy Fawkes Night (also called Bonfire Night and Firework Night) is an annual celebration observed on November 5 for more than 400 years following the Gunpowder Plot of 1605 when 13 conspirators planned to blow up Parliament and kill King James I.
 
Guy Fawkes was arrested while guarding explosives the plotters had placed beneath the House of Lords. People in London lit bonfires to celebrate the failure of the plot, and an act of Parliament was passed to appoint the date as a day of thanksgiving for the “joyful deliverance of James I”. This act remained in force for 254 years, until 1859.

MOVIE MONDAY - YOUR SISTER'S SISTER

“People talk about mumblecore but I prefer bumblecore, hyper-realistic bee movies about how bees really are.” - Mindy Kaling
 
Last weekend we watched a very disappointing film that convinced me once again that I am definitely getting older and that I have crossed the generation gap (possibly two generation gaps…). I am now a middle aged man heading towards the conservatism of old age, and have begun to view many of the new generation’s “culture” with incomprehension and therefore a fair degree of disdain. There! Having confessed my prejudice, you can now take my review of the film with as much salt as you care to sprinkle on it.
 
The film is Lynn Shelton’s 2011 “Your Sister’s Sister” starring Mark Duplass, Emily Blunt and Rosemarie DeWitt. This is ostensibly classified as a comedy, but “romantic” it definitely isn’t. It concerns a triangle of two half-sisters and their man friend. One of the sisters is lesbian, the other is straight and the man is the most infuriating, lily-livered, sleazy nong I have seen in recent times in films. The sisters vie for his attentions and there is a lot of talking, swearing, sleeping with each other and generally a lot of airing of “contemporary” issues – sex, lesbianism, relationships, marriage, sex, friendship, family, sex, veganism, death, sex, lies, pretensions, dirty talk, hypocrisy…
 
Now, don’t get me wrong, I am a very tolerant person and quite accepting of people’s lifestyles and sexual orientations. What I won’t tolerate is twaddle masquerading as wit, swearing masquerading as candour, and lack of a story masquerading as realism. The film was largely improvised by the three lead actors and it shows. Movies have a written script because it really does show when there is no script, as in this movie.  And actors who pretend to be real but turn out phony. The film was dull, predictable and completely lacking any charm.
 
Mark Duplass exemplified the bathos of acting in this movie, in which he was a co-producer, along with several others and Lynn Shelton the director who also ‘wrote” it. He is completely unlikeable and has no redeeming features whatsoever, I’m afraid. Emily Blunt I have watched before and she acted well, but in this film she cannot do anything with the drivel of first world problems she was subjected to act in. Rosemarie de Witt tries the hardest to make something of her cardboard cutout role as the lesbian sister, however, once again the material she has to work with betrays her efforts.
 
I watched very patiently through the first half-hour of the movie, trying to swallow the bilge, hoping it would start getting interesting… But no, it just went on and on without anybody saying or doing anything that made me think. The ending was the worst. Smug, gratuitous, predictable, self-indulgent and “mumblecore” to its core… In case you don't know what this is:

Mumblecore is a subgenre of American independent film characterised by low budget production values and amateur actors, heavily focussed on naturalistic dialogue, which began in 2002 and unfortunately continues to be made to the present. The first mumblecore movie is considered to be Andrew Bujalski’s 2002 movie “Funny Ha Ha” - another irritating movie without a plot, with people who are uninteresting, boring, whiny and aimless.
 
Watch “Your Sister’s Sister” at your risk – we felt we wasted 90 minutes of our life at the end of it. Reading some of the hype, including the critics’ quotes on the promo poster above makes me roll my eyes. What are these people thinking? Please, get a life!

ART SUNDAY - CHARDIN

“Every artist undresses his subject, whether human or still life. It is his business to find essences in surfaces, and what more attractive and challenging surface than the skin around a soul?” - Richard Corliss
 
Jean-Baptiste-Siméon Chardin (b. 1699, Paris, d. 1779, Paris) was a French painter of still lifes and domestic scenes showing an intimate realism and a tranquil atmosphere. His paintings are infused with a luminous quality and show evidence of a masterly handling of the paint. For his still lifes he chose humble objects (“Le Buffet”, 1728), and for his genre paintings modest events (“Dame Cachetant une Lettre”, 1733 - Lady Sealing a Letter). He also executed some fine portraits, especially the pastels of his last years. He was nominated to the Royal Academy of Painting in 1728.
 
