Last book bought

Maybe it is because I am fascinated by chins, but always thought Campbell should have done a brother movie with Joe Bob Briggs.

Then again, and still on the matter of chins, I still think Robert Vaughn is secretly Kyle Maclachlan's dad (or possibly mine ... my mother was a stewardess for Western Airlines a year or so prior to when I was born, and while she had lousy things to say about most celebs, she had nothing but raves for the ever-courteous Vaughn, who she pratfell into a couple times on a bumpy flight.)

*Googles Joe Bob* Ha yes, I see what you mean (and him being a horror/exploitation aficionado would surely seal the deal).

Hehehe, not hard to imagine Vaughn being charm personified.

Bought a couple of Jodorowsky books (THE SON OF BLACK THURSDAY and ALBINA AND THE DOG MEN), although I have only ever read his graphic novels before. The man is a genius so I doubt I will be disappointed.

THE SPIRIT ARCHIVES Vol. 6

I have no. 3 beforehand (1941 material) and aim to collect the whole series, maybe except the last one, which is post-Eisner.

This. Absolutely fascinating art history, if you like that sort of thing.

That looks interesting. I've only got the thick 10 lb sweeping survey style art history books like Gardner's and Jensen's.

Somerset wrote:

That looks interesting. I've only got the thick 10 lb sweeping survey style art history books like Gardner's and Jensen's.

It is. From the advent of American abstract expression in the 1940s, pretty much up to the present, art historians and avant-garde artists themselves have painted--so to speak--abstract art as a highly rationalistic and secular artform. This book makes absolutely clear that abstract art, in its inception and through its formative years, was imbued with deep metaphysical meaning. Indeed, it was this meaning that made abstract art art rather than mere decoration.

As I said I have only the broadstrokes, but I do recall that my opinion of abstract art couldn't have been lower before having done any reading on it - I came away thinking there was substantially more to it than the lay impression I'd inherited of it as basically a scam.

Somerset wrote:

As I said I have only the broadstrokes, but I do recall that my opinion of abstract art couldn't have been lower before having done any reading on it - I came away thinking there was substantially more to it than the lay impression I'd inherited of it as basically a scam.

Are you referring to the financial whitewashing scams over the years ? Or a suspision of pretentiousness?
Both have been known to exist, but there is a wide world of art out there.

Yes, a bit of both...just the notion that Pollock's paintings for example were random drippings without thought or craft that "anyone could do" and that whomever saw value in it, especially those paying sums for it, were being pretentious suckers.

I think that kind of skepticism is probably quite rampant. I know I had zero exposure to art history before I thought, "Hey that's a gap I'd better take a class." But even that didn't help because the class was like being strangled.

Those thick art history books I mentioned above are still quite intimidating and dry. But I also have a neat little book by Camille Paglia called Glittering Images which wanders through art history using a couple dozen exemplar pieces to talk about and offer appreciation. That book is really accessible and informative and changed my mind about some of the 20th century stuff.

Camille Paglia is worthy of much respect. She's a dam' good writer.

Agreed. She did a poetry book in the same vein called Break, Blow, Burn that was also excellent, and her book on Hitchcock's The Birds for the BFI is among the best film readings I've come across. I still dip in and out of Sexual Personae on occasion (it's a crazy book) but have yet to finish the entire thing.

Even though I have a lot of unread books lying in wait, I bought a couple of Carl Jung books and The Flowers of Evil by Charles Baudelaire. That one I read a long time ago, and thought it was excellent.

I slogged my way through most of Mysterium Conjunctionis. Didn't profit much by it, although I do find Jung interesting.

MICHEL STROGOFF (aka THE COURIER OF THE CZAR ) by Jules Verne.
Read this as a child and loved it. Curious to see how I enjoy it now.

I hear that book is a Strogoff genius...

(I'll see myself out...)

CJB wrote:

I hear that book is a Strogoff genius...

(I'll see myself out...)

Yeah, strog off!

MORPHIC RESONANCE- THE NATURE OF FORMATIVE CAUSATION by Rupert Sheldrake

JAMES BOND, THE SPY WHO LOVED ME+JAMES BOND AND MOONRAKER by Christopher Wood.
I read TSWLM before, must have been 30 years ago, and remember really enjoying that one-way more than any other non-Fleming Bond. MR will be a first read.

Phantom Commander wrote:

JAMES BOND, THE SPY WHO LOVED ME+JAMES BOND AND MOONRAKER by Christopher Wood.
I read TSWLM before, must have been 30 years ago, and remember really enjoying that one-way more than any other non-Fleming Bond. MR will be a first read.

You are going to find a wholly Fleming-worthy passage during a scene that was scripted but apparently not filmed (even though I've seen pictures of the actors on the very nice set), with Bond looking in at the zero-gee procreation center.

Wood utterly and completely nails it here with the dichotomy of Bond as a hard man and yet ... anyways, it is worth reading the whole thing to get to that one line, for me at least.

Just got hold of the rest of THE SPIRIT ARCHIVES from various US book stores, except for one issue, no.24:

And also no.27, which does not interest me, as it is the new adventures, post-Eisner era.

Douglas R. Hofstadter: I AM A STRANGE LOOP

Bought a whole bunch of books by Øvre Richter Frich.
One of my favourite writers, who has sadly been cancelled for some time now.

Phantom Commander wrote:

Bought a whole bunch of books by Øvre Richter Frich.
One of my favourite writers, who has sadly been cancelled for some time now.

Frich is part of a growing group of cultural luminaries on that score. Fleming will soon join Frich, and for very similar "transgressions."

GOETIA-THE LESSER KEY OF SOLOMON THE KING
also known as Lemegeton.A book about demons summary.