“On one side is Underbelly, the London events company which claims to have taken Edinburgh’s Hogmanay celebrations to another level. It is backed by a city council which has gleefully watched the numbers rise in those indexes that confer tourism superstardom: unique-users, profits and exposure. Facing them is a rebel alliance … [called] Citizen, launched last April to bring together local groups seeking to restore Edinburgh as ‘a place for people rather than profit’.” – The Observer (UK)
Author: Matthew Westphal
Hollywood Isn’t The Only Film Industry With Skin Color Issues: Bollywood Has A Brownface Problem
“The controversial practice of ‘brownface’ in Indian cinema, where actors with lighter skin wear brown makeup to play certain roles — often reinforcing negative stereotypes — has been attracting attention. [What’s more,] actors with lighter skin are frequently seen as more ‘sellable’ at the Indian box office and often receive higher profile parts.” (video) – BBC
JFK’s Cold War Cultural Dogma — and Where It Came From
During the cultural Cold War, President John F. Kennedy delivered eloquent speeches claiming that only “free societies” fostered great creative art. But no one scanning centuries of Western literature and music could possibly believe that. Where did this Cold War dogma come from? One Nicolas Nabokov. – Joseph Horowitz
No Picture This Time, at the New Year
No picture this time because food was so bad. The kitchen, which prepared the takeaway in front of me, tried hard and worked like crazy, getting it hot and out. – Jeff Weinstein
When A Pimp Stabbed Samuel Beckett Nearly To Death
It happened in the winter of 1938 in Paris, as he was walking home from a movie with friends: a pimp named Prudent (yes, really) badgered them for money. (Later, in court, Beckett asked his attacker why he did it, and Prudent replied, “I don’t know, sir. I’m sorry.”) – The Independent (UK)
Is Walt Whitman The Writer We’ll Need In 2020?
“Watch clips of fevered crowds, from today or the past, chanting against ‘enemies of the people’; they are malignant scenes, but ones that in no small part mimic religious revivals. … Human beings are meaning-making creatures. A politics that is unable to translate its positions into some sort of transcendent language, pointing to something greater than the individual, is a politics that will ultimately fail. Whitman understood this.” – The New York Times
T.S. Eliot’s Love Letters To A Woman Not His Wife Are Being Made Public — And He Left A Bitchy Note To Posterity To Go With Them
The poet fell in love with Emily Hale in 1912, while he was a graduate student at Harvard. She did not reciprocate at the time, though they corresponded until 1956, when she announced that she would be donating his letters to her to Princeton, to be opened 50 years after both were dead (i.e., Jan. 2, 2020). Eliot was more than a little irked at Hale’s decision (he had her letters to him destroyed), but, since he couldn’t stop her, he left a statement of his own that “is also revelatory in its own way.” – Slate
The 2010s In Black British Theatre
“The last 10 years have seen a boom for black British playwrights, actors, artistic directors and others in the industry. What has changed on and off stage – and what’s next?” Eight Black theatremakers offer their answers. – The Guardian
Following Sexual Harassment Suit, Co-Founder Of Minnesota Multicultural Dance Company Resigns
Uri Sands, who founded the St. Paul-based TU Dance in 2004 with his spouse, Toni Pierce-Sands (both are former Ailey dancers), after “a lawsuit was served on a member of the company’s board in October, alleging sexual misconduct by Sands involving a female employee between 2015 and 2017. The lawsuit also alleged negligent supervision of Sands by the company.” – The Star Tribune (Minneapolis)
Musicological Mythbuster Linda Shaver-Gleason: The Exit Interview
William Robin: “Linda tackled subjects from the purported ugliness of contemporary music to the contested idea of the ‘masterpiece’ to myths around Beethoven’s deafness to whether music is actually a universal language (spoiler alert: it’s not). … A little over two weeks ago, however, she posted a new entry: ‘I didn’t finish the book, and I’m not resuming the blog. Instead, I’m dying.’ … We spoke on the phone on Sunday. Here is an edited transcript of our conversation: an exit interview with one of my favorite public musicologists.” – National Sawdust Log