Born in Paris, Chardin never really left his native quarter of Saint-Germain-des-Prés. Little is known about his schooling and training, although he worked for a time with the artists Pierre-Jacques Cazes and Noël-Nicolas Coypel. In 1724 he was admitted to the Academy of Saint Luc. His true career, however, did not begin until 1728 when, thanks to the portrait painter Nicolas de Largillière (1656-1746), he became a member of the Royal Academy of Painting, to which he offered “La Raie” (The Skate) and “Le Buffet”, both now at the Louvre Museum.
 
Although not yet established, he was beginning to gain a reputation. In 1731 he married Marguerite Saintard, and two years later the first of his figure paintings appeared, “Dame Cachetant une Lettre”. From then on Chardin alternated between paintings of “la vie silencieuse” (the silent life) or scenes of family life such as “Le Bénédicité” (The Grace) and half-figure paintings of young men and women concentrating on their work or play, such as “Le Jeune Dessinateur” (Young Man Drawing) and “L’ Enfant au Toton” (Child with Top, Louvre). The artist repeated his subject matter, and there are often several original versions of the same composition.
 
Chardin's wife died in 1735, and the estate inventory drawn up after her death reveals a certain affluence, suggesting that by this time Chardin had become a successful painter. In 1740 he was presented to Louis XV, to whom he offered “La Mère Laborieuse” (Mother Working) and “Le Bénédicité”. Four years later, he married Marguerite Pouget, whom he was to immortalise in a pastel portrait. These were the years when Chardin was at the height of his fame. Louis XV, for example, paid 1,500 livres for “La Serinette” (The Bird-Organ).
 
Chardin continued to rise steadily on the rungs of the traditional academic career. His colleagues at the academy entrusted him, first unofficially (1755), then officially (1761), with the hanging of the paintings in the Salon (official exhibition of the academy), which had been held regularly every two years since 1737 and in which Chardin had participated faithfully. It was in the exercise of his official duties that he met the encyclopaedist and philosopher Denis Diderot, who would devote some of his finest pages of art criticism to Chardin, the “grand magician”  that he admired so much.
 
Chardin’s carefully constructed still-lifes do not bulge with appetising foods and superficial brilliance often seen in the works of his contemporaries, but are concerned with the objects themselves and with the treatment of light. In his genre scenes he does not seek his models among the peasantry as his predecessors did; he paints the petty bourgeoisie of Paris. But manners have been softened, and his models seem to be far removed from Le Nain’s austere peasants. The housewives of Chardin are simply but neatly dressed and the same cleanliness is visible in the houses where they live. Everywhere a sort of intimacy and good fellowship constitute the charm of these modestly scaled pictures of domestic life that are akin in feeling and format to the works of Jan Vermeer.
 
Despite the triumphs of his early and middle life, Chardin’s last years were clouded, both in his private life and in his career. His only son, Pierre-Jean, who had received the Grand Prix (prize to study art in Rome) of the academy in 1754, committed suicide in Venice in 1767. By that time, the public’s taste had also changed. The new director of the academy, the all-powerful Jean-Baptiste-Marie Pierre, in his desire to restore historical painting to the first rank, humiliated the old artist by reducing his pension and gradually divesting him of his duties at the academy. Furthermore, Chardin’s sight was failing. He tried his hand at drawing with pastels. It was a new medium for him and less taxing on his eyes. Those pastels, most of which are in the Louvre Museum, are highly thought of in the 20th century, but that was not the case in Chardin’s own time.
 
Chardin lived out the remainder of his life in almost total obscurity, his work meeting with indifference. It was not until the middle of the 19th century that he was rediscovered by a handful of French critics, including the brothers Edmond and Jules de Goncourt, and collectors (the Lavalard brothers, for example, who donated their collection of Chardins to the Museum of Picardy in Amiens). Especially noteworthy is the LaCaze Collection donated to the Louvre in 1869. Today Chardin is considered the greatest still-life painter of the 18th century, and his canvases are coveted by the world’s most distinguished museums and collections.
 
His “Still Life with Pipe and Jug” above, of 1737 in the Louvre, is characteristic of his still life painting.

MUSIC SATURDAY - MARCELLO

“Define a lady:  She who owns an oboe yet refuses to play it.” – Oboe Jokes
 
The illustration is Canaletto's "Arrival of the French Ambassador at the Doge's Palace".
 
For Music Saturday a delicious concerto from the pen of an Italian Baroque composer, Alessandro Marcello (1684-1750). It is his Concerto per Oboe, strings and basso continuo in D minor (SF 935 - Op.1; first published in 1717). It is in three movements: I. Andante e spiccato; II. Adagio; and III. Presto. Marcel Ponseele (Baroque Oboe) is accompanied by the Ensemble “Il Gardellino”.
 
A slightly older contemporary of Antonio Vivaldi, Alessandro Marcello held concerts at his hometown of Venice. He composed and published several sets of concertos, including six concertos under the title of ‘La Cetra’ (The Lyre), as well as cantatas, arias, canzonets, and violin sonatas. Marcello often composed under the pseudonym Eterio Stinfalico, his name as a member of the celebrated Arcadian Academy (Pontificia Accademia degli Arcadi). He died in Padua in 1747. Alessandro's brother was Benedetto Marcello (1686~1739), also a composer.
 
Although his works are infrequently performed today, Marcello is regarded as a very competent composer. His ‘La Cetra’ concertos according to Grove are “unusual for their wind solo parts, concision and use of counterpoint within a broadly Vivaldian style, placing them as a last outpost of the classic Venetian Baroque concerto”.
 
This concerto Marcello wrote in D minor for oboe, strings and basso continuo is perhaps his best-known work. The absolutely delightful middle movement is often played alone, but it wonderfully complemented by the two outer movements. Its worth was attested to by Johann Sebastian Bach who transcribed it for harpsichord (BWV 974).

FOOD FRIDAY - RAISIN BREAD

“Let there be work, bread, water and salt for all.” - Nelson Mandela
 

It’s All Saints Day today and to celebrate it we baked raisin bread. This is a relatively easy recipe that always turns out well. The secret is to let the dough rise sufficiently in order to have a soft bread.
 

RAISIN BREAD
 

Ingredients
Melted butter, for greasing and brushing
250g plain white flour
250g plain wholemeal flour
1 tsp ground cinnamon
¼ tsp ground cloves
¼ tsp ground allspice
2 tsp (7g/1 sachet) dried yeast
1 tsp sugar
1.5 tsp salt
175mL lukewarm water
100 mL lukewarm milk
1 cup sugar
1 cup sultanas/raisins
2/3 cup vegetable oil
Extra water, for brushing
 

Method

1. Brush a 10 x 20cm loaf pan with the melted butter to lightly grease. Measure all your ingredients.
2. Dissolve the yeast, sugar and a pinch of salt in the lukewarm water and stir to mix. Add a little flour to make a batter. Leave to rise.
3. Add the sugar to the lukewarm milk and dissolve to stir well. Mix with the risen batter.
4. Place the flour, salt and spices in a large bowl and mix well to combine. Add the sultanas/raisins.
5. Make a well in the centre and add the batter to the dry ingredients and mix well. Add more warm water to make a very soft dough.
6. Add the oil to the dough and knead to incorporate it, until smooth and elastic.
7. Shape the dough into a ball. Brush a large bowl with the melted butter to grease. Place the dough into the bowl and turn it over to lightly coat the dough surface with the butter.
8. Cover the bowl with a damp tea towel and then place it in a warm, draught-free place to allow the dough to rise.
9. Leave the dough to prove until it is double its size, between 45-75 minutes at 30˚C. When the dough is ready, it will retain a finger imprint when lightly pressed.
10. Once the dough has doubled in size, punch it down in the centre with your fist and knead on a lightly floured surface again for 2-3 minutes or until smooth and elastic and returned to its original size.
11. Preheat oven to 200°C.
12. Punch the dough down and shape into a loaf. Place the dough in the greased loaf pan. Brush lightly with the melted butter. Stand the pan in a warm, draught-free place, as before, for about 30 minutes or until the dough has risen about 1cm about the top of the pan.
13. Bake in preheated oven for 30 minutes or until golden and cooked through.
14. Turn the loaf immediately onto a wire rack and allow to cool.Once cool, store the loaf in a well-ventilated place at room temperature.

This post is part of the Food Friday meme,
and also part fo the Food Trip Friday meme.