Hearing Voices ... Again
Posted by J. Mark Bertrand
on Thursday, November 13, 2008
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My Orr Street Studio reading from February has made the news -- or at least, a photo of it has. Vox Magazine did a profile on Orr Street's "Hearing Voices" reading series, which was started by my friend Anthony Connolly with another friend, Allison Smythe (both of them are quoted in the article). It's great to see our little group in Houston, now split by diaspora, having such a wonderful afterlife. If you're ever in Columbia, MO, Orr Street should be on your agenda. Here's the article:My wife was particularly charmed by the juxtaposition of the opening line -- "Drawings of muscular, nude figures ... " -- with my lamentably unmuscular and gratefully unnude photo.
Reviewing Bibles for Fun and ... well, Just Fun
Posted by J. Mark Bertrand
on Thursday, October 16, 2008
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BibleDesignBlog.com is a side project of mine that's taken on a life of its own. Traffic over there has shot through the roof recently, so I should probably be mentioning this site there instead of the other way around. The idea of the site is simple. As a former graphic designer obsessed with good typography and a Christian to boot, I've always been fascinated by the Bible as, among other things, a design problem. How do you arrange all that information to promote readability? And in an age of declining publishing standards, how do you manufacture a book meant to be read not once but for a lifetime?
"The physical form of the Good Book," in other words. Thanks to the forbearance of my wife and the kindness of a lot of people in the publishing industry, I've been able to write about the topic at length. Whether my efforts really contribute to any substantive improvements, I can't say, but it's a terribly fascinating way to spend one's time.
Today, for example, I posted a lengthy piece about a new edition from Cambridge University Press, the classic Pitt Minion featuring a relatively new translation called the English Standard Version. If you haven't clicked over and taken a look at the site before, this would be a good feature to see -- lots of photos, some of them even in focus!
New MacBooks: A Good Thing
Posted by J. Mark Bertrand
on Tuesday, October 14, 2008
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The new MacBooks have been unveiled, and I'm happy to see that the body is aluminum. My current white MacBook replaced a 12 inch Powerbook I loved in every way. The only reason I parted with it was the processor switch. Since Apple didn't make an Intel-based 12 inch, I had to go with the 13 inch MacBook, despite my misgivings about the plastic case. (I also had to settle for a reflective screen, something I was reluctant to do.) But at first, I was happy. Two things changed that: the plastic case started cracking along the inside edge -- a common problem, apparently -- and the sharp case edge around the keyboard made actually typing for any length of time uncomfortable.
The new MacBooks feature what Apple is calling "unibody" construction, which should solve the cracking issue. Unfortunately, based on what I see in the photos, the sharp edge seems to have been carried over. I hope this isn't really the case. Either way, I'll be happy to get back into an aluminum case, relegating the plastic laptop to some kind of homebound duty where ruggedness isn't a requirement.
What I was really hoping for, though, was a sub-13 inch notebook, something that would make a good travel companion to a regular desktop system. At just 4.5 pounds, though, perhaps this one will do the trick.
Halloween Netflix
Posted by J. Mark Bertrand
on Thursday, October 09, 2008
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When the weather changes and the leaves begin to fall in earnest, my thoughts turn naturally to . . . scary movies. Far be it from me to wax philosophical about the pleasure we take in frightening ourselves. Suffice it to say, we do. At this time of year, I start re-ordering my Netflix list, leap-frogging a bunch of low budget B-movies straight to the top. I can't rely on television to meet the demand -- unlike Christmas, which dominates programming at least a month and a half before it happens, Halloween doesn't merit much beyond a Charlie Brown special. Even IFC, which at least makes an effort, is just going to run things like Return of the Living Dead, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and, of course, the choice of literal-minded people everywhere, Halloween. Sure, Halloween is as commercialized as Christmas, but in more of a county carnival way. Zombie walks? Sure. Parades down main street? Not so much.What is a scare-seeker to do? Honestly, a lot of the classics -- especially the post-Friday the 13th slasher stuff -- don't appeal to me much. So my strategy these days is to hunt for foreign horror. Guillermo del Toro's Spanish-language films, for example -- The Devil's Backbone, The Orphanage -- and the occasional French entry, like They Came Back. I enjoyed Them enough to watch it again this Halloween -- though apparently not everyone liked it. Why foreign? I think the de-familiarization that comes with a story set in a different culture freshens up the genre.
Of course, the real challenge this year is going to be putting together a fresh Halloween playlist. It's going to be hard to beat the one from a couple of years ago, which headlined with "It's Halloween" by The Shaggs.
Recent Writing
Posted by J. Mark Bertrand
on Friday, October 03, 2008
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I had a horror film experience at a secluded gas station over the summer. Walking into the restroom, I found a body at the bottom of the tub. Like a good product of my culture, I snapped a phone picture, and then I wrote about it on my blog Write About Now. If you want to know more, here's the link: "There's A Story All Right."
Today at The Master's Artist, I was inspired by a boring movie and a letter Norman Mailer wrote to William F. Buckley, Jr. to think about the difference between a high concept story and a well-told one. Again, here's the link: "How You Write."
And at BibleDesignBlog.com this week, I've written about the color blue, about tan calfskin, a pocket psalter, a size comparison, and an exciting unboxing.
Sandbaggers Redux
Posted by J. Mark Bertrand
on Thursday, October 02, 2008
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Not that I missed the point of John Le Carre's "The Madness of Spies" in last week's New Yorker or anything. Not that I don't have a dog-eared copy of The Second Oldest Profession. But I confess I have a thing for the bureaucratic side of cloak-and-dagger for which there is no better fix than a dose of Neil Burnside. I plugged it last August, and I'll do it again -- my favorite spies, The Sandbaggers.
The only thing better than discovering an old series like this just waiting to be enjoyed is stumbling over an unfamiliar author with a long backlist. Unfortunately, I'll never be able to watch The Sandbaggers for the first time again, and everything I've hoped would give me the same thrill has failed. I had high hopes for The Sweeney, for example, especially given my appreciation for Life on Mars, but I just couldn't get into it in the same way. So the hunt continues. Are there any 'serious' 70s or 80s spy shows out there waiting to be discovered?
"Thick" Confessional Identities
Posted by J. Mark Bertrand
on Wednesday, October 01, 2008
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Reading James K. A. Smith, I find myself nodding in agreement more often than not, and here he manages to say in a few words what I've stumbled over many times."A more persistent postmodernism -- one that really follows through on the implications of claims made by Derrida, Lyotard, and Foucault (or better, the meshing of their central claims with insights from the Christian theological tradition) -- will issue not in a thinned-out, sanctified version of religious skepticism (a "religion without religion") offered in the name of humility and compassion but rather should be the ground for the proclamation and adoption of "thick" confessional identities. . . . In this respect much of the dominant discussion in postmodern theology or philosophy of religion actually shrinks back from the more radical implications of the postmodern critique."It's always seemed to me that, as a reaction to the twentieth century's hollowed out evangelicalism, taking the process further -- getting thinner, in Smith's parlance -- doesn't have much going for it, whereas "'thick' confessional identities" have a lot to offer. Which might explain why, though I naturally privilege my own confessional identity, I feel an affinity for most anyone with a confession, even if it's traditionally at odds with my own.
JAMES K. A. SMITH
Who's Afraid of Postmodernism: Taking Derrida, Lyotard, and Foucault to Church, pp. 116-117
