“I think I’ve had some talent but it doesn’t go as far as being an artist, because if you think that Kurosawa was an artist and Bergman was an artist and Bunuel was an artist and [Federico] Fellini, then it’s clear as a bell that I’m not an artist.”
Category: people
A Century Of Yiddish Humor, All In One Woman
“At 100 years old, [Bel] Kaufman is still shpritzing jokes, Jewish and otherwise, which is in her genes. Her grandfather was the great Yiddish storyteller Sholem Aleichem,” who created the Tevye character now known from Fiddler on the Roof. This year she “became one of the few adjunct professors in her age cohort and taught a course on Jewish humor at Hunter College, her alma mater.”
Why Western Artists Aren’t Protesting Ai Weiwei’s Arrest?
“Young Western artists are producing works that amount to nothing more than footnotes in art history, and then this Chinese artist appears who takes a totally different approach and makes 98 percent of the art world look very, very old.”
Christopher Hitchens On Losing His Voice To Cancer
“To a great degree, in public and private, I ‘was’ my voice. All the rituals and etiquette of conversation, from clearing the throat in preparation for the telling of an extremely long and taxing joke to (in younger days) trying to make my proposals more persuasive as I sank the tone by a strategic octave of shame, were innate and essential to me.”
The Last Days Of Beryl Bainbridge (And Her Unfinished Novel)
For years she was obsessed with, but was unable to finish, writing The Girl in the Polka-Dot Dress. During her final illness, says friend Mervyn Bragg, she “was at the centre of tentacles of tubes. She was anguished, exasperated, but very coherent. She said she had it all worked out, and could I fix it that she get 30 days?”
Where Is Ai Weiwei?
The Chinese artist was “arrested by the Chinese police on 3 April in Beijing as he was about to board a scheduled flight for Hong Kong. He has not been seen or heard from since. There is no currently no news on Ai’s condition, only rumour, including an unconfirmed and appalling graphic report, by a disaffected Xinhua journalist writing under a pseudonym, that Ai has been tortured, and has begun to confess to his supposed crimes.”
Tim Minchin’s Empirical Comedy
“[In] one song, he contemplates the inconceivability of soulmates and sings to his wife, ‘But I’m just saying/ I don’t think you’re special/ I-I mean, I think you’re special. But you fall within a bell curve’.”
China Bars Writer From Traveling
“Chinese authorities have barred dissident writer Liao Yiwu from travelling to Australia for a Sydney festival for ‘security reasons’ and advised him against publishing his works abroad, event organisers said.”
Can Ai WeiWei’s Art Change China?
In more than 2,700 posts, Ai increasingly criticized the government, calling for freedom of speech and unfettered information. Hans Ulrich Obrist, curator at London’s Serpentine Gallery, calls the blog “one of the greatest social sculptures of our time.”
The Formidable Mr. Laurents
“Arthur Laurents, who died Thursday as an exceptionally young nonagenarian, was one musical theater writer who was impossible to overlook. Dismiss him — and how could you dismiss the man who wrote the books for “West Side Story” and “Gypsy”? — and you’d have your head handed to you, no matter if you were a lowly reviewer or a formidable diva.